George Ball, Diplomacy for a Crowded World, (1976), Part 1 on "Cleaning up the abberations," especially chapter 1.
 
 In the game of chess, Bobby Fisher had the image of the master player who would keep his opponent and onlookers dazzled by a series of unpredicted moves.  This is was also the image of the Nixon Administration’s foreign policy, primarily orchestrated by National Security Advisor, and later Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
 In the first chapter of George Ball’s book “Democracy in a Crowded World”, George Ball describes the foreign policy of the Nixon-Kissinger Era.  The primary focus here is on chapter 1 “Cleaning up the Aberrations, in which Ball describes the unilateralism of U.S. foreign policy in the Nixon-Kissinger Era. George Ball was the Under Secretary State for President Johnson under Secretary of State Dean Rusk.
 Ball describes the shift in U.S. foreign policy as the nation entered the Nixon Administration “Unilateralist” because the U.S. decided to undertake initiatives at its own discretion while informing selected individuals, groups, and nations.  In this, Ball means that the U.S. consulted its allies less under Nixon and Kissinger.  The most important foreign policy theme of the era was the fact that the new policies were directed at fixing the problems of the past, or “cleaning up the aberrations”.
 The diplomatic behavior of the U.S. was considered to be that of the “lonely cowboy”, which symbolizes an image America stands for. Secrecy was fundamental in the institutionalization of the foreign policy making process. Ball heavily criticizes this. In addition, Nixon and Kissinger surrounded themselves with “articulate young experts” who would easily participate in the administration’s foreign policy making process without offering much opposition or gaining too much influence. 
 The perceived difficulties of consulting allies before undertaking U.S. foreign policy initiatives partly resulted in the administrations decision to conduct foreign policy in such a unilateralist manner, according to Ball. Consulting allies would mean constant communication and likely opposition on some matters. Nixon and Kissinger could not have this. In order to most effectively extricate the United States out of its past problems, the administration thought it would have to act more independently. Ball viewed these tactics as not benefiting the United States much, though not necessarily hurting our global relations to any large and publicly noticeable extent. Some the closest U.S. allies were embarrassed by the U.S. foreign policy initiatives, however.  
 The actual diplomatic behavior of Nixon-Kissinger took place in three realms: Southeast Asia and China, the Soviet Union, and the Middle East. The aberrations of the first included the entanglement in Vietnam and the lack of communications with Communist China.  The Soviet Union agreed to increase diplomatic relations through détente. The Middle East was engulfed in a situation that convinced the administration to buy time there. 
 Ball puts primary focus on the initiatives taken in East Asia and towards the Soviet Union. He criticizes Nixon for making a surprise trip to China in an attempt to strategically thwart the Soviet Union under the cover of improving relations with China. Ball does not deny, however, that Nixon and Kissinger were actually trying to improve relations with China for other reasons. Among these was an effort to curb the resentment felt by Beijing toward the U.S. for its military activity in Vietnam. Ball stresses the embarrassment felt by the Japanese, who had succumbed to American pressure in years before to not conduct diplomatic relations with China, when the surprise visit to China was made. Tokyo was not informed until the last minute.
 Ball claims Nixon’s failure to create a doctrine of extraction in Vietnam caused the American disengagement in Southeast Asia to take so long. Successive administrations had become entangled in the Vietnam mess because there was no clear exit strategy from the start, and an escalation of the war was consistently being conducted as it became more and more difficult to “win”. A loss or withdrawal in Vietnam early on was deemed unacceptable. The idea behind this was that by avoiding long range planning, the U.S. government could avoid making “irreversible decisions.” In addition to this, Ball claims foreign policy makers failed to understand the nature of the situation, which he describes as being caused and regulated more by internal forces. Even if the military effort succeeded, claims Ball, the effort still would have failed, since “there was no adequate indigenous political base on which our power could be emplaced.” 
 As for the Nixon-Kissinger initiatives with regard to the Soviet Union, Ball claims that there wasn’t much substance or change in relations behind the so called “détente” (something to do with rapprochement). Ball claims détente was a rather ambiguous term that even the French had difficulty defining. Détente, in reality, was not much more than a new cordiality in the formal relationships of the two superpowers. Ball claims the Soviets actually had more to gain from détente. Détente would improve the image, or “legitimacy”, of the Soviet state in its relations with the West. This in turn would weaken the American resolve to more aggressively confront the Soviet Union on a number of international issues because the Soviet Union would appear not so antagonistic as compared to previous years. The Soviet Union had much to gain in trade and commerce with the technologically superior West. Ball ultimately dismisses détente as amounting to the mindless rhetoric of politicians. 
 Ultimately, according to Ball, though the Nixon-Kissinger Administration did not do worse than their predecessors, they did not improve the global situation with respect to the United States either. Many issues were left unresolved. The mistakes of past endeavors were corrected, but they were corrected in such a way to leave a lasting imprint of unilateralist foreign policy strategy in the executive branch of the U.S. government.
 
Summary by Brian K. Bodine