A rich portrait of a brilliant mind

A superb intellectual biography of Kissinger, his ideas presented in the context of his time.

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Intelligent, well-written and interesting

As some of the other reviews note this is really a survey of Kissinger's intellectual context - it explains what he thought, why he thought it and why his thinking has proved so contentious. it is not a biography of Kissinger but an intellectual analysis of his 'Realist' political doctrine, which the author clarifies and defends. The doctrine of Realism is based upon the 'tragic' view that humans (and nation states) are ultimately self-interested and moral considerations about world peace and human rights (from the Left) and nationalist assertiveness (from the Right) both generate high-handed interventions that lead to disorder. Disorder means a more divided and aggressive world that produces suffering on a grand scale. The path to a safer world is via the more modest route of 'order' (conciliation, compromise, and face-saving).

The first chapter is a long survey of Allende's Chile, leading up to the Pinochet coup, aiming to dispose of the idea that this was Kissinger's doing. The second chapter, outlines the rise of Hitler's Germany, to explain where Realism's 'tragic view' comes from. A couple of chapters explore the views of German Jewish emigres to America (Arendt and Strauss), before we get a longer chapter on another German Jewish emigre, Hans Morgenthau, who propounded the Realist doctrine. A chapter on Vietnam shows how Kissinger brought Realism to American foreign policy, though only after non-Realist policies had made a mess of the whole thing, and how Kissinger's diplomacy strove purposefully for order and peace.

I have outlined the chapters because I loved the way the author used the sequence to help generate his argument - the book is 'journalistic' in its sense of story and story-telling, rather than 'academic' (an exhaustive treatment of a specific issue). The author has the journalistic awareness that listeners need to be interested, want to be informed first so that they can understand more complex issues later, and that there has to be a point to the book that matters (here, the argument that Realism is an important means to peace).

The author is even-handed, presenting counter-evidence and accepting mistakes and imperfections in the doctrine and Kissinger's application of it. It is more about gaining an intellectual appreciation of Kissinger's position than a fan-boy hagiography of him. I have read various books on Kissinger and had read some Arendt, Strauss and Morgenthau - but I would say that it is the combination of story-telling and argument that meant I learned a lot more than I expected here, and enjoyed doing so. Recommended!

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1 person found this helpful

Fragmented

As other reviewers have said, this is neither a biography, nor a detailed consideration of Kissinger's practice and impact as statesman, but a series of linked essays, of which just two focus on distinct foreign policy challenges - on Chile and Vietnam. In these, Gewen makes a defence of Kissinger which I personally found unconvincing, even on realist grounds. The Middle East, Bangladesh, even China, are mentioned only in passing now and then.

It's not bad, and the performance is good, but given the length in retrospect I'd rather read a biographical or historical account, and use that to make my mind up, rather than approach through the lens of Gewen's argument.

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