The ambassador whose 24 years in Washington made him the hidden circuit of Soviet–American diplomacy
On the night of October 27, 1962, a secret meeting with Robert Kennedy. The Soviets would withdraw missiles from Cuba; the Americans would withdraw theirs from Turkey. The superpower bargain that pulled the world back from nuclear war was sealed in the embassy drawing room.
Soviet ambassador to the United States from 1962 to 1986, 24 years that made him the indispensable circuit of Cold War diplomacy. His secret backchannel with Robert Kennedy resolved the Cuban Missile Crisis, and his extraordinary relationship with Henry Kissinger drove détente and the SALT agreements.
Career Timeline
- 1944Entered Higher Diplomatic School, part of the 'Stalin call-up' into diplomacy
- 1946Joined Foreign Ministry, served under Molotov and Gromyko
- 1952–1957Counsellor at the Soviet Embassy in Washington
- 1957–1959UN Deputy Secretary-General
- 1960–1962Head of the Foreign Ministry's Americas Department
- 1962–1986Ambassador to the US — served under six American presidents over 24 years
- 1986–1988CC Secretary and head of the International Department
- 1988–1991Foreign-policy adviser to Gorbachev
Related historical events
- 1962The Cuban Missile CrisisAmbassador to the US · secret meeting with RFK that resolved the crisisOn the night of October 27, 1962, he held a secret meeting with Robert Kennedy, securing the pivotal agreement: Soviet missiles out of Cuba in exchange for the quiet removal of American Jupiter missiles from Turkey. The meeting brought the 13-day nuclear standoff to an end.
- 1969–1979Détente and the SALT NegotiationsSoviet ambassador to the U.S. and Kissinger's backchannel counterpartHis secret talks with Kissinger broke the SALT I impasse and gave Nixon and Kissinger a channel to claim credit for the breakthrough.
- 1985–1989The New Thinking and the End of the Cold WarBrought twenty-four years as ambassador in Washington to the International Department.
The Kissinger–Dobrynin Back Channel
The Kissinger–Dobrynin channel, the most productive secret negotiating conduit in Cold War diplomatic history, began operating with the Nixon administration in 1969. National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and Soviet Ambassador Dobrynin met regularly in the White House Map Room, bypassing the State Department and formal diplomatic channels to connect the two superpowers' top leadership directly. A secure telephone line between Kissinger's office and the Soviet embassy gave the back channel its physical form. The two men met as often as four times a week, dining together while managing the affairs of the nuclear-armed superpowers.
From 1971, the channel became the primary venue for arms control. When the formal SALT talks in Vienna deadlocked, Nixon and Kissinger pursued a breakthrough through their secret line to Dobrynin. The result was the ABM Treaty and a five-year freeze on offensive strategic weapons, signed at the Moscow summit in May 1972: the first time the two powers brought the nuclear arms race under treaty control. That same year, the back channel produced the Berlin access agreement, and in 1973 it paved the way for the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), laying the groundwork for the 1975 Helsinki Final Act.
Dobrynin's diplomatic style was the channel's essential engine. Kissinger assessed him as "free from the tendency of ordinary Soviet diplomats to engage in petty squabbling to demonstrate vigilance before their superiors; he understood that a reputation for reliability is an important asset in foreign policy." Dobrynin distilled the relationship in his memoir inscription to Kissinger: "To Henry, my opponent, partner, friend."
The channel's exceptional nature was laid bare by its exclusion of the American Secretary of State. In February 1972, Kissinger briefed Dobrynin on precisely what Secretary William Rogers knew and did not know about U.S.–Soviet relations. Dobrynin reported to Moscow that it was "a unique situation when the Special Assistant to the President secretly informs a foreign ambassador about what the Secretary of State knows and does not know."
In 2007, the U.S. State Department and the Russian Foreign Ministry jointly published Soviet-American Relations: The Détente Years, 1969–1972, which placed both sides' records of the meetings side by side for the first time. Dobrynin's memoranda often proved far more detailed than Kissinger's, since documenting the talks was his full-time responsibility, whereas Kissinger briefed Nixon orally in person.