Later Years
In 1993 O'Brien was appointed Founding Director of the New Zealand Centre for Strategic Studies He served as Director for almost 8 years until his retirement in 2001, earning the new institution a respected reputation and high public profile. Controversy surrounded his replacement in 2002 by David Dickens, a former Ministry of Defence official. The Parliamentary Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade investigated the matter and issued a critical report.
In 2009, O'Brien published a book entitled 'Presence of Mind: New Zealand in the World'. The book New Zealand in the World is a selection of writings on the place of New Zealand in the world reflecting on the position of a small country such as New Zealand and its place on the international stage from the perspective of a small, internationally minded, modern and multicultural democracy.
O'Brien continues as an Advisor to the Centre for Strategic Studies and remains sought after by media and commentators for his foreign policy views and advice. He has recently (2012) published several articles arguing against proposed reforms in the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
Read more about this topic: Terence O'Brien (New Zealand Diplomat)
Famous quotes containing the word years:
“When Prince William [later King William IV] was at Cork in 1787, an old officer ... dined with him, and happened to say he had been forty years in the service. The Prince with a sneer asked what he had learnt in those forty years. The old gentleman justly offended, said, “Sir, I have learnt, when I am no longer fit to fight, to make as good a retreat as I can” —and walked out of the room.”
—Horace Walpole (1717–1797)
“We never become really and genuinely our entire and honest selves until we are dead—and not then until we have been dead years and years. People ought to start dead and then they would be honest so much earlier.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)