Nick has kindly brought to this article by Kissinger to my attention and reminded me of some things I neglected to mention.
Dr. Kissinger is not actually a doctor.
Mr. Kissinger is indeed wanted for questioning in a bunch of countries, some of which you may have heard of. These include France, Spain, presumably Chile, ...
Henry went out with Marlo Thomas and Bond girl Jill St. John. If being a war criminal wasn't reason enough to hate somebody, surely this is too much.
Hank is quite frightened of his past coming to light. He is quite libelous and, thanks Nick, has written in Foreign Affairs on limiting universal jurisdiction. He calls it a dangerous precedent, retroactive one assumes, where some old internationally appointed activist judge could accuse anybody of injustice with enough evidence.
I like Christopher Hitchens for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is he has given me this bit of wisdom: You do not have to like someone to like his work. The strongest work and ideas should stand independent of their authors if they are to withstand any inquiry. I think Hitchen's work will, by and by, withstand himself. Even if I disagree with him on specifics, as in God is Not Great, I have concede to him the better argument [certainly regarding the religious institution, although I would fight to keep this separate from the spiritual individual: these might not be the same].
I've read five of his books. I was quite aware of how forcefully Hitchens can rip something down when I got The Trial of Henry Kissinger. This might have been why I picked it up. I have always disliked Kissinger, perhaps at times for as small a reason as taste, and I thought I'd outsource my battle.
Hitchen's claim: The US Government searches the world to bring justice to evil-doers and war criminals like Milosovec and Hussein. Perhaps they're traveling too far. Consider Henry Kissinger, snug in the nicest building in New York, as a war criminal yet untried. The US set a precedent at the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials which strong discourages leaders (with death) from mass murder, genocide, plots to overthrow governments their nations are at peace with, and otherwise acting illegally. Hitchens claims that Kissinger is guilty of all that and more, except where the Nazi might (falsely) argue he was just following orders, Kissinger was more often than not the one telling people what to do.
War crimes and other unpleasantness aside, the book does a good job of dancing around a central paradox of the political and power aspirant: how does a fiercely intelligent man with first-hand knowledge of the horrors of unchecked power not get it -- that he is continuing a history of mass murder in the name of a bad idea (realpolitik)? I don't believe there's a finite amount of good traits. One can be smart and compassionate. Perhaps ambition is the culprit. Perhaps the skills it takes to get the job precludes a more reasonable candidate? Perhaps you can't make generalizations about the rare unique individual in politics?
For those who hate reading, Eugene Jarecki adapted the thesis of Hitchens' argument in a more even-handed (a better thing), less-detailed (worse) documentary available here. An impressive roster of politicos give their opinion on Kissinger, although the man, sadly, does not speak for himself. Jarecki's other film is Why We Fight. It's very good. The trailer is below.
Interesting: The 57,000 American Samoans do indeed have national voting rights in some small, electoralcollegedelegaty sense. So, the tightest primary could come down to the little islands and possibly make for a mildly-entertaining Tom Hanks movie.
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