1. Anonymous says:

    I’m reading James Mann’s Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush’s War Cabinet, and it’s not much of an overstatement to say that neoconservative foreign policy is almost entirely a reaction against Henry Kissenger. Personally most of the major neocons cut their DC teeth directly opposing Kissenger, everyone from Wolfowitz and Perle who interned in grad school for an operation set up by Nitze and Acheson to counter forces trying to reel in anti-balistic missiles, to Cheney and Rumsfeld, who battled him in the Ford administration. I can’t imagine anything has changed in the 30 years since.

  2. Anonymous says:

    Welllll, remember: Kissinger has spent the last thirty years proclaiming – and built an enormously successful consulting practice – around the idea that we need to treat China with kid gloves. I don’t think I’ve ever read an op-ed from him that didn’t emphasize the necessity of respecting Beijing’s perspective and power.

    That doesn’t mean he’s wrong, of course – he’s almost certainly correct when he says that trying to fight China’s rise to superpower status is futile and dangerous. But it doesn’t represent any sort of moment of clarity or new thinking on his part. Hell, it looks more like he’s a paid flack trying to preserve his clients’ investments.

  3. Anonymous says:

    FMguru

    Kissinger actually included a very pointed disclosure in the column, admitting he was a paid consultant. So at least now (unlike when he was named to the 9/11 commission) he is explicit about his ties.

    But you’re right, he’s the guy who has been engaging with China all along. So why change now?

  4. Anonymous says:

    FMguru beat me to the punch — proving both my brillance (that I agree with FMguru) and that I didn’t read the original piece and, accordingly, did not see the disclaimer.

    What I was going to say is that Kissinger writes for his clients. I can’t put it any better than the guru of FM, Kissinger is a paid flack.

    But even paid flacks are sometimes correct.

  5. Anonymous says:

    China will be powerful. The US has no choice in this matter.

    China will be hungry. She will have no choice but to play the world game to her own advantage.

    The US may or may not be powerful. We have choices, but do not seem inclined to make them to our own advantage.

  6. Anonymous says:

    China and the US have too much in common. Each society is taught from birth that their nation is the pluperfect center of the universe.
    Since we’re losing a war to one-fifth of freakin’ Iraq, and owe them $400 billion, there doesn’t seem like there’s anything we can do about China, not that we should. Let them assume the insanities of â€empire†for awhile.

  7. Anonymous says:

    I have said it several times before in other places, there isn’t going to be a war to overthrow the hegemony of the United States. What’s going to happen is, when the rest of the world has finally had it with our idiotic shenanigans, they’ll sell off their Treasury Bonds and drop the dollar as the world reserve currency.

    We will immediately fall into a depression so deep it will make 1931 look like the height of good times. Every part of the economy that has depended on cheap credit will tank in a week. The American middle class, unable to get out from under their no-value â€interest only†mortgages and such will be wiped out to the last Bush-voting moron in 30 days.

    We won’t be able to buy enough gas to fuel the air wing of one aircraft carrier long enough for them to fly from their fields around Fresno down to San Diego to join the ship, and the ship won’t have the wherewithal to get from North Island to Point Loma, let alone anywhere further.

    What the BushBoobs don’t realize is their moron economics has handed our freedom of action over to the approval of others. And their patience is running thin.

  8. Anonymous says:

    TC — You’re right, and it’s interesting that Kissinger doesn’t mention that China is underwriting our economy. Probably doesn’t want to upset his repbulican buddies…

    What I’ve always thought of Kissinger is that he’s a pragmatist. And when I say â€I always thought,†I mean, â€What other people have written.†He always seems to be the kind of person to have absolutely no moral principle whatsoever. His only yardstick was, â€What will be best to augment American power?†What he says about China, even if he is a paid flack, seems to follow from that position.

    I think his true position is that we can’t defeat China militarily or economically. Those roses about peace and prosperity? That’s probably his Mandarin sponsors talking.