BOOK REVIEW: Terrorism, Betrayal & Resilience: My Story of the 1998 U.S. Embassy Bombings

Reviewed by James L. Bullock

It is an oft-told tale in Foreign Service circles that America’s diplomats, not its soldiers and sailors, are the nation’s first line of defense. Certainly more U.S. ambassadors than generals or admirals have been killed in the line of duty since World War II. That fact, however, does little to redress the enormous mismatch of bureaucratic and budgetary clout between our career diplomatic and development civilians, on the one hand, and their military counterparts, on the other.