The Dark Machiavellian More Hated Than Feared: Kissinger at 100

If you want to know why Henry Kissinger is the most demonized motherfucker on the planet, read the quick historical rehash by Slate's Fred Kaplan of Kissinger's body counts while handling the United States' foreign policy efforts at the height of the Cold War between the 1960s through 1970s (with a dark realization his policy ideas lived on well into the modern-day War On Terror). 

Kissinger had his moments of triumph in his years of power, from 1969–76: U.S.–Soviet détente, the opening of China, and his shuttle diplomacy in the Middle East (though it was President Jimmy Carter who, a few years later, forged an enduring peace between Israel and Egypt).

Still, the dark side of Kissinger’s tradecraft left a deeper stain on vast quarters of the globe—and on America’s own reputation.

Chile is the darkest blotch on Kissinger’s legacy. He was the chief architect of the U.S. policy to destabilize the regime of Chile’s democratically elected socialist president, Salvador Allende...

This was not a case of Kissinger merely doing Nixon’s dirty work. In fact, Nixon was considering a proposal by a senior State Department official—one of Kissinger’s aides—to reach a modus vivendi with Allende. Kissinger postponed a White House meeting with the aide and convinced Nixon to crush the new government instead...

He did the same thing three years later, after the Argentine coup, whose military leaders were even more brutal and murderous. In fact, he berated an aide who suggested issuing a démarche to the Buenos Aires government. Instead, Kissinger turned a blind eye to Operation Condor, an assassination operation against left-wingers throughout much of Latin America. In that context, he told Argentina’s foreign minister, “Look, our basic attitude is that we would like you to succeed.” And he urged him to succeed—that is, to put down dissidents and critics—as quickly as possible. State Department officials and ambassadors started issuing protests to the dictators in charge of Condor. Kissinger put the kibosh on their efforts, demanding that “no further actions be taken on the matter.”

Kissinger also gave a green light to Indonesia’s 1975 invasion of East Timor, which resulted in the killing of more than 100,000 civilians. He told Gen. Suharto, Indonesia’s leader, that his use of U.S. weapons “could create problems”—that is, legal problems for Nixon and Kissinger—but added, “It depends on how we construe it: whether it is in self-defense or is a foreign operation.” An East Timor Truth Commission later concluded that U.S. political and military support for Suharto was “fundamental to the Indonesian invasion and occupation.”

This was all of a piece with Kissinger’s actions, back in the spring of 1971, after the East Pakistan coup led by Gen. Agha Muhammad Yahya, which led to the deaths of millions of civilians. “To all hands,” Kissinger supported the coup, writing in a cable to diplomatic personnel, “don’t squeeze Yahya at this time.”

And, of course, dominating Kissinger’s entire time in power, there were the massive bombings of North Vietnam, which did nothing to turn or stop the war, and the secret bombings of Cambodia. The latter—a ferocious stream of aerial attacks that began in March 1969 and roared on for more than a year under the code names “Breakfast Plan” and “Operation Menu”—killed as many as 150,000 civilians. It also so destabilized the entire country of Cambodia that the Khmer Rouge moved into the vacuum and murdered at least 2 million more, roughly a quarter of the country’s population.

There's a reason why whenever a beloved celebrity like Tina Turner passes away, the immediate social media reaction is "Why the fuck is Kissinger still alive?"

Kissinger still lives because he converted political connections into personal power, and because the United States refuses to hand him over for war crimes or any other crimes against humanity he clearly caused across his career (and the bloody legacy he left in his wake).

Kissinger defends himself to this day by arguing the global struggle against Communism required a "realpolitik" response: That is, to be as brutal and undermining as the Stalin-backed insurgencies had been in the 1950s across Eastern Europe and then the Third World. In this, Kissinger describes himself as a Machiavellian, in that "the ends justified the means" in ensuring American economic and political influence on the world stage.

If Kissinger truly is a Machiavellian, he overlooked one of the key teachings: In Machiavelli's question "whether it is better to be Loved or Feared," Machiavelli answered his own question by pointing out "It is more important to avoid being Hated" because in that moment you lose the Respect a Prince - or any leader - needs to keep himself in power.

In Kissinger's wake were dozens of nations broken, bloodied, left to suffer under dictatorial regimes backed by American muscle. The citizenry of those nations did not, will not forget that the United States - selling ourselves as a beacon of liberty and justice - became hypocritical monsters turning a blind eye to the suffering of those who begged for liberty and justice for their own.

In this, the United States remains a target of hate across the Third World nations that we need to deal with in our ongoing efforts to maintain global political stability (which we've learned is a better way to maintain our interests through strong economies built on trade and cooperation).

Because of that legacy, Henry Kissinger remains a Prince more Hated than Feared, and clearly never Loved. I don't care what Jill St. John saw in him.