Cirrus@Austlit

'Keith Waller was a pioneering Australian diplomat.  Arguably the most talented recruit to the infant Department of External Affairs in the mid-1930s, he was a suave and persuasive prosecutor of Australia’s interests, serving every Prime Minister from Lyons to Whitlam with distinction.

'In 1941, Waller was sent to Chungking, where he established one of Australia’s first overseas missions. A youthful indiscretion almost ended his career there, and he returned to Australia under a cloud. Waller redeemed himself, however, winning praise for his difficult role as Secretary to the Australian Delegation to the San Francisco conference that established the United Nations.  Subsequent assignments took Waller to Brazil, Washington and Manila; as Consul General. From London, where he served as a liaison officer, Waller conveyed to Canberra Britain’s anger at its exclusion from the ANZUS Alliance. Later, as Ambassador in Bangkok, Waller sought to breathe life into the moribund South East Asia Treaty Organisation. Most of his diplomatic contemporaries eschewed administration; Waller found he had a talent for it. In the late 1950s, C.M.H. Clark immortalised Waller in print as one of External Affairs’ ‘Men in Black’, a role in which he revelled.

'In 1959, Menzies chose Waller as the avuncular face of a revivified, post-Petrov relationship with the Soviet Union. Waller was one of the architects of Australia’s successful policy of ‘Confrontation’ of Indonesia in the early 1960s, which was later judged one of the Department of External Affairs’ finest hours. Appointed the first ‘professional’ ambassador in Washington, Waller bore the brunt of ministers’ insatiable need to know US thinking on Vietnam policy.  As Secretary from 1970 of a re-named Department of Foreign Affairs, Waller re-organised and modernised operations in Canberra and overseas.'  (Publication summary)

'So begins this sweeping true story of a fractured but close-knit Australian family during World War II, focusing on the service of the twins and life on the home front as experienced primarily by their elder sister and mother. When hostilities are declared, Terry joins the Australian Military Forces and is quickly promoted. However, as a militiaman, he is banned from serving overseas. Having watched Edwin join the glamorous RAAF and become a pilot, Terry resigns his commission to follow his twin. Forced to swallow the disappointment of failing to emulate Edwin by winning his wings, Terry becomes a navigator in heavy bombers in the closing stages of the European war.

'Readers are transported from the Charles family home in northern NSW to Canberra, Africa, England, Scotland, the United States, the Subcontinent and Ceylon between 1939 and the end of 1945 as the perspective shifts between the two protagonists.

'Little-known aspects of wartime experience are explored, including the so-called ‘wet canteens’ debate; the international negotiations over the release of interned Allied and Japanese diplomats, and the life of the Raj on the north-west frontier and in India and Ceylon.

'The author’s clever interweaving of primary documents with historical fact gives rare insights into the lives and relationships of the Charles family and creates an authentic snapshot of wartime Australia. The Charles Family’s War is a compassionate and multilayered examination of two intelligent and articulate young men who come of age in the cauldron of global conflict.' (Publication summary)

'ASIO’s ambivalence about Manning Clark might not have incited a diplomatic training incident, writes Alan Fewster. But Clark’s response, thinly veiled as fiction, was uncompromising' 

'Born into colonial wealth and privilege, Sir Keith Officer (1889-1969) was the archetypal Anglo-Australian. Officer served with distinction in the Great War and in British Nigeria before making a significant contribution to Australian conservative politics in the late 1920s.

'On joining the fledgling foreign service, he was Australia's first diplomat, and became his country's most senior representative overseas. For thirty years, at hardship posts and in the gilded salons of the northern hemisphere, the impeccably connected Officer sought to advance Australia's international interests with equal skill and dedication. Urbane, puckish and gregarious, Officer loved pomp and ceremony, yet remained a disciplined, ascetic bachelor, addicted to exercise and cold showers, happiest on his yacht or tramping unshaven through the bush.

'Officer's life and career, from Gallipoli to the Cold War, epitomised the Westminster tradition of apolitical public service, and served as a model for the first generation of Australian diplomats.' (Melbourne University Press website)