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I can understand why people despise Kissinger, but he’s a pretty interesting figure on the whole. Not the best diplomat or Secretary of State we’ve had, but cer

I can understand why people despise Kissinger, but he’s a pretty interesting figure on the whole. Not the best diplomat or Secretary of State we’ve had, but certainly a seminal figure in American foreign policy.

lolbert5 3y ago
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lolbert4 3y ago
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anigbrowl 3y ago
Certainly, but lots of terrible people are also interesting. Kissinger strikes me as a prime example of Lord Acton's dictum at how power corrupts; by any reasonable standard he committed absolutely egregious acts, but because they inured to the USA's strategic benefit, there has never been any political will to hold him accountable. It's like how the US promotes the idea of a 'rules based international order' but habitually diminishes the UN, refuses to participate in the International Criminal Court and so on.
- deleted 3y ago
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- 627467 3y ago
  Because "rules based international order" can only really be enforced by a hegemon, and obviously the hegemon can't really "be it" and "be in it" simultaneously
  - thrway63245 3y ago
    [dead]
  - jakobnissen 3y ago
    Of course they can. The police can't just arbitrarily kill people, either.
  - anigbrowl 3y ago
    No offense, but I'm getting a lot of 'trust me bro' vibes from this post.
- protocolture 3y ago
  Theres a semi apocryphal story that one of Kissingers friends warned him before he started working under clearance, that once he had access to "Intelligence" that other people didn't have, he would lose his humanity to the spooks, and assume he was smarter than the people without clearance. Which seems to be sort of what happened.
  - mikehotel 3y ago
    https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsberg-limitations-knowledge https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsbe...
  - reducesuffering 3y ago
    > assume he was smarter than the people without clearance Idk, it's actually wild how HN is almost entirely "Kissinger is a war criminal" meme-ing with little actual specific policy substance behind it. Meanwhile, if you read any Kissinger, you'd realize he understood history and the international relations better than 99% of these comments. Truly, word-for-word basis you will undoubtedly learn far more about history reading World Order than you will these HN comments. Personally, I have little hope in their uneducated decisions in a position of astronomical consequences and no 20/20 hindsight.
    - jrflowers 3y ago
      > meme-ing with little actual specific policy substance behind it. This is a good point. Can we really say for certain that “bombing noncombatant countries both during a war and after a treaty was signed” is a war crime, and even if it were would “coming up with the whole idea” even count as contributing to something like that? It is confusing stuff like this that has led to no person ever being convicted for war crimes — the concept is too nebulous and complex to nail down. Surely if Kissinger were a war criminal he would have said so in the books that he wrote
      - n8cpdx 3y ago
        You can be both a war criminal and an insightful writer.
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lolbert4 3y ago
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__rito__ 3y ago
He is interesting in the way Hitler, Stalin, or Churchill are "interesting".
bigbacaloa 3y ago
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lolbert5 3y ago

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lolbert4 3y ago

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anigbrowl 3y ago

Certainly, but lots of terrible people are also interesting. Kissinger strikes me as a prime example of Lord Acton's dictum at how power corrupts; by any reasonable standard he committed absolutely egregious acts, but because they inured to the USA's strategic benefit, there has never been any political will to hold him accountable. It's like how the US promotes the idea of a 'rules based international order' but habitually diminishes the UN, refuses to participate in the International Criminal Court and so on.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
627467 3y ago
Because "rules based international order" can only really be enforced by a hegemon, and obviously the hegemon can't really "be it" and "be in it" simultaneously
- thrway63245 3y ago
  [dead]
- jakobnissen 3y ago
  Of course they can. The police can't just arbitrarily kill people, either.
- anigbrowl 3y ago
  No offense, but I'm getting a lot of 'trust me bro' vibes from this post.
protocolture 3y ago
Theres a semi apocryphal story that one of Kissingers friends warned him before he started working under clearance, that once he had access to "Intelligence" that other people didn't have, he would lose his humanity to the spooks, and assume he was smarter than the people without clearance. Which seems to be sort of what happened.
- mikehotel 3y ago
  https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsberg-limitations-knowledge https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsbe...
- reducesuffering 3y ago
  > assume he was smarter than the people without clearance Idk, it's actually wild how HN is almost entirely "Kissinger is a war criminal" meme-ing with little actual specific policy substance behind it. Meanwhile, if you read any Kissinger, you'd realize he understood history and the international relations better than 99% of these comments. Truly, word-for-word basis you will undoubtedly learn far more about history reading World Order than you will these HN comments. Personally, I have little hope in their uneducated decisions in a position of astronomical consequences and no 20/20 hindsight.
  - jrflowers 3y ago
    > meme-ing with little actual specific policy substance behind it. This is a good point. Can we really say for certain that “bombing noncombatant countries both during a war and after a treaty was signed” is a war crime, and even if it were would “coming up with the whole idea” even count as contributing to something like that? It is confusing stuff like this that has led to no person ever being convicted for war crimes — the concept is too nebulous and complex to nail down. Surely if Kissinger were a war criminal he would have said so in the books that he wrote
    - n8cpdx 3y ago
      You can be both a war criminal and an insightful writer.

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lolbert4 3y ago

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__rito__ 3y ago

He is interesting in the way Hitler, Stalin, or Churchill are "interesting".

bigbacaloa 3y ago

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