Listen to the PodcastIn a time when the threat of nuclear war with the Soviet Union, an unwinnable war in Vietnam, and a rising socialist China all threatened to tear the nation apart, no person exerted more influence upon foreign policy than Henry Kissinger. As Secretary of State under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, Kissinger's legacy stretches far and wide, and is still a source of controversy today.
Along with being awarded the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize for his work in the Vietnam peace accords, Kissinger is attributed with arranging the policy of detente with the Soviet Union, negotiating the SALT I and Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaties, and leading a set of secret talks with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai that would bring aout Nixon's groundbreaking 1972 summit and the normalization of relations between the U.S. and China.