Gilmore, Harry Joseph
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The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project AMBASSADOR HARRY JOSEPH GILMORE Interviewed by: Charles Stuart Kennedy Initial interview date: February 3, 2003 Copyright 2015 ADST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born and raised in Pennsylvania Carnegie Institute of Technology (Carnegie Mellon University) University of Pittsburgh Indiana University Marriage Entered the Foreign Service in 1962 A-100 Course Ankara, Turkey: Rotation Officer/Staff Aide 1963-1964 Jupiter missiles Ambassador Raymond Hare Ismet Inonu Joint US Military Mission for Aid to Turkey (JUSMAT) Turkish-US logistics Consul Elaine Smith Near East troubles Operations Cyprus US policy Embassy staff Consular issues Saudi visa laws Turkish-American Society Internal travel State Department: Foreign Service Institute (FSI); Hungarian 1964-1965 Language training Budapest, Hungary: Consular Officer 1965-1967 Cardinal Mindszenty Janos Kadar regime Soviet Union presence 1 Relations Ambassador Martin Hillenbrand Israel Economy Liberalization Arab-Israel 1967 War Anti-US demonstrations Government restrictions Surveillance and intimidation Environment Contacts with Hungarians Communism Visa cases (provocations) Social Security recipients Austria/Hungary relations Hungary relations with neighbors Religion Soviet Mindszenty concerns Dr. Ann Laskaris Elin O’Shaughnessy State Department: Soviet and Eastern Europe Exchange Staff 1967-1969 Hungarian and Czech accounts Operations Scientists and Scholars exchange programs Effects of Prague Spring Relations with local Embassies Director, Boris Klosson Moscow, Soviet Union: Assistant Cultural Officer 1969-1971 Detailed to USIA USIA Efficiency reports Operations Surveillance Relations with public Travel Scientific exchanges McKinney Russell US exchange groups Cultural nationalism Music Ambassador Jacob Beam Henry Kissinger United States Military Academy; Political Science Department 1971-1973 Education system 2 “Communism; Theory and Practice” Courses of study Student body Admiral William James Crowe Vietnam War Civil-Military relations in Soviet Union Army-Navy rivalry Student evaluation State Department: Yugoslav Desk Officer 1973-1975 US policy Non-Alignment USIA Centers Extremists Expatriate communities in US Croatian press distortions Congressional interest FBI Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations act (RICO) US/Yugoslav relations Artukovic case Trieste Ambassador Malcolm Toon Tito US/Yugoslav relations Yugoslav military Munich, Germany: Political (Internal) Reporting Officer/Liaison 1975-1978 To Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty (RFERL) Board of International Broadcasting “Neutron Bomb” German opposition Soviet Jewish emigration Operations Broadcasting guidelines Olympics Poland Pope John Paul II Eastern Europe Chancellor Helmut Schmidt US Policy Franz Joseph Strauss FO-104 Starfighter bribe issue Congressional interest Christian Social Union Forgery 3 Christian Social Union Christian Democratic Union Hermut Kohl German politics French US military State Department: Deputy Director, Office of Eastern European 1978-1981 And Yugoslav Affairs Country responsibilities US policy Economic reforms Personnel Polish independence Most Favored Nations treatment Restrictive emigration policies Bulgaria Family reunification Jaruzelski Soviets invade Afghanistan Tito death Yugoslavia relations Belgrade, Yugoslavia: Deputy Chief of Mission 1981-1985 Ambassador David Anderson Post-Tito leadership “Greater Serbia” Vice President George H.W. Bush visit KAL 007 shootdown Milovan Dilas Sarajevo Winter Olympics Financial difficulties Mika Planinc Ethnic divisions America Center Raymond Benson European role Serbs in Croatia Andrija Artukovic Leader contacts David Anderson Larry Eagleburger State Department; Director, Office of Central European Affairs 1985-1987 Countries Kurt Waldheim case 4 Ambassador Ronald Lauder Austrian Jewish property Adolph Hitler Austria’s “Free Ride” Czechoslovakia Vaclav Havel Career vs. Political Ambassadors Swiss Germany/Quadripartite meetings Star Wars contracts German economy La Belle disco bombing Rozanne Ridgway Jewish reparations Return of Jewish property German Democratic Republic Warsaw Pact economic potential Soviet military production East Berlin construction East Germany (GDR) armed forces GDR economy Family reunification Berlin status Hans Dietrich Genscher German exports European Community (EC) French-German relationship Aviation Berlin security Berlin airlift Soviet Berlin troops Helmut Kohl US Germany policy Kohl-Reagan relationship Berlin, Germany: US Minister and Deputy Commander of the 1987-1990 American Sector Operations Senat responsibilities and powers Embassy organization Police relationship Igor Machsimichev Person relations with Allies Monthly ministerial meetings Berlin status Berlin government 5 Allies Berlin responsibilities Relation with Allies Political parties Gorbachev influence Erich Honecker Quadripartite Agreement German unification Soviet air presence Berlin Air Safety Center Intelligence presence Relations with Embassy Bonn George Vest Public safety Terrorists US Libya bombing German regional travel Egon Krenz Leipzig demonstrations Movement for change Growing demonstrations West German police Soviet police Talk Team Opening of Berlin Wall Coping with GDR citizens Emotional drams German Freedom to travel GDR elections Social Democratic Party Unification Soviets call for Tripartite meeting Ambassador Walters Berlin, Germany: Principal Officer, US Embassy Office in Berlin 1990-1991 German states in district Consolidating East & West Berlin Missions Personnel changes Foreign Service nationals Reporting First Golf War protests Christa Wolf Women’s issues Lee Boem VIP visitors Difficulties of East/West amalgamation President George Bush 6 Restraints on optimism East German agriculture NATO membership Germany-Poland border Political Parties Nuclear weapons Chancellor Kohl Foreign Minister Gernscher Gorbachev NATO Defense guarantee Lander governments East German industry Stasi (Security) files Gauk Commission Unification euphoria Army War College: Deputy Commander for International Affairs 1991-1992 Student body International Fellows Program Operations Evaluation Hiatus in Senate Hearings due to change in Administration 1992-1993 Study of Armenian language Senator Sarbanes Hearings United States Ambassador to Armenia 1993-1995 Armenia’s emergency humanitarian needs Armenian history American Armenian community Azerbaijan dispute Nagorno-Karabakh conflict Closed borders Land-locked Armenia Security Shortages US humanitarian aid Winter Warmth program Educated populace President Levon Ter-Petrossian Foreign Service Nationals (FSNs) Medical problems USAID Embassy building Regional history 7 Turkey-Armenia relations Turkish-Armenian Reconciliation Commission Armenian Struggle for the Armed Liberation of Armenia (ASALA) Justice Commandos of the Armenian Genocide (ASALA) Armenia-Russia relations Minsk Group Cease-Fire (1994) Possibilities of conflict resolution Minsk Group, CSCE American envoys for dispute resolution Regional US ambassadors’ meetings Regional oil exploration Karabakh settlement issue Azerbaijanis Religion Chechens American-Armenian Political Organizations Armenian friends in US Congress American University of Armenia Armenian Diaspora Western noted Armenians State Department: Foreign Service Institute (FSI); Dean 1995-1997 of Area Studies/Dean of School of Professional and Area Studies (name change) Merger Senior Seminar Evaluation Retirement: 1997 State Department; Caucasus Area Studies Lecturing INTERVIEW Q: This is a Foreign Affairs Oral History Program interview with Harry J. Gilmore. This interview is being conducted under the auspices of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. I’m Stu Kennedy. Harry and I are old friends. Harry, let’s start at the beginning. When and where were you born? Can you tell me something about your family on both sides? GILMORE: Yes. I was born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania on November the 16th, 1937. McKeesport had the nearest hospital to my hometown, Clairton, the coking center for the U.S. Steel Co. It remains U.S. Steel’s coking center, by the way. Yes, coke, the byproduct of soft coal, which is used to smelt steel. 8 Q: Let’s start first on your father’s side. Where do the Gilmores come from? Tell me something about the Gilmore family and how they got to there, and your father. GILMORE: My father’s family was neatly split between English and Welsh ancestry on his father’s side and German ancestry on his mother’s side. In fact, his mother, Frances Marie Eisner, was the only member of her family – she was the youngest child – born in the United States. The others were born in or near Luxembourg. We’re not entirely sure because no one in the family kept records. My father’s father was a riverboat carpenter, and his relatives included riverboat captains and engineers. Pittsburgh, of course, is where the Monongahela and the Allegheny rivers join to form the Ohio, and barge and riverboat building were in the Gilmore family tradition on that side. On my mother’s side the men were coal miners and later mill workers. Q: What did your father do? Where did he go to school? GILMORE: My father was one of seven children. He lost his dad when he was nine years old. His mother was a practical nurse and midwife who was determined to keep her family together. My father delivered newspapers and worked after school from junior high on. He never got to go to college, although he was very well self-taught.