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"The Kissinger Cables": WikiLeaks Releases 1.7M Historical Records
An anonymous reader writes to note the latest large-scale document release from WikiLeaks: "The cables are all from the time period of 1973 to 1976. Without droning about too many numbers that can be found in the press release, about 200,000 of the cables relate directly to former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. These cables include significant revelations about U.S. involvements with fascist dictatorships, particularly in Latin America, under Franco's Spain (including about the Spanish royal family) and in Greece under the regime of the Colonels. The documents also contain hourly diplomatic reporting on the 1973 war between Israel, Egypt and Syria (the 'Yom Kippur war'). While several of these documents have been used by U.S. academic researchers in the past, the Kissinger Cables provides unparalleled access to journalists and the general public. 'The illegal we do immediately; the unconstitutional takes a little longer.' — Henry A. Kissinger, U.S. Secretary of State, March 10, 1975."
'Fascist Dictatorship' is verging on hate speech. Please use the term 'Stability-Enhanced Administration' or 'American Regional Security Ally'.
My initial reaction was to think, "at least he admits it, privately."
After I thought about it for a half a minute, this quotation made my day. I realized that the people of the United States had passed a law that put a man like that in fear. Add one point in the "democracy" column!
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
Wait, so "They are playing dirty" makes "We are playing dirty" right?
Siding with scoundrels tends to return and bite you in the ass. Osama is the proof (and he did win with 9/11. Look at your law and your freedoms today.)
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Well, I believe Machiavelli wrote a separate book on republics, which I haven't read, but the closest relevant chapter in _the Prince_ is probablyChapter IX, where he says:
I'm aware that Machiavelli's name is a synonym for ruthlessness, but if you actually read what he wrote, there's a lot more to it than that. He wrote a lot about the importance of gaining and keeping the people's support. So, I do not think Kissinger by and large took the right lessons from Machiavelli. Now, Lyndon Johnson, *there's* a true student of Machiavelli!
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
Wow, and here I was thinking of an alternative where we managed to partner with people who weren't corrupt murderous assholes who we could train to fight without having our own weapons and training used against us.
Who am I kidding? The only two possible choices for dealing with the USSR were bin Laden and Santa Claus! We did the best we could!
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Osama is one way it can return and bite you. The other way it can hurt you is with what the spooks call "blowback", as demonstrated most thoroughly in Iran and the US-supported Shah: We support the thugs, the people hate the thugs, so there's a popular revolt that replaces the thugs, and for some reason the new guys thoroughly hate us.
Some other examples of where this dynamic comes into play:
- Chile (thanks to Pinochet)
- Venezuela (after the botched coup against Chavez)
- Nicaragua and Panama (thanks to Manuel Noriega, another CIA asset)
- El Salvador (with US-sponsored death squads)
- Cuba (the US strongly supported the brutal Batista, which is why Castro hated us so much)
- Lebanon (our support of Israeli cluster bombs in Beirut and the like bolsters Hezbollah)
- Vietnam (they still are mad about the "killing millions of them and leaving land mines and chemical weapons all over the place" thing)
- Iraq (we thought they had WMDs because we had sold them the weapons in question)
- in the near future, Afghanistan
I am officially gone from
What Machiavelli talked about was how to achieve and hold power. That requires the people's support. But a Machiavellian, like any true politician, does it for his own sake, not for theirs -- and Machiavelli thus talked about how to reconcile this fundamental selfishness with the need to keep the people's support.
The problem comes when there is a distinction between enacting policies that benefit the people, and feigning to so just in order to get their support while actually not having their best interests at heart. This is why transparency in governance is the ultimate enemy of politicians and yet the only thing that gives government a shade's chance of actually serving the public.
The USSR was a fascist country, although the red sort of fascism
Red fascism? Is that supposed to be an oxymoron? Fascism and communism were mortal enemies. You might want to look up a minor historical incident called World War II.
What fascism and communism did have in common was that they were both totalitarian. Words have a meaning; use them appropriately.
I am glad the West's only country capable of standing against the USSR had politicians like Dr Kissinger that were focused on winning.
And how was Henry focused on winning? By sabotaging peace negotiations and prolonging the Vietnam war so Nixon could win in 1968? The Vietnam war was a quagmire for the US and as such the USSR loved it. They could grind down the US just by shipping a few weapons to North Vietnam. Hence he was giving aid to our enemies - the Constitutional definition of treason.
True, the cheerleading for North Korea and China on Slashdot is almost embarrassing.
Absent, but embarrassing.
I have to wonder at the thought processes of somebody who, when you say "Y'know, our support of Operation Condor was really pretty disgusting", somehow hears "I love Communism so much that I'd kiss Uncle Joe right on his death camps! Viva La DPRK!" and begins frothing at the mouth...
Please forgive me if I'm harder on my own country than others. It is because it is my country, the one I have the most stake in and the most control over (Ha!). It's the same reason I'm more concerned with my own kid's behavior than that of other children.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
I don't know how happy Kissinger is or the rest of his ilk. I do know that nations can not take treaties with the US seriously at all. Just the example of the treaties signed with native American peoples alone are enough to force me to believe that treaties with the US are worthless.
It is all very depressing. But I suspect that without slavery, forced labor, creation of deliberate poverty to force low wages, and usurping land and generally scheming to rob the world blind I doubt that the US would ever have existed at all. Human history seems to be all about this evil mindset. The Apache rampaged and attacked others and took what they wanted as normal practice. The later immigrants into the Americas did no differently at all. The one difference is that the Apaches did not hide what they did at all. Even admitting that such things go on is dangerous for Americans. Dr. King is an example of what our government can do when people speak out.
Normalizing relations with China while not abandoning Taiwan is an example of something that could have become a festering wound that he avoided.
To give the devil his due, there are certain things that Nixon/Kissinger did right. You mentioned one of them. Others are détente and SALT I. But those are no reason to loose sight of the corrupt, murderous, and possibly outright treasonous things that they also did. History is full of such contradictions. For example, nobody likes to mention that without Stalin's forced industrialization in the 1920's and 30's, the Nazis probably would have won.
If the US had had more interest in actually promoting democracy and democratic changes when promulgating its foreign policy, the result would have been more democratic countries that used the US as a model, or at least viewed it in a positive way. On those few occasions when the US has acted in a manner that reflected its own ideals, this has often been the result.
Sadly US foreign policy has usually been shortsighted, focused on advancing US corporate interests and ensuring "stability" in a region - with "stability" usually being in the form of a brutal dictatorship. Things that should at least theoretically not be in keeping with US ideals. Apparently its more important that say US Sugar keeps its control over the sugar industry than the people of the Dominican republic get to have democratic rule and fair laws etc. Mostly it seems the US ideals are seen as being for US citizens only, and that its okay if the rest of the world suffers wars, massacres, dictatorships, etc to make that possible. This is why so many foreign countries dislike the US so much in the end.
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
Isn't that really what the basic function of a government is?
The basic functions of a government are supposed to be:
- Prevent citizens from robbing, killing, raping, vandalizing, etc each other.
- Prevent other countries from sending people to rob, kill, rape, vandalize, etc its citizens.
Neither of those require oppressing people who live in other countries.
I am officially gone from
Continually annoys me when these idiots scream "Well Stalin killed millions!" I don't give a shit, I didn't pay taxes in the Soviet Union that supported a war machine that assisted in the massacre of a huge percentage of the Central American civilian population. My tax dollars didn't ship weapons to Cuba, but they did pay for free weapons for apartheid South Africa. My government didn't approve sending warplanes to the North Vietnamese government, but it did give direct and explicit approval to carrying out genocide in East Timor. Yep, Mao wasn't a nice guy, but the citizens of my country didn't elect Mao to represent me. They elected Reagan and a pair of Bushes, who were every bit as bad without the excuse of Mao's morphine addiction.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin