Kissinger’s senior thesis at Harvard was written during the immediate post–World War II period when existentialism was entering its heyday. But Kissinger did not embrace Spengler’s historical inevitability, the notion that civilizations rise and fall in a never-ending cycle, but rather the freedom of the individual to act within the constraints of history. The most profound intellectual influence on Kissinger, Grandin asserts, was Oswald Spengler, author of The Decline of the West. No, there are deep metaphysical roots to his wrong-doing. Grandin rejects the notion that Kissinger was a mere political opportunist willing to sell his intellectual independence to the highest bidder. In his introduction, Grandin declares that the focus of his work is not on Kissinger’s “outsized personality” but his effect on the contemporary world that accepts war as a more or less permanent state of affairs. The former is a sweeping, penetrating effort to hold Kissinger accountable for his sins and trace them to their ideological origins the latter, the first of two projected volumes, is a combination of first-rate biography and hagiography. The latest offerings in the struggle over Kissinger’s legacy are Greg Grandin’s Kissinger’s Shadow: The Long Reach of America’s Most Controversial Statesman and Niall Ferguson’s Kissinger, 1923–1968: The Idealist. It included a single sentence of criticism which elicited a nine-page, single-spaced rebuttal. George Ball told me that he had once written a laudatory review of one of Kissinger’s books. I suspect, given my historiographical acquaintance with him, that nothing pleases him more, although he probably could do without the criticism. Operation Peter Pan brings Cuban children to the US.No figure in the history of contemporary American foreign policy has gotten more ink than Henry A. US announces removal of the last Soviet missiles from Cuba. He accepts Kennedy’s pledge not to invade Cuba. Kennedy agrees to remove missiles from Turkey. Khrushchev agrees to remove Soviet missiles. Kennedy proposes removal of Soviet missiles from Cuba under United Nations supervision and guarantee that US would not attack Cuba. Kennedy ignores first message and responds to second message. US U-2F shot down with surface-to-air missile near Banes, Cuba. Khrushchev sends message to Kennedy that deal must include removal of US Jupiter missiles from Turkey. Soviets offer to withdraw missiles in return for a US guarantee to not invade Cuba. Kennedy orders flights over Cuba to increase from once to twice per day. Soviet Union Premier Nikita Khrushchev responds to Kennedy’s message that the US blockade was an “act of aggression.” Refuses to remove missiles from Cuba. Khrushchev orders Soviet ships to stop 750 miles from Cuba. Kennedy addresses the public and announces a naval blockade of Cuba. U-2 photos show medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) and intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) launch pads under construction.Įx-Comm, group of American political leaders, discuss Cuban quarantine. U-2 spy plane photos verify service-to-air missile (SAM) site under construction in La Coloma, Cuba. Cuba expelled from the Organization of the American States (OAS).Ĭastro indicates Cuba will soon have new defenses against the US.Ĭastro allows Union of Soviet Socialist Republics(USSR) nuclear missiles on Cuba.
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