The hypocrisy of the Cold War. How Henry Kissinger decided the fate of Vietnam, Chile, USSR and all over the world
His foreign policy, sometimes opportunistic and reactive, was absorbed by the use of power and deprived of concern for the people left after it. It is because his America was not an air by the city on a hill, he never felt unnecessary: ideas go out and go out of style, and power - no. From 1969 to 1977, Kissinger has established himself as one of the most influential functionaries in history.
For some time he was the only person who had ever held the positions of a national security advisor and state secretary-two completely different positions that at the same time placed responsibility for him for the formation and pursuit of American foreign policy.
If his German-Jewish origin and English with emphasis were distinguished by the ease with which he possessed power, made him a natural avatar of the American state of national security, which grew and gain momentum over the 20th century, like the organism that survive himself. Thirty years after Mr Kissinger went into a comfortable life in the private sector, I served eight years in a larger war after the Cold War after September 11.
Being a deputy national security advisor, whose duties included spelling and communication, I often focused on the history that America told than the actions we made. In the White House, you head an establishment that includes the most powerful armed forces and economics in the world, and at the same time you have the right to a radical history: "We consider self -evident truth that all people are created equal.
" But I was constantly encountered with the contradictions embedded in the US leadership, with the realization that our government is equipped with autocrats, while its rhetoric appeals to dissidents who are trying to overthrow them, or that our nation ensures compliance with the rules - for warfare, resolving disputes and disputes. The flow of trade, at the same time insisting that America is released from imitation of them when they become inconvenient. Mr Kissinger did not suit this dynamics.
For him, the authority is more rooted in what you did than that you have argued, even when these actions made US human rights and international law concepts invalid. He helped to widen the war in Vietnam and spread it to Cambodia and Laos, where the United States dropped more bombs than they dumped into Germany and Japan during World War II.
These bombardment, which often led to the non -selected death of civilians, did not improve the conditions on which the war in Vietnam ended; In any case, it simply demonstrated what the United States was ready to come to, to express their dissatisfaction with losing. According to the irony, this kind of realism reached its climax in the midst of the Cold War, a conflict that was allegedly connected with ideology.
On the part of the free world, Kissinger supported the campaigns of genocide - Pakistan against Bengal and Indonesia against the Eastern Timorians. In Chile, he is accused of helping to lay the foundation for a military coup, which led to the death of Salvador Allende, elected to the left President, and initiated a terrible period of autocratic rule.
A generous excuse is that Mr Kissinger represented Etos, who believed that the goals (the defeat of the Soviet Union and revolutionary communism) justify the means. But for a large part of the world, such thinking carries a cruel signal that America often brings to its marginalized population: we care about democracy for us, not for them. Shortly before the victory, Allende Kissinger said: "These questions are too important that Chilean voters can solve them themselves.
" Did all this cost it? Mr Kissinger was entrusted with trust, the idea that America should impose a price on those who ignore our requirements to influence the decisions of others in the future. It is difficult to understand how Laos bombing, a coup in Chile or murder in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) contributed to the end of the Cold War.
But Kissinger's Non-Entiumental view of global affairs allowed him to achieve consistent breakthroughs in relations with autocratic countries close to the weight category of America: discharge with the Soviet Union that reduced the escalation The People's Republic to the world order and initiated Chinese reforms that have brought hundreds of millions of poverty people.
The fact that these reforms were initiated by Dan Xiaopin, thus a Chinese leader who ordered the dispersing of protesters on Tiananmen Square indicates the ambiguous nature of Kissinger's heritage. On the one hand, the American-Chinese rapprochement contributed to the completion of the Cold War and raising the standard of living of the Chinese people.
On the other hand, the Communist Party of China has become the main geopolitical opponent of the United States and the avant -garde of authoritarian tendency in world politics, sending a million Uighurs to concentration camps and threatening the invasion of Taiwan, whose status remained unresolved as a result of Mr. Kissner's diplomatia. Mr Kissinger lived half of his life after he left the government.
He paved the path that became a two -party route in which former officials built a profitable consulting business while trading in global contacts. For decades, he was a welcome guest at a meeting of statesmen and magnates, perhaps because he could always give an intellectual basis to explain why some people are strong and have the right to own power.
He wrote a whole shelf of books, many of which strengthened his reputation of the oracle of world affairs; In the end, people as Henry Kissinger, not the victims of the superpower bombardment, including children in Laos, who continue to die from unobtrusive bombs that clog their country. You can consider these unbearable bombs as an inevitable tragedy of conducting world affairs.
From a strategic point of view, Mr Kissinger, of course, knew that as a superpower, she has a huge error that history could forgive. Only a few decades after the end of the Vietnam War, the same countries we bombed sought to expand trade with the United States. Bangladesh and Eastern Timor are now independent countries that receive American assistance. Chile is governed by a socialist milenial, whose Minister of Defense is Mr. Aliend's granddaughter. Superposts do what they should.
The wheel of history rotates. From where and when you live depends, it will crush you or lift you. But such a worldview confuses cynicism (or realism) with wisdom. History, its content, matters. In the end, the Berlin Wall fell not because of the chess moves made on the board of a large game, but because people in the East wanted to live like people in the West. Economics, popular culture and social movements were important. Despite all our shortcomings, we had the best system and history.
According to the irony of fate, Kissinger's attractiveness was partially explained by the fact that his history was exclusively American. His family miraculously escaped the wheels of history, fleeing from Nazi Germany at the moment when Hitler brought his devil's idea. Mr Kissinger returned to Germany as part of the US Army and released a concentration camp. This experience has given him alertness to the messianic ideology related to state power. But this did not leave much sympathy for outsiders.
It also did not motivate him to associate the post -war American Supervision with a spider web of norms, laws and loyalty to certain values that were recorded in the post -war order in America to prevent the New World War. After all, trust is whether you are who you call yourself. No one can expect perfection in public affairs than in relationships between people.
But the United States paid the price for their hypocrisy, although it is more difficult to measure than the result of war or negotiations. Over the decades, our history of democracy began to sound empty for a large number of people who could point to the places where our actions have deprived the meaning of our words, and "Democracy" simply sounded as a continuation of American interests.
Similarly, our perseverance on the international order based on the rules was ignored by authoritarian leaders who indicate the sins of America to justify our own. Now the story has made the full circle. We are seeing the revival of autocracy and ethno -nationalism around the world, especially in Russia's war against Ukraine.
In the Gaza sector, the United States supported the Israeli military operation, which resulted in civilians at such a rate that they once again showed most of the world that we selectively approach compliance with international laws and norms. Meanwhile, at home, we see democracy to obey the desire for power within a part of the Republican Party. That's where cynicism can lead.
Because, when there is no higher desire, there is no story that could make sense of our actions, politics and geopolitics are just a zero game. In such a world, power gives the right. All this cannot be thrown on Henry Kissinger's shoulders. In many respects, he was the same as a creation of the American state of national security as its author. But it is also an instructive story. Whatever the imperfect we are, the United States needs our history to survive.
This is something that fastens multiple democracy within the country and distinguishes us from Russia and China. This story argues that the child in Laos is equal to the dignity and value of our children and that the people of Chile have the same right to self -determination as we are. For the United States, this should be part of national security. We forget about it at our own risk. The author expresses a personal opinion that may not coincide with the editorial position.