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The author was deeply involved in Switzerland´s transformation of the Cold War policy of comprehensive defence into a modern security policy designed to foster stability and peace. Intellectual father of the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining, and the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces, Winkler has helped to create a set of foreign and security policy tools of world renown. He was also instrumental in shaping the vision of the " Maison de la Paix", in the very heart of international Geneva, home to the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, the three Geneva centres and more than a dozen other institutions serving peace and development - a place to meet, to think, and to act unique in the world.

In his memoirs Winkler tells the story how this transformation came about. It is a unique testimony on a crucial period of Swiss foreign and security policy. The book is a must for anybody interested in Swiss policy and international security.

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