Background
Popper was born in Manhattan, New York and raised in White Plains, New New York
Popper was born in Manhattan, New York and raised in White Plains, New New York
Popper entered university at the young age of 15 and graduated valedictorian of his class from Harvard University in 1932 and received a Harvard master"s degree in government in 1934.
He was a member and former President of the American Academy of Diplomacy. He and his family were Jewish. He then went on to join the research staff of the Foreign Policy Association, until the United States entered World World War World War II Popper worked in Army intelligence at a base in Miami where he traced Axis power movement and influence in Latin America.
David H. Popper began his career as a diplomat when World World War II came to an education
In September 1945 Popper joined the United States State Department and was assigned to the then new bureau of United Nations affairs He had a brief scrap with McCarthyism when he was internally investigated because some past associates and organizations of which he had been a member had leftist connections.
He was briefly suspended without pay, but after an investigation that involved interviewing his former Boy Scout leaders, he was cleared. He served as Deputy Director of United Nations Political and Security Affairs from 1951 to 1954.
He served as Director of the Office of Atlantic Political and Military Affairs from 1962 to 1965 alongside Adlai East. Stevenson, then ambassador to the United Nations.
He served as United States Ambassador to Cyprus (1969-1973) during the administration of President Makarios. In 1973 he returned to Washington, District of Columbia to serve briefly as Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs for the duration of that year. His next assignment was to be his most prominent.
Popper is best known for having served as United States ambassador to Chile during the Pinochet regime.
His tenure began in February 1974, four months after General Augusto Pinochet overthrew the democratically elected president Salvador Allende in the 1973 Chilean coup d"état, with tacit support from the United States government. In his capacity as chief United States diplomat in Chile, Popper was forced to walk the diplomatic tight-rope of balancing concerns of human rights violations by the Chilean military regime with strategic geopolitical and economic objectives of the Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford administrations.
The United States embassy in Chile once received a cablegram from Secretary of State Henry Kissinger that read "Tell Popper to cut out the political science lectures" in reference to a meeting at which Popper had brought up human rights violation concerns with the Chilean defense minister. After spending three years as ambassador to Chile he finished his diplomatic career as special representative for Panama Canal Treaty Affairs.
He retired in 1980.
In semi-retirement David Popper served as the ghost writer for former United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim"s memoirs, entitled In the Eye of the Storm.
The book was published in 1986 but printing was soon terminated as Waldheim"s past as a Nazi officer during World World War II surfaced. The autobiography overlooked those years of Waldheim"s life. Popper died at Georgetown University Hospital of complications from a fall at the age of 95.
His companion of 14 years, Olie Rauh, had died 5 months earlier in February 2008.