This study focuses on the life of William C. Bullitt, perhaps the most charming, devious, and thoughtful person in Soviet-American relations in the interwar and early postwar years. Cassella-Blackburn introduces Bullitt as a young patrician who persistently pushed his views concerning Russia on the Wilson Administration. His thoughtfulness and persistence landed him the position as leader of a mission to the Bolsheviks in early 1919. He attempted to isolate the Bolsheviks within the Liberal world order while the Bolsheviks were weak.

Fourteen years later, an older more...