Mean Old Kissinger’s History Lesson

I don’t know much about Henry Kissinger other than that he has big scary eyebrows, he worked for Nixon, he was nice to China, and he has a sinister accent. In other words, I, having not read up enough on his era and actions, have internalized the superficial and widespread knowledge that he is bad, bad, bad. For all I know, he might be, though I am inclined to disbelieve it in total, given that the purveyors of that image are those with whom I often disagree. I was pleased to read, then, his essay in today’s Washington Post, in which he lists the three revolutions turning our world on its head geopolitically: 1. the collapse of or change in Europe’s structure; 2. the attempt of radical Islam to be victorious through the internal morphing through population growth of non-Islamic states into sharia-shaped tools of Islamic salvation; 3. the movement of geopolitical relevance from the occident to the orient, or at least, from the ocean of the occident – the Atlantic – to the oceans of the orient – the Pacific and the Indian. As a concise description of the world, and contra Kissinger’s reputation with the headline-reading crowd (i.e., myself), it was – it seemed to me – remarkably clear of bloodthirsty, imperialistic, or cynical observation. “Just the facts, sir,” was what I heard. Perhaps I am deluded.

The import of the essay seemed to be little more than reporting what people know already: that Europe is changing in ways yet to be fully understood; that Islam will not embed itself in the West without adjustment; that China and India are on everyone’s mind. The particular insight that I found to be new – and it may not be – was the linking of observation one – that Europe is changing, growing less statist, at least temporarily – with observation three – that China and India (and the rest) are growing ever more powerful and consequential. This is most likely a coincidence, for as soon as these countries tried on capitalism, they were bound to like it, economically, and gain power from it. But it may also be in part causal. It is a common observation that World War I ended Europe, that only the most dire of provocations could thenceforward force it to defend itself, and that any self-projection on the world stage, especially militarily, was bound to be tentative and slowed by the excessive social consciences and the emasculated armed forces they had bred to protect themselves from the self-inflicted wounds of the First World War. And although the illness of the Second was largely caused by the medicines taken and the balms applied to the wounds of the First, Europe recoiled ever more firmly from violence and resolute action on the world stage, lashing themselves together into a great ungainly scarecrow without a heart, to build a fine utopia of peace. May we never take that route. It is fine and right to give up the abuse of others, but to give up the influence of others because one is convinced of one’s own ineradicable iniquity is to leave oneself open to others’ influence, not always benign or unarmed.