[1] Born to American parents in China, Lilley learned Mandarin at a young age before his family moved back to the United States at the outbreak of World War II.

After the suppression of the Tiananmen Square protests, Lilley was critical of the Chinese crackdown and harbored a prominent dissident in the embassy, but worked to prevent long-term damage to United States–China relations.

[2] As a CIA operative, Lilley worked in various parts of Asia, including Laos, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Mainland China.

Early in the administration of President Ronald Reagan, he was appointed to the National Security Council, where he served as the senior expert on East Asia.

Lilley's resistance resulted in a compromise in which the United States agreed to reduce arms sales to Taiwan but set no timeline for stopping them.

In the private sector, he taught about China at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and consulted for companies doing business in East Asia.

[4] His tenure in South Korea coincided with profound political change there; the year after his arrival, the country held its first real presidential election in nearly two decades.

That personal relationship meant that Lilley often had the ear of the president on issues relating to China, and many of his missives home were read directly by Bush.

[3] On November 5, 1991, President George H. W. Bush nominated Lilley to succeed Henry S. Rowen as the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs.

[8] Following his retirement from government service, Lilley became a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, focusing on East Asian relations, and continued writing and speaking about the relationship between the United States and China.