ADST-DACOR Diplomats and Diplomacy Book
THE COLONELS' COUP AND THE AMERICAN EMBASSY
A Diplomat's View of the Breakdown of Democracy in Cold War Greece
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by
ROBERT V. KEELEY
Prologue by
JOHN O. IATRIDES
Pennsylvania State University Press, January 2011
280 pp, appendices, and, index
Cloth $74.95 (members' price $43.00 - limited time only)
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JOHN O. IATRIDES:
"Keeley’s baptism in the ways of American diplomacy and Greek politics is recounted in this remarkably candid and historically valuable memoir. He takes the reader inside the embassy and paints a revealing picture of the complex, fractious, and often frustrating process through which the ambassador and his senior staff were involved in the formulation and execution of American policy during a particularly delicate period in U.S.-Greek relations, . . . [The book covers] the inner workings of the embassy, in which senior staff members are shown to be less than receptive to the differing views of their junior colleagues; the relationship between the embassy and the main protagonists of the Greek political crisis of 1965–66; and the exchanges between the embassy and the Department of State before and after the colonels’ coup of 21 April 1967." |
A major event in the history of the Cold War, the Colonels’ Coup of April 21, 1967, ushered in seven years of military rule in Greece, turning the Greek democracy into yet another country where fear of Communism led the United States into alliance with a repressive right-wing authoritarian regime. Coming as a surprise to the U.S. government (which was expecting a generals’ coup instead), the Colonels’ Coup was accepted by Washington after the fact, despite internal disputes within policymaking circles about the wisdom of accommodating the upstart Papadopoulos regime. Among the dissenters was Bob Keeley, then serving as a political officer in the U.S. embassy in Athens (returning in 1985–89 as ambassador). This book, the 43rd volume in the ADST-DACOR Diplomats and Diplomacy Series, is his contemporary insider’s account of how U.S. policy was formulated, debated, and implemented during the critical years 1966 to 1969 in Greek-U.S. relations. Published by the Penn State University Press, the book is also available in a Greek-language edition from Patakis, an Athens publisher.
ROBERT V. KEELEY was a U.S. Foreign Service officer from 1956 to 1989. He retired with the rank of Career Minister, having served as ambassador to Mauritius, Zimbabwe, and Greece; as deputy chief of mission in Uganda and Cambodia; and as deputy assistant secretary of state for African affairs. From 1990 to 1995, he was president of the Middle East Institute in Washington. Since 2005 he has chaired the Council for the National Interest Foundation, working for peace in the Middle East.
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