George Shultz, the most consequential twentieth-century American statesman since George Marshall, has died. He has been less celebrated than some of his predecessors and one or two successors. But he will get his due. There are some reasons why: No other secretary of state besides Marshall had as intuitive an understanding of the combined economic, military, and political elements of American power. No other secretary of state made as effective use of the bureaucracy (or was as respected by it). No other secretary of state was as trusted implicitly (rather than flagrantly) by his president. No other secretary of state had as intimate a feel for the structural elements of a negotiation — it was he who finally put an end to the silly practice of ‘linkage’ by which American diplomats would negotiate against themselves. And no other secretary of state had as deep an affection for the honesty, optimism, and talent of the American people. Like Mr William Seward, George Shultz was sublime. He was also something else: a liberator. His freed his country and its government from the spectre of collapse in collective bargaining between bosses and trade unions. He freed his country and its allies from the messy denouement of the Bretton Woods system. He freed his country and its chief adversary from the costly stagnation of the Cold War. His death is a great loss for the world.
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