The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project AMBASSADOR JAMES C. CASON Interviewed by: Charles Stuart Kennedy Initial interview date: November 13, 2009 Copyright 2012 ADST TABLE OF CONTENTS Background Born in New Jersey into a US Navy family and raised in a number of US Naval stations in the United States and abroad. Dartmouth College Johns Hopkins School of International Studies (SAIS) Senior year in Salamanca, Spain Fulbright scholarship, Montevideo, Uruguay Communists and Tupamaros Entered the Foreign Service in 1970 San Salvador, El Salvador: Consular Officer 1970-1972 Ambassador Henry Catto, Jr. Sol Meza kidnapping National Guard Military dispute\ Visa load Visa fraud Environment Clandestine guerilla movement Economy Government Soccer Wars Relations with Honduras Marriage Ethnic population State Department: Special Assistant to Assistant Secretary 1972-1973 For Latin American Affairs Charlie Meyers Cuban subversion The Twenty Committee Soviets Operations 1 Allende Chile El Salvador guerilla movement Kidnappings US policies Jamaica/Cuba relations State Department of State; Foreign Service Institute (FSI): Portuguese 1973 Language training Lisbon, Portugal: Political Officer 1973-1975 Ambassador Stuart Scott Ambassador Frank Carlucci Dictator Marcello Caetano Operations Military Revolution Portuguese colonies Internal and external reforms General Antonio de Spinola Otelo Numuo Saraiva de Carvalho Mario Soares Operations Political Parties Predicting election outcome Security Portuguese military Kissinger Economy Alvaro Cunhal Spain US policy Social life Elections Maracaibo, Venezuela: Principal Officer 1975-1977 Economy Oil compnies US ownership percentage American natonals Visas Citizenship cases Relations with US embassy US citizens acquiring Venezuela nationality Consulate building Environment Contacts 2 Reporting Ambassador Miles Frechette US/Venezuela relations Illegal aliens State Department: FSI Advanced Economic Training 1977-1978 Hospitalization Course instruction State Department: FSI: Italian language training 1978 Milan, Italy: International Marketing Center 1978-1981 Jim Goodsill; Head of Trade Center US exports promotion Facility Commerce Department Recruitment of exhibitors Operations Participants Red Brigades Closed for security reasons Montevideo, Uruguay: Political Counselor 1981-1982 Economy Tupamaro guerilla movement Environment Communist Party Relations “Cronogrrama” Military Falkland War British Uruguay support for Argentina Kissinger prisoner exchange proposal PNGed Meritorious Honor Award Panama City, Panama: Political Officer 1982-1984 General Manuel Noriega Colombian drug traffickers Armufo Arias National Guard General Torrijos Elections Who’s Who In Panama Relations 3 Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) Nikki Barletta Ambassador Ellis Briggs Cubans Mission to Grenada Phil Agee State Department: Guatemala/Belize Desk Officer 1984-1987 Elliot Abrams Guerilla Groups Violence trends Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) Political asylum cases Meritorious Honor Award La Paz, Bolivia: Political Counselor 1987-1990 Narcotics Political Parties Government US training programs Coca DEA Bolivia Data Base production Colombians President Evo Morales CIA National Human Intelligence prize Cocaine production Bolivia coca production law Ambassador Robert Gelbard Political Section Superior Honor Award Drug Cartel reporting Compadre Palenque Gathering and assembling intelligence President Jaime Paz Zamora Prosecuting drug traffickers The National War College 1990-1991 Assessing the Gulf War Course content Student body Tegucigalpa, Honduras: Deputy Chief of Mission 1991-1995 Ambassador Cris Arcos Ambassador William Pryce Contadora Process Drug trafficking 4 Corruption President Correjas Helms-Burton Law Visas as weapon US investments Industry Maquilas Norfolk, Virginia: Political Advisor to the Supreme Allied Commander 1995-1997 Atlantic SACLANT and NATO General Jack Sheehan Organization content and operations Scope of responsibilities Iceland defense Relations with Russians National contributions Bosnian Accords Guantanamo Cuban refugees Canadians NORAD defense issues Kosovo Environment Kingston, Jamaica: Deputy Chief of Mission 1997-2000 Security Environment Drug trafficking Relations Cubans Visa fraud Local employees Cost of living Peace Corps Joint marijuana eradication efforts Corruption Relations Racial society Dealing with government Tourism Economy Living conditions State Department: Director of Plans and Coordination (PPC), Western 2000-2002 Hemisphere Bureau Operations Canada issues 5 Cuba Helms-Burton legislation Drug Trafficking Chavez Bush policy 9/11 evacuation Havana, Cuba: Chief of Mission, US Interests Section (Swiss Embassy) 2002-2005 Relations Visa problem Cuban US residents Castro history Staff Privacy Restrictions Demonstrations Harassment Security Illegal immigration Marielle exodus Migration Accords Relations with Cuban Ministry Rafael Dausa Travel restrictions Contacts restrictions Ana Montes spy operation Washington restrictions on Cuban Embassy US support of dissidents Outreach programs Reaching the public Castro’s Operation Shield Ladies in White European Union/Cuba relations Black Spring of 2003 Chavez oil subsidies Human Rights Christmas in Havana European diplomats Cotonou Agreement “Corporal” Cason Plane hijackings Canadian policy American celebrity visitors Europe policies Brazil/Cuba relations Radio Marti 6 Cuba’s Washington Interest Section Local staff Cuban medical Guarani language study State Department: FSI; Guarani language study 2005 The United States Ambassador to Paraguay 2005-2008 Gurani language study Musical performance Mercusur Rutherford B. Hayes USAID programs Medical Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) Human Rights Elections Colorado Party Bolivia Brazil President Fernando Lugo Venezuela Chaco War (War of the Triple Alliance) Languages Chaco region Oil Universities Religion US interests Uruguay Rivers Military Public diplomacy Retirement 2008 President, Center for Free Cuba Director, Quincy Oil and Gas, Paraguay Cabo Cason Consulting Senior Inspector, State Department Mayor of Coral Gables, Florida (April 12, 2011) INTERVIEW 7 Q: Today is the 12th of November, 2009-- CASON: Friday the 13th. Q: That’s right. It’s Friday the 13th of November, 2009. This is an interview with Ambassador James C. Cason being done on behalf of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training and I’m Charles Stuart Kennedy. And all right, do you go by Jim or? CASON: Jim. Q: OK Jim, let’s start at the beginning. When and where were you born? CASON: I was born in Atlantic City New Jersey on November 14th, 1944. Q: All right. Can you tell me something about the Cason side of the family? CASON: Yes I can. I know quite a bit as my hobby is genealogy. Q: Good. CASON: And I’ve been working on my family history for some 50 years. Q: Well, what can you tell me? CASON: First, I’m getting ready now to publish the family history. Q: OK. CASON: The Casons were in the first Jamestown Colony. Q: Mm-hmm. CASON: Three Cason brothers worked as laborers in the Colony between 1615-1620. One was killed by the Indians and the others died of illness or starvation. After the disbandment of the Colony, Thomas Cason came over from England around 1630, settling in the area of Lynnhaven in Lower Norfolk County, Virginia. He was a prosperous tobacco planter, and one of the original first families of America. Most of his descendants in the succeeding 19 generations also were farmers and tobacco planters, up to about 1900. Around that time one of my relatives became a wheelwright. Tobacco farming in the area was no longer profitable. The leaf sucked nutrients from the soil, which became worthless without fertilizer. Beginning about 1700, Casons moved south and then out west, looking for better opportunities than Virginia could afford. My great grandfather became a bookkeeper for the Norfolk Water Works for the city of Norfolk. And then my grandfather, who I did not know well, worked as a haberdasher. My father was the first Cason to go to college. He graduated from William and Mary, went into 8 insurance in Boston, and as the War loomed, quit and joined the Navy. He learned to fly in Pensacola, Florida, and became a dive bomber pilot, assigned to the newly christened carrier Hornet. Q: Hence you were born in Atlantic City. CASON: Hm? Q: Hence Atlantic City. CASON: Yes, that’s right, because during the war my mother was living with her family in Atlantic City. Her father was in insurance and banking; she was Miss New Jersey in the Miss America contest, and my father met her when he was assigned to the area in 1943 teaching new Navy pilots to land on carriers. Q: Oh, I was wondering because my brother was a naval aviator during the war and at one point after the war he was stationed in Atlantic City. CASON: My father lived and worked all up and down the East coast in those days. Q: Yes. CASON: But he was basically a Southerner from Norfolk, or as he would say, “Nawfuc.” He was a true gentleman and patriot. The Navy was his career. He flew Douglas Dauntless SDB-4 dive bombers in all the battles of World War II in the Pacific. He participated in Doolittle’s Raid as a landing signal officer in 1942, and was in the Battle of the Coral Sea, Leyte Gulf, Midway, all the big carrier battles. He helped sink a cruiser in the Battle of Midway and won the Distinguished Flying Cross and many other awards. After the war we lived in California, Florida, French Morocco, and Virginia. He flew Hurricane hunter planes out of Miami –flying into storms to take measurements. He specialized in hunting Russian submarines, and took the first picture of a Soviet nuclear sub at the North Pole and the famous picture of Russian missiles en route to Cuba during the missile crisis. Eventually he worked his way up to Captain, headed Fleet Air Wing 11 in Jacksonville which had over 100 P2 and P3 patrol bombers, he was Commodore of the Middle East Fleet in the 1960s. And so that was the family I grew up in, a naval aviator’s family. Q: Are there any particular stories of World War II that stand out? CASON: Oh, many stories, tremendous stories. He was on five carriers that either sank or were disabled. He was always jumping in the water after Kamikaze planes crashed into the ship -- Q: It sounds like the Lexington and the Franklin and -- CASON: Yes, the Hornet as well -- 9 Q: I guess they didn’t really want him to come onboard. CASON: No (laughs). He was in the water all the time and dozens of his buddies died but, like most of that generation, he didn’t want to talk too much about his exploits or what happened. But I’m lucky. Before my Grandmother died, she gave me my father’s letters written from the Hornet and other places during the war, so I had access to his thoughts at the time-- Q: Yes. CASON: He’s dead now. As I said, he didn’t want to talk too much about the war years because so many of his friends were killed. His whole war experience was in the Pacific. And he stayed on after the war in naval aviation, ending up with 30 years in the service. And so I grew up in a naval family and moved up and down and around the coast. I lived in 19 places, went to five high schools. In the early 1950s we moved to then French Morocco where my father was Executive Officer of a French naval base from which he flew P2s. Q: Was that Port Lyau -- CASON: Port Lyautey. Q: Port Lyautey, Yes. CASON: So I lived in exotic Port Lyautey during the Moroccan breakaway from France and remember tanks on the base and it was all very exciting and new. I remember playing on the beaches near the Wadi Sabu where our landing craft landed in WWII. We played among the rusting wrecks on weekends. -- Q: Yes. CASON: I had an Arab and a French maid while there. I used to know some Arabic and some French because of that. The experience of living in French Morocco at that time really peaked my interest in foreign affairs. And I was a stamp collector and I collected stamps from all over the world. That too gave me an abiding interest in the world outside the United States. Q: Mm-hmm. CASON: Another thing that peaked my interest in foreign affairs was a teacher I had in those days. I was about eight or nine years old. She urged me to read history books, including Winston Churchill’s books on WWII. The Turn of the Tide and his other histories of WWII really helped me decide to get involved in world affairs. I decided early in life, before age 12, to become a diplomat. 10