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Henry Kissinger Facts

Henry Kissinger Facts
Henry Kissinger is an American diplomat, politician, statesman, and businessman who served as the National Security Advisor for presidents Richard Nixon and Henry Ford during the 1970s. While serving as advisor to those presidents, Kissinger steered the government toward some controversial and sometimes seemingly contradictory policies. He believed in taking a hardline against communist regimes and insurgencies in the Third World, to the point where he advocated supporting right-wing governments accused of human rights violations. Kissinger partly brought about the Soviet-American détente of the 1970s, "opened" China, and negotiated a cease fire in the Vietnam War, although it was later broken. He was born Heinz Alfred Kissinger in Fürth, Germany on May 27, 1923 to Louis and Paula Kissinger. The Kissingers fled Germany for the United States after Hitler and the National Socialists came to power, with Henry spending most of his teen years in New York City. He served in the U.S. Army during World War II in the intelligence section, translating classified German documents and messages. After the war he earned a BA in political science from Harvard in 1950 and a PhD also from Harvard in 1954. He has been married twice and has two children from his first marriage.
Interesting Henry Kissinger Facts:
Kissinger is Jewish, which is why his family left Germany in the 1930s.
Despite living most of his life in the United States and speaking fluent English, he never lost his German accent.
One of Kissinger's first notable and important positions was with the Council on Foreign Relations think tank during the 1950s.
Kissinger served as Secretary of State for both Nixon and Ford.
Although an avowed anti-communist, Kissinger was a practitioner of realpolitik, meaning that if it was in the United States' interest to cooperate with a communist nation than it should do so.
Kissinger help negotiate a lasting peace settlement between Egypt and Israel after the Yom Kippur War in 1973. Many historians attribute his efforts to Egyptian President Anwar Sadat's move away from the Soviet Union.
He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating the Paris Peace Accords in 1973, which temporarily ended hostilities in the Vietnam War. After Saigon fell to the communists in 1975, Kissinger attempted to return the award.
Kissinger is a lifelong member of the Republican Party.
He played a major role in the CIA's coup that ousted democratically elected Chilean President Salvador Allende from power in 1973.
After President Ford lost to then Governor Jimmy Carter in the 1976 presidential election, Kissinger went back to working for think tanks, such as the Trilateral Commission, and also taught and wrote extensively.
In the post-Cold War world Kissinger's legacy has been mixed. Many on the left, especially the more far-left, view Kissinger as a war criminal for his support of repressive regimes, especially in Latin America. Neoconservatives generally view Kissinger favorably, but some on the far-right and the emerging populist right see him as a globalist and elitist.


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