Kissinger on Kissinger: ‘My job was to inspire, not to gratify’

Reflections on America's role in the world and, as a Jew, his negotiations with Arab leaders from 1977 interview

In 1977, Douglass Cater, vice-chairman of the Observer, and Kenneth Harris, associate editor, called on Dr Henry Kissinger in his 10th-floor office at the Georgetown Centre for Strategic and International Studies where he was professor of diplomacy. This is an extract from that exclusive interview.

Did your early years, up to the age of 15 in Germany, have a formative influence on your thinking?