Against the sprawling backdrop of the Cold War, The Kremlinologistrevisits some of the twentieth century's greatest conflicts as seen through the eyes of its hardest working diplomat, Llewellyn E Thompson. From the wilds of the American West to the inner sanctums of the White House and the Kremlin, Thompson became an important advisor to presidents and a key participant in major global events, including the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War. Yet unlike his contemporaries Robert S. McNamara and Dean Rusk, who considered Thompson one of the most crucial Cold War actors and the "unsung hero" of the Cuban Missile Crisis, he has not been the subject of a major biography'until now.
Thompson's daughters Jenny and Sherry Thompson skillfully and thoroughly document his life as an accomplished career diplomat. In vigorous prose, they describe how Thompson joined the Foreign Service both to feed his desire for adventure and from a deep sense of duty. They also detail the crucial role he played as a negotiator unafraid of compromise. Known in the State Department as "Mr. Tightlips," Thompson was the epitome of discretion. People from completely opposite ends of the political spectrum lauded his approach to diplomacy and claimed him as their own.
Refuting historical misinterpretations of the Berlin Crisis, the Austrian State Treaty, and the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Thompsons tell their father's fascinating story. With unprecedented access to Thompson's FBI dossier, State Department personnel files, letters, diaries, speeches, and documents, and relying on probing interviews and generous assistance from American and Russian archivists, historians, and government officials, the authors bring new material to light, including important information on the U-2, Kennan's containment policy, and Thompson's role in US covert operations machinery.
This unique and monumental biography not only restores a central figure to history, it makes the crucial events he shaped accessible to a broader readership and gives contemporary readers a backdrop for understanding the fraught United States-Russia relationship that still exists today.
Acknowledgments Introduction Part I 1. The Beginning 2. Into the World 3. To Moscow 4. The Siege of Moscow 5. The Germans in Retreat 6. Conferences 7. The Hot War Ends and the Cold War Begins 8. The Truman Doctrine 9. The Birth of Covert Operations 10. Overseas Again Part II 11. Chief of Mission 12. The Trieste Negotiations 13. The Austrian State Treaty Negotiations 14. Open Skies, Closed Borders Part III 15. Khrushchev's Decade (19531964) 16. Moscow 2 17. Khrushchev's First Gamble: Berlin Poker 18. Dueling Exhibitions 19. The Russian Is Coming 20. U-2: The End of Détente 21. Picking Up the Pieces 22. Working for the New President 23. Meeting in Vienna 24. The Twenty-Second Congress of the Communist Party 25. Up the Down Escalator 26. Goodbye Moscow, Hello Washington 27. Thirteen Days in October 28. Limited Test Ban Part IV 29. The Lyndon Johnson Years 30. Strand One 31. Thompson's Vietnam 32. Strand Two 33. Strand Three 34. Moscow 3 35. The Six-Day War 36. Glassboro 37. 1968 38. ""Retirement,"" So to Speak Notes Bibliography Index
""This magnificent book, handsomely produced by the publisher, is a pleasure to read. Jenny Thompson and Sherry Thompson have skillfully interwoven memories from their childhood experiences in Russia, their mother's unpublished memoirs, other family papers, interviews with American diplomats, extensive research in published and unpublished documents, and wide range of scholarly studies to create a thorough and insightful examination of the long diplomatic career of their extraordinarily discreet and self-effacing father.""
