Paul H. Nitze, adviser to presidents of the United
States from both parties, a leading strategist and arms
control expert, and co-founder of Johns Hopkins'
School of Advanced
International Studies, died on the evening of Oct. 19
at his home in Georgetown. He was 97.
Just a week earlier at the celebration of SAIS' 60th
anniversary, Secretary of State Colin Powell paid tribute
to Ambassador Nitze, his friend and colleague of many
years. Secretary Powell said then that Paul Nitze was an
"icon" to those in the State Department. Going to a meeting
with Paul, he said, "was like having Moses at the table."
Unable to attend the celebration, Nitze sent word to
Powell that, of all the things he did in a career that
lasted nearly half a century, he considered the founding of
SAIS to be his greatest accomplishment.
In an interview with The Gazette in 2002, Nitze
said, "I have a sense that the school, and to some extent
I, did well — that we added to the strength of the
Washington intellectual establishment."
Nitze founded the School of Advanced International
Studies in 1943 along with Christian Herter and other
leading statesmen. In 1989 the school, which became a
division of Johns Hopkins in 1950, was renamed in his honor
to recognize his distinguished private and public career
and exceptional service to SAIS and the university for five
decades.
"SAIS has suffered a profound loss with the death of
Paul Nitze," said Jessica P. Einhorn, dean of SAIS. "In
founding this school with Christian Herter, he implemented
a special vision. Paul knew that in the wake of World War
II, the country would need future leaders and diplomats who
understood international relations not just from an
American viewpoint but also from a worldwide context. His
legacy will live on through the more than 11,000 graduates
of the school who are a testament to his wisdom and his
foresight."
JHU President William R.
Brody said, "The entire nation owes a debt of gratitude
to Paul Nitze, but we at Johns Hopkins are particularly
saddened by his death. As co-founder of SAIS more than 60
years ago, he demonstrated in a private undertaking the
wisdom and vision that was so much a part of his public
life. The university relied over the years on his
leadership and advice, and we are very much the better for
it."
After graduation from Harvard University and a decade
as an investment banker at Dillon, Read & Company and P.H.
Nitze & Company, Nitze joined the U.S. government in 1940
and advised every president from Franklin Roosevelt to
Ronald Reagan, with the exception of Jimmy Carter. In 1950,
while at the State Department, Nitze was responsible for
the formulation of NSC 68, the document that provided the
framework for the Cold War between the United States and
the Soviet Union. He also served as director of the
Department of State Policy Planning Staff, secretary of the
Navy, deputy secretary of defense and member of the U.S.
delegation to the Strategic Arms Limitations Talks from
1969 to 1974. In 1962, he was a member of the group of top
officials who met daily with President Kennedy to advise
him during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
As head of the U.S. negotiating team at the Arms
Control Talks in Geneva from 1981 to 1984, Nitze took his
now famous "walk in the woods" with Soviet negotiator Yuli
Kvitsinsky in an effort to break the deadlock between the
super powers on Euromissiles. From 1984 to 1989, he was
ambassador-at-large and special adviser to the president
and secretary of state on arms control matters, playing a
crucial role in negotiating the Immediate-Range Nuclear
Force and strategic arms treaties.
Nitze's public life was chronicled in several books,
including Strobe Talbott's 1988 The Master of the
Game and David Callahan's 1990 Dangerous
Capabilities: Paul Nitze and the Cold War. Nitze
published his memoirs, From Hiroshima to Glasnost: At
the Center of Decision, in 1989. In 1985, President
Reagan awarded Nitze the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the
highest civilian honor in the United States. On Jan. 10,
2001, the U.S. Navy named the 44th ship of the Arleigh
Burke class of guided missile destroyers in honor of Nitze.
The USS NITZE, currently under construction, is scheduled
to be commissioned in March.
Nitze's devotion to the nation was rivaled only by his
commitment to SAIS. In launching the school in 1943, he and
Herter convinced business friends to fund the fledgling
institution. Eleven years later, while working and teaching
at SAIS, he succeeded Herter as chairman as the SAIS
Advisory Council, a position that only he or Herter held
until 1981.
In 1957, Nitze conceived the idea of a SAIS-related
think tank — now the
Johns Hopkins Foreign Policy Institute
— to involve the school
more directly in the discussion of U.S. foreign policy
issues. Three years later he was instrumental in helping
then JHU President Milton Eisenhower raise $4.2 million for
the SAIS building at 1740 Massachusetts Ave. in northwest
Washington, D.C. The building was named for Nitze and his
wife, the late Phyllis Pratt Nitze, in 1986. In 1980, he
helped establish the Security Studies program at the
Foreign Policy Institute and co-taught a course on security
issues there.
When SAIS had outgrown its building in 1988, Nitze
offered to match any amount raised by SAIS up to $5 million
to expand the school. The challenge was successfully met in
1989, doubling the school's physical plant with the
addition of the Rome Building at 1619 Massachusetts Ave.,
N.W.
Nitze retired from the U.S. government in 1989 and
spent his remaining years at SAIS, teaching, writing and
pursuing his lifetime interest in strategic and national
security studies. He is survived by his wife, Leezee
Porter; four children, Heidi, Peter, William and Phyllis
Anina Nitze Moriarty, from his previous marriage to Phyllis
Pratt Nitze; a stepdaughter, Erin Porter; 11 grandchildren;
three step-grandchildren; and seven great-grandchildren.
In a broadcast e-mail sent Wednesday to the Johns
Hopkins community, President Brody concluded by saying that
he wanted to convey to Nitze's family "our deepest
admiration for a statesman, a visionary, a colleague, and a
dear friend of the university. It is hard to imagine," he
wrote, "a life more nobly lived than was his."
A funeral service was planned for Saturday at the
National Cathedral in Washington, followed by a private
burial.
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