Henry A Kissinger

Kissinger was the most powerful secretary of state of the postwar era, he was both celebrated and reviled. His complicated legacy still resonates in relations with China, Russia and the Middle East. He died on Wednesday November 29 at his home in Kent, Conn. He was 100. He advised 12 presidents — more than a quarter of those who have held the office. At a critical moment in American history and diplomacy, he was second in power only to President Richard M. Nixon. He joined the Nixon White House in January 1969 as national security adviser and, after his appointment as secretary of state in 1973, kept both titles, a rarity. When Nixon resigned, he stayed on under President Gerald R. Ford. His negotiations with the North Vietnamese diplomat Le Duc Tho in January 1973 in Paris led to a deal to end the American war in Vietnam, and both men shared the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize, though Mr. Tho declined to accept it. Divorced in 1964 after a 15-year marriage to Ann Fleischer, Mr. Kissinger married Nancy Maginnes in 1974 and moved to her home in Manhattan. Ms. Maginnes was then working for Nelson A. Rockefeller, the former New York governor and a friend and ally of Mr. Kissinger’s. Kissinger is survived by his wife, Ms. Maginnes, and his children with Ms. Fleischer, David and Elizabeth. His younger brother, Walter B. Kissinger, a former chairman of the multinational company the Allen Group, died in 2021.