X-Nico

7 unusual facts about Foreign Service


Clements Worldwide

Later it moved to serving those in the Foreign Service, and in the late 1970s began focusing on expatriate clients.

Foreign Service

Diplomatic service, the body of diplomats and foreign policy officers maintained by the government of a country

United States Foreign Service, the diplomatic service of the United States government

Her Majesty's Diplomatic Service, the diplomatic service of the United Kingdom, and specifically the organisation which ran the Foreign Office in London before amalgamation with the Diplomatic Service in 1918

Foreign Service Journal

It covers foreign affairs from the perspective of American Foreign Service personnel, members of Washington's foreign policy establishment, as well as features on living overseas as a foreign affairs professional.

Gharanai Khwakhuzhi

Having inherited political awareness from his predecessors, and a keen believe in "do something rather than talk" for his country; he started his service for the Government of Afghanistan in October 2011 serving as a Foreign Service Officer in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, soon he was promoted as the Deputy Director of Foreign Communications at the Directorate General of Communications and Archive.

Syed Murad Ahmed Khairi

He completed his B.A. (honors) in Economics and M.A. from Dacca University in 1954 and was selected to join the Foreign Service after competitive examinations in 1954.


Brice W. Goldsborough

Brice W. Goldsborough II (1902–1971) was a Foreign Service officer and a son of a Governor of Maryland, Phillips Lee Goldsborough; and Mary Ellen Showell (?-1930).

Concerned Foreign Service Officers

Concerned Foreign Service Officers (CFSO) is a group of current and former Foreign Service and Civil Service employees of the U.S. Department of State, cofounded by William Savich and Daniel M. Hirsch, created to investigate, document and expose alleged misuse of the security clearance process by the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service (DSS).

Deryck Murray

Murray served as a diplomat in the Foreign Service of Trinidad and Tobago 1978–1989, becoming a representative to the United Nations in New York, where he served as Vice-Chairman of the Fifth Committee and Chairman of the Committee for Programme & Coordination.

Gordon Tullock

Following a brief period in private practice, he joined the Foreign Service that fall.

Herbert S. Okun

After retiring from the foreign service, he served as chief aide to former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and former British Foreign Secretary Lord David Owen in the talks to end the slaughter resulting from the break-up of Yugoslavia.

Laurence O'Keeffe

He joined the Civil Service in 1953, initially in HM Customs and Excise, but transferred to the Foreign Service in 1962 and was posted to Bangkok 1962–65; the South East Asia desk at the Foreign Office 1965–68; Head of Chancery at Athens 1968–72; Commercial Counsellor at Jakarta 1972–75; and head of the Hong Kong and Indian Ocean Department, FCO, 1975–76.


see also

Alejandro Estivill

After his entrance into the Foreign Service in 1993, he has served as special advisor to the Secretary of Foreign Relations, Political Affairs Attaché for the Mexican Embassy in Costa Rica, Chief of Staff for the Undersecretary of Foreign Relations Enrique Berruga, Director General for Cultural Affairs and Director General for North American Affairs.

Alexandra Uteev Johnson

As a Foreign Service Officer she worked as an analyst in the Department of State's Bureau of Intelligence and Research specializing in Soviet relations with Arab countries.

Andrey Lukanov

During his time in the foreign service, Lukanov had gained connections with western businessmen such as Robert Maxwell and engaged in controversial business dealings.

Avner Less

From 1954 to 1968, he served in the Israeli foreign service as an attaché in New York City and Paris, as permanent representative of Israel to the annual conference of the UN Drug Commission in Geneva, and as a representative of Israel at Interpol.

Christian Pauls

Pauls joined the Foreign Service in 1975 and then served at the German Foreign Office in Bonn and at the embassies of the Federal Republic of Germany in Greece, India, Italy and the USA, where he coincidentally had gone to middle school (Hardy Middle School, Georgetown, Washington DC) when his father, Rolf Friedemann Pauls, was the Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United States.

Claude A. Buss

After continuing his studies at the Paris Institute of Political Studies, he became a U.S. Foreign Service officer, serving in the U.S. legation in Beijing from 1927 to 1928 and as vice-consul in Nanjing from 1931 to 1934.

Datu Yusoph Boyog Mama

In 1977, Datu Yusoph Mama started his professional career in the Foreign Service when he became a Foreign Trade Analyst in the Bureau of Foreign Trade in Makati, Metro Manila.

Di Morrissey

In her later years, Di went on to become a journalist on London's Fleet Street, and worked for CBS in Honolulu, where she lived with her husband who was in the foreign service, and even had a small role in the series Hawaii Five-O, a guest role in season three, episode seven, 1970 starring as 'Alicia Anderson'.

Edward T. Hall

During the 1950s he worked for the United States State Department, at the Foreign Service Institute (FSI), teaching inter-cultural communications skills to foreign service personnel, developed the concept of "High context culture" and "low context culture", and wrote several popular practical books on dealing with cross-cultural issues.

Foreign Service Institute

The orders were ultimately issued and, on March 13, 1947, Secretary of State George Marshall announced the establishment of the Foreign Service Institute.

Gays and Lesbians in Foreign Affairs Agencies

The second publicly gay U.S. ambassador, and the first publicly gay Foreign Service officer to be appointed as ambassador, was U.S. Ambassador to Romania Michael Guest, who was appointed by President George W. Bush and in 2001 sworn in by Secretary of State Colin Powell.

H. Allen Holmes

Holmes began his diplomatic career by joining the Foreign Service in 1959; his first posting was as a consular and political officer in Yaoundé, Cameroon.

Harry Powlett, 4th Duke of Cleveland

Vane entered the foreign service and held posts in Paris and Stockholm before entering the House of Commons in 1841 as a member for South Durham.

Heather M. Hodges

Hodges joined the Foreign Service in 1980 and was assigned to Caracas, Venezuela.

Howard Kent Walker

Howard Kent Walker (born December 3, 1935) is a US diplomat, Foreign Service officer, former United States Ambassador to Togo, Madagascar, and Comoros.

J. Anthony Holmes

Holmes has spent many of his thirty-year Foreign Service career on issues affecting Africa, including service as the economic-commercial section chief in Harare and in the economic section in Nairobi.

Jackson McDonald

He began his career in the U.S. Foreign Service in 1980 as Third Secretary and Vice Consul at the American Embassy in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

James Moriarty

James F. Moriarty, United States diplomat and career foreign service officer

Jean Désy

Désy was recruited by Oscar D. Skelton, Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, in 1925 to fill the position of Counsellor in Canada's new foreign service.

Jean-Pierre Lehmann

In 1966 he obtained his bachelor degree from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and subsequently he did his doctorate at Oxford University (St Antony’s College), where he was from 1967 to 1970.

John R. Dinger

John Dinger and his brother Larry Miles Dinger were the first brothers to rise through the career ranks of the U.S. Foreign Service to serve as ambassadors.

Joseph E. Persico

In 1960 Persico joined the United States Information Agency working in Argentina, Brazil, and Washington as a Foreign Service Officer.

Joseph Palmer

Joseph Palmer II (1914–1994), American foreign service officer and ambassador

Leticia Ramos-Shahani

After passing the Philippine Foreign Service Officer (FSO) Examination, she held various high positions such as: she was appointed Ambassador to Australia from 1981 to 1986; Secretary-General of the World Conference on the UN Decade of Women in Nairobi, Kenya in 1985.

Lucius D. Battle

In 1968, Battle resigned from the Foreign Service to work as Vice President of Communications Satellite Corporation (Comsat).

Malcolm Templeton

Malcolm Templeton (born 1924) is a former New Zealand Foreign Service officer, who held a number of senior positions, including that of permanent representative to the United Nations, and Deputy Secretary of Foreign Affairs under Secretary Merwyn Norrish.

Marie Melchior Joseph Théodore de Lagrené

Lagrené remained in office after the establishment of the July Monarchy in 1830 and held a number of prominent position in the French foreign service.

Marius Grinius

After having been stationed in the Canadian Forces Base in Lahr, Germany from 1971 to 1979, Mr. Grinius joined the Canadian foreign service in 1979.

Maura Connelly

Ambassador Connelly received a B.S. in Foreign Service from Georgetown University and a Masters in National Security Studies from the U.S. Naval War College.

Myles Ponsonby

In 1951, he entered the British government's Foreign Service, later transferring to the Diplomatic Service, and held posts in Egypt (1951), Cyprus (1952–53), Beirut (1953–56), Djakarta (1958–61), and Nairobi (1963–64).

Patricia McMahon Hawkins

During a three year hiatus from the Foreign Service, Pat served as the Executive Assistant to the President and CEO of Otis Elevator Company, in Farmington, Connecticut.

Peter Tarnoff

During his career as a Foreign Service Officer, Tarnoff served as Executive Secretary of the Department of State and Special Assistant to Secretaries of State Edmund Muskie and Cyrus Vance (1977–1981); Director, Office of Research and Analysis for Western Europe (1975–76); Special Assistant to Ambassador-at-Large Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. (1967); and Nigerian Analyst in the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (1966–67).

Regional Security Officer

Under the RSO's direct supervision are the following groups: U.S. Marine Security Guards, Assistant RSOs, local guards, foreign service national (FSN) investigators, an office management specialist and other secretarial and staff assistants, a Surveillance Detection Unit (with a mission of detecting hostile surveillance), security engineering officers, security technical specialists, as well as Navy Seabees assigned to post.

Robert Litwak

Robert Litwak is vice president for programs and director of International Security Studies at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington D.C. He is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and a consultant to the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Robert O. Blake

During his 30-year career in United States Foreign service, Blake served as ambassador to Mali from December 10, 1970 until May 20, 1973 as a member of the Nixon administration, serving under U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

Roderick Alleyn

Like his younger brother, Sir George entered the Foreign Service: Death in a White Tie implies that Sir George is the Governor of Fiji in the late 1930s, as he writes to Alleyn from Government House in Suva.

Rodney Dennys

Dennys joined the Foreign Service in 1937, serving in various intelligence posts, including Cairo and Paris.

State Magazine

The Foreign Service News Letter was dated March 20, 1947, and was published monthly by the office of the Director General of the United States Foreign Service to "acquaint members of the Foreign Service with plans and developments of interest to or which may affect operations or personnel in the field."

Susan S. Jacobs

Her Foreign Service career has also included tours in Caracas, Tel Aviv, New Delhi, Bucharest, and San Salvador.

Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Fellowship

Thomas R. Pickering, a graduate of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, held the rank of Career Ambassador, the highest rank in the U.S. Foreign Service.

Tracey Ann Jacobson

Jacobson, a career member of the Foreign Service, has served overseas in Seoul, South Korea, Nassau, Bahamas, and Moscow, Russia.

Vogelgesang

Sandra Louise Vogelgesang (b. 1942), a United States Foreign Service officer and U.S. State Department official

Walter Short

Major General Short´s decorations include: Army Distinguished Service Medal, Legion of Merit, Mexican Border Service Medal, World War I Victory Medal, American Defense Service Medal with Foreign Service Clasp, Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal with One Battle Star (Pearl Harbor), American Campaign Medal, World War II Victory Medal, and Officer of the Legion of Honour.

Wanda Nesbitt

A career Foreign Service officer, she was appointed United States Ambassador to Namibia on September 24, 2010.

William Bishop

Bradford Bishop (William Bradford Bishop; born 1936), United States Foreign Service officer and fugitive from justice