Southern Cold Warrior

Book excerpt: For a quarter of a century, South Carolinian James P. Richards was a skillful bi-partisan legislator, standing on the front lines with Presidents Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, and his congressional colleagues to shape American Foreign Policy in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East during the Cold War. In 1957, Richards served as Eisenhower’s ambassador to the strategic Middle East, travelling 30,000 miles and visiting fifteen nations explaining the evils of “international communism.” Richards’ bi-partisanship and his experiences in the Middle East are of interest to America in the post-9/11 world.