kennan was 95.he was still writing op-ed pieces in the "new york times," still giving some lectures. he published a small book, a history of the kennan family, which he had researched in many small archives across new york and new england and other states. but he writes the unquestionable decline of my own powers, intellectual powers, but beyond that, going into the personal, the inability to confront the small distractions of life, the decline of memory, and the limit of concentration. i see myself surrounded in this house by great prizes, demands upon me, demands i don't see in myself the power to cope with. many of these arrive with expectations, things i have done in the past, coming from people who have no idea of the innerworkings of old age. r.i.m in effect a victim of my own past. i am sure,of this, that i have lived too long, i have outlived myself. by so many,ietly "you look all right." [laughter] i try, in the face of all of this, to do my best, but it is not good enough, and the wearines

we at the kennan institute were enormously pleased to have found nina. really it wasn't as supporting nina but her work supporting the mission at a really difficult time for talking and thinking seriously about russia, ukraine, former soviet region issues and anything that had a whiff of election interference. you all know very well, i can imagine england on this call hasn't noticed you can't open your mouth and have a conversation about what's happening in that part of the world without it becoming about american politics. nina comes along with just a doggedly i would say clear commitment to the idea that you can work on this topic and not have it just american domestic politics or some other kind of political agenda. i want to offer a few further thoughts about why this book is so worthwhile to pick up and read. i have read it and really enjoyed and benefited from it, why the kennan institute was so important to support nina and her work. first is that there's something almost metaphorically perfect about the fact that nina again as a canon fell and wa

and on american history tv, historian -- historian frank costigliola talks about his book "the kennaniaries." mr.

suddenly we don't want to hear from him more because he's not the only want you can mind you had george kennan claiming he was architect of the containment policy is hell reduce on a great thinkers in america or what happened after in 1900 he said nato expansion is an assault against russia it will start a new cold war it is the worst thing that could possibly do on the father's holds in their graves and oh he has essentially disappeared way we did not want to hear from you know this in a more and you can also say the same of jack matlock he was the last ambassador to the disobeyed union under reagan but also bush and. he said just as a credit for this difficulty go shisha no ending the cold war which was then announced to be over in $1009.00 but then of course where what he was critical about this when he rewrite the later on say you know actually the cold war was a one why would we hear from the guy who negotiated the end of the cold war when we actually won it instead so he was also house a little bit away with all this great experience to how to understand your opponent and really lay the

suddenly we don't want to hear from him more because he's not the only want you can mind you had george kennan when he was architect of the containment policy is held reduced on a great thinkers in america or what happened after in 1900 he said nato expansion is an assault against russia and it will start a new cold war it is the worst thing that could possibly do on the father's holds in their graves and oh he has essentially disappeared where we did not want to hear from you know this in a more and you can also say the same of jack matlock he was the last ambassador to the disobeyed union under reagan but also bush and. he said just as a credit for this difficulty go shisha know ending the cold war which was then announced to be over in $1009.00 but then of course where well what he was critical about this when he rewrite the glitter and say you know actually the cold war was won why would we hear from the guy who negotiated the end of the cold war when we actually won it instead so he was also house a little bit away with all this great experience to how to understand your opponent and real

diplomatic finger wagging and what is enormously refreshing and if i may say so fundamentally george s kennan about what nina has written is that it is self-critical about the way that we are not resilient in the face of challenges that are going to be there whether there's a vladimir putin behind them or there isn't so i find that very refreshing. it's an unfortunate description of an unfortunate reality but it isn't that since very refreshing so i want to give the floor to asha and then we will. took questions from jane and questions from our audience out there. >> thank you matt. i wanted to just pick up where you left off in terms of why this book is really important to america's understanding of this problem which i think is stymied for 3 main reasons i would say in this book really addresses all three of those . the first is that as nina points out in her book, this is not america's first rodeo with disinformation coming from russia. this was the kgb's tempo. the house had hearings about this in 19 need to . we've looked at this but largely with the fall of the soviet union we thought i