He applied the "Page 99 Test" to his new book, America's Cold Warrior: Paul Nitze and National Security from Roosevelt to Reagan, and reported the following:
Page 99 of my book describes Paul Nitze’s takeaway from his work on the 1957 report “Deterrence and Survival in the Nuclear Age” (the Gaither Report), and a meeting with President Dwight Eisenhower and Secretary of State John Foster Dulles in which Nitze failed to persuade them to take drastic action.Learn more about America's Cold Warrior at the Cornell University Press website.
Should you read only page 99 of this book, I think you would get a good sense of what mattered to Paul Nitze. He believed in superior U.S. military capabilities to deter foreign attacks, and that nothing was so provocative to the Soviet Union as U.S. weakness. And he did not hesitate to tell anyone that they were wrong.
There is a quote on page 99 that sums up Nitze’s personality and his approach to individuals—however powerful—who did not accept his logic. After he met with Dwight Eisenhower and John Foster Dulles, Nitze wrote Dulles a letter that concluded: “Finally, assuming that the immediate crisis is surmounted, I should ask you to consider, in the light of events of recent years, whether there is not some other prominent Republican disposed to exercise the responsibility of the office of Secretary of State in seeking a balance between our capabilities and our unavoidable commitments, equipped to form persuasive policies, and able to secure the confidence and understanding of our allies, whether by direct communication or communication through emissaries.” If Dulles ever responded to that, I have yet to find it.
Dulles and Nitze had never liked each other. Yet—up until 1957—Dulles sought Nitze’s counsel. Why was that? More broadly, how did Nitze command the attention of American presidents and their advisors from the start of the Cold War to its end? This is a fundamental question that I wrestle with in the book. And, when it comes to arriving at an answer, page 99 alone will not suffice.
--Marshal Zeringue
Posts
