Henry Kissinger

Henry Alfred Kissinger (born May 27, 1923) is an American diplomat who
played an important part in foreign affairs via his role in several
Republican administrations between 1968 and 1976.

Personal background

Kissinger was born in Fuerth, Germany. In 1938, fleeing Hitler's persecution
of Jews, his family came to New York City; Kissinger was naturalized a
United States citizen on June 19, 1943.

He spent his high school years in the Washington Heights section of upper
Manhattan, but has never lost his pronounced German accent. Kissinger
attended high school at night and he worked in a shaving brush factory
during the day. While attending City College of New York, in 1943, he was
drafted into the Army and became a German interpreter for the 970th
Counter-intelligence Corps.

Henry Kissinger received the BA Degree Summa Cum Laude at Harvard College in
1950. Urban legend has it Kissinger is the only person to receive a perfect
grade point average from Harvard, but in fact received one 'B' senior year.
He received the MA and Ph.D. degrees at Harvard University in 1952 and 1954
respectively. His doctoral dissertation was titled A World Restored:
Metternich, Castlereagh and the Problems of Peace 1812-22.

Politically ambitious, he cultivated relations with Nelson Rockefeller.
When, in 1968, it became clear that Richard Nixon would be elected
President, Kissinger became an advisor to Nixon.

But both men were loners, shy and introverted, who liked to think of
themselves as cool and masterful strategic thinkers. Both men idealized
"strength" and despised weakness.

The Nixon administration

While working for Nixon, Kissinger established the policy of detente with
the Soviet Union. He also negotiated the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks
(culminating in the SALT I treaty) and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. In
July and October of 1971, Kissinger made two secret trips to the People's
Republic of China to confer with Zhou Enlai and set the stage for the
groundbreaking summit undertaken by Richard Nixon in 1972, and the
normalization of relations between the PRC and the United States.

He was awarded the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize along with Le Duc Tho of Vietnam,
for his work on the Vietnam peace accords. Kissinger and Nixon had come to
office in 1968 on a promise of a quick end to the Vietnam War, but the
intervening years saw an escalation in conflict as well as its extension to
an illegal bombing campaign (overseen by Kissinger) in Laos and Cambodia.
Tho refused the prize rather than share it with Kissinger, and the satirical
musician Tom Lehrer famously said "Political satire became obsolete when
Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize."

Kissinger served as the Secretary of State from 1973 to 1977 in the Nixon
(1973-1974) and Ford administrations.

Kissinger may have played a role in the September 11, 1973 coup by Augusto
Pinochet against the government of Chilean President Salvador Allende.
Documentary evidence shows CIA involvement throughout the coup, but
Kissinger says he reversed his initial position supporting a coup well
before it happened.

Despite the occasional allegation of planning a shady plot in a foreign
country, Kissinger was largely popular with the public, becoming one of the
better liked members of the increasingly unpopular Nixon administration.
Kissinger had little involvement with the Watergate scandal that would
eventually bring down Nixon and many of his closest aides- a fact which
greatly increased Kissinger's reputation as the "clean man" of the bunch. At
the height of his popularity he was even regarded as somewhat of a sex
symbol, and was seen dating starlets like Jill St. John, Shirley MacLaine
and Candice Bergen.

When Nixon resigned in 1974 Kissinger remained Secretary of State under new
President Gerald Ford.

In December of 1975, Kissinger and Ford met with General Suharto of
Indonesia, approving his invasion of East Timor, which led to the massacre
of 200,000 Timorese. Until the release of documents confirming his
foreknowledge of the invasion, Kissinger claimed that he was unaware of
Suharto's intentions when he left Jakarta.

Following the Ford Administration, he played a relatively minor role in
subsequent governments (perhaps, some have alleged, due to a bad
relationship with George Bush), although he continued to participate in
policy groups such as the Trilateral Commission and do political consulting,
speaking, and writing.

In 2002, President George W. Bush appointed Kissinger to chair a committee
to investigate the events of the September 11 attacks. His appointment led
to widespread criticism, generally taken from the position that Kissinger
has never been supportive of the public's right to know, but also from the
position that Kissinger is viewed by some as a war criminal in his own right
(see "Accusations Against Henry Kissinger", below). In response,
Congressional Democrats insisted that Kissinger file financial disclosures
to reveal any conflicts of interest. Both Bush and Kissinger claimed that
Kissinger did not need to file such forms, since he would not be receiving a
salary. When the Democrats insisted, however, Kissinger resigned from the
commission. On December 13, 2002 he stepped down as the chairman of a panel
citing conflict of interest with his clients.

With his first wife, Ann Fleischer, he had two children, Elizabeth and
David. He currently lives with his second wife, the former Nancy Maginnes,
in Kent, Connecticut. He currently is the head of Kissinger and Associates,
a consulting firm.

Writings

His writings include Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy (1957), The
Necessity for Choice (1961), The Troubled Partnership (1965), and Diplomacy
(1994). Memoirs, The White House Years (1979), Years of Upheaval (1982), and
Years of Renewal (1999); biographies by S. R. Graubard (1973) and W.
Isaacson (1992); study by B. and M. Kalb (1974).

Accusations Against Henry Kissinger

The book The Trial of Henry Kissinger by Christopher Hitchens (2001) accuses
Kissinger of conspiracy to commit murder and war crimes. The February and
March 2001 issues of Harper's Magazine feature a series by Hitchens on the
case for charging Kissinger with war crimes. Hitchens presents an argument
that 1) on at least one occasion, Henry Kissinger conspired to commit
murder, and 2) on numerous other occasions, Kissinger was the primary force
behind certain acts that could quite plausibly be considered war crimes.

The primary charges against Kissinger:

   * As National Security Advisor to President Nixon directed the first
     phase of US bombings in Cambodia (1969-1975) and thus masterminded the
     murder of an estimated 600,000 peasants there;
   * helped engineer and then protect the Augusto Pinochet coup of 1973 and
     subsequent regime of torture and murder.
   * Under President Ford Secretary of State Kissinger gave the go-ahead to
     Indonesia's invasion of East Timor and subsequent massive war crimes there;

Regarding East Timor, previously secret documents released in late 2001
revealed that Kissinger indeed gave Suharto his support for the invasion of
East Timor during a visit to Indonesia in 1975, thus refuting his claim in a
1999 interview that he had not discussed the matter in advance and only
found out about it as he was leaving the country. As many as 200,000 people
may have died as a result of the invasion. Although it was illegal for the
arms that the US supplied to Indonesia to be used for offensive purposes,
the documents revealed that Kissinger was unconcerned over the illegality of
their use; his primary concern was over manipulating the public perception
of what happened. "We would be able to influence the reaction in America if
whatever happens, happens after we return", he was quoted as saying.

Kissinger has refused to respond point by point to Hitchens's charges.
However, in a speech before the National Press Club he was asked about these
charges and his response was that in the cause of world peace, serious
people can have legitimate disagreements about the means. In attempting to
create a war crimes charge, Kissinger claims that Hitchens is taking
selected quotations and documents without taking into account the context
and the situation that those documents existed in and that Hitchens ignores
the significant advances in world peace that were taken under his tenure,
such as the Anti-Ballistic Treaty, detente and arms reduction treaties with
the Soviet Union, the opening to China, and the withdrawal from Vietnam.
Kissinger stated that this is nothing more than the politics of revenge and
vendetta and that it cheapens and makes a mockery of the concept of war
crimes and crimes against humanity. Kissinger stated that this mockery of
the concept of war crimes is an obstacle to creating the just and peaceful
world that Hitchens claims to wish to create, and as a result, he will not
respond to Hitchens.

It is worth noting that Hitchens is neither the first nor only person to
accuse Kissinger of war crimes. As of May 2002, he is wanted for questioning
in Chile (related to the Pinochet coup) and Spain.

Hitchens' book inspired a feature-length documentary, "The Trials of Henry
Kissinger", directed by Eugene Jarecki, which also highlighted the charges
against Kissinger.

A suit was filed 2001 September 10 by the family of Gen. Rene Schneider,
once head of the Chilean general staff, accusing Kissinger of arranging his
1970 murder for opposing a miltary coup.[1]

Quotes by Kissinger

   * On foreign policy:- "Foreign Policy is not missionary work."
   * On power:- "Power is the greatest aphrodisiac."
   * On women:- "For me, women are only a diversion, a hobby."

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