Henry Alfred Kissinger é um diplomata americano, de origem judaica, que teve um papel importante na política estrangeira dos Estados Unidos entre 1968 e 1976.
Em 1938, devido às perseguições anti-semitas na Alemanha nazista, emigra com seus pais para os EUA, obtendo a cidadania americana em 19 de junho de 1943.
Depois de servir na Segunda Guerra Mundial, fez o seu doutoramento pela Universidade Harvard em 1954, tornando-se imediatamente instrutor na mesma instituição; depois de alguns anos, obteve o título de professor.
Kissinger foi conselheiro para a política estrangeira de todos os presidentes dos EUA de Eisenhower a Gerald Ford, sendo o secretário de Estado dos Estados Unidos , conselheiro político e confidente de Richard Nixon.
Em 1973 ganhou, com Le Duc Tho, o Prêmio Nobel da Paz, pelo seu papel na obtenção do acordo de cessar-fogo na Guerra do Vietnam. Le Duc Tho recusou o prêmio.
Henry Kissinger esteve envolvido numa intensa actividade diplomática com a República Popular da China, o Vietnã, a União Soviética e com África. Ainda hoje uma figura polémica e controversa, alguns dos críticos de Kissinger acusam-no de ter cometido crimes de guerra durante sua longa estadia no governo como dar luz verde para a invasão indonésia de Timor e a golpes de estado no Chile, Camboja e no Uruguai , sendo que por diversas vezes Kissinger usava de uma política tortuosa, em que parecia jogar com um "pau de dois bicos" ; entre tais críticos incluem-se o jornalista Christopher Hitchens e o analista Daniel Ellsberg . Apesar de essas alegações ainda não terem sido provadas em uma corte de justiça, considera-se perigoso para Kissinger entrar em diversos países da Europa e da América do Sul.
Henry Kissinger foi um dos mentores ou mesmo o mentor da chamada Operação Condor para a América do Sul, tendo o mesmo dito uma vez ao ministro de relações exteriores argentino da época, que: “Se há coisas que precisam ser feitas, vocês devem fazê-las rapidamente”, referindo-se a eliminação e repressão a quem era contra a ditadura, incluindo aí, obviamente torturas e mortes.
“Se você não sabe para onde vai, todos os caminhos o levarão a lugar nenhum.”
If you don't know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere
citado em "The Forbes Book of Business Quotations: 14,266 Thoughts on the Business of Life" - Página 336, de Edward C. Goodman, Ted Goodman - Publicado por Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 1997, ISBN 1884822622, 9781884822629 - 992 páginas
Sobre o apoio dos EUA ao golpe que derrubou Salvador Allende, presidente democraticamente eleito do Chile, em 11 de setembro de 1973.
citado em Richard R. Fagen, " The United States and Chile: Roots and Branches http://www.foreignaffairs.org/19750101faessay10135/richard-r-fagen/the-united-states-and-chile-roots-and-branches.html", Foreign Affairs, January 1975.
“Se ouvíssemos Nixon, teríamos uma guerra nuclear por semana.”
Henry Kissinger, secretário de Estado americano, segundo a biografia do presidente Richard Nixon A Arrogância do Poder
Fonte: Revista Veja, Edição 1 665 - 6/9/2000 http://veja.abril.com.br/060900/vejaessa.html
Statement of 1973, as quoted in "In Tapes, Nixon Rails About Jews and Blacks" in The New York Times (10 December 2010) http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/11/us/politics/11nixon.html.
1970s
“Intellectuals are cynical and cynics have never built a cathedral.”
As quoted in Sketchbook 1966-1971 (1971) by Max Frisch, p. 230
1970s
Commenting on the Iraq War in a BBC interview of 19 November 2006, as quoted in "Kissinger: Iraq military win impossible" by Tariq Panja, Associated Press, at Yahoo! News (20 November 2006) http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061120/ap_on_re_mi_ea/britain_iraq_kissinger
2000s
Clark Moustakas, as quoted in Sacred Simplicities: Meeting the Miracles in Our Lives (2004) by Lori Knutson, p. 141
Misattributed
A World Restored: Metternich, Castlereagh and the Problems of Peace, 1812-22 (1957), p. 2
1950s
National Security Study Memorandum 200. Adapted as policy by President General Ford originally classified. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Study_Memorandum_200
1970s
“It is barely conceivable that there are people who like war.”
Transcript of telephone conversation with poet and anti-war activist Allen Ginsberg from the National Security Archive http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB263/19710423-1950-Ginsberg-FIX.pdf (23 April 1971)
1970s
A World Restored: Metternich, Castlereagh and the Problems of Peace, 1812-22 (1957), p. 206
Paraphrased variant: The most fundamental problem of politics is not the control of wickedness but the limitation of righteousness.
Quoted by Walter Isaacson, " Henry Kissinger Reminds Us Why Realism Matters http://time.com/3275385/henry-kissinger/", Time, 4 September 2014
1950s
Phone call with Gen. Alexander Haig (9 December 1970) quoted in National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 123. The quotation was an excerpt from one of several phone conversations in which Kissinger ridiculed Nixon’s views about the war: "When Nixon proposed an escalation in the bombing of Cambodia, Kissinger and Haig felt obliged to humor the president while laughing at him behind his back" (Washington Post, May 27, 2004). Transcript at the National Security Archive http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB123/Box%2029,%20File%202,%20Kissinger%20%96%20Haig,%20Dec%209,%201970%208,50%20pm%20106-10.pdf
1970s
Munk debates – “21st Century will belong to China” – Kissinger, Zakaria, Ferguson, Li http://www.livestream.com/munkdebates/video?clipId=pla_937b4cf4-e0ea-4ed5-a458-6a3ba43769b8
2000s
On bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam war. From an interview with the Atlantic magazine - "The Lessons of Henry Kissinger" https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/12/the-lessons-of-henry-kissinger/505868/ (10 November 2016)
2010s
Statement of 1973, as quoted in Canadian and World Politics (2005) by John Ruypers, Marion Austin, Patrick Carter, and Terry G. Murphy
1970s
Cited in "Identifying the Wild Beast and Its Mark" http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2004241?q=durant&p=par, in The Watchtower (1 March 2004)
2000s
The End of the Road (1982), Ch. 25 "Years of Upheaval"
1980s
Meeting of the "40 Committee" on covert action in Chile (27 June 1970) quoted in The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence (1974); the quotation was censored prior to publication due to legal action by the government. See New York Times (11 September 1974) "Censored Matter in Book About C.I.A. Said to Have Related Chile Activities; Damage Feared" by Seymour Hersh
[Omi, M., Winant, H., Racial Formation in the United States, Taylor & Francis, 2014, 978-1-135-12751-0, https://books.google.com/books?id=T7LcAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA239, harv, 2018-11-02]
1970s
“The accumulation of nuclear arms has to be constrained if mankind is not to destroy itself.”
Press conference held on 13 February, 1974
Kissinger to Nixon, quoted in Bass, G. J. (2014). The Blood telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a forgotten genocide.
Fonte: FRUS: Documents on South Asia, 1969–1972, vol. E-7 (online at http://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76ve07), White House tapes, Oval Office 637-3, 12 December 1971, 8:45–9:42 a.m. Hereafter cited as FRUS, vol. E-7. quoted in Bass, G. J. (2014). The Blood telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a forgotten genocide.
“If the President had his way, we’d have a nuclear war every week.”
Fonte: Henry Kissinger on Nixon, as quoted in Bass, G. J. (2014). The Blood telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a forgotten genocide. chapter 19
“The security of Israel is a moral imperative for all free peoples.”
Fonte: See For the Record: Selected Statements 1977-1980 https://books.google.com.br/books?id=wcx4AAAAMAAJ, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1981.
The Coronavirus Pandemic Will Forever Alter the World Order, by Henry A. Kissinger, The Wall Street Journal https://www.henryakissinger.com/articles/the-coronavirus-pandemic-will-forever-alter-the-world-order/, April 3, 2020
2020s
