Thinking Global Archives

Thinking Global

May 19, 2011

Berlin 1961: Acheson Fills a Kennedy Power Vacuum

By Frederick Kempe

Dean Acheson knew a White House policy vacuum when he saw it, the absence of any Kennedy administration Berlin policy, and he was determined to fill it with the rapier brilliance that had already made him an historic figure. His paper, the first major Kennedy administration reflection on Berlin, landed on Secretary of State […]

Thinking Global

May 19, 2011

Berlin 1961 Amplified Edition Trailer

By Frederick Kempe

This video, put together by the superb team at Penguin for the amplified e-book version of Berlin 1961, is really cool

Thinking Global

May 18, 2011

Berlin 1961: Soviet Humor

By Frederick Kempe

Some of the best political humor grew out of Eastern Europe during the Cold War, when tens of millions of oppressed people let off steam through laughter. The Soviet public’s growing awareness of their country’s failings in 1961 had produced a bumper crop of jokes, told in the growing food lines as Soviet leader […]

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May 17, 2011

Berlin 1961: Khrushchev to Kennedy: You Can’t Escape Berlin

By Frederick Kempe

America’s ambassador to Moscow had never seen Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev so fixated on the Berlin issue nor so determined to bring the crisis to a head. Khrushchev was already in foul temper when he reluctantly consented to receive President Kennedy’s first letter to him, which contained his long-sought invitation to a summit meeting in […]

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May 17, 2011

Why Berlin Fascinates

By Frederick Kempe

In the days of German unification two decades ago, when I was serving as the Wall Street Journal’s Berlin bureau chief, I marveled at the speed with which the locals bulldozed and then extracted almost every remnant of the Berlin Wall. I was tempted, in an act of civil disobedience, to stand before one of […]

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May 16, 2011

Berlin 1961: Snubbed Soviet Strikes Back

By Frederick Kempe

Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev was still waiting for John F. Kennedy’s answer to his multiple pleas for an early summit when the U.S. president delivered his apocalyptic State of the Union address, which spoke of the Soviet and Chinese quest for world domination, as the first of several perceived indignities. The shock waves of Kennedy’s […]

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May 13, 2011

Berlin 1961: Reuters Interview

By Frederick Kempe

A great interview with Jim Ledbetter of Reuters on my new book, Berlin 1961: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and the Most Dangerous Place on Earth. (I have mentioned that I have a book out, right?) It runs 8 minutes, 18 seconds and is set, appropriately enough, in front of the Berlin Wall—or, at least, the parts of […]

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May 12, 2011

Berlin 1961: Kennedy’s First Mistake

By Frederick Kempe

It was the first, live televised press conference in U.S. history, and President John F. Kennedy beamed his 200-watt smile as he looked across the assembled media gathered in the cavernous, newly opened State Department auditorium. He had real news for them: Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev had released two captured American airmen, which Kennedy could […]