Paul Nitze

Paul Henry Nitze (January 16, 1907 – October 19, 2004) was an American businessman and statesman who served as United States Deputy Secretary of Defense, U.S. Secretary of the Navy, and Director of Policy Planning for the U.S. State Department. He is best known for being the principal author of NSC 68 and the co-founder of Team B. He helped shape U.S. Cold War defense policy over the course of numerous presidential administrations.

Nitze was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, the son of Anina Sophia (Hilken), a homemaker, and William Albert Nitze, a professor of Romance linguistics who concluded his career at the University of Chicago. His parents were both of German descent. His ancestors came from the region of Magdeburg in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. In his memoir, From Hiroshima to Glasnost, Paul Nitze describes how as a young boy he witnessed the outbreak of World War I while he was traveling in Germany with his father, mother, and sister, arriving in Munich just in time to be struck by the city crowds' patriotic enthusiasm for the imminent conflict.

Nitze attended The Hotchkiss School, where he was a member of the class of 1924 and the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools. He graduated from Harvard University in 1928 and entered the field of investment banking.

Nitze entered government service during World War II after having been hired by his Wall Street colleague James Forrestal when Forrestal became an administrative assistant to President Franklin D. Roosevelt. In 1942, he became finance director of the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs, working for Nelson Rockefeller. In 1943 he became chief of the Metals and Minerals Branch of the Board of Economic Warfare, until he was named director, Foreign Procurement and Development Branch of the Foreign Economic Administration later that year. From 1944 to 1946, Nitze served as director and then as Vice Chairman of the Strategic Bombing Survey for which President Harry S. Truman awarded him the Legion of Merit. One of his early government assignments was to visit Allied-occupied Japan in the immediate aftermath of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and assess the damage. This experience framed many of his later feelings about the power of nuclear weapons and the necessity of arms control.

In the early postwar era and Cold War, he served in the Truman Administration as Director of Policy Planning for the State Department (1950–1953). He was also the principal author in 1950 of the highly influential but secret National Security Council policy paper, NSC 68, which provided the strategic outline for increased US expenditures to counter the perceived threat of Soviet armament. During the Korean War, he advised the Truman administration against blaming the Soviet Union for the conflict too directly in order to avoid risking an escalation to World War III.

From 1953 to 1961, Nitze served as president of the Foreign Service Educational Foundation while concurrently serving as associate of the Washington Center of Foreign Policy Research and the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of the Johns Hopkins University. In 1956 he attended the Project Nobska anti-submarine warfare conference, where discussion ranged from oceanography to nuclear weapons.

Nitze co-founded the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) with Christian Herter in 1943 and the world-renowned graduate school, based in Washington, D.C., is named in his honor. His publications during this period include U.S. Foreign Policy: 1945–1955. In 1961, President Kennedy appointed Nitze Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs. In 1963, Nitze became the Secretary of the Navy, serving until 1967. According to the US Navy "as the Navy secretary, he raised the level of attention given to quality of Service issues. His many achievements included establishing the first Personnel Policy Board and retention task force (the Alford Board), and obtaining targeted personnel bonuses. He lengthened commanding officer tours and raised command responsibility pay."

Following his term as Secretary of the Navy, he served as Deputy Secretary of Defense (1967–1969), as a member of the US delegation to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) (1969–1973). Later, fearing Soviet rearmament, he opposed the ratification of SALT II (1979).

In 1985 President Reagan awarded Nitze the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his contributions to the freedom and security of the United States.

In 1986, he received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.

In 1989, Nitze received the US Senator John Heinz Award for Greatest Public Service by an Elected or Appointed Official, an award given out annually by Jefferson Awards.

In 1991, he was awarded the prestigious United States Military Academy's Sylvanus Thayer Award for his commitment to the Academy's ideals of "Duty, Honor, Country".[6]

In 1997, Nitze was awarded the Naval Heritage Award by the US Navy Memorial Foundation for his support of the US Navy while he was Secretary of the Navy.

Nitze died in Washington, D.C., at age 97 in October 2004.

The Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Nitze is named in his honor. Nitze visited the ship for several ceremonial occasions prior to his death.

The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of the Johns Hopkins University is named in his honor.

St. Mary's College of Maryland, where he served as a trustee, has an honors program in his name.

Vice chairman of the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey (1944–1946)

Director of Policy Planning for the United States Department of State (1950–1953)

Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs (1961–1963)

Member of the US delegation to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (1969–1973)

Special Adviser to the President and Secretary of State on Arms Control (1984–1989)