An introduction to the diaries of George F. Kennan
Here is an arms-control plan, based on a new nuclear strategy, that requires no negotiations, no treaties, and no verification—a plan that the United States and its allies, taking arms control into their own hands, can implement unilaterally, thereby immediately reducing the risk of a nuclear confrontation.
What has caused the deterioration of relations between the United States and the Soviet Union since 1974? George F. Kennan argues that it has had less to do with external reality than with the shifting impulses of the American political establishment. Mr. Kennan, a Foreign Service officer for twenty-six years and a former ambassador to the Soviet Union and to Yugoslavia, is one of the leading Western scholars of Russian affairs. He is the author of numerous books, including Realities of American foreign Policy, Russia and the West Under Lenin and Stalin, and The Nuclear Delusion, and has won two Pulitzer Prizes and two National Book Awards. He is now professor emeritus at the Institute for Advanced Study, at Princeton University.
Diplomat and historian , GEORGE F. KENNAN entered our Foreign Service in 1926 following his graduation from Princeton. He served as a Russian-speaking aide to Ambassador Bullitt from 1933 to 1935; was in Prague at the time of the Czechoslovakia subjugation, in Berlin until Pearl Harbor; and was our ambassador to Moscow from 1952 to 1953 and to Yugoslavia from 1961 to 1963.
The paper which follows has been drawn from GEORGE F. KENNAN’S new book, RUSSIA AND THE WEST UNDER LENIN AND STALIN, the Book-of-the-Month Club selection for dune. Mr. Kennan entered the Foreign Service in 1926, following his graduation from Princeton. He was the invaluable Russian-speaking aide to Ambassador Bullitt in Moscow from 1933 to 1935, was in Prague at the time of Czechoslovakia’s disintegration, in Berlin until Pearl Harbor, and was our Ambassador to Moscow from 1952 to 1953. One of our most authoritative scholars of the Soviet system, he is today the Ambassador to Yugoslavia.
Speaking as a Presbyterian and also as a diplomat who has served in Berlin, Vienna, Prague, Riga, Lisbon, Moscow, and Washington, George F. Kennan addresses the Christian responsibility in international life
During his recent residence in England, GEORGE KENNAN, our former ambassador to Russia, found himself obliged on sacral occasions to explain to European audiences the reasons for the American participation in the Allied intervention in Russia in 1918-1920. The following article represents the result of recent researches into an episode that was long surrounded by confusion and obscurity.
Each year the Atlantic takes its pick of the more notable commencement addresses, and this year we are proud to print the words spoken by GEORGE F. KENNAN to the seniors of Radcliffe College. A former ambassador, who spent many years in Russia, a former policy-maker of our Slate Department, Mr. Kennan knows full well the necessity of national security. He also knows the risks we run if we attempt to establish internal policing which parallels that of the police state.
AMBASSADOR GEORGE F. KENNAN,who was expelled from Moscow in 1952 by the Kremlin, has a profound knowledge of Germany, Russia, and the borderlands between. He entered the Foreign Service in 1926, following his graduation from Princeton. His first assignments took him to Switzerland, Germany, Estonia, and Latvia, after which he pursued Russian studies for two years at the University of Berlin. From 1933 to 1935 he was the invaluable Russian-speaking Aide to Ambassador Bullitt in Moscow, and remained there until 1937. In 1938 and 1939 he was in Prague, where he witnessed the disintegration of Czechoslovakia under the Nazi pressures. The war years were spent in Berlin, Lisbon, London, and again — Moscow. In 1947, Secretary Marshall appointed Mr. Kennan his “diplomatic chief-of-staff.” Speaking to the Princeton alumni in February, he made these recommendations for the training of young diplomats and students of international affairs.