I find Richard Nixon to be an endlessly fascinating person. And based on everything I have read and know about him, I can't think of someone Nixon would despise more on paper. Kissinger was an East Coast intellectual, Jewish, Ivy League educated, cunning, and ambitious.

We know that Kissinger was initially a supporter of the Nelson Rockefeller campaign and called Nixon the most dangerous candidate running in 1968, but once Rockefeller was defeated, Kissinger quickly read the writing on the wall.

Once Nixon was elected, Kissinger was named national security advisor and that office became more powerful than it had before and arguably ever has since. And we know that Nixon consolidated foreign policy decision making to the White House so that he didn't have to worry about the State Department or the Defense Department.

My question is, how did this Nixon-Kissinger relationship even get off the ground? Was Nixon simply unaware of Kissinger's background, or was he able to put his prejudices aside?