Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser to former President Jimmy Carter, has died.
His daughter Mika, co-host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” made the announcement late Friday in a post on Instagram. “My father passed away peacefully tonight. He was known to his friends as Zbig, to his grandchildren as Chief and to his wife as the enduring love of her life,” she wrote. “I just knew his as the most inspiring, loving and devoted father any girl could ever have.”
A cause of death was not provided. Brzezinski was 89.
Brzezinski was born in Warsaw, Poland, in 1928. He later earned a Ph.D. at Harvard University and became a U.S. citizen in 1958.
Brzezinski worked as an adviser to the John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey and Carter campaigns and worked in the Johnson and Carter administrations. He served as Carter’s national security adviser from 1977 to 1981. It was in 1981 that he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Brzezinski was considered instrumental in normalizing relations with China, and helped lay the groundwork for the Camp David accords in which Egyptian and Israeli leaders reached a deal for peace. He also served during the Iran hostage crisis, which marred Carter’s foreign policy reputation.
Brzezinski was a counselor and trustee at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, D.C.,-based think tank.
John Hamre, CSIS president and CEO, credited Brzezinski with being the leading figure behind the downfall of the Soviet Union. “If there was a single architect of the fall of the Soviet Union, it was Zbigniew Brzezinski. He considered it the moral imperative of the age and the singular focus of his professional career,” Hamre said.
Hamre also said that former President Ronald Reagan had asked Brzezinski to stay on as national security adviser, but he declined because he thought Reagan needed a fresh perspective.
Brzezinski leaves behind his wife Emilie, his children Ian, Mika and Mark, and five grandchildren.
