to henry kissinger. you need to look at that relationship to they because they guess the key to understanding what was really going down and his relationship to kramer. nixon never ever understands the relationship. he is putting stars on hage as could, the fastest in history to reach for stars and he doesn't understand. he thinks the relationship is a friend kissinger who is a right-winger who sends memos. he does not know that clamour is actively working with hage to try and implement his ideology or to slow nixon down and then there's the kramer who is part of the bush administration in the defense department. kramer's son plays an active role with the nsc during all this and he will be able to follow his role. i am not 100% sure, i think he was, maybe the source of the words evil empire in that speech. he went and the times to get on with general hannig and had exactly the same views as general heggs so there's a lot new. there is a lot new for you to read, a lot of for you to learn about it more dis

kissinger's accent.i can't fall for this. i just have to not saying anything. and kissinger said, even a hundred years war have to admit and at some point. i will come to your party. people in nations that have been permanent friends or enemies, only permanent interests. that said, having gone through the process with dr. kissinger, i decided next time around to write about somebody who had been dead for 200 years. that was dr. franklin. i wanted to read about the realism and american foreign policy because kissinger, for all of this controversy that he wrote, was the greatest we list or realpolitik thinker, understanding balance of power, understanding the forces of influence, not been caught up by sentimentality or emotional assemblages figuring out national interest. the only person who did a equally well as benjamin franklin, who was her envoy in paris, was able to do the quintessential great american theme when american foreign policy works which is two we then interest with idealism. so besides wri

in those days daniel bissell was a public member, kissinger was a member. a great french strategist was a member, and they would occasionally come to court on hudson to comment on the work that hudson was going to offer their insights. and so he maintained friendly relations with many of them. obviously, he shared some concern about academic over specialization and they need to really step back and look at things in the broadest possible perspective, which i think some of his academic colleagues were honestly failing to do that they had sort of had some academics suffered from what kahn suffered from what he called focusing on specialized areas. so kahn was clearly a admirer of these individuals but was suspicious of academics to some degree, perhaps rightfully so. >> thank you. can you hear me? iq. when i walked into the room today, i said to ken, is there anybody else here who was with herman kahn, and he thought not that -- summary also also? what's your name? [inaudible] >> so i did not prepare anything. but ken said he would welcome. i said i would say

think of-ry kissinger, henry, he dated the likes or is it the looks of jill st. john and who confessed, bragged, that power is the greatest aphrodisiac. or take dennis kucinich. who has won the statuesque elizabeth. and geeks, do not despair. you can get the upgrade. just get yourself to washington. when we come back, we're going to ask those four national security reporters to give us the straight scoop. has president obama shown enough of a command presence, meaning real control of the government bureaucracy in fighting this war? plus scoops and predictions from the notebooks of these top reporters. we'll be right back. chris: welcome back. the obama administration is ending its first year under huge pressure on the security front. some from past administrations are on record doubting this team has the right focus. here's former attorney general michael mukasey in "the wall street journal" this week. some in the executive branch are focused more on not sounding like their predecessors than in finding a neutralizing people who believe it is their religious duty

walter isaacson written terrific biographies of ben franklin and henry kissinger. robert carol, two pulitzer prizes along with numerous others awards. author of the amazing three volume biography of lyndon johnson. peggy noonan ronald reagan's chief speechwriter. then a terrific book about those years. "what i saw at the revolution." mel painter, a priceton university historian and author of "creating black americans: history of african-americans over the last 400 years." that was white a mouthful. peggy, when you were in the white house with ronald reagan, at the end of the first year i think people would have talked about optimism, confidence, things like that. what do you think people will say with this first year? >> i think this first year of obama, i think history will probably look back on it as an attempt to change the face of america in the world, which so far appears to be a good beginning, coupled with, i think, a serious domestic misstep with regard to focusing on certain issues that were not the great issues the american people were focused on when the

the story about henry kissinger asking what to think of the french religion, and he says it's too early to say. and it's a nice tour because i think it does capture a kind of civilization state way of thinking, which is in a different sense of time, different notion of time. and i'm very struck by the way the chinese have conceived of, you know, their rise. i mean, by and large, they are playing for time i think. while the outgrowing actually every relationship that china is involved it is moving with time in a more favorable direction. japan, well, if china continues to grow like this for another 20, 10, 15 years, strong voice, doesn't have to be at the present rate, but six to 8%, then japan will be in a different relationship to china. and i think it does view its relationships, likewise the relationship with the united states. it's certainly been true in the region. so they do, i think they are very patient, and they play very long game. but i don't mean that in a kind of, i don't think that's just a kind of ploy. i think that's a cultural facet of the way the chinese think. on your

secondly, both obama as well as kissinger have articulated a vision after nuclear free world. in your judgment, how doable is it? can we put the genie back in the bottle? untrain, develop a system for testing cheating that could lead to that sort of vision? >> yeah, the case of the hitler question, what i said is that nuclear weapons haven't made any difference in history, at least since world war ii. however, not the same as saying they couldn't. one reason for getting nuclear weapons, you might say, and i say this in the back, is to hedge against the possibility of the rise of another diabolical, extremely clever, very lucky monster like hitler. i don't see that on the horizon and so forth. and saddam hussein is not in that category. but you might want to, that seems reasonable to me. i'm not saying they wouldn't make any difference. not likely they will, but it could. to the second question, i'm not sure that you need agreement. first place you are going to have the argument, we have to have some in case of the horrible thing happening. obviously if you get rid of nuclear w

stanley kubrick drawn upon a composite, henry kissinger and werner von brunn and the scientist and thether of the hydrogen bomb among histories but more than anyone else kubrick cited herman kahn in the movie. that is to say some of kahn's thought experiments -- and these were potential scenarios, thought experiments, devices as kahn put it designed to expand the mind and to eliminate the kind of conundrums policymakers had to think when they had to imagine what the future might look like. and one of these devices was -- as he called it was the doomsday machine, a kahn thought experiment about a device who's only purpose was to destroy all life. and it was essentially designed to teach military strategists the limits to what an ideal and fully capable deterrent could do. he's never meant as a real concept and almost immediately after raising this thought experiment of this fully capable deterrent on thermonuclear war kahn explains why it's an acceptable but kubrick instead shows literally to cite verbatim passages from a book talking about the doomsday machine which he noted was based

henry kissinger challenged that at a conference we ran and csis in 1979, he challenged its undersecretary of defense. ronald reagan, jim watkins, admiral watkins was in the room when ronald reagan moved towards seeking strategic defense initiative as a flanking maneuver as a way out. burke has something going for him in adding agility, which we lost. in the strategy. he ended a second term as cno. burke stated it was obviously time for him to retire. ike would have none of it. it was his third time however and you was disappointed with himself and his own leadership. he opened up to me here at csis was a failure to the bay of pigs. he felt he had let himself down. he felt he had not performed the way he had performed previously. he went over this privately with me again and again. he would never write it up because he said he didn't want to hurt anybody now that it was over. he served as acting chairman of the joint chiefs during this period. he would be invited into these meetings, allowed to take no note and b. and criminal change made, no capability or allies whether this was a work of

secondly, both obama as well as henry kissinger and schultz and others as you know have articulated a vision of a nuclear-free world. in your judgment, how doable is it. can we put the genie back in the bottle, untrain nuclear scientists, develop a system for detecting cheating, et cetera, et cetera that could lead to the vision. >> the case of the hitler question, what i've said is that nuclear weapons haven't made any difference in history at least since world war ii. however, not the same as saying they couldn't make any difference. so that one reason for getting nuclear weapons you might say, and i say this in the book is to hedge against the possibility of the rise of another diabolical extremely clever, very lucky monster like hitler someplace. i don't see any of the little hitlers aren't in that category. but that seems reasonable to me. i'm not saying they couldn't make any difference but as far as i can see they haven't and it seems very unlikely they will but they could. in terms of the zero option, with schultz, et cetera, i don't -- i mean, i'm not sure that you need agree

henry kissinger challenged that at the conference we ran.elligible] ronald reagan, jim watkins, he was in the room when ronald reagan moved toward seeking strategic defense initiative as a flanking maneuver as a way out. burke had something going for him in adding agility which we lost. he ended his second term as cno. burke stated it was time for him to retireike -- for him to retire. ike would have none of it. he opened up to me here at csis was the failure of the bay of pigs. he felt he let himself down. he felt he had not performed the way he had performed previously. he went over this privately with me again. he would never write it up because he did not want to hurt anybody now that it was over. he served as acting chairman of the joint chiefs. he would be invited into these meetings and a lab to take no notes and there would be changes made and no capability to analyze whether this was a workable operation or not. burke regretted he did not go to president kennedy to blow the whistle. this will not work with all these compromises. whe

kissinger senior fellow and a bed -- and a board member of the new american foundation.e is a distinguished fellow at yale. that is a big title. he writes regularly for "the new york times," "the l.a. times," and others. his most recent book is "god and gold." "american foreign policy and how it changed the world" receive the prize in 2002 and "god and gold" to him that last year or the year before. john is the albert milbank professor at princeton and the co-director of the princeton project on national security and has been a transatlantic fellow and has served on the policy planning staff of the state department and has written several books. richard is a resident fellow. he was chairman of the defense policy board and assisted the secretary of defense during the reagan administration. stephen is the second of our telephone speakers is a professor of natural relations -- national relations. he has written six books and dozens of journal articles. he writes and publishes the political blog "the washington note," and appears regularly on television and radio. he was the