Raymond Thurston
 Raymond Thurston    (diplomat, spook?) | ||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||||||||||||
| Born | 1913 Saint Louis, Missouri, USA | |||||||||||||
| Died | 1981 (Age 68) | |||||||||||||
| Nationality | US | |||||||||||||
| Alma mater | Washington University in St. Louis, University of Texas, University of Wisconsin, Foreign Service Institute, National War College | |||||||||||||
Spooky diplomat and former advisor to SACEUR Lauris Norstad who attended the 1961 Bilderberg.
| ||||||||||||||
Raymond Leroy Thurston was a US diplomat[1] whose roles suggest that he was working with the spookier aspects of diplomacy. He attended the 1961 Bilderberg conference.
Education
Thurston studied at Washington University in St. Louis, the University of Texas, and the University of Wisconsin.[2]
He took a postgraduate in Russian at the Foreign Service Institute in 1948.
He is a graduate of the National War College, 1951-1952.
Career
Thurston joined the Foreign Service in 1937. He worked in Canada, Italy, India and Washington before going to Moscow in 1949. He spent two years there as the embassy's first secretary, then was counselor of embassy from 1950 to 1951.[3]
He was deputy director and then director of the State Department's Office of Eastern European Affairs from 1952 to 1954, then served as deputy chief of mission in Athens, Greece, from 1955 to 1957. From 1957 through 1960, he was counselor of the American Embassy in Paris and political adviser to Army Gen. Lauris Norstad who was commander of NATO forces.[3]
Thurston was alternate representative of the United States delegation to NATO, 1961.[2]
He was appointed US ambassador to Haiti from 1960 to 1963. An authority on Soviet and Eastern European affairs and former NATO adviser, he was appointed ambassador to Haiti because President John F. Kennedy was impressed with Dr. Thurston's work as a field evaluator of U.S. aid programs in Iran and India.[3]
Dr. Thurston recommended that the US aid program in Haiti be suspended. It was also during this time that the Kennedy administration temporarily suspended diplomatic relations with Haiti when Haitian President Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier continued to hold the presidency after his term in office had expired. When relations on the ambassadorial level with Haiti resumed, that government refused to accept Thurston as U. S. ambassador. After teaching for a time, he was named ambassador to Somalia in 1965, a post he held until retiring four years later.[3]
Event Participated in
| Event | Start | End | Location(s) | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bilderberg/1961 | 21 April 1961 | 23 April 1961 | Canada Quebec St-Castin | The 10th Bilderberg, the first in Canada and the 2nd outside Europe. |
