Phillips Talbot’s India fellowship coincided with the country’s independence movement. He witnessed the partition of India and Pakistan and got to know the leaders of both new countries, including Mahatma Gandhi. His fellowship began in 1938 and ended in 1950, interrupted by World War II, during which he served in naval intelligence. Previously a reporter for the Chicago Daily News, after his fellowship he went on to help found and run the institute’s sister program, the American Universities Field Staff, continuing to write extensively about his region.
President John F. Kennedy appointed Phil assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern and South Asian affairs from 1961 to 1965, and he served as ambassador to Greece from 1965 to 1969, during a successful military coup. He was president of the Asia Society from 1971 to 1980 after helping John D. Rockefeller III found the organization in 1956. While serving in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, Phil worked to resolve conflicts between India and Pakistan before their 1965 war over Kashmir, Pakistan’s closing of its border with Afghanistan, between Greece and Turkey over violence on Cyprus and in Arab refugee negotiations with Israel.
Phil received a doctorate in international relations from the University of Chicago in 1954 and a bachelor’s from the University of Illinois in 1936. He is the author of multiple books, including a compilation of his ICWA reports, An American Witness to India’s Partition.