White House Years

"This is the first and most important of Kissinger’s three volumes of memoirs. None of his other books—with the possible exception of his Harvard PhD thesis, A World Restored: Metternich, Castlereagh and the Problems of Peace 1812-22—give such an insight into the mind of this towering figure. It’s all in the White House Years, which covers Kissinger’s time as National Security Advisor in Nixon’s first term: not just this key insider’s account of the opening to China, détente with the Soviet Union, and the secret negotiations that ended the Vietnam War, but the ‘geopolitical’ approach to international politics that shaped his moves and the tactics that were its corollaries, in particular ‘linkage’ (negotiating on a broad front). The reflex to give first priority to equilibrium between the major powers is actually brought out most tellingly in the chapter on the India-Pakistan crisis in 1971: the State Department favoured democratic India on the ‘merits of the issue’ but Kissinger swung US policy behind authoritarian Pakistan because its government was a bridge to China. Kissinger also tells some funny stories incredibly well. I used to read to my students the passage describing what happened when Mel Laird, the Defense Secretary, smoking a cigar, gate-crashed Nixon’s audience with the Pope, and we would regularly weep with laughter. No, I don’t think so. In some circumstances a major power can arm-twist or buy a settlement between lesser states, as the Americans did between the Israelis and Egyptians in 1978. However, when a major power – especially one with a veto on the UN Security Council – is determined to use force against a small state there is not much that anyone can do that would not make matters worse."