Wising up to America's Foreign Policy Wise Men

Has there ever been an American diplomat as revered as George Kennan? Kennan was often celebrated as the wisest of the Wise Men, the prescient seer who offered his country prudent counsel during a century-spanning life—most famously, the strategy of containment that would govern American policy until the demise of the USSR. Testimonies to Kennan’s sagacity could be found on all sides of the political spectrum: The liberal historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. described the one-time ambassador to the Soviet Union as “indisputably an American sage” while his conservative counterpart John Lukacs lauded the diplomat as “a visionary and a prophet.” In 2004, during an event celebrating Kennan’s hundredth birthday, then Secretary of State Colin Powell hailed the centenarian as “our best tutor, our inspiration.” Other Cold Warriors like John Foster Dulles or Robert McNamara have been excoriated for their belligerence and blundering; Kennan has been widely admired for laying out a moderate foreign policy that sought to curb Soviet ambitions but avoid needless bloodshed or the risk of nuclear war.