{"product_id":"2940012671028","title":"Dramatic Moments in American Diplomacy","description":"Scanned, proofed and corrected from the original edition for your reading pleasure. (Worth every penny!)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e***\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFOREWORD\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe public apathy in regard to our foreign policy and the cheerful indifference shown by the majority of our people towards the Diplomatic Service has had a baleful influence upon our country. Even since the disclosures of Germany's designs in the world war have turned attention violently towards the realm of world politics, and thrust the slumbering questions of our international rights and duties into the glare of newspaper headlines, the discussion thus aroused in our press and in our legislatures has revealed a comprehensive ignorance of the first principles of our foreign relations. It displays a total disregard for more than a century of painstaking upbuilding by that successful and farseeing body—the American Diplomatic Corps.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt is not and could not be the object of this volume to give a chronological history of the diplomatic achievements of the United States. My purpose is rather to present in simple form a few of the most striking incidents in the service—to picture the outstanding figures and big dramatic actions in our dealings overseas which should be common knowledge to all Americans, but is not.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI have no fear that the story will be old or stale. Part and parcel of our very life though they be, I venture that a large proportion of both the actions and the principles set forth will be not only new but amazing to most readers. Yet they are the A B C of American diplomatic history. I claim no historical erudition whatever. This book adds not a syllable to the literature of the subject, and it is not intended to.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt is hoped that perhaps a narrative, told rather in the language of the man on the street than in the dignified diction of the historian, and setting forth the adventurous and dramatic episodes in the lives of our envoys, the plots they have discovered, the Empires they have defied, the kingdoms they have acquired, may help to create some interest in this most vital matter. It is hoped that it may, for instance, bring some appreciation of the mutual interdependence between Great Britain and America. If the casual reader was aware that under the guiding hand of our Revolutionary heroes we had three times before joined forces with the Navy of Great Britain to face the predatory forces of despotism, and had been defended by that Navy from that day to this, he would be better prepared to debate \"the freedom of the seas.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhile this book does not pretend to give even a cursory review of American diplomacy, I hope that, having taken this much of a glimpse into our world situation as it has developed, the reader may acquire an appetite for the real facts in the case, for future reference at the primaries, and elsewhere.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e—R. W. P., Pinehurst, N. C. , Feb. 8, 1918.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e***\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAn excerpt from the beginning of:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCHAPTER I. - BENEVOLENT NEUTRALITY\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eKing Louis's Private Messenger Makes a Discovery in London—Beaumarchais, America's First Friend, Writes a Letter—A Secret Conference of State in Philadelphia—Timothy Jones, Alias Silas Deane, the First American Diplomat—The Continental Army Saved by \"Roderique Hortalez.\"—Some Revolutionary Correspondence Showing that All is Not Neutral that Protests. Clandestine Diplomacy.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSecret diplomacy is almost a lost art. The Hohenzollerns still affect a fondness for this most thrilling and romantic pastime. But the Hohenzollern ministers have not been able to achieve the dizzy heights of deception and the infinite finesse and delicate touch which were the characteristics of the fine game of intrigue and counter-plot as concocted in the mystic chambers of subtle cardinals and imaginative ministers of the Talleyrand period a hundred years ago. Then a government envoy had as many disguises as Stillman Hunt, the detective, and might be disclosed any time as his enemy's chief of staff, or his confidential secretary.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn 1775 a temporary peace prevailed in the world. The French Ambassador in London, entirely surrounded by spies, went his innocuous and pompous way. But meantime a singular individual was in London laying the train of the Bourbon revenge for the loss of Canada. In subtle and successful guise he was accomplishing precisely what the Prussian, Kühlmann, attempted in 1914. He spent his time singing duets with the Minister for Foreign Affairs and displaying an amazing talent in frivolity, in droll stories, in desperate and amusing nocturnal intrigues. He was a playwright of the first water by way of diversion; a plotter of inordinate devices and imagination, a master of dramatic language on all occasions, and absolutely without reputation....","brand":"OGB","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47078902300912,"sku":"2940012671028","price":1.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012671028_p0.jpg?v=1763571628","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012671028","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}