How a Soviet spy outmaneuvered John Maynard Keynes to ensure U.S. financial dominance

"The U.S. demanded through Bretton Woods that Britain agree to establish the U.S. dollar as the global trade and finance vehicle, the global unit of account. This is something the British resolutely refused to agree to in the run-up to Bretton Woods and arguably never agreed to at Bretton Woods. White used ruses that I describe in the book, whereby his technocrats changed all the text behind the scenes, changed this inscrutable language. Various delegation heads only saw this at the end of the conference when they were being told to check out. Keynes, when he finally had time to read this thing he had signed up to was pretty damn annoyed. This was truly power politics at its best or worst, however you want to look at it."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/03/14/how-a-soviet-spy-outmaneuvered-john-maynard-keynes-and-ensured-u-s-global-financial-dominance/