ON KISSINGER'S PASSING

 I happened to have a brief exchange of views with Kissinger about China in 2000. At the time, I was alarmed by the laxity of the Clinton administration in policing the exports of dual-use high techology to China, which I deemed reckless. Kissinger asked his director of Kissinger Associates, Paul Bremer III – the future governor of Iraq – to answer on his behalf . In it, Bremer wrote that Kissinger told him that he shared my concerns, which were not however shared by the Washington elite at the time.

Whilst in my view he was less important and competent – among US top foreign policy experts – than George Kennan, Kissinger knew how to successfully make the transition from academic life to the corridors of power in Washington DC. I say that he was less competent than Kennan because he never really understood the USSR as Kennan did, nor could he get the better of Soviet diplomats the way he did with Zhou Enlai or Mao of China.

The book that launched his career was not about Metternich, but his 1957 " Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy”, in which he made the case for the feasability of limited nuclear wars among superpowers. The book made him one of the darlings of the military-industrial complex and impressed both Kennedy and Richard Nixon.

Kissinger also knew how to deal with political leaders -from Ceaușescu to Nixon- who had oversized egos, if not downright megalomania, like the Romanian dictator. Nixon did not like Kissinger much, he just used him. For his part, Kissinger was singing praises to Nixon during working hours, whilst calling him unstable and a drunk in evening meetings with his friends.

Kissinger honestly acknowledged that at the origin of his success in China was the chief of the Czechoslovak secret service, which was the first to bring to his attention the existence of the Sino-Soviet split. Chancellor Adenauer of Germany also helped, giving him a book on the subject written by a German intelligence official.

Kissinger was an enormously ambitious individual. He wanted a big success in China and to get it, he made the error of agreeing to the demands of the Chinese to formally consider Taiwan as part of China. He did so without informing Nixon first or indeed without having his approval. Critics contend that he did in effect hand over Taiwan to China.

Finally, unlike Kennan, Kissinger was not known to oppose NATO’s eastern expansion, nor advocate for its dissolution . His last proposal was not to keep Ukraine neutral, but to convince Kiev to give up part of Ukraine’s territory in exchange for NATO membership. Sad but true.

All Hegemons Have an Expiry Date

 A day after Jake Sullivan's 7-hour meeting with his Chinese counterpart Yang Jiechi, questions remain about the true objectives of the American "negotiators".

I, for one, am inclined to believe that Sullivan was instructed to use a carrot-and-stick approach with China. Over the past few years, China-bashing by various White House administrations has not yielded any practical results, so the overused threat of sanctions if China does not align itself with the US against Russia would not have worked by itself. 

It is entirely conceivable, therefore, that during the 7 hours of talks Sullivan might have alluded to "giving" China chunks of Russian territory in case wider conflict erupted and the Chinese came on board. Similar techniques were used by Henry Kissinger in the 70s to divide the former communist bloc and they worked. 

This time, however, China is a much more prosperous country and, as such, cannot embark on an anti-Russian course without risking serious consequences, nor does it want to. The United States cannot conceivably hope to stop China helping Russia, if needed, as both countries share the same continent and the same strategic interests, while being the targets of various sanctions and hostile propaganda from Washington.

The role of "masters of the universe" played by the United States over the last 20 years is fast becoming untenable , as the demise of the US as the sole hegemon is approaching. Sadly, instead of opting for a more rational organisation of decisionmaking in world affairs, officials of the current American administration prefer to evade reality and cling to the forlorn hope of keeping the world still, with them on top.

Now more than ever, the American foreign policy establishment needs to display clear thinking and set for the United States achievable objectives instead of ideological ones. This means that its top diplomats should stop pushing liberal democracy worldwide, as this lacks exportable qualities and is intensely disliked by at least two thirds of the world, from Russia and Asian countries, to the Islamic world and Africa. By the same token, the Americans should stop lecturing and moralising foreign leaders and countries and instead sit down with them at the negotiating table, fully taking into consideration their grievances and security concerns. 

Unfortunately, by walking the current path, the White House team - from the President down to Victoria Nuland at the State Department, who were the original architects of the events in Ukraine's Maidan - run the huge risk of getting their country into nuclear conflict with Russia.