Honestly, the reason everyone makes a big deal about Zbigniew Brzezinski is because he actually helped shape a ton of American foreign policy during the Cold War and after. He was President Carter's national security adviser and had this intense rivalry with people like Henry Kissinger. From what I've seen, he was famous for predicting the downfall of the Soviet Union way before it happened and for pushing the U.S. to support dissidents there. People either loved his bold ideas or thought he was kind of too aggressive about the U.S. leading the world. After being in government, he spent, like, over thirty years at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), still writing and influencing debates about Russia, China, and even the Middle East. I even read that his personal diaries showed he never really left the fight—all his career, he was obsessed with making sure the U.S. would stay a top power. So, whether you liked him or not, Brzezinski really changed a lot of the way American presidents think about power around the world. If you ask me, it's kinda wild how much one smart dude can change history.