and to experience the blessings and responsibilities of American liberty. During decades of service as a senior U.S. Civil Service official and U.S. Army reserve officer, he advised and mentored generations of senior U.S. officials including presidents, secretaries of defense and state, U.S. military chiefs, and a range of protégés, students, and friends on principles of history and strategy. The author’s words at Arlington Cemetery provide personal insights into his father’s remarkable faith and notable Cold War colleagues and service that continued until his death in 2003 at the age of 95. (See InsideTheColdWar.org under the “About the Author” heading.)

 

Education. The author’s academic experiences also shaped his understanding and perspective on America, the Cold War, and freedom’s enemies. Phillips Academy Andover taught history, literature, discipline, and the principle of “non sibi,” or “not for self.” Harvard College’s students, reading requirements, and research capabilities opened new horizons for the author as did remarkable teachers like Paul Tillich and three future National Security Advisors: William Bundy, Zbigniew Brzesinski, and Henry Kissinger, with the latter also a special tutor in political philosophy, diplomacy, and policy formulation who personally encouraged the author’s academic studies and public service even as strategic views came to differ. Independently, Reinhold Neibuhr and Dietrich Bonhoeffer stimulated ehtical concerns and policy interests. Graduate study at the University of California Berkeley brought the natural beauty of California, provided teaching and research fellowships in political philosophy and constitutional law, and introduced inspirational professors like Norman Jacobson, Sheldon Wolin, and Carl Schorske in studying the history of ideas and political philosophy and their impact on human society. Meanwhile, Berkeley’s Free Speech Movement of 1964 demonstrated the “politically correct” dogmas and temptations of an increasingly radical U.S. political Left as having an ultimately destructive national impact on academic freedom and informed peaceful discourse.

 

Government Service—OSD, NSC—1963–1976. Convinced that liberty, ideas, ideologies, and security are integral to core realities, responsibilities, and instruments of national power and statecraft, the author took the U.S. Civil Service Management Intern Program examinations during the presidency of John Kennedy and joined the Office of Secretary of Defense (OSD) of Robert McNamara, in the summer of 1963. Between three annual academic leaves to continue studies in Berkeley from September through May, he encountered Washington D.C.’s leviathan bureaucracy and McNamara’s dominant quantitative “systems analysis” approach as applied to U.S. Cold War strategies including for “Mutual Assured Destruction” nuclear deterrence, Vietnam, and arms control, each of which the author believed required quite different criteria of defense, political-military strategies, and diplomacy than McNamara’s. In 1966, the author joined the U.S. Civil Service and OSD full time, and in the fall of 1967 was assigned by OSD to the National Security Council (NSC) staff at the White House. Over the next nine years he worked there with three presidents (Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Gerald Ford) and three National Security Advisors (Walt Rostow, Henry Kissinger, and Brent Scowcroft). He gained an unparalled close-up view of presidential leadership, discussions, strategies, interagency staffs and processes, and lessons learned, including those from Vietnam (to which he took nine NSC field trips), public information, Congressional relations and countering aggressive Soviet doctrines and actions.

 

Non-Government Policy Institutes and U.S. Senate—1976–1980. In August 1976, the author moved to the private sector in support of national security policy and roundtables involving a wide range of officials, academics, and experts seeking effective U.S. Cold War strategies. In September 1978, he joined the staff of Senator John Tower (R-TX), a model of Congressional leadership on the Senate Armed Services Committee and policy committees, in his knowledge of defense and foreign policy issues and in his skill in working on a bipartisan basis. Tower’s bipartisan approach notably included Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson (D-WA) and his staff, and private sector organizations and leaders that ranged from conservative Republicans to the bipartisan Committee on the Present Danger, Democrats, Social Democrats and labor officials. Under Senator Tower’s direction, the author focused on policy research and briefings; worked with Senators, staff, and independent experts; prepared hearings; and assisted in coordinating the text of the comprehensive new U.S. national security strategy of “peace and freedom” and “peace through strength” presented in Reagan’s 1980 campaign platform.

 

Reagan Administration—1980 to September 1987. Through working on the platform draft, Reagan’s post-1980 election Defense Transition Team, and, after the inauguration, as Reagan’s NSC Director of Arms Control until September 1987, the author was directly involved for seven years as a member of the Senior U.S. Civil Service in key analyses, discussions, and directives of the Reagan Revolution in U.S. Cold War strategy, especially on the core issues of U.S. arms control, Soviet military buildups, treaty violations, and deceptions. He prepared drafts of presidential NSC briefings, option papers and directives; joined especially