Partnership with National Security advisor kissinger. Im going to share the screen so we could look at powerpoint pictures as we go through the sequence. First of all, here is president nixon himself. He had been born in 1913. He grew up in a lower middleclass family in california. To dukeated and went University Law school. This was in the worst years of the great depression. The mid1930s. During the Second World War he joined the u. S. Navy. Nixonuld see a photo of as an officer. He served with distinction in the pacific. Noncombat but as a logistics expert. Getting the right equipment to the right place at the right time. He was given a series of commendation from his commanders. He was also a very talented poker player. He had a great ability to bluff. That is a valuable quality in someone who is undertaking policy at a highlevel. In 1946 after he had been demobilized from the navy, he ran for congress. On the right, you could see a poster from his first election campaign. In 1946, a lot of world war ii veterans elected into congress and senate, one of them was nixon himself. The other was john f. Kennedy. Another is joe mccarthy. His early political career, nixon rose very rapidly through the ranks. He was an anticommunist. He worked hard to understand communism and why briefly during the depression Many Americans had been attracted could to communism. He was dedicated to rooting out communism from high places. He understood it was a good weapon to use against the democrats. A characteristic of republican rhetoric in the 40s was the insertion that in the state department and other parts of the government, communists were at work and truman knew they were at work. He ran successfully for a seat in the senate in 1950. Red baiting his opponent. He was chosen by eisenhower to be his running mate. Between 1946 and 1952. He goes from a congressman to Vice President ial candidate. Because he won the the election of 1952, he was inaugurated as Vice President. That is the job he held throughout the eisenhower administration. In 1960 he was the republican candidate in the election against john f. Kennedy. This was an election that he lost very narrowly. One of the closest elections of the 20th century. To make matters worse, he lost again in 1962 when he ran unsuccessfully for the governorship of california. In 1962, when he was in his late 40s it seemed as though is political career had now come to an end. He went back into relative obscurity of the life of a new york lawyer. Barrysastrous failure of goldwater in the president ial campaign of 1964, he was unsuccessful in running against lyndon johnson. It gave nixon the opportunity to revive his political career. , won68 he was back again the republican nomination and won the election against hubert humphrey. By then, the vietnam war was in full swing. This was the election in which johnson had been entitled to run but withdrew from the race after he had been challenged inside the democratic primaries by Jean Mccarthy and robert kennedy. Housecomes into the white , inaugurated in 1969. Henry kissinger was the man he chose his National Security advisor. Kissinger had been born 10 years later than nixon. He was born and raised in germany. He loves playing soccer as a kid. Very good in school. He was jewish. His family was jewish. As the nazi persecution of the German JewishCommunity Exit escalated the family eventually took the decision to emigrate. Certainly saved their lives. He was 15 when he came to the United States for the first time. He became a citizen during world war ii. Because he was perfectly fluent person fore was a the american armies fighting in europe. The german counterattack against the americans in the winter of 19441945. Briefly as a private soldier he had the job of organizing a newly liberated town in germany from the nazis. The organizational abilities made his superiors look favorably upon him. When the war finished kissinger went to college, first at hevard and that is where wrote his doctoral citation. Politician atr the austrohungarian empire. He contributed to the pacification of europe at the end of the napoleonic wars of 1815. Kissinger wrote admiringly. He was somebody who perfectly understood the concept and the balance of power and the importance of using hard political realities. In theds we read about influential article. Kissinger was a great believer in balance of power in politics. It has to be subordinated to current political realities. 1950s, kissinger had the faculty appointment at harvardharvard and soon got ten. He published a book when you got Nuclear Weapons use them in a way that prevented an earth destroying apocalypse. He was cautiously optimistic. It was possible to fight a limited nuclear war. This became a bestseller among the policy elite and had kissingers name spread around washington about upandcoming Foreign Policy advisers. During the early 1960s, he was an advisor to nelson rockefeller. A moderate republican. The opposite of Barry Goldwater. In 1968, when nixon approached him with the possibility you might become National Security advisor, he was perfectly well to jump over to nixons camp and sees this marvelous opportunity to become a senior policymaker inside the new nixon white house. Although eisenhower had been president in the 50s, eisenhower was really a very bipartisan politician. That is the first time the republicans had been in the presidency since Herbert Hoover left the office in 1932. There wasnt a big pool of republican officeholders as there were democrats. One of the things nixon and kissinger did together was to revolutionize americas diplomatic posture with respect to two of the other great powers in the world. One was the soviet union. The other was china. The Nuclear Weapons race had been going on ever since the end of world war ii. Tested the russians their Nuclear Weapons for the first time. By 1969, the low population states of the great plains and west were honeycombed with missile silos. So were the great plains of siberia. Both sides gradually realized they had a common motive in trying to reduce the danger of an accidental exchange of weapons. In fact, they had a common interest in preventing nuclear war from ever taking place. The destructiveness was so complete. They reached a condition of mutually assured destruction. They even reach the point of overkill. They could kill each other each others populations many times over. It was time to start rethinking how to understand the arms race. Whether it made any kind of sense. Both sides had already appreciated when they signed the treaty in 1963 that they had a common interest in not testing these weapons in the atmosphere. 1969 they also recognized a common interest in trying to deescalate back from the brink of an accidental war. On the right it shows Neil Armstrong walking on the surface of the moon. This took place in the first year of the Nixon Administration. The summer of 1969. An incredible achievement. People are interested in the world of weapons and military hardware understood perfectly any rocket that could take man to the moon could be packed with Nuclear Warheads and used against the other side. Bmssharacteristics of ic when they are fired into space and they come down at a supersonic speed out of space orbit to attack their targets on the ground. Wrinkle in the weapons by 1968 was what was called the mirv. Warhead,f having one there would be nine or 10 packed into the rocket. They would be fired and dispersed in space. Each would head for a different target. These are the conditions under which nixon decided to approach the soviet union. Here is a cartoon from the time. Paradoxes ofe Nuclear Weapons. Two armies facing each other. Both loaded with these powerful bombs. Used, theunt to be enemy might retaliate. Other side it says do not be used because the enemy right might retaliate. There they are firing archaic weapons because they cant use the most powerful weapon in their arsenal. The characteristics of the Nixon Kissinger style of diplomacy was not to use the regular channels. Not go through the state department and use the professional foreignpolicy staff who were trained to do exactly this kind of work. Instead, they have back channels with the soviet ambassador in d. C. He is a fascinating person. Inbecame soviet ambassador 1962 when kennedy was president. He remained in that job right through 1986. He worked with president kennedy, johnson, nixon, ford, carter, and reagan. Continuity of office overseeing the soviet union inside the usa. Everyone agreed he was charming and populated and incredibly knowledgeable about Foreign Policy affairs. Than throughrather the state department, nixon and kissinger talk about the crucible of data with the soviet premier. He is shown there on the left. Here is nixon talking with him, leaning in to make sure he gets the nuances of the translation right. Himn was able to persuade with the rightness of reducing nuclear arsenals. Each side was spending far too much money on nuclear arsenals. They were increasing the danger of accidental war. They have a mutual interest in deescalating. Negotiations began. The strategic arms litigation. In 1972 it leads to the signing of the salt agreement. One interesting aspect of it t is depicted on the right it shows an antiballistic missile. If the enemy fires its Nuclear Weapons against us, we will surround our cities with defensive missile bases. If our radar shows enemy missiles are coming towards us, we will fire antiballistic missiles which will intercept them and prevent our cities from being destroyed. At first glance that seems like a very good idea. As you know, one of the characteristics of war planning and wargaming during the cold war was to think very carefully about the way in which the enemy would interpret your actions. You have to make sure your intention is understood. The american war planners, especially the negotiators from the treaty said this if we build antiballistic Missile System and surround our cities, what the enemy might think is this. That is a sign the americans are planning the first strike against us. Retaliate they only have to shoot down our counterstrike. In the words, the fact they are is anng abm systems ominous sign that they are planning to strike us first. That is dangerous because it escalates the mutual perception of threat so that the question becomes how do we reduce the danger that this is what they will think . , itanswer they came up with was in the treaty was this we are not going to build the systems. We will leave ourselves defenseless. By leaving ourselves defenseless, we are making it less likely that our intentions will be misunderstood. That if they launch against us, we will be utterly destroyed. We know we could launch against them before our missiles hit us. Ascends to the principle of making itself defenseless as a way of reducing the danger of nuclear war. It is a complicated way of thinking but it does have internal logic that proved largely persuasive to policymakers on all sides. It was at a summit meeting in 1972 that the soviet and american leaders signed the treaty. The u. S. Senate also endorsed it. In america people were horrified by this. Anticommunist, the toughest of the anticommunists like perry goldwater thought this was dismayed. Goldwaters view was they wont ascend to it unless they believe it helps them. If it helps them a cant possibly help us as well. There were people who still said whatever one side gains, the other side must lose. This is a condition in which both sides could gain because both could be reassured of the reduction of danger. Another thing that made it particularly painful was the year before nixon came into the checks in 1968 , just like the hungarians had attempted to establish a little distance between themselves and soviet control. Was in check government no way hostile to the soviet union. Responded byians ofding tanks, this was one the many traumatic events of 1968. Anticommunist throughout america, it was one more sign the soviet union is utterly untrustworthy. Nixon had got such a strong anticommunist credentials from his earlier career, we can do this in the first place. If democratic president s tried it almost certainly wouldve won the united opposition of the republicans. Nixon understood he was in a his democratic rivals probably could not have accomplished this. Another development of the first Nixon Administration was the diplomatic opening to china. Zedong successfully completed the Chinese Revolution in 1949. There was the use of chinese troops in the early days of the againstar when attacks the chinanorth korea border were moving north in north korea. Earlyn 1949 and the 1970s, the United States didnt have diplomatic relations with communist china, the peoples republic of china at all. United states continued to recognize taiwan. That is the offshore island in the pacific to which they had led the retreat of nationalist chinese at the end of the Chinese Revolution in 1949. On the few occasions when an were doingp to let this, diplomat, they are having formal talks. By 1970 and 71 nixon is thinking extremely odd about the situation. Nixon wrote an article in the journal of Foreign Affairs which was published in 1967 in which he said this. View, we cannot afford to leave china forever outside the family of nations. By 1969, 1970 it was becoming clear that communism was not monolithic. There were differences between russian communists and chinese communist. The difference is again between them and vietnamese communists. It was possible to see the difference between the various brands of national communists. One of the central principles of Foreign Policy is the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Begander incidents to take place between china and the soviet union, nixon and kissinger understood if we could be friends with china or achieve diplomatic normalization, that will add pressure on the soviet union. Want to give them an easy target. In 1946,o way back eventually the soviet system is going to fold up because of its own imperfections. A little badge. Here is mao in the foreground. The people in the background are karl marx, frederick engels, lenin, and stalin. In this classic lineage of communism. The next of the great leaders. Inside china it had been incredibly turbulent between the Chinese Revolution and the arrival of nixon and kissinger. Perhaps the most catastrophic policy decision ever made was the greatly forward. Towas the attempt by china increase Grain Production in the chinese countryside and also go through a crash course in industrialization. What actually happened was the peasant farms were forcibly collectivized. You could see people in the photograph working on farms. Hope was the rationalization and efficiency of largescale farms would lead to a sharp increase in Grain Production. What actually happened was they wound up being taken away from them. Formsorked hard on such then they wouldve done if they had been working on lands of their own. Productivity went down very sharply. Another aspect of the greatly forward was the decision to have a crash course of industrialization. System that marxs is predicated on an industrial society. That the industrial working class would be revolutionaries. People were encouraged to make homemade furnaces. To bring all of their metal hope china could become a mass producer of steel goods. The technology could not be done on a homemade scale. This was another policy initiative which failed drastically. Just to give you an idea of the scale of calamity, the famine that began in china is regarded by most people as the single worst famine in the entire history of the world. Literally millions, perhaps as many as 50 Million People died of starvation between 1959 and 1961. One of the many crazy policies pursued in the greatly forward was for pests, rats, flies, mosquitoes, and sparrows. Theres something to be said about the first three, when the have to kill sparrows, the result was the natural predator against insects disappeared. The killing of the sparrows was almost immediately followed by a great plague of locusts, the damage was on a biblical scale. Luckily there was the calling off of this crazy program. The chineseike is death rate. It is an and upward jump. It was a sharp rise in the birth rate. That led to the chinese one child policy, that has been highly controversial human rights issue. The other policy amo undertook was the cultural revolution. The Chinese Revolution was becoming the rock retires. There was a lot of corruption inside the government offices. Ofwas to restore a sense revolution inside china. The booklet of his own sayings. Unsettlebout trying to the stability. Which china begun to achieve by the 1960s. The intellectuals. People had been accused of intellectual deviancy from the strict path of maoist communism are being denounced. They could be executed altogether. Also rituals of public shaming been accused of being intellectuals. They stood on chairs in public squares denouncing them for their decency deviancy from the maoist policy. When late summer and early fall came about, and enormous urban depopulation took place. Chinese officials no longer worked in agriculture and were forced to go work in the harvest with the memory of the routes for which they become. Nearly all books from the west were banned unless they were books of marxist orthodoxy. The revolution was also remembered as a horrible period of regression and mass persecution. As i mentioned earlier, this is along the boundary between the soviet union and china. It is becoming clear that although china and the soviet union are both communist nations , and mao admired stalin. The policy and political differences are