Kissinger, a new two-part, three-hour biography, offers an incisive portrait of Henry Kissinger, the enigmatic powerbroker who served in the topmost echelons of American diplomacy. Whether celebrated or reviled, Kissinger’s contradictions reflect those at the heart of America’s foreign policy during the second half of the 20th century, a period in which America became the unchallenged superpower in the world yet often pursued policy at odds with its own highest ideals. The film features interviews with dozens of Kissinger’s proteges and colleagues, including Roger Morris, John Negroponte, Winston Lord, and Morton Halperin, as well as historians and journalists including Hedrick Smith, Sally Quinn and Fareed Zakaria. Here are the experts who spoke to American Experience about Kissinger's actions, and his legacy.

 

Roham Alvandi is the author of Nixon, Kissinger, and the Shah: The United States and Iran in the Cold War.

 

 

Elizabeth Becker is a former journalist who covered Cambodia during the Vietnam War.

 

 

Robert Brigham is a professor of history at Vassar College specializing in U.S. foreign policy and the Vietnam War.

 

 

Kyle Burke is an assistant professor of history at the University of South Florida, specializing in U.S. foreign relations. 

 

 

Scott Butcher is a retired senior foreign service officer.

 

 

Ariel Dorfman is an Argentine-Chilean-American novelist and playwright.

 

 

Sophal Ear is a Cambodian-American political scientist and associate professor in the Thunderbird School of Global Management at Arizona State University.

 

 

Carolyn Eisenberg is a professor of U.S. History and American Foreign Policy at Hofstra University. 

 

 

John Farrell is author of Richard Nixon: The Life.

 

 

Niall Ferguson is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and a senior faculty fellow of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard. He is author of Kissinger: 1923-1958: The Idealist.

 

 

Greg Grandin is a professor of history at Yale University.

 

 

Richard Haass is a former American diplomat and President of the Council on Foreign Relations.

 

 

Morton Halperin served in the Johnson, Nixon, Clinton and Obama administrations in the Department of Defense and National Security Council.

 

 

Sam Hoskinson is a former State Department official. 

 

 

Barbara Keys is a professor of history at Durham University, UK.

 

 

David Kissinger is Henry Kissinger’s son and a Hollywood film producer. 

 

 

Peter Kornbluh is a senior analyst at the National Security Archive and the director of the Chile Documentation Project and the Cuba Documentation Project.

 

 

Anthony Lake is an American diplomat and political advisor who served under the assistant to the president for national security affairs in the Nixon administration. He later served as National Security Advisor to President Clinton.

 

 

Winston Lord served as Special Assistant to National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger from 1969-1973 and went on to serve as Ambassador to China and other high-level diplomatic posts. 

 

 

Roger Morris served on the National Security Council during the Johnson and Nixon presidencies. He is author of Uncertain Greatness: Henry Kissinger and American Foreign Policy.

 

 

John Negroponte served in the U.S. Foreign Service from 1960 to 1997, as Ambassador to Honduras, Mexico and Iraq, and Director of National Intelligence from 2005-2007.

 

 

Lien-Hang Nguyen is Associate Professor in the History of the United States and East Asia at Columbia University.

 

 

William Quandt served as a member of the National Security Council under Presidents Nixon and Carter. 

 

 

Sally Quinn is a former Washington Post journalist and chronicler and doyenne of the Washington social scene.

 

 

Raad Rahman is a journalist specializing in human rights.

 

 

Angus Reilly is a journalist writing a book about Kissinger during World War II.

 

 

Ben Rhodes served as a Deputy National Security Advisor under President Barack Obama.

 

 

Orville Schell is the Director of the Center on U.S.-China Relations at Asia Society in New York. 

 

 

Thomas Schwartz is a historian and author of Henry Kissinger and America Power: A Political Biography.

 

 

Hedrick Smith is a Pulitzer Prize-winning former New York Times reporter.

 

 

Sarah Snyder is a historian and professor at American University.

 

 

Jeremi Suri is a historian at UT Austin and author of Henry Kissinger and the American Century.

 

 

Khatharya Um is Associate Dean of the Social Sciences Division, Associate Professor of Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies in the Department of Ethnic Studies, and Chair of Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. 

 

 

Juan Gabriel Valdes is a former Chilean Ambassador to the U.S. 

 

 

Salim Yaqub is a professor of history at UC Santa Barbara and specialist on the Middle East.

 

 

Fareed Zakaria is a journalist, political commentator and author.

 

 

Jianying Zha is a Chinese-American journalist.