Peter van Buren
Peter van Buren (born 1960) is a former United States Foreign Service employee, and the author of two novels and two non-fiction books about military affairs. Early life. Peter van Buren was born in New York City. Career. Van Buren served in the U.S. Department of State for 24 years, including a year in Iraq as a team leader for two Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs). After his book, "We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People", was published in 2012 Van Buren claims to have experienced  a series of escalating, adverse actions. His former employer, the U. S. State Department, claimed van Buren had not properly cleared his book for publication under Department rules, and that the book contained unauthorized disclosures of classified material. "The Washington Post" noted that "Van Buren has tested the First Amendment almost daily." The Government Accountability Project and the ACLU helped defend van Buren, and the State Department eventually allowed him to retire with his standard pension and benefits. Van Buren was associate producer for the film "Silenced" (2014) by James Spione. In August 2018, Twitter banned Van Buren for life  for writing that "harasses, intimidates, or uses fear to silence someone else's voice."