Détente, a French word meaning to "relax tension", began in a limited measure under the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations to improve communications with potential adversaries. Both Kennedy and Johnson had begun to institute talks on weapons testing and proliferation, but Détente, as a policy, was pursued much more vigorously with Nixon and his National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger (Penna, par. 2). The end game of Détente was to induce the Russians into cooperation with the United States. By 1971, tensions between the US and the USSR were so high, and the distrust between the two Superpowers so keen, it could only be seen, by some, including Kissinger, that direct talks and negotiations with mutual interests as their anchor was the only reasonable course of action. Others, however, felt that talks and negotiations were analogous to appeasement and made the United States look weak. One such dissenter, Phil Williams, an analyst with the Royal Institute of International Affairs explained in 1985:.
By opting out of the arms race and placing, or misplacing, its faith in the arms control process, it is argued that the United States enabled the Soviet Union not only to achieve strategic parity but, in certain respects at least, to attain a degree of superiority (Williams, par. 1). .
However, Nixon had a much larger picture in mind and perhaps a further reaching ideology than could be fully appreciated by those sailing in the political winds of the day. With a U. S. anti-communist fervor as a backdrop, seemingly shared by both Republicans and Democrats framing an increasing distrust between the Russians and the Chinese, Kissinger saw an emerging third Superpower in a competitive communist China as an American advantage which needed to be exploited. At the same time, Nixon believed that the Russians could benefit from, and would embrace trade with the U. S., in the form of grain, which they desperately needed.
