ABSTRACT
The word "disengagement" is not to be found in the text of George Kennan's Reith lectures. Indeed, the term has, in its protean ambiguity, been linked with political tendencies and sentiments for which Kennan and such systematic D-planners as Hugh Gaitskell and Denis Healey have a scant regard. German nationalists of the Right, as of the Left, have often hurled at Chancellor Adenauer the reproach that he is reluctant to trust the German nation as such, that he wants to tie the Germans so firmly to the West that they will no longer have the opportunity of pursuing a foreign policy of their own. Thus, the contemplated "liberation" of Europe is to be accompanied by a declaration of Europe's incompetence to play a role in world affairs. Wherever the Atlantic pact has replaced the will of nations to defend themselves, instead of strengthening it, its usefulness has become questionable.
