Bridge Builder

Walther Leisler Kiep is one of the most independent and influential German postwar politicians. He is also a successful entrepreneur and longtime chairman of Atlantik-Brucke, the influential German-American friendship organization, which he now serves as honorary chairman. In his autobiography, Kiep speaks frankly about a life at the center of power: as an independent politician and treasurer of the governing CDU party from 1970 to 1991, who did not shrink from conflict with party leaders Helmut Kohl and Franz Josef Strauss; as Minister of Finance in Lower Saxony; as a longtime member of the Volkswagen Supervisory board for 21 years; and as an ambassador for German-American relations, and confidant of several US presidents. As well as presenting an inside history of the relationship between Germany and the United States, the book sheds particular light on the struggle for German unification and that country's complex relationship with the Middle East. "Kiep is an entertaining storyteller, and he shows a good sense of narrative pace. His memoirs are also of immediate relevance for scholars of international history. Over the past decade, historians have been eager to uncover the activities of 'transnational,' nongovernmental actors, as opposed to formal government-to-government relations. From this standpoint, Kiep's wide-ranging activities as a diplomatic and financial troubleshooter are illuminating," William Glenn Gray, Purdue University.