The first thing is of course to study hard. Kissinger is a student who loves reading very much. His classmates recalled that Kissinger was very serious, sitting in a thick and soft chair, studying from morning till night, biting his nails while learning. When his nails were bitten off, he bit the meat below, and then he bit and bled. You can make up this picture yourself. Kissinger was very excited when he was writing his undergraduate thesis. His undergraduate thesis is entitled The True Meaning of History.
It is uncertain how well this paper is written, but it is the longest paper ever written by an undergraduate at Harvard University, with 388 pages, which is the length after deleting a large section about philosophers such as Hegel. In this paper, Kissinger told all the books he had read, so that Harvard University had to make special provisions, the so-called "Kissinger's Law". Kissinger's Law stipulates that the graduation thesis of Harvard undergraduates should not exceed 35,000 words or 140 pages in the future.
? (2) Identify your interests as soon as possible.
Ferguson said that people are confused about why Kissinger is interested in history, but he did not study history, but studied administration. Administration doesn't sound nobler than history. This shows that Kissinger is a very pragmatic person. He doesn't want to sit in his study all his life, but he still wants to do something practical. After he graduated from the doctor's degree, he obviously got the letter of appointment from the University of Chicago, but he refused to go anyway because he thought very clearly. Although the University of Chicago has a high academic status, the road to Washington passes through Harvard. At the University of Chicago, getting into politics is not that easy.
(3) Find a suitable tutor.
This is what people are very curious about. Kissinger, a German, was very interested in German problems, but he didn't choose karl friedrich as his mentor. Friedrich is the main authority of modern German studies, and Kissinger's mentor William Young Del Eliot is a typical American southerner. He was a lieutenant in the artillery force during World War I and studied at the University of Paris, Vanderbilt University and Oxford University. What attracted Kissinger may not only be Eliot's thoughts, but his enthusiasm for politics. Eliot participated in Roosevelt's New Deal and served as an adviser to Eisenhower. He advocated early that the United States should be prepared to resist the fascist aggression of Germany, Italy and Japan, which made Harvard students who advocated non-interventionism very angry at that time. Professor Eliot was proved right afterwards.
When Kissinger first visited Eliot, Eliot was not interested in him. He just said that he was too busy. He told Kissinger that you should go back and read Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, and then go to him. Kissinger was never trained in philosophy. It took him half a semester to finish a paper, but when Eliot read this paper, he suddenly discovered Kissinger's talent, and he guided Kissinger to read all kinds of classic works. When Kissinger was a senior in college, Professor Eliot asked him to make suggestions on his manuscript.
(4) Adapt to the survival rules of academic circles as soon as possible.
Kissinger has been following Professor Eliot, and he began to mix academic circles very early. Learning is also a Jianghu, and there are many survival rules. Kissinger has a good grasp of some rules, but he doesn't care much about others, so he has always been a controversial figure. After graduating from undergraduate course, Kissinger helped Professor Eliot chair a summer seminar on international issues, and invited 30 or 40 young leaders from all over the world to Harvard for further study every holiday. Later, many dignitaries emerged from these students. Kissinger also ran a magazine called confluence, and invited many celebrities to write articles. Facts have proved that these practices not only exercised his talents, but also helped him quickly establish his own social network.
(5) Be sensitive to the changes of the times.
When Kissinger graduated, the Korean War broke out. After that, although Kissinger was busy studying for a doctorate at school, he never forgot to pay attention to current events. He once did a special study on nuclear weapons for the American Council on Foreign Relations, and later published a book entitled Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy. This book received a good response, and the young Dr. Kissinger soon became the most important nuclear strategy expert in the United States, and even Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, praised this book. Why is this book so popular? An important reason is that the topic is good.
(1) There is no need to make friends in universities.
Many people think that you have to make friends when you go to college, especially when you go to a prestigious school like Harvard or Peking University, and you have to rely on alumni resources in the future.
This is a misunderstanding. Many young people did make best friends in college, but Kissinger didn't. The reporter once interviewed his Harvard classmates and found that he didn't have particularly good friends during his college years. Others say that he is not liked at all. This may be because Kissinger is an older veteran and a poor child, which is incompatible with Harvard's aristocratic temperament. He prefers to find his comrades in the army. But it also tells us that there is no need to spend too much energy to make friends at school.
(2) There is no need to be the first in the university.
Although Kissinger worked hard and achieved excellent results, he was not the best. At Harvard University, he is definitely not an eye-catching star. Although he was recommended by his tutor, Kissinger was not selected as an academic elite group until his senior year, that is, the Harvard branch of the honor society of American universities. This shows that the person who is most likely to succeed is not the first in every exam, but the students who easily get into the top ten or so in the class.
(3) There is no need to pay too much attention to the topic of your thesis.
Kissinger's undergraduate thesis is about the philosophy of history, especially about why the famous historians Spengler and Toynbee are wrong and why Kant is right. The theme he wants to discuss is: how to treat the contradiction between historical determinism and our will as individuals with free will in human society. Kissinger's doctoral thesis is mainly about German Chancellor metternich. Many people say that this is because Kissinger worships metternich very much, which is a misunderstanding. In fact, if Kissinger didn't become a celebrity in the future, no one would read this book written by metternich.
(4) There is no need to follow suit.
What I want to say is the topic of Kissinger's thesis. From these two topics, we can know that the most important thing in writing a thesis is to exercise your thinking ability. You don't need to follow the trend when writing a paper, because the trend will rise and fall, but your analytical ability and judgment ability will be invincible when dealing with various problems in the future.
(5) There is no need for an academic road to go dark.
Judging from Kissinger's experience, we don't need to plan all the life paths in advance. If you really want to learn, what Kissinger has to do is very simple, nothing more than issuing papers, evaluating professional titles, and promoting step by step. But even if he succeeds in being promoted to a professor at Harvard University, so what? If Kissinger chooses the academic road and goes all the way to the dark, he will never have those exciting experiences again.
As soon as President Kennedy took office, he recruited a group of elites, most of whom came from Harvard University. Dr Kissinger of Harvard University and McGeorge· Band-Aid, Dean of Harvard College of Arts and Sciences, are close friends and national security advisers of Kennedy. Kissinger's good friend and Harvard colleague Schlesinger Jr also received a letter of appointment from the White House. He is inevitably jealous. Suddenly, one day, when Kissinger stayed in a luxury villa in Rockefeller, he received a letter from a band-aid. The Band-Aid invited him to be the foreign policy adviser in charge of nuclear weapons and Germany.
If you were Kissinger, how would you reply to this letter? Kissinger was certainly happy, but he was also cautious. He politely declined the full-time job and offered to do it part-time. Kissinger's excuse was to teach at Harvard, but what he really worried about was that Rockefeller was unhappy. I didn't expect Rockefeller to say that he was too mother-in-law. Rockefeller advised him that he could take any position as long as he could really make a contribution, which made Kissinger admire and shocked.
If you were a band-aid, what would you say to Kissinger? One of the tasks of the band-aid is to invite heroes from all walks of life as much as possible to help Kennedy make suggestions. Kennedy dissolved the complicated bureaucratic system during President Eisenhower's time, mainly relying on his own small circle. Most of these consultants are Harvard elites, and the media call them "prodigies". Kissinger is also a close confidant of Harvard Band-Aid. However, Kennedy suggested hiring Kissinger full-time, but Band-Aid argued that Kissinger should only be given a part-time job. So why didn't the band-aid reuse Kissinger?
Kissinger's talent is obvious to all. Kissinger went to Europe as a consultant to meet German Chancellor Angela Adenauer. Adenauer is one of the greatest politicians in Europe, but he just doesn't trust the American government. American embassy officials who accompanied Kissinger to Adenauer were surprised to find that Kissinger easily achieved what a full-time diplomat could not. His words reassured Adenauer. Adenauer said that what he heard in Washington was too empty, while what Kissinger said was much more specific and comforting.
Strangely, Kissinger just can't be reused by President Kennedy. He spent most of his time in Boston instead of Washington. Occasionally, CIA reporters will send top secret information and put it in a safe specially bought in the office. As soon as President Kennedy took office, he encountered many diplomatic crises. First, the Berlin crisis, American tanks and Soviet tanks face to face. Both sides are armed with live ammunition, only about 146 meters apart, and may go off at any time. Then there was the Cuban crisis. The Soviet Union deployed a number of medium-and long-range missiles in Cuba, and World War III was imminent. Dave Bowles, Special Assistant to the President, had dinner with the President. He thought it was his last supper. Defense Secretary McNamara remembers walking out of the White House and enjoying the sunset. He thinks this is the last Saturday in his life.
A senior adviser of the Soviet Kremlin and his wife called and told her "Don't take anything and leave Moscow at once". Kissinger knew nothing about it. While his former colleagues are trying to deal with the threat of World War III, Kissinger is negotiating salary with a group of "female soldiers" of Rockefeller's research team.
This may be the earliest political lesson Kissinger learned. He always complains that the band-aid doesn't trust him and never lets him participate in real decision-making. The contradiction between them even developed to President Kennedy. He finally realized that this is not a band-aid and his own grievances, but is determined by the rules of the political game.
Being in politics is like driving on the expressway. The speed of this expressway can reach150km, or even higher. Suddenly, two forks in the road appear in front of you. One is called Rockefeller Avenue and the other is called Kennedy Avenue. What would you do? Can you stop the car, check the map, find the location with GPS, and then choose a better road? No, the traffic rule on the political expressway is that you can't step on the brakes when you meet a fork in the road, you can only step on the accelerator and make your own choice in an instant, with no chance to turn back. What should I do if I drive to the end and find myself driving on a broken road? There is no way, because there is no exit on expressway. This is the first lesson of realistic politics that Kissinger learned when he entered politics.
But then again. Happiness depends on misfortune. If Kissinger is really reused by Kennedy, it may not be a good thing for him. Kissinger was still a young intellectual full of idealism at that time, and had no deep insight into the complexity and danger of politics. On the Berlin issue, if you listen to Kissinger, maybe a big war will break out between the United States and the Soviet Union, but if you listen to Kennedy, you can maintain peace by compromise and behind-the-scenes transactions, in a seemingly disgraceful and idiotic way.
For Kissinger, Nixon's victory made him feel sad, and he was still a loyal supporter of Rockefeller.
Kissinger still hasn't lost confidence in politics. His idea was that Nixon might appoint Rockefeller, but it backfired. Nixon didn't invite Rockefeller, but invited Kissinger to come to new york to discuss "his position in the new government". Kissinger returned to new york, and White House representative Mitchell asked him, would you like to be a national security adviser? Kissinger is a complete idiot.
Why did Nixon have a crush on Kissinger?
One possibility is that Kissinger ran around on the Vietnam issue, looking for channels for peace talks. If Nixon invited Kissinger, the Vietnam problem could be solved as soon as possible.
Another way of saying it is that Kissinger leaked the information about the peace talks with Vietnam to Nixon so that Nixon could take the lead in the election. This statement is also unreliable. Kissinger doesn't have much information, and he is not the only secret channel for communication between the United States and Vietnam. Besides, with Nixon's cunning and suspicious character, even if Kissinger tipped him off, Nixon might not listen.
What really attracted Nixon was a report written by Kissinger to the new president. This report was drafted by Kissinger and his Harvard colleagues, and it mainly talks about how to improve the efficiency of government decision-making. Both Kissinger and Nixon believed that the Johnson administration was caught in the Vietnam War because the foreign policy-making machine was out of order.
Interestingly, in this report written by Kissinger and his colleagues to the new president, it is specifically mentioned that three positions should be given priority: Minister of Affairs, Press Secretary and "National Security Liaison and Adviser". Speaking of the third post, that is, Kissinger's national security adviser, this report specifically mentioned that Nixon should pay attention to the possible friction between the people in this post and the State Council. The State Council in Kennedy and Johnson administrations lacked confidence, communication and team spirit, which led to bureaucracy and departmentalism in decision-making, and finally made a big mistake. Ferguson's comment is: Kissinger may not fully realize that he and his colleague * * * wrote the most brilliant application letter in the history of American foreign policy.
When Nixon appointed Kissinger, he made it clear that Kissinger's duties were different from those of previous national security advisers such as Rostow and Band-Aids. His first task is to "completely reorganize the work of the National Security Council" and let the National Security Council make more emergency plans. "Don't wait until things happen before taking action."
Nixon himself did not think that he had found the treasure by appointing Kissinger. Although we can't overestimate Kissinger's role in solving the Vietnam issue, it was Kissinger and Nixon who jointly achieved the "ice-breaking" of US-China relations, which is a rare stroke in the history of modern diplomacy.
Interestingly, the idea of Lianhua resisting the Soviet Union was actually inspired by Kissinger from a Czech diplomat. The Czech diplomat tentatively asked Kissinger if he thought the United States and China would reach some kind of agreement. Kissinger didn't know what medicine he was selling, so he said quietly that every country wanted to establish diplomatic relations with as many countries as possible.
The Czech diplomat is more worried. He is worried that once the United States and China reconcile, the Soviet Union will worry about being isolated. If the Soviet Union is worried about being isolated, it will inevitably increase its crackdown on Eastern European countries. The speaker has no intention, but the listener has a heart. These words of Czech diplomats lit up Kissinger's thinking. Although Kissinger is famous as a strategic master, his views on the general trend of the world are actually not as profound as those of Czech diplomats. Small countries worry about risks from all directions every day and ponder all the possibilities. This is a rule: the real diplomatic master is actually a big shot in a small country, such as Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore.
Niall ferguson and Kissinger: Idealists.
The book we have just finished reading is Kissinger: The Idealist by the famous British writer Ferguson. He was born in Kissinger and wrote that Kissinger was the national security adviser of President Nixon in 1969. Ferguson divided Kissinger's growth experience into five stages.
The first stage is that Kissinger experienced German tyranny when he was young, appreciated American democracy and participated in the Second World War.
The second stage was his initial contact with philosophical idealism and historical knowledge at Harvard University, and he began to set foot in the new field of nuclear strategy, and soon became an academic star.
In the third stage, during Kennedy's administration, Kissinger became a part-time "assistant", and he learned a painful lesson from the political reality of DC.
In the fourth stage, Kissinger realized that the biggest international challenge facing the United States was the Vietnam issue, and he devoted himself to the new Vietnam War. In this process, he realized the true inside story of policy decision-making and the chaotic and pessimistic situation of Vietnam War.
In the fifth stage, Kissinger was unexpectedly appointed as national security adviser by Nixon. When he wanted it, he didn't. When he didn't want it, the power he dreamed of suddenly came.
We read this book not only to learn from Kissinger's successful experience. I also want you to learn to observe history. Kissinger's greatest talent is not philosophical speculation or dealing with people, but his special insight into history. Kissinger said: "You must know what kind of history is relevant. You must know what kind of history can be used for reference. " In his view, the failure of President Johnson's Vietnam policy is due to the ignorance of history of the President himself, his advisers and the "little soldiers" who fought in Vietnam. No one in the whole chain of command seems to realize that we can learn from history.
Kissinger's view of history is not a simple copy. His trick is: "any connection between two historical events does not depend on the exact correspondence, but on the similarity of the problems they face", because "historical lessons should be extrapolated, not sought for consistency". Understanding the historical background is indispensable for studying foreign affairs. In particular, history can be understood as "national memory" because a nation wants to identify itself through its cognition of history. Therefore, historical research is a guide to understanding other countries.
Auxiliary books
If you are still not satisfied after reading this biography of Kissinger's "Half Book", you can also look at Isaacson's "Kissinger: Behind the Game of Great Powers". Kissinger himself has many books, such as On China recently published, World Order and Great Diplomacy written before, all of which are voluminous, but they are all worth reading.