A new book details the long and storied career of Frank C. Carlucci III, a diplomat and Cold Warrior who served six U.S. presidents and became the first Italian-American Secretary of Defense.
“Get Me Carlucci” tells his story using his own words, interviews with his contemporaries, and context from his daughter, Kristin Carlucci Weed.
“He was a humble man who never bothered with writing his own story. It was only late in his life, after much prodding from his family, that he wrote a short memoir down for his grandchildren,” Carlucci Weed said of her late father.
“‘Get Me Carlucci’ is built around excerpts from the memoir my father wrote for his family, with context provided by me,” she said. “Since he was talking about his own experiences and had a lot of insider knowledge, I had to fill in the blanks.”
The book details Carlucci’s early military days, his time as a young foreign service officer during the Congo Crisis of the 1960s, as Ambassador to Portugal during their transition to democracy in the 1970s, and his return to Washington to serve as Deputy Director of the CIA, National Security Advisor, and eventually Secretary of Defense under President Ronald Reagan.
Carlucci also mentored a young Colin Powell, and “ultimately set Powell on a different career trajectory” when he asked Reagan to recall Powell to Washington while national security advisor, Carlucci Weed said.
“The president thought the world of him,” Powell said. “I thought the world of him.”
One of the most surprising things Carlucci Weed learned about her father was that embassy staff in Portugal were not looking forward to the arrival of the man they termed “tough guy Carlucci” when he was appointed to the position in 1974. But they were quickly won over after he held his first press conference at the airport in Portuguese.
“That created quite an impression since no American ambassador prior had spoken the language, nor had they made themselves available to the Portuguese press,” she said. Carlucci is perhaps more famous in Portugal than in the U.S., and the U.S. ambassador’s residence in Lisbon is now named Casa Carlucci in his honor.
“Finally, in ‘Get Me Carlucci’, one of the most talented, effective and courageous people ever to serve in multiple high government offices gets due recognition,” said Robert Gates, who served as Secretary of Defense from 2006 to 2011 and as Director of Central Intelligence from 1991 to 1993.
But despite his national and international accomplishments, Carlucci Weed says her father was most proud of his efforts to aid his home state of Pennsylvania after Hurricane Agnes in 1972.
“It did widespread damage and was the costliest hurricane to date, resulting in 118 fatalities and $3.5 billion in property damage,” she said. At the time, there was no government agency for handling disaster relief, and Carlucci took on the role of “flood czar,” overseeing billions of dollars in federal aid on the ground.
“He would also go on to recommend the creation of some sort of relief agency for future disasters. This, of course, led to the creation of FEMA [the Federal Emergency Management Agency],” she said.
Carlucci Weed said she was compelled to complete his story not just for personal reasons, but because of the “extreme partisan politics of today.”
“He was an example of a person who worked for both Republican and Democratic administrations — and repeatedly put the nation above party and personal interest,” she said. “From the Kennedy to Reagan administrations, he was a quiet problem solver — tough, experienced — and always putting the national interest first.”
The book’s title comes from a 1981 Washington Post article titled “Get Me Carlucci is the summons for the quintessential Survivor.” The article was published after he left the CIA under Carter and was confirmed as deputy secretary of defense under Reagan.
“The ideal he epitomized as a representative of a certain sort of Washington figure has largely disappeared from the highly partisan American political landscape of today,” Carlucci Weed said. “As a country, we would all do better to remember that desire for service before self and party, and to look for leaders who embody those values.”
TMX contributed to this story.
