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Reith Revisited: Angela Stent on George Kennan

Professor Angela Stent examines the lessons to be learnt from American diplomat George Kennan's 1957 Reith Lectures 'Russia, the Atom and the West'.

Professor Angela Stent examines the lessons to be learnt from the 1957 Reith Lectures by the legendary American diplomat George Kennan, titled "Russia, the Atom and the West". Kennan, the architect of the American post-war policy of containment of the Soviet Union, was a key player during the Cold War. Stent, the former National Intelligence Officer for Russia and Eurasia at the US National Intelligence Council, evaluates the continuing relevance of the lectures, in conversation with Sarah Montague.

The series assesses the contributions of great minds of the past to public debate, in a dialogue across the decades with contemporary thinkers. In 1948, households across Britain gathered before the wireless as the pre-eminent public intellectual of the age, the philosopher Bertrand Russell delivered a set of lectures in honour of the 91热爆's founder, Lord Reith. Since then, the Reith Lectures on the 91热爆 Service and subsequently Radio 4 have become a major national occasion for intellectual debate. In this series Radio 4 revisits five of the speakers from the first ten years of the Reith Lectures.

Producer: Neil Koenig
Researcher: Josephine Casserley

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15 minutes

New to the Reith Lectures? Here鈥檚 where to start

Four lectures recommended by the series producer.

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