(FORTUNE Magazine) – Few American public figures have been as celebrated during their time in office as Henry Kissinger, who came to Washington in 1969 a highly regarded but relatively unknown Harvard professor and left in 1977 the preeminent statesman of our age. Fewer still have maintained such enormous influence -- or remained so controversial -- so many years after leaving office. In Kissinger: A Biography (Simon & Schuster, $30), Walter Isaacson, an assistant managing editor at Time, comes closer than anyone has yet to capturing the intensity and complexity of this remarkable man. Isaacson's ! colorful, probing, and extraordinarily well-documented 767-page account was produced with and benefited from its subject's cooperation. Kissinger granted Isaacson numerous interviews, encouraged friends and associates to do the same, and made available unpublished documents and family papers. Among the hundreds of people with whom the author spoke -- Kissinger's critics as well as his admirers -- was this reviewer, who counts himself staunchly in the admiring camp. I joined Kissinger's National Security Council staff in late 1969, served as his economic adviser for five exhilarating years, and have enjoyed our friendship ever since. After stating that, I should also tell you that I found parts of this book uncomfortable to read and, at times, difficult to accept, particularly the gossipy comments by Kissinger's confidants regarding his attitude toward government colleagues. I believe these should not be taken too seriously and would rather focus on the more substantive issues that this latest examination of Kissinger's life and times describes. Isaacson begins, appropriately, at the beginning. He establishes the crucial link between Kissinger's childhood in what became Nazi Germany and his adult achievements and personality. The crisis in his homeland and the anti-Semitism he encountered growing up in the small city of Furth fed his desire, when in power, to create a stable and balanced world order. At the same time, they encouraged the suspiciousness and sensitivity to slights that Kissinger later displayed as a Harvard professor and in government. Those are traits, I might add, that would only have been encouraged by the meanspirited environment of the Nixon White House. Virtually all of us who worked in it at the time understood that we were operating in a ''tough neighborhood'' -- the bureaucratic equivalent of walking down a dark street at night in New York City. Isaacson captures in rich detail the relentless intensity and range of Kissinger's diplomatic efforts. Chief among them were his interminable efforts to disengage the U.S. from the Vietnam war in a way that would, at a minimum, produce a ''decent interval'' before the Saigon government's inevitable fall; his ''shuttle diplomacy'' between Israel and Egypt in 1974, the success of which was based on the enormous confidence that Israel's Prime Minister Golda Meir and Egypt's President Anwar Sadat placed in him; the detente that he and Nixon temporarily achieved with the Soviet Union; and, above all, the historic breakthrough of reestablishing diplomatic relations with China in 1972. About Kissinger's personalized style of diplomacy -- with its mixture of intrigue, ego, and brilliance -- Isaacson is ambivalent. He acknowledges that most of Kissinger's successes probably could not have been achieved had he left policy formulation and decision-making to the traditional bureaucracies. Here's a small example that's not in the book: When President Nixon was about to visit China for the first time, I recall that the Pentagon, citing ''security reasons,'' decided to hold up a Beijing-bound shipment of satellite transmission equipment that was supposed to beam back pictures of the historic trip. Only an irate call from Kissinger got the necessary license issued at the last minute. But Isaacson also correctly notes that there were times when Kissinger's policies would have received broader support from both Washington infighters and ordinary voters if he had consulted and involved more people in formulating them. One case where this penchant for keeping his cards hidden hurt, even Kissinger now admits, was his failure in 1974 to persuade skeptics in Congress to support the SALT II agreement to limit nuclear arms. To me, the biggest hole in this otherwise thorough assessment of Kissinger's career is its analysis of his encounters with international economics. It is true that he initially felt little enthusiasm for such issues -- and to this day cannot be said to be overly fond of them. Indeed, as Kissinger's senior economic adviser I was often kidded by friends about having a role akin to being military adviser to the Pope. BUT KISSINGER soon recognized that economics was destined to play a significantly greater role in international affairs and over time took an increasing interest in the subject. In 1971, when the U.S. decided to jettison the fixed exchange rate system by no longer converting the dollar into gold, Kissinger actively pressed Europe and Japan to devalue their currencies to help reduce America's emerging trade deficit. In return, he pledged that the U.S. would lift an import surcharge that had earlier been imposed by Nixon and his Treasury Secretary John Connally. Keeping the surcharge in place too long, Kissinger correctly felt, would damage allied unity prior to the Beijing and Moscow summits scheduled for early 1972. I also believe Isaacson underplays Kissinger's role as tutor and trainer to a whole generation of foreign policy experts, many of whom today occupy the senior ranks of George Bush's State Department and NSC staff as well as Bill Clinton's comparable circle of advisers. For most of us, the experience of working for Kissinger -- his exacting demands for sound analyses, his requirement that any policy recommendation include an assessment of its implications for U.S. interests elsewhere in the world or on other issues, his relentless insistence that words matter and must convey precise ideas -- was unique and rewarding. Many of us enjoyed responsibilities far greater than we ever imagined possible so early in our careers. What will be history's judgment of Kissinger? From his studies of Metternich and Bismarck, professor Kissinger learned that policy cannot be divorced from personality. That point was brought home to him even more sharply after he gained experience in office, first as National Security Adviser and then as Secretary of State. In January 1974, during his first Middle East shuttle, he reflected: ''As a professor, I tended to think of history as run by impersonal forces. But when you see it in practice, you see the difference personalities make.'' Isaacson amplifies on that linkage skillfully, extensively, and ultimately with the proper balance. For despite his numerous unflattering accounts of Kissinger's excessive zeal in undermining bureaucratic rivals and willingness to tolerate Richard Nixon's often crude and conspiratorial behavior, Isaacson never loses sight of the man's undeniable achievements. At a time when America was in turmoil over the Vietnam war, Kissinger's leadership enabled the nation to avoid two opposite but equally destructive courses: the excessively dovish temptation to withdraw into isolation and abandon competition with the Soviet Union on the one hand, and the excessively hawkish impulse to abandon cooperation with the Soviets on the other. By moving decisively to contain Soviet influence, Kissinger helped create the conditions that led to the eventual collapse of that country's empire; by underscoring that there were areas in which the U.S. would cooperate with the Soviet Union, he avoided confrontations that could have imperiled peace in other parts of the world. Remember, at the time the U.S., divided over Vietnam, might not have had the will to defend its interests if challenged. Isaacson's sharpest criticism is that, in doing all this, Kissinger placed too much emphasis on power politics and too little on the idealistic values % that many Americans see as the historical foundation of their foreign policy. Thus inattention to human rights, Isaacson argues, undermined support for detente with the Soviets from both the right and the left and weakened Kissinger's overall policy construct. I'm less convinced. On that point, Kissinger maintained, correctly as it turned out, that he could advance the cause of Jewish emigration from Russia better by pursuing quiet diplomacy than by trying to force specific, public commitments from Moscow. More broadly, Kissinger always defended his emphasis on balance-of-power realism and the vigorous pursuit of America's national interest as the best way to ensure the stable world order that he believed was the ultimate moral imperative in a nuclear age. His exertions and successes in pursuit of that goal add up to an impressive and enduring legacy. My guess is that history will be, if anything, kinder to Kissinger than this biography has been.

BOX:

EXCERPT: ''Because he was . . . a victim of the Nazis' ideological fervor, a yearning for stability and order was bred into his character.''