For example, China and the Soviet Union-America's ideological enemies-could actually become excellent rading partners. global intersts could be surveyed not in black and white but in shades of grey. The two statesmen argued that if Americans would put aside their Cold War biases and look at the world with fresh eyes, U.S. In foreign affairs, Nixon and Kissinger embraced the idea of realpolitik, a German word meaning "real politics." According to realpolitik, political goals should be defined by concrete national interests instead of abstract ideologies. However, both men were outsiders, equipped with an outsider's readiness to question accepted orthodoxy. In several prior presidential campaigns, Kissinger had actually worked against Nixon. Kissinger was a Harvard-educated Jewish emigre from Germany and a prominent figure in East Coast intellecutal circles. Nixon was a conservative California Republican, suspicious of the more liberal East Coast Republicans and exhausted with the political and strategic theories of Ivy League intellectuals. At first glance, Richard Nixon's partnership with Henry Kissinger seemed improbable. NIxon and Henry Kissinger, his leading adviser on national security and international affairs, altered this Cold War policy approach. They divided the world into "us" and "them," and they established policies based on an assumption commonly held that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." Therefore, a country opposed to communism was, by this definition, a friend of the United States. They stressed that there existed a basic conflict between democratic, capitalist countries and totalitarian, communist ones. Before Nixon took office, most American leaders shared a common Cold War ideology. During his years in office, Richard Nixon fundamentally reshaped the way the United States approached the world.
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