Komer thanks Bundy for evening with State Department staffers

December 1967 memo reveals early professional connections between future Suriname diplomats.

Date: December 1, 1967

A memorandum from Robert W. Komer (Special Assistant to President Johnson) to "Bill" (likely William P. Bundy, then Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs) included both "Mr. Duemling" and "Mr. LaRoche" on its carbon copy (cc) list.

Details:

  • The letter was a thank you note from Komer to Bundy regarding a recent evening where Komer "enjoyed talking to your two lads".
  • At this time (late 1967), Robert W. Duemling was serving as Special Assistant to Assistant Secretary William Bundy (1966-1970).
  • Richard R. LaRoche had joined the State Department in April 1967 and was likely assigned to the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs prior to his first major overseas posting to Jakarta in September 1968.

Significance: This document establishes that Robert W. Duemling and Richard R. LaRoche were operating within the same bureau of the U.S. State Department (Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs) and were on the periphery of high-level communications as early as 1967. This indicates a long-standing professional awareness or connection, some 15 years before both individuals played central, and sometimes conflicting, roles in U.S. operations and diplomacy concerning Suriname in the early 1980s (Duemling as Ambassador, LaRoche as DCM/Chargé d'Affaires).

Source:

[CIA Memorandum from Robert W. Komer to "Bill" [Bundy], ]()December 1, 1967 (Document ID: CIA-RDP79S01091A000100020017-1).

Link:

https://archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-cia-rdp79s01091a000100020017-1/mode/1up?view=theater

Internal Link:

Date:
December 1, 1967
Categories:
Diplomacy, Log, Matthew Smith, Research, The Suriname Archive
Tags:
Career History, Professional Network
Boxes:
MW Zotero
Years:
1967
Persons:
Richard Laroche, Robert Duemling, Robert W Komer, William P Bundy
META DATA
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