ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on both of the major interests in Alex George's work—political elites and American-Soviet relations—by examining the manner in which American opinion leaders assessed the Soviet Union and relations between the superpowers between the end of the Vietnam War and the end of the Cold War. It focuses on American leadership views of the Soviet Union and Soviet-American relations. The Foreign Policy Leadership Project was initiated with a view to undertaking a survey of Americans in leadership positions in a broad range of occupations. A search for a single source that identifies persons who occupy a variety of leadership roles, as well as those in sub-leadership positions who would have a high probability of occupying the top roles in the years ahead, proved fruitless. The leadership samples were therefore constructed in ways that represented several types of compromises between the ideal and reality.
