Diplomacy

Originating with the diplomat George Kennan, who used the term in his 1946 “Long Telegram” to the State Department offering an explanation of Soviet motives, containment came to describe the overall American strategy during the Cold War. Rather than accommodate the Soviet Union, and appease its penchant for expansionism, or seek to roll back Soviet gains in Eastern Europe and run the risk of nuclear war, the US used containment as a moderate approach that aimed to check Soviet ambitions in areas of vital interest while waiting for the flaws within their own system to manifest. Containment often struggled with problems of credibility, as it left the adversary the choice of where to aggress, and nuclear deterrence frequently led to disagreements between the US and its European allies, where a war was likely to occur. Yet containment prevailed, in many different varieties, through the end of the Cold War, when the Soviet Union did in fact collapse under its own weight.

From the French for “relaxing,” détente refers to the easing of tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It came into prominence during the presidency of Richard Nixon, who championed a more cooperative attitude with the Soviets in order to achieve arms control, facilitate the American exit from Vietnam, and join efforts to secure peace in the Middle East. Détente was a subject of fierce criticism, especially from conservatives and hawkish liberals who regarded Nixon as selling out to the Soviet adversary. It came to an end with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 but provided a template for Ronald Reagan, a former détente critic, to end the Cold War on peaceful terms.

Founded in the year 800 CE under the king Charlemagne, the Holy Roman Empire for much of European history was a patchwork series of territories across the modern states of Germany, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Czechia, and parts of Poland and western France. The rulers of each of its territories were known as “electors” for their power to vote for an emperor, an office with which they shared power. The empire was torn apart by the Protestant Reformation, which proved especially powerful in Germany. It managed to survive until 1806, when Napoleon conquered its remaining states. The great French satirist Voltaire once joked that it was “in no way holy, nor Roman, nor an empire.” Much of modern Europe came out of this empire and the aftermath of its dissolution and Napoleon’s conquest of its remaining states. Kissinger uses the end of the empire as the base with which to begin his book.