Kissinger? Really?

I generally don't read the Times Argus, but I read it today because they have a story about my son and his new book.

 Still, imagine my surprise when I saw their lead editorial today singing the praises of Henry Kissinger.

It's actually a note about a Kissinger article in The Atlantic, which in the words of the Times Argus, is “a provocative article for The Atlantic describing the greatness of Henry Kissinger as a statesman,” and here's the core of the argument:

 

Kaplan reviews other Kissinger projects, including intervention leading to the rise of Pinochet in Chile and the withdrawal of support from Ethiopia by the Carter administration, which led to immense suffering in the Horn of Africa.

 

Kaplan’s reading of these situations is open to question, but his larger point is a good one: that a pragmatic foreign policy may be more moral than a moralistic one if the moralistic one cannot work. 

 Should I repeat that phrase? “The greatness of Henry Kissinger as a statesman”.

I'm not sure what your definition of “statesman” is, but in my view it is not precisely the same as a mass murderer, engineer of coups against democratically elected officials, of an architect of genocide.

For some reason there is always a certain mindset that to be taken seriously in discussions of foreign policy one must always be prepared to shed the blood of the darker races. I think it's supposed to stand for “realism”. Never mind that the history of genocide and support for dictators that the United States has been guilty of has made us demonstrably weaker and more vulnerable, it's all for the good of maintaining balance in Kissinger's bipolar view of the world.

Shame on you, Times Argus. 

5 thoughts on “Kissinger? Really?

  1. Henry Kissinger is one of the greatest examples of failed foreign policy in the history of the planet.

    Praising Kissinger’s statesmanship is like extolling the virtues of napalm as a skin exfoliator.  

  2. An ivory tower pragmatist, he was.

    Kissinger always gave the impression of hovering slightly above a bad smell that presumably emanated from lesser mortals who had the misfortune of falling under the marching shoes of those who served his strategic long view.

    Congratulations to Adam on his book, Jack.  It looks like the TA accidentally flipped the image of his book, but that may actually be appropriate to the fantasy genre. 😉

  3. Although Kissinger was supposed to be working for the Johnson Administration in ’68 to facilitate an end to the Vietnam War at the Paris Peace Talks, what he actually did was some low-down and sleazy work for the Nixon people, putting a bug in Thieu’s ear that, if he held out til after the ’68 elections, a ‘New’ Nixon administration would be more supportive of making peace on Thieu’s (Saigon’s) terms rather than Hanoi’s.  The dirty bastard thus, in his “art of statesmanship and diplomacy,” prolonged the Vietnam War til ’73–more dead Americans, many many more dead Vietnamese.  All for his fucking future career with Nixon.  A career which created more death in South America, Cyprus, and Timor.

    He should die a slow agonizing death.  Then, I suppose, the media nitwits will make him a martyr.  Look what they did with Reagan.

    Die, Henry, DIE!  

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