Henry Kissinger: Trending quotes (page 3)

“Here, according to the mythology of the liberals, was a peaceful little country that Nixon attacked. The fact that there were four North Vietnamese divisions within 30 miles of Saigon coming across the border killing Americans—killing 500 a week starting within two weeks of Nixon’s inauguration—was ignored in the debate on Cambodia by protesters emphasizing the technical neutrality of Cambodia and ignoring that its ruler had invited our response.”

Henry Kissinger

On bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam war. From an interview with the Atlantic magazine - "The Lessons of Henry Kissinger" https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/12/the-lessons-of-henry-kissinger/505868/ (10 November 2016)
2010s

Peace , Country

“In the 1950s and 1960s we put several thousand nuclear weapons into Europe. To be sure, we had no precise idea of what to do with them.”

Henry Kissinger

Statement of 1973, as quoted in Canadian and World Politics (2005) by John Ruypers, Marion Austin, Patrick Carter, and Terry G. Murphy
1970s

Idea

“Every civilization that has ever existed has ultimately collapsed … History is a tale of efforts that failed, of aspirations that weren’t realized... So, as a historian, one has to live with a sense of the inevitability of tragedy.”

Henry Kissinger

Cited in "Identifying the Wild Beast and Its Mark" http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2004241?q=durant&p=par, in The Watchtower (1 March 2004)
2000s

History , Sense , Effort

“Blessed are the people whose leaders can look destiny in the eye without flinching but also without attempting to play God.”

Henry Kissinger

The End of the Road (1982), Ch. 25 "Years of Upheaval"
1980s

God , People

“I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its own people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves.”

Henry Kissinger

Meeting of the "40 Committee" on covert action in Chile (27 June 1970) quoted in The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence (1974); the quotation was censored prior to publication due to legal action by the government. See New York Times (11 September 1974) "Censored Matter in Book About C.I.A. Said to Have Related Chile Activities; Damage Feared" by Seymour Hersh

[Omi, M., Winant, H., Racial Formation in the United States, Taylor & Francis, 2014, 978-1-135-12751-0, https://books.google.com/books?id=T7LcAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA239, harv, 2018-11-02]
1970s

People , Country

“The accumulation of nuclear arms has to be constrained if mankind is not to destroy itself.”

Henry Kissinger

Press conference held on 13 February, 1974

“We are the ones who have been operating against our public opinion, against our bureaucracy, at the very edge of legality.”

Henry Kissinger

Kissinger to Nixon, quoted in Bass, G. J. (2014). The Blood telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a forgotten genocide.
Source: FRUS: Documents on South Asia, 1969–1972, vol. E-7 (online at http://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76ve07), White House tapes, Oval Office 637-3, 12 December 1971, 8:45–9:42 a.m. Hereafter cited as FRUS, vol. E-7. quoted in Bass, G. J. (2014). The Blood telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a forgotten genocide.

“If the President had his way, we’d have a nuclear war every week.”

Henry Kissinger

Source: Henry Kissinger on Nixon, as quoted in Bass, G. J. (2014). The Blood telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a forgotten genocide. chapter 19

Way , War

“The security of Israel is a moral imperative for all free peoples.”

Henry Kissinger

Source: See For the Record: Selected Statements 1977-1980 https://books.google.com.br/books?id=wcx4AAAAMAAJ, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1981.

People

“The world’s democracies need to defend and sustain their Enlightenment values. A global retreat from balancing power with legitimacy will cause the social contract to disintegrate both domestically and internationally.”

Henry Kissinger

The Coronavirus Pandemic Will Forever Alter the World Order, by Henry A. Kissinger, The Wall Street Journal https://www.henryakissinger.com/articles/the-coronavirus-pandemic-will-forever-alter-the-world-order/, April 3, 2020
2020s

Democracy , World