Global Adventures on Less-Traveled Roads: A Foreign Service Memoir

This autobiographical memoir traces Foreign Service Officer Jim Bullington's journey along less-traveled roads from redneck roots to a career as a diplomat and U.S. Ambassador. His adventures include challenging segregation as a college newspaper editor in Alabama; three tours of duty as a "warrior diplomat" in Vietnam; service in exotic posts in Southeast Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa; a job as municipal Foreign Minister for the City of Dallas; six years as Peace Corps Director in Niger; and post-retirement recall to diplomatic duty in Senegal to help end a 30-year insurgency. The book recounts his personal as well as professional life, including his marriage to Tuy-Cam following their narrow escape from behind North Vietnamese lines during the 1968 Tet Offensive. It provides a behind-the-scenes look at the practice of American diplomacy, featuring struggles with Washington bureaucrats as well as hostile foreign leaders.