The quest for peace: Henry A. Kissinger on Germany.

• Author: Reimer, Mirco
• Position: Biography

Introduction: The Phenomenon Kissinger

"If you don't know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere."--Henry A. Kissinger

Henry A. Kissinger is a unique figure in United States foreign relations history. Kissinger's career is unusual in at least three aspects: He is an intellectual, who spent most of his adulthood at a university; he became the first foreign-born Secretary of State; and he is a Jewish war refugee, a German, but also an American. Also, Jeremy Suri has noted that Kissinger's career is about "the rise of fascism, the Holocaust, and democratic responses ... ethnic identity, education, and social networking", but most importantly, about his thinking that "exemplifies the role of ideas, memories, and prejudices in daily life." To others, Kissinger is "the quintessential American icon, a great American success story" since he, after all, is a Jewish-German immigrant who narrowly escaped the Holocaust and ended up serving at the highest level of U.S. government, as Hanhima?ki has noted.

Indeed, Kissinger is a phenomenon, which is also due to his extreme popularity while serving in office. In 1972, Kissinger ranked fourth in Gallup's "Most Admired Man Index", and in 1973 he ranked first--never before had a Secretary of State or any presidential advisor been placed on Gallup's list. From this day and onwards, Kissinger has been a larger than life figure. Another poll illustrates this: In May 1973, 78 percent of Americans were able to identify Kissinger while in comparison, in 2007 only 65 percent could recall the name of Condoleezza Rice, Secretary of State at that point, despite of the technologically facilities citizens now could utilize.

The rationale behind writing about Kissinger is, partly, that personalities matter in the conduct of policy. In the 1960s, a study of the Institute for Defense Analysis concluded that "the force of personality tends to over-ride procedures." Kissinger's own writing also subscribes to this notion. However, this rationale does not mean that personality is the only determinant of policy outcomes. Kissinger certainly did not formulate and implement American foreign policy completely by himself during his time in office. Still, this essay assumes that Kissinger's policy decisions cannot be understood without considering Kissinger's own ideas and personal influences before he entered the Nixon administration.

The literature on Kissinger is packed, literally shelves of books have been written about Kissinger, but surprisingly few works have combined two important aspects when examining his life: The time before he went to Washington and became a member of the Nixon administration, and his relationship to his native country, Germany. One reason might be that Kissinger never was much identified with Germany and German politics in the U.S.--despite his origin and accent. During his time in academia, Kissinger was primarily viewed as a nuclear strategist, not an expert on the German question --even though he did consultative work for the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations on that particular question. Another reason might be that most research focuses on Kissinger's time in the Nixon and Ford administrations where Germany was not at the center of attention. Rather, the issues of the day centered around Kissinger's involvement in detente with the Soviet Union, the 'opening of China', the Vietnam War, Kissinger's controversial involvement in the American intervention in Chile, and his 'shuttle diplomacy' in the Middle East. These works are numerous and range from admiring Kissinger to almost despising him.

While these works are important, of course, it is one's belief that in any serious effort to understand how Kissinger has handled American foreign policy, it is necessary to understand how his ideas formed during his writings and personal experiences in the decades prior to his entry in governmental positions. Some academic and journalistic works have tried to shed light on these features. Dickson, Weber, and Cleva have provided detailed accounts on the European and German intellectual tradition and the influence these traditions had on Kissinger's Weltanschauung, with particularly focus on Kissinger's Harvard honors thesis and his subsequent dissertation at Harvard. But few have blended Kissinger's early intellectual development and tied it to his ideas about his native country Germany before he entered the Nixon administration.

Consequently, what this essay will try to achieve is to address Kissinger's main conceptual ideas, in particular his views on Germany before he entered the Nixon administration. An essay of this length will have to compromise, as does any piece of scholarship. Therefore, it is also important to emphasize what this essay will not try to emphasize. This essay will not deal with 'private' Kissinger, and his extensive writing on nuclear weapons and other foreign policy issues, unless these things can be connected to the essay's overarching theme which is Kissinger's views and relationship with Germany prior to his entrance in the Nixon administration. Also, while the essay tries to highlight what influenced Kissinger's thinking on Germany, it will not compare his views to those of other professionals. This essay is, quite frankly, about one man only: Henry A. Kissinger.

As the essay will try to tease out, Kissinger's outlook prior to 1969--when he became National Security Advisor--has changed little in the last fifty plus years. Stephen Walker has emphasized: "Kissinger's academic works reflect his personal philosophy of history and his political philosophy which strongly influenced the policies that Kissinger advocated while on office." John Stoessinger, a graduate student at Harvard with Kissinger in the 1950s, has also highlighted that Kissinger's diplomacy as Secretary of State was deeply rooted in the insights of the young doctoral student Kissinger at Harvard a quarter century ago: "We are witness here to a unique experiment in the application of scholarship to statesmanship, of history to statecraft." Since Kissinger's writing and decision making reflects an element of continuity it is even more interesting to examine his early thoughts on Germany. In order to do so, we need to go seventy-five years back in time. Our destination is New York City where the main protagonist of this essay was about to arrive on a ship from Europe with his family.

Coming to America

In 1938, the Kissingers had been forced to flee their native country Germany due to their Jewish belief and the horrors of Nazi Germany and arrived in New York City on a ship. The new life in America proved to be a thrilling experience for the young Henry Kissinger, fifteen years old at that point. Kissinger later recalled:

"I always remembered the thrill when I first walked the streets of New York City. Seeing a group of boys, I began to cross to the other side to avoid being beaten up. And then I remembered where I was."

Kissinger's first encounters with America proved fruitful. The young Kissinger was ambitious, focused, and serious in his attempt to assimilate himself into his new American society. While many German-Jewish immigrants were content with their new-won social and cultural environment--which, obviously, was way more comforting than the tyranny of Nazi Germany--the young Jewish refugee tried to assimilate himself and succeeded, partly...