In later years, Henry Kissinger remained engaged in the White House, writing a book on leadership techniques, testifying before a Senate committee over North Korea‘s nuclear danger, and attending sessions. He unexpectedly travelled to Beijing in July to have a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
As secretary of state under US Republican President Richard Nixon, he took part in many of the historic international events of the 1970s. The actions of the Jewish immigrant who was born in Germany directly led to the Paris Peace Accords with North Vietnam, China’s diplomatic openness, the historic weapons control negotiations between the US and the Soviet Union, and stronger connections between Israel and its Arab neighbours.
Kissinger became less of the main designer of US foreign policy after Nixon’s resignation in 1974. Nevertheless, he proved to be a tough diplomat serving under President Gerald Ford and expressed strong views for the remainder of his life.
Many praised Kissinger for his wisdom and depth of experience, but because of his backing for anti-communist dictatorships, particularly in Latin America, some viewed him as a war criminal.
Other countries attempted to jail or investigate him over previous US foreign policy, restricting his movements in his later years.
In 1973, Le Duc Tho of North Vietnam received one of the most contentious Peace Prizes ever, but he would subsequently disavow it. After two Nobel Committee members quit, citing worries about the US’s covert bombardment of Cambodia, investigations began.
Despite referring to Kissinger as a “super secretary of state,” Ford also observed that the former was prickly and confident—qualities that detractors were more prone to linking to egotism and paranoia. Ford even claimed that “Henry, in his mind, never made a mistake.”
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During an interview conducted just before his death in 2006, Ford stated, “He possessed the thinnest skin of any public figure I ever knew.”
Though he had a gravelly German accent and a brooding demeanour, Kissinger was not quite a rock star; in his single days, he was seen as a stylish gentleman who courted gorgeous ladies in Washington and New York. He claimed that having power was the best way to seduce someone.
Kissinger was renowned for his ability to strategize and his willingness to remain silent on personal problems, despite reportedly admitting to a reporter that he considered himself a lone cowboy hero.
Born in Furth, Germany, on May 27, 1923, Heinz Alfred Kissinger immigrated to the US in 1938, just before the Nazi persecution of Jews in Europe came to an end.
In Europe during World War II, Kissinger joined the US military after changing his identity to Henry. In 1943, Kissinger obtained US citizenship and was awarded a scholarship at Harvard University, where he graduated with a master’s in 1952 and a doctorate in 1954. He taught at Harvard for the next seventeen years.
For a large portion of that period, Kissinger worked as a consultant for government organisations; in 1967, he even acted as a go-between for the State Department in Vietnam. He informed the Nixon team about peace talks by using his contacts within the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson.
Nixon appointed Kissinger national security adviser after he won the 1968 presidential election on a campaign to end the Vietnam War.
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Due to his intensely personal and emotional style of diplomacy—which he originally used on his first “shuttle” voyage in response to the Arab-Israeli conflict—Kissinger became well-known.
After travelling back and forth between the two cities for thirty-two days, Kissinger played a significant role in the negotiations for a sustainable disengagement deal between Israel and Syria in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
In an effort to decrease Soviet influence in China, Kissinger made two trips there. During one of those trips, he had a covert meeting with Premier Zhou Enlai. The formalisation of ties between the two countries and Nixon’s historic summit with Chairman Mao Zedong in Beijing were the ultimate outcomes.
Kissinger was not involved in the cover-up and continued to hold that job when Ford became president in the summer of 1974; therefore, the resignation of Nixon due to the Watergate affair had no impact on her. Ford did, however, succeed him as national security adviser in an effort to include alternative perspectives on global concerns.
Following their journey to Vladivostok in the Soviet Union, Ford and Kissinger met with Leonid Brezhnev and came to an agreement on the terms of a strategic weapons accord. Kissinger’s historic detente efforts, which resulted in a decrease in US-Soviet hostilities, came to an end with this accord.
Even though Kissinger was a skilled diplomat, he wasn’t perfect. He faced criticism in 1975 for his inability to convince Egypt and Israel to consent to a second phase of disengagement from the Sinai.
Furthermore, Nixon and Kissinger faced harsh criticism for supporting Pakistan during the 1971 India-Pakistan War. Kissinger eventually issued an apology after his remark that the Indians were “bastards” was overheard.
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Like Nixon, he was concerned about the expansion of left-wing ideology throughout the Western Hemisphere, and for years to come, his handling of the problem caused great animosity among many Latin Americans towards Washington.
He collaborated with the CIA in 1970 to plan the assassination of Chile’s democratically elected but Marxist president, Salvador Allende. After the military angrily seized power in 1976, he wrote a paper endorsing the autocrats.
Kissinger’s career as an executive branch official ended with Ford’s defeat to Democratic contender Jimmy Carter in 1976. Ronald Reagan, the following Republican president, broke up with Kissinger because he felt the former was too liberal for his conservative support base.
After leaving the government, Kissinger established a prominent and influential consulting firm in New York that provided advice to the most influential companies in the world. In addition to writing books and serving on company boards and other foreign policy and security-related forums, he became well-known as a television global affairs analyst.
President George W. Bush appointed Henry Kissinger to lead an inquiry group after the events of September 11, 2001. However, Democratic concerns compelled him to step down from the position, as they believed that Kissinger’s consulting firm had a conflict of interest with many of its clients.
After his first wife, Ann Fleischer, filed for divorce in 1964, he married Nancy Maginnes, an aide to the governor of New York, in 1974. Through his first marriage, he had two children.
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