BONUS SPECIAL: The Legacy of Henry Kissinger

Henry Kissinger, the child refugee who rose to become US 0:00:03.800 --> 0:00:06.640 Secretary of State, has died at the age of one hundred. 0:00:07.080 --> 0:00:10.879 He was one of America's most distinguished diplomats. Kissinger passed 0:00:10.880 --> 0:00:13.840 away at his home in Connecticut, according to his statement 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:16.799 from Kissinger associates. We get more on the life of 0:00:16.840 --> 0:00:19.079 Henry Kissinger from Bloomberg's Nathan Hager. 0:00:19.440 --> 0:00:22.759 Henry Albert Kissinger was born in nineteen twenty three in 0:00:22.840 --> 0:00:25.520 the German state of Bavaria, the oldest son of a 0:00:25.600 --> 0:00:29.080 Jewish school teacher, Kissinger was known as Heintz until he 0:00:29.120 --> 0:00:31.760 moved with his family to the United States in nineteen 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:35.760 thirty eight to escape Nazi persecution. At the age of nineteen, 0:00:35.840 --> 0:00:39.000 while excelling at City College of New York, Kissinger was 0:00:39.080 --> 0:00:41.839 drafted in the Army. He served as an interpreter in 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:44.400 the country of his birth during World War II, and 0:00:44.520 --> 0:00:47.320 after the war he helped to round up Gestapo officers 0:00:47.360 --> 0:00:50.920 as a member of the nine hundred seventieth Counterintelligence Corps. 0:00:50.960 --> 0:00:53.880 In an interview with Bloomberg's editor in chief John Mickelthwade, 0:00:53.920 --> 0:00:57.840 Kissinger said he saw the first hand impact of authoritarianism 0:00:57.880 --> 0:00:59.960 and totalitarianism in his youth. 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:05.800 It was an experience which it's so elemental then it 0:01:05.840 --> 0:01:07.039 becomes part of you. 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:11.039 Kissinger brought that experience back with him to the United States. 0:01:11.080 --> 0:01:14.920 He resumed his studies at Harvard University. His doctoral dissertation 0:01:15.080 --> 0:01:18.760 there focused on balances of power in nineteenth century Europe. 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:21.760 As a tenured professor at Harvard, Kissinger honed of the 0:01:21.800 --> 0:01:25.840 conservative real politic worldview that would dominate his thinking on 0:01:25.959 --> 0:01:29.440 foreign policy for more than a half century. Kissinger also 0:01:29.560 --> 0:01:33.880 cultivated relationships with policymakers in Washington that led him to 0:01:33.959 --> 0:01:37.560 the White House in nineteen sixty nine as National Security 0:01:37.600 --> 0:01:41.920 Advisor to President Richard Nixon. Kissinger's secret trips to China 0:01:42.000 --> 0:01:45.120 in nineteen seventy one paved the way for arguably the 0:01:45.160 --> 0:01:49.080 greatest foreign policy achievement of the Nixon presidency. His own 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:50.520 visit the following year. 0:01:50.680 --> 0:01:54.920 Knowing of President Nixon's express desire to visit the People's 0:01:55.000 --> 0:01:58.840 Republic of China, Premier jo and lae On, behalf of 0:01:58.880 --> 0:02:02.640 the government of the People's Republic of China, has extended 0:02:02.640 --> 0:02:04.960 an invitation to President Nexon to visit China. 0:02:05.040 --> 0:02:08.040 The opening of China and an anti ballistic missile treaty 0:02:08.080 --> 0:02:10.840 hammered out with the Soviet Union achieved what would become 0:02:10.880 --> 0:02:15.280 known as Kissinger's triangular diplomacy, but his penchate for secrecy 0:02:15.440 --> 0:02:18.800 would lead to controversy. Kissinger was the first person to 0:02:18.840 --> 0:02:22.080 serve as both National Security Advisor and Secretary of State 0:02:22.120 --> 0:02:24.960 at the same time. That allowed Nixon to run foreign 0:02:25.000 --> 0:02:28.000 policy more or less directly from the White House. The 0:02:28.000 --> 0:02:30.880 president summed up his attitude in a taped conversation with 0:02:30.960 --> 0:02:34.720 Kissinger about the Christmas Day bombing in Vietnam in nineteen 0:02:34.840 --> 0:02:41.960 seventy two. Kissinger fed into that paranoia about enemies in 0:02:42.000 --> 0:02:45.720 the press by ordering wiretaps of reporters and White House 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:49.519 aids looking for leaks. That expanded use of surveillance led 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:53.000 to Nixon's resignation under the weight of Watergate, but the 0:02:53.000 --> 0:02:56.440 weight of one major foreign policy decision would cloud Kissinger's 0:02:56.480 --> 0:02:59.360 legacy for the rest of his long life. The Secret 0:02:59.400 --> 0:03:03.280 War in Cambodia. Kissinger orchestrated the operation that dropped more 0:03:03.320 --> 0:03:06.720 than one hundred thousand tons of bombs on North Vietnamese 0:03:06.760 --> 0:03:09.320 positions in the country. It helped lead to the rise 0:03:09.360 --> 0:03:12.760 of a genocidal Khmer Rouge regime after the war, but 0:03:12.880 --> 0:03:16.519 Kissinger would never stop defending his conduct in Vietnam, even 0:03:16.560 --> 0:03:19.040 against critics who labeled him a war criminal. 0:03:19.240 --> 0:03:22.560 Would say a better way At any one point, we 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:26.959 didn't think so. I still don't think so, but I'm 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:32.079 open to that argument. But what is meant by better? 0:03:32.320 --> 0:03:35.320 That pragmatic approach to the world as it is, rather 0:03:35.360 --> 0:03:38.160 than how policymakers might like it to be would inform 0:03:38.240 --> 0:03:41.360 Kissinger's view long after he left public office and sought 0:03:41.360 --> 0:03:44.240 to wield influence as a private citizen. At the age 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:47.320 of eighty eight, Kissinger wrote the book on China, about 0:03:47.320 --> 0:03:49.760 the country he helped to bring back to the world stage. 0:03:50.000 --> 0:03:53.000 In a twenty twenty interview at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum, 0:03:53.120 --> 0:03:56.440 Kissinger warned of the risks of confrontation between the world's 0:03:56.480 --> 0:03:57.600 two biggest economies. 0:03:57.960 --> 0:04:03.440 Let's say it's some pass for some cooperative action de 0:04:03.560 --> 0:04:10.080 Willsbill fld HMDU A catastrophe comfortable du wil. 0:04:10.000 --> 0:04:13.720 Dulw Henry Kissinger worked to head off that catastrophe. After 0:04:13.760 --> 0:04:17.200 he reached his one hundredth birthday as President, Biden sent 0:04:17.279 --> 0:04:21.479 cabinet secretaries to Beijing in twenty twenty three to stabilize relations. 0:04:21.760 --> 0:04:25.200 The one US diplomat that Chinese President Shi Jinping would 0:04:25.200 --> 0:04:27.680 meet face to face was the man he called an 0:04:27.720 --> 0:04:32.279 old friend to China, former Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger. 0:04:32.760 --> 0:04:35.040 I'm Nathan Hager Bloomberg Radio. 0:04:35.920 --> 0:04:39.960 We thank Bloomberg's Nathan Hager for that report. Kissinger sat 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:43.400 down with Bloomberg editor in chief John Micklethwaite on June 0:04:43.440 --> 0:04:46.600 seventh in New York City. They discussed his life and 0:04:46.720 --> 0:04:50.679 career upon turning one hundred years old. The conversation ranged 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:53.120 from his concerns that China could end up in a 0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:57.200 military conflict with the US over Taiwan all the way 0:04:57.240 --> 0:05:00.720 to the future of President Vladimir Putin after Russher invasion 0:05:01.040 --> 0:05:04.280 of Ukraine. He spoke about how his own worldview was 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:08.080 shaped by what he experienced as a Jewish teenager he 0:05:08.240 --> 0:05:11.839 escaped Nazi Germany and what he saw in the concentration 0:05:12.040 --> 0:05:16.320 camps as an American soldier. Here's their conversation in its entirety. 0:05:17.720 --> 0:05:20.880 There are few living people who have had as great 0:05:20.880 --> 0:05:24.920 an impact on how the world stands today as Henry Kissinger. 0:05:25.720 --> 0:05:29.279 He has advised American presidents since the nineteen sixties, stood 0:05:29.320 --> 0:05:32.599 toe to toe with the likes of Chairman Mao Goldomeyir 0:05:32.760 --> 0:05:36.600 and Vladimir Putin changed the fortunes of countries in ways 0:05:36.640 --> 0:05:41.520 that are still admired, condemned, and debated. Seventy years ago, 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:45.440 as a young man at Harvard, Kissinger wrote that in 0:05:45.480 --> 0:05:48.800 the life of every person, that comes a point when 0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:52.440 he realizes that, out of all the seemingly limitless possibilities 0:05:52.440 --> 0:05:55.960 of his youth, he has in fact become one actuality. 0:05:56.560 --> 0:06:01.000 One's journey across the meadows as indeed followed a regular path. 0:06:01.760 --> 0:06:04.919 Having just celebrated his one hundredth birthday, you might imagine 0:06:04.960 --> 0:06:09.479 Henry Kissinger's path is now set. In fact, he is 0:06:09.520 --> 0:06:13.080 plainly still involved in public life, still talking to leaders 0:06:13.120 --> 0:06:17.040 around the world. His legacy can be felt from Cuba 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:21.560 to Caro. But we've broken this interview into three geographic parts. 0:06:22.520 --> 0:06:25.680 Europe where he was born, the United States, where he 0:06:25.800 --> 0:06:30.839 found power and fame, and Asia, which he transformed. And 0:06:30.880 --> 0:06:33.440 then we have a more personal epilogue to do with 0:06:33.520 --> 0:06:45.800 that legacy. Henry Kissinger was born in nineteen twenty three 0:06:45.880 --> 0:06:49.400 in the German town of Foth. Two years later, Adolf 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:52.720 Hitler came to the town to denounce its Jewish citizens. 0:06:53.520 --> 0:06:56.960 I began by asking Henry Kissinger how his first fifteen 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:01.920 years of persecution and chaos ended when his family escaped 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:05.560 to America in nineteen thirty eight, has shaped his worldview. 0:07:07.640 --> 0:07:16.520 I spent my youth within a disintegrating society. The German 0:07:17.040 --> 0:07:27.600 society was collapsing into the Hitler period that gradually, in 0:07:27.680 --> 0:07:33.920 each election the Nati period party gained, and then when 0:07:34.080 --> 0:07:38.920 Hitler finally came to power, I, together with all my 0:07:39.160 --> 0:07:43.480 family and all the people I knew well, became part 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:49.400 of a discriminated minority, living in a town in which 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:54.080 there were science at every public place that Jews are 0:07:54.160 --> 0:07:58.480 not welcome here, and at the entrance to every town 0:07:58.680 --> 0:08:06.120 venue that did drain or car or anywhere. So there 0:08:06.240 --> 0:08:06.880 was my youth. 0:08:07.160 --> 0:08:08.960 Do you think that your view of the world of 0:08:09.040 --> 0:08:11.720 something that needed some degree of order if you look back. 0:08:12.640 --> 0:08:19.760 I believe that for a tutality, or for a group 0:08:19.880 --> 0:08:29.040 in which people lived, stability or to pre condition for creativity. 0:08:30.160 --> 0:08:33.679 Now that's not a sord I had then so precisely, 0:08:35.280 --> 0:08:39.040 but stability meant a great deal. 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:43.360 The next time you came back to Germany was in 0:08:43.400 --> 0:08:46.679 the war. You came back as a soldier. You fought 0:08:46.679 --> 0:08:49.520 in the Battle of the Bulge, You saw the concentration camps, 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:53.280 you helped, you took part in this of the rounding 0:08:53.360 --> 0:08:56.120 up of Nazis, all by the age of like twenty 0:08:56.160 --> 0:09:00.360 four to twenty five. That is a hinterland that very 0:09:00.360 --> 0:09:03.160 few people in modern politics have. If you look at 0:09:03.160 --> 0:09:06.640 the people you dealt with, the gal Mau, all those 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:08.800 people that they had seen warfare well. 0:09:09.000 --> 0:09:15.240 I came back to Germany as a rifleman in the 0:09:15.240 --> 0:09:21.240 eighty fourth Infra Division of the US Army, and uh 0:09:22.400 --> 0:09:28.960 so I saw war in its most immediate form, under 0:09:29.040 --> 0:09:35.240 circumstances in which you have fellowship with your fellow soldiers, 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:43.800 it's your hope of survival hm and everything depends on it. 0:09:44.559 --> 0:09:47.720 And I was lucky that my fellow soldiers of that 0:09:47.800 --> 0:09:57.280 period were from northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin. Uh It's 0:09:57.320 --> 0:10:03.640 called the rail Splitter Division after Lincoln R. And so 0:10:04.320 --> 0:10:08.840 that was the environment to then as the battle neared 0:10:09.120 --> 0:10:12.600 the German border. After the bat during the Battle of 0:10:12.679 --> 0:10:19.160 the Bolts, I was transferred to intelligence, which was still 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:26.440 at the front, but not right in it. For two 0:10:26.480 --> 0:10:32.360 miles back at the in the civilian population. But so 0:10:32.520 --> 0:10:41.280 I saw the impact of authoritarianism and totalitarianism in my 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:51.200 youth and of war in the next period. And so 0:10:52.840 --> 0:11:00.080 it was an experience which it's so elemental that it 0:11:00.120 --> 0:11:10.839 becomes part of you, because the child both see dangers 0:11:13.400 --> 0:11:22.440 but also the sense of unity of a community when 0:11:22.760 --> 0:11:33.040 when they believe in fundamental We know today that German 0:11:33.120 --> 0:11:41.959 tanks were probably better than our tent, but you could 0:11:42.000 --> 0:11:47.359 never convince American soldiers of it, because they were convinced 0:11:48.920 --> 0:11:54.240 that if better tanks could be built, we'd be building. 0:11:56.480 --> 0:11:59.559 And I've never forgotten that. 0:12:00.280 --> 0:12:02.760 For most of your life you were dealing with world 0:12:02.880 --> 0:12:09.000 leaders who had had somewhat similar experiences. You could argue, 0:12:09.160 --> 0:12:13.240 but they'd seen combat. But the last American president to 0:12:13.320 --> 0:12:17.320 be in that state was the first President Bush. You 0:12:17.400 --> 0:12:20.760 look around the leaders of the Western world. Now, they're 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:23.560 all people, some of them closer to my age than yours, 0:12:23.840 --> 0:12:26.920 who've never seen those things. And I wonder whether you 0:12:26.960 --> 0:12:29.440 think that makes a difference to world politics. Do you 0:12:29.480 --> 0:12:31.800 worry about that with today's leaders. 0:12:32.520 --> 0:12:37.559 I think that leaders who have not had any experience 0:12:37.679 --> 0:12:44.800 of cadetrophy or at the edge of cadetrophe sometimes believe 0:12:44.920 --> 0:12:52.959 they have more obsdence than they really do, and they 0:12:53.040 --> 0:12:58.480 did characteristic of our It's fatterly in the its. 0:12:59.040 --> 0:13:02.600 Because the one exception and possibly is Jijinping because he 0:13:02.640 --> 0:13:05.320 went through the Cultural Revolution, didn't he so he would 0:13:05.360 --> 0:13:08.760 have had some experience of the terror that you would 0:13:08.800 --> 0:13:09.160 have seen. 0:13:09.559 --> 0:13:17.400 Well. For t a crucial experience was living in a 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:24.679 cave with it. Further, after father Adami leader was purged 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:30.880 by Mao, and in his conversations before he became prejided, 0:13:31.880 --> 0:13:37.240 he would refer to the fact that this experience made 0:13:37.320 --> 0:13:37.920 him strong. 0:13:38.400 --> 0:13:40.600 As you said, you grew up in this period of 0:13:40.720 --> 0:13:46.400 chaos and disintegration. You are seen to be somebody who 0:13:46.440 --> 0:13:50.000 wants to does not want Russia, if it loses the 0:13:50.040 --> 0:13:54.520 war in Ukraine, to be overly punished. Is that in 0:13:54.600 --> 0:13:58.160 part because you saw what happened to Germany. The Germany 0:13:58.200 --> 0:14:00.599 before the First World War was a very seemed, a 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:05.160 very proud, successful country. The best university is the best, 0:14:05.160 --> 0:14:09.360 all these things, and then humiliation and disintegration follows. Do 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:10.920 you worry about that with Russia? 0:14:11.520 --> 0:14:18.240 I worry about the fact that Russia has been an 0:14:18.280 --> 0:14:26.840 integral part of European history for six hundred years, and 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:31.800 in a very special way because it is infinitely larger 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:37.920 than any European country and it has always been part 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:43.239 of Asia, the Middle East and Europe. That the unique 0:14:43.320 --> 0:14:50.760 aspect of Russia in comparison to the European countries. So 0:14:50.880 --> 0:14:57.280 it has been torn throughout its history between a desire 0:14:57.480 --> 0:15:04.840 to become fully European and the fear of European technical 0:15:06.040 --> 0:15:12.240 uh superiority or capacity. Europe will become more stable, the 0:15:12.280 --> 0:15:18.680 world will become more stable when Ratia accepts the fact 0:15:20.160 --> 0:15:25.640 that it cannot conquer Europe ah, but it has to 0:15:25.760 --> 0:15:31.800 remain part of Europe by some sort of consensus as 0:15:31.880 --> 0:15:36.880 other states do UH. But a do Mond Rasa is 0:15:36.920 --> 0:15:41.360 so crushed that it sees its being a factor of 0:15:41.680 --> 0:15:50.480 international politics in other regions and becomes a subject for 0:15:50.760 --> 0:15:58.960 European competition among the various states. So it is important 0:16:00.520 --> 0:16:06.160 for Ukraine to be preserved and for Ukraine to emerge 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:14.800 from the war as a autonomous, strong, in democratic country. 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:22.600 We have substantially achieved this objective h by now it 0:16:22.640 --> 0:16:28.440 can still be improved in terms of the borders of 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:34.600 Ukraine in the what I hope will be the concluding 0:16:34.720 --> 0:16:40.480 phases of the war. But I would prefer to preserve 0:16:40.640 --> 0:16:47.720 Prussia because the dissolution of Russia or the reduction of 0:16:47.800 --> 0:16:53.800 rassure to resentful impotence. What said of a new set 0:16:55.000 --> 0:16:56.560 of tensions, do. 0:16:56.600 --> 0:16:59.840 You think Vladimir Putin is somebody who could live with? 0:17:00.840 --> 0:17:00.920 You? 0:17:00.960 --> 0:17:03.640 Said? You want a Russia that doesn't that realizes where 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:04.440 its borders are. 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:10.399 That's to remember two things about Vladimia Pudent. That he is, 0:17:10.680 --> 0:17:17.119 on one level the inheritor of traditional Russia and therefore 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:25.400 has the tendencies towards as certain that I've described earlier. 0:17:26.680 --> 0:17:32.400 But there's also uh a Vladimirir Pudent who grew up 0:17:32.520 --> 0:17:38.040 in the seats of Leningrad in which a over half 0:17:38.119 --> 0:17:44.800 of the population died of starvation. Uh and under under 0:17:44.880 --> 0:17:51.360 constance read but he has translated that into never warning 0:17:52.280 --> 0:18:00.399 European military power to be in easy leads of f 0:18:00.520 --> 0:18:07.200 Saint Petersburg and made sor cities like Moscow. So when 0:18:07.200 --> 0:18:09.760 the border of Europe at the end of the war, 0:18:11.080 --> 0:18:15.199 which was the d military border of Europe, which was 0:18:15.240 --> 0:18:21.000 in the center of Europe, moved to within three hundred 0:18:21.080 --> 0:18:27.119 miles of Moscow, and maybe fifty miles of Saint Petersburg. 0:18:28.280 --> 0:18:33.880 He reacted very strongly, and as it turns out, at 0:18:33.880 --> 0:18:35.640 the edge of your rationality. 0:18:36.200 --> 0:18:39.080 You once said to me that Ladim v. Putin was 0:18:39.160 --> 0:18:42.360 more Dostoyevsky than Hitler. Do you still think of him 0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:42.719 in that way? 0:18:42.760 --> 0:18:46.960 Well, I think he's a Dostoyevsky type figure, be set 0:18:47.080 --> 0:18:57.000 by ambivalences and unfulfillable aspirations, but not devoted to power 0:18:57.240 --> 0:19:04.040 in the abstract U, but very capable of HU using 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:09.879 UH power that it turned out he used it excessively 0:19:10.000 --> 0:19:18.359 in relationship UH to UH to Ukraine. I would like 0:19:18.680 --> 0:19:26.119 a Russia to RECOGNI that recognizes that its relations to 0:19:28.040 --> 0:19:37.399 but to Europe have to be based on agreement and 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:43.080 the kind of consensus. And I believe that this war 0:19:43.160 --> 0:19:50.240 will if it ended properly, may make it achievable. 0:19:49.960 --> 0:19:53.199 If it's ended on the terms you're describing. Do you 0:19:53.240 --> 0:19:55.600 think Vladimir Putin can survive in power? 0:19:57.160 --> 0:20:00.000 It's improbable. 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:02.680 On the other side of the fence. With the moment 0:20:02.800 --> 0:20:06.800 we have, the Ukrainian counter offensive seems to begun. Do 0:20:06.840 --> 0:20:10.560 you see that as the last offensive before you have 0:20:10.680 --> 0:20:16.440 to move to diplomacy and peace. Talks of some sort. 0:20:16.720 --> 0:20:21.159 Well. I began to urge moving to its diplomat a 0:20:21.240 --> 0:20:29.080 year ago when I urged that the various parties to 0:20:29.240 --> 0:20:33.360 the conflict as themselves how they want to end it, 0:20:34.480 --> 0:20:36.840 not that they would end it right at that point, 0:20:36.880 --> 0:20:41.280 but that they would know what their political aims were. 0:20:43.000 --> 0:20:48.320 I think that becomes increasingly important as time goes on. 0:20:50.720 --> 0:20:55.040 Let'st we wound up at a point where the war 0:20:55.160 --> 0:21:00.800 becomes its own objective, and were military operations and military 0:21:00.960 --> 0:21:09.480 relations between powered dominate all of this geopolitical thinking. And 0:21:09.600 --> 0:21:15.720 at that point, countries like China will have to become 0:21:15.800 --> 0:21:22.040 from their point of view, increasingly active. That would spread 0:21:22.080 --> 0:21:24.200 it into a world conflict. 0:21:24.240 --> 0:21:27.360 Do you think that that is actually the real danger, 0:21:27.480 --> 0:21:33.520 that the Dombas doesn't become Europe's frontier with Russia becomes 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:37.639 sort of Europe's frontier with China, that Russia gets driven 0:21:38.480 --> 0:21:40.000 back into the arms of China. 0:21:40.960 --> 0:21:46.359 Well, it could happen because Ratia gets driven back, or 0:21:46.400 --> 0:21:56.240 because Rasia collapsed and disintegrates. It's a functioning major or 0:21:56.320 --> 0:22:06.240 tenament state, and therefore it was so in its current faith, 0:22:07.359 --> 0:22:12.080 which I support, I think we will correct and resistently 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:15.000 attack on Ukraine. 0:22:15.200 --> 0:22:18.000 We talked about China and Russia. One power that could 0:22:18.080 --> 0:22:23.000 emerge much more powerfully from this particular episode is Germany. 0:22:23.800 --> 0:22:27.359 Germany is probably the country that's going to rebuild Ukraine. 0:22:27.400 --> 0:22:29.760 If it happens, it may be involved in rebuilding Russia. 0:22:30.920 --> 0:22:36.480 And within Europe. If you visit Spain, if you visit Italy, 0:22:37.000 --> 0:22:40.120 you can feel that the frontier of Europe has been 0:22:40.240 --> 0:22:43.280 dragged to the east, so the center of Europe is 0:22:43.320 --> 0:22:47.600 now closer to Berlin, so to speak, and that Germany, 0:22:47.680 --> 0:22:50.560 by the fact it's been involved in supplying more arms 0:22:50.600 --> 0:22:53.440 and everything like that, that it is it looks set 0:22:53.480 --> 0:22:56.560 to become a bigger power in Europe. Do you agree 0:22:56.600 --> 0:23:00.440 with that? Firstly and secondly do you think that Germany 0:23:00.480 --> 0:23:01.800 is ready for that task? 0:23:03.000 --> 0:23:10.320 I agree that the which is the description of the 0:23:10.359 --> 0:23:16.320 transformation of the gender of gravity in Europe. It's been 0:23:16.600 --> 0:23:24.000 inherent since before World War One and was one of 0:23:24.040 --> 0:23:30.800 the causes of World War One because of the refusal 0:23:30.840 --> 0:23:38.120 of other countries to accept this reality, but also because 0:23:38.160 --> 0:23:44.439 of the inability of Germany to understand the transformation of 0:23:44.520 --> 0:23:53.640 its own possism. Because the leading country has to be 0:23:53.800 --> 0:24:06.199 an example of moderation and wisdom in balancing the interests 0:24:06.240 --> 0:24:11.439 of all the countries if there are to be participants 0:24:11.600 --> 0:24:22.840 in the system. And historically h Germany wanted to exercise 0:24:22.920 --> 0:24:32.840 its potential by domination, and its tragedy has been after 0:24:32.960 --> 0:24:40.720 the retirement of Pittmarck, the failure to learn this lesson, 0:24:42.000 --> 0:24:51.600 which tracted into two training wards, which also the entire 0:24:51.680 --> 0:24:59.000 position of Europe in the world. So now it has 0:25:00.680 --> 0:25:05.960 is again in this position, and it has no leaders 0:25:07.200 --> 0:25:13.159 with an experience of either the Nazi period or of 0:25:13.280 --> 0:25:19.160 the war MM, so they have to construct the system 0:25:19.320 --> 0:25:25.439 by themselves, and they're new there in off, it's only 0:25:25.480 --> 0:25:29.639 a year or so, and it is not a reflection 0:25:31.560 --> 0:25:36.320 on their abilities, but a description of a new talent 0:25:36.680 --> 0:25:40.880 for them that hasn't existed in that form before. 0:25:41.600 --> 0:25:44.000 Do you think that also causes problems for the other 0:25:44.080 --> 0:25:46.879 great powers? You know, you you wrote a lot of 0:25:46.960 --> 0:25:51.800 history about containing you know, first containing France, then containing Germany, 0:25:51.920 --> 0:25:53.560 and now that now there is an issue. I mean, 0:25:53.600 --> 0:25:55.000 if you if you are France. 0:25:55.160 --> 0:26:04.520 Well, if Germany was in conflict with France since the 0:26:04.560 --> 0:26:10.399 Thirty Years' War in the seventeenth century, because French policy 0:26:10.680 --> 0:26:18.480 was explicitly based on maintaining the balance of power, within 0:26:18.640 --> 0:26:24.280 Central Europe, which in practice meant maintaining a division of 0:26:24.400 --> 0:26:34.720 Germany between MM competing states and friends. Partly to mid states. 0:26:34.760 --> 0:26:40.280 The Germany made and Britain came to look at Germany 0:26:40.560 --> 0:26:47.080 as a said to its sea power. So when the 0:26:47.200 --> 0:26:54.600 ball fell, the neither the British nor the French leader 0:26:56.160 --> 0:27:03.879 were enthusiastic about the unification of Germany. But the reality 0:27:04.119 --> 0:27:08.600 is that British private it's in the eighties and seventies 0:27:09.240 --> 0:27:15.040 when Germany was unified. It's the last major European country 0:27:15.119 --> 0:27:22.000 to be unified in eighteen seventy one. Set set this 0:27:22.160 --> 0:27:27.000 will have a greater impact than Diffrench Revolution. So we 0:27:27.040 --> 0:27:32.600 are at this moment now when a new structure of 0:27:32.680 --> 0:27:40.040 Europe has to be created HM based on this reality. 0:27:41.920 --> 0:27:48.760 And I'm describing the challenge here, not the UH. I'm 0:27:48.760 --> 0:27:56.760 not saying that the Germans have failed. It's new and 0:27:56.880 --> 0:27:59.439 it's a new challenge for this generation. 0:28:00.040 --> 0:28:02.640 Also a challenge for France and Britain. Very quickly, they've 0:28:02.640 --> 0:28:06.840 followed very different paths, especially since Sewers. You know, frances 0:28:07.240 --> 0:28:11.120 has very much defined itself, often in opposition to America, 0:28:11.800 --> 0:28:15.400 and it's buried itself in the European Union. The British, 0:28:15.400 --> 0:28:18.280 by contrast, have tended to stick with the Americans. And 0:28:18.359 --> 0:28:22.000 now they are outside the European Union. And you and 0:28:22.040 --> 0:28:25.000 I can argue about who's got things right over the 0:28:25.000 --> 0:28:28.359 past fifty years, but we are where we are, and 0:28:28.400 --> 0:28:31.160 I wonder you look at France and you look at Britain. Now, 0:28:31.760 --> 0:28:35.960 who is better placed to go forward? Britain outside the 0:28:35.960 --> 0:28:38.240 europe Union, France inside it. 0:28:38.440 --> 0:28:46.280 Psychologically Britain it is fedow placed because in the structure 0:28:46.360 --> 0:28:54.680 of the world that one can imagine appearing, whatever Europe 0:28:54.800 --> 0:29:02.880 does to its own conception it r RelA cooperation with 0:29:03.000 --> 0:29:11.000 America and pursuing parallel politics with America will have to 0:29:11.040 --> 0:29:17.880 be an essential component on it because by itself opposing 0:29:18.040 --> 0:29:22.320 all the other major power centers uh, Europe is in 0:29:22.360 --> 0:29:26.120 a difficult position to do that, and it may be impossible. 0:29:27.080 --> 0:29:36.720 So Britain historically is better placed uh uh to do it. Uh. 0:29:36.840 --> 0:29:41.720 Britain's problem is its connection, how to connect with Europe, 0:29:43.320 --> 0:29:48.440 not how to connect with the United States. It has 0:29:49.960 --> 0:29:58.720 the history of the special partnership and an instinctive fear 0:29:59.160 --> 0:30:03.800 in Britain. Th the danger comes from across the oceans 0:30:05.160 --> 0:30:11.440 and comes from across the border, while in Europe the 0:30:11.440 --> 0:30:19.880 instinctive ferience the danger comes from land invasions. So for 0:30:20.120 --> 0:30:25.240 Britain to link to Europe has turned out to be 0:30:25.440 --> 0:30:29.920 not possible organically, so it now has to be done 0:30:29.960 --> 0:30:33.120 by policy. And I think. 0:30:32.920 --> 0:30:36.720 That you actually think Britain would. I might disagree with 0:30:36.720 --> 0:30:38.600 you on this, but you think that Britain is sort 0:30:38.600 --> 0:30:42.280 of psychologically happier outside the European Union. 0:30:43.200 --> 0:30:46.680 Yes, I think it is, and I think it's also 0:30:48.120 --> 0:30:53.440 a great opportunity for it to act as a link 0:30:54.680 --> 0:31:00.200 between a unifying Europe and America. 0:31:00.480 --> 0:31:04.000 You're listening to a special conversation with distinguished diplomat and 0:31:04.080 --> 0:31:07.360 former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. We'll have more 0:31:07.360 --> 0:31:11.840 of that conversation next. Henry Kissinger has died at the 0:31:11.880 --> 0:31:15.160 age of one hundred. We're listening to a special conversation 0:31:15.240 --> 0:31:17.920 he had with Bloomberg editor in chief John Micklethwaite not 0:31:17.920 --> 0:31:21.720 too long ago. He discusses his life and career. Let's 0:31:21.720 --> 0:31:23.160 hear more of that conversation. 0:31:23.360 --> 0:31:30.240 Now, America has never been true to itself unless it 0:31:30.320 --> 0:31:32.440 meant something beyond itself. 0:31:33.040 --> 0:31:36.200 Henry Kissinger said those words about his adopted Homeland in 0:31:36.320 --> 0:31:39.880 nineteen seventy three. He first arrived in the United States 0:31:39.920 --> 0:31:43.320 in nineteen thirty eight as a fifteen year old refugee. 0:31:43.680 --> 0:31:46.640 I began the second part of our conversation about the 0:31:46.760 --> 0:31:51.320 United States by asking, if his life story was uniquely American, 0:31:52.000 --> 0:31:55.200 could he have achieved what he has done anywhere else? 0:31:57.000 --> 0:32:07.400 Absolutely uniquely American. I was at a dinner in Germany 0:32:08.680 --> 0:32:13.960 when the German chancellor of the Democratic Germany was prison 0:32:15.640 --> 0:32:24.840 and the American ambassador rather amazingly as the chancellor, what 0:32:24.960 --> 0:32:29.520 would have happened to me in Germany if I had 0:32:29.600 --> 0:32:40.920 survived due to this period? And he said, I would 0:32:40.960 --> 0:32:48.960 be a junior professor in Munich at Munich University. 0:32:50.160 --> 0:32:52.440 That brings us very nice. That brings us very nicely 0:32:52.480 --> 0:32:55.120 to the next phase of your life. You go to Harvard. 0:32:55.880 --> 0:32:58.720 I think at different times of your life you had 0:32:58.800 --> 0:33:02.320 taught about chemistry and being an accountant, which is a 0:33:02.360 --> 0:33:07.720 wonderful image. But one of your mentors, Fritz Kramer, had 0:33:07.760 --> 0:33:11.160 a phrase about you were you were musically tuned to history. 0:33:11.880 --> 0:33:14.640 You go to Harvard, and the other kind of great 0:33:14.640 --> 0:33:19.760 figure of your youth, Bill Elliott Oppressor at Harvard, directs 0:33:19.800 --> 0:33:23.120 you towards the philosophy of history rather than just history itself, 0:33:23.520 --> 0:33:26.200 and that's where you get all the cant or the spinosa. 0:33:26.960 --> 0:33:29.680 Is that a really important difference. You know, you've always 0:33:29.720 --> 0:33:32.480 been obsessed not as by history, but the ideas behind it. 0:33:34.200 --> 0:33:42.040 Later on in life, my views, in those of many 0:33:42.160 --> 0:33:49.680 of the academic community at Harvard can be teritibly described. 0:33:49.840 --> 0:33:57.400 It's not veral. But in that period of my life, 0:33:57.880 --> 0:34:06.040 which in a funny way was its second immigration into America, uh, 0:34:06.200 --> 0:34:10.360 the first from Germany and the second from the army. 0:34:10.680 --> 0:34:16.719 Mm Uh, I haven't played a very important role because 0:34:16.760 --> 0:34:24.400 it gave me uh confident or inspiration, it's a better word, 0:34:25.600 --> 0:34:30.120 into the direction I was sort of divided. I was 0:34:30.239 --> 0:34:37.480 doing extremely well in chemistry, mostly based on memory, and 0:34:37.600 --> 0:34:40.919 I went to see the head of the chemistry department. 0:34:42.400 --> 0:34:47.960 His name was Professor Kisyakovsky, became a very well known 0:34:48.040 --> 0:34:54.800 figure up and I asked him whether I should major 0:34:54.880 --> 0:35:00.279 in chemistry, and he said, if you have to ask me, no, 0:35:01.880 --> 0:35:07.560 and so this then, but I've I was on that 0:35:07.719 --> 0:35:12.520 other codes already inwardly, it gave me the confidence to 0:35:12.680 --> 0:35:17.720 do it. The philosophy. I was most interested at first 0:35:17.880 --> 0:35:25.520 in philosophy, in theory of knowledge, in theory of values. 0:35:25.880 --> 0:35:26.440 Mm. 0:35:26.480 --> 0:35:36.080 But history it's a way to combine the inherent uncertainties 0:35:37.600 --> 0:35:43.480 of philosophy. Inherent because so far no absolute answers have 0:35:43.640 --> 0:35:50.520 ever been found by any civilization. With the results of 0:35:50.560 --> 0:36:01.120 what actually happened, and the ads I progressed, I progress 0:36:01.960 --> 0:36:13.759 in development, I became very philosophical. History became my dominance then. 0:36:14.360 --> 0:36:18.160 And I think if one reads my books that seem 0:36:19.200 --> 0:36:20.520 run through all of. 0:36:20.440 --> 0:36:23.320 Them, where in your life is that the idea of 0:36:23.360 --> 0:36:28.439 the philosophy of history most most the ideas be most 0:36:28.640 --> 0:36:32.200 challenged by reality. You know, you've said that history is 0:36:32.239 --> 0:36:35.680 interesting because you get reality conflicting. 0:36:37.360 --> 0:36:43.840 Life is torn between managing the presence and the evolution 0:36:44.440 --> 0:36:51.960 of the presence, so that in individual lives and of 0:36:52.080 --> 0:37:04.400 course magnified into society's lives, there's always the ambiguity that 0:37:06.760 --> 0:37:12.760 emphasis on the presence leads to stagnation, and that therefore 0:37:13.840 --> 0:37:19.880 everything else around you will outstrip that society. And so 0:37:20.080 --> 0:37:26.799 how to strike that balance between ultimate values and what 0:37:27.000 --> 0:37:28.719 reality imposes on you? 0:37:30.320 --> 0:37:30.440 Uh? 0:37:30.920 --> 0:37:37.040 And reality is never quite adequate. But ultimate values are 0:37:37.080 --> 0:37:46.000 too absolute because they demand a degree of imposition on others. Ah, 0:37:46.040 --> 0:37:51.520 how to strike that balance is maybe it's maybe given 0:37:51.560 --> 0:37:59.040 to us. It's our insoluble problem to keep a motivation 0:37:59.680 --> 0:38:02.760 at the appropriate level. 0:38:03.280 --> 0:38:05.680 Isn't that quite interesting? Isn't that also the story of 0:38:06.520 --> 0:38:10.360 American foreign policy? You have this, You've always argued that 0:38:10.400 --> 0:38:13.600 there's a set of ideals that America wants to. 0:38:13.360 --> 0:38:17.400 Yes, it's best. The problem for America, Yeah, because we 0:38:17.560 --> 0:38:22.439 have been ex closed as it is possible to be, 0:38:23.600 --> 0:38:27.719 to be satisfied with where we are, and we've been 0:38:27.800 --> 0:38:33.520 protected by two great oceans because whenever the society in 0:38:33.560 --> 0:38:38.560 the almost every place else, every place else was tempted 0:38:38.719 --> 0:38:48.879 to be excessively satisfied with itself, its neighbors intruded on them. 0:38:48.960 --> 0:38:52.040 It was very difficult to do that in America because 0:38:52.080 --> 0:38:56.160 of these oceans. But after World War two and now 0:38:56.280 --> 0:39:03.200 increasingly so uh, and now it's artificial intelligence totally. So 0:39:04.840 --> 0:39:12.919 we are part of an international global system, and it 0:39:12.960 --> 0:39:20.040 goes beyond internationally, it goes beyond its universal system. And 0:39:20.120 --> 0:39:25.160 we have simultaneously to adjust to that and conducted day 0:39:25.200 --> 0:39:31.719 to day policy with countries that have the same situation 0:39:33.440 --> 0:39:36.800 and with other countries that grow up to our level 0:39:37.040 --> 0:39:44.640 of achievement. That never existed before in history. 0:39:44.880 --> 0:39:47.440 You've always said America should balance a sort of shining 0:39:47.480 --> 0:39:52.239 city on a hill, complex with reality. And you look 0:39:52.280 --> 0:39:55.200 at the last you look at the last Cold War, 0:39:55.920 --> 0:39:58.720 and America won it by kind of singing a song 0:39:58.760 --> 0:40:02.319 of liberty of those ideals, but also by doing really 0:40:02.360 --> 0:40:05.600 basic things helping people, the Marshall Plan and things like that. 0:40:06.120 --> 0:40:09.520 If you go to America's allies, they will say America 0:40:09.600 --> 0:40:12.719 doesn't talk about those ideals any longer. It just talks 0:40:12.760 --> 0:40:16.000 about America first. And in terms of trade deals and 0:40:16.040 --> 0:40:18.319 things like that, America isn't you know, it's not even 0:40:18.400 --> 0:40:23.040 doing trade deals with its allies in either Asia or Europe. 0:40:23.160 --> 0:40:26.040 So that America, in a strange way, is more disconnected 0:40:26.880 --> 0:40:28.520 from what it should be than it has been. 0:40:28.640 --> 0:40:35.040 Well, actually, in fact, America it's not more disconnected. It's 0:40:35.160 --> 0:40:42.600 probably more connected than it's been. In word, it's considered 0:40:42.640 --> 0:40:46.920 the great period of American history, except that during the 0:40:47.080 --> 0:40:51.319 Marshall Plan at the end of World War two, oh, 0:40:51.400 --> 0:40:55.279 this was new, so it was in a new experience, 0:40:56.600 --> 0:41:03.120 and it would therefore it became very significant in day 0:41:03.160 --> 0:41:08.319 to day thinking of policy makers. Now policy makers are 0:41:09.440 --> 0:41:14.640 torn between and at that time we had over fifty 0:41:14.719 --> 0:41:19.000 percent of the world's gross national product. Now we are 0:41:19.080 --> 0:41:24.680 down to about twenty four percent, which is still a 0:41:24.920 --> 0:41:33.080 huge percentage, and it's still extremely influential percentage, but it 0:41:33.239 --> 0:41:38.719 requires us to be more discriminating. So it looks as 0:41:38.760 --> 0:41:44.399 if we are entrenching the problem that bothers me. It's 0:41:44.520 --> 0:41:51.000 not right basically, the entrenching, but the we have not 0:41:51.160 --> 0:42:01.200 yet found a concept that unified Americans, and so now 0:42:01.440 --> 0:42:07.839 the advocacy of the realization that we need a new 0:42:09.200 --> 0:42:16.200 idea for world order, it's dunk to a much smaller 0:42:16.239 --> 0:42:20.239 group that existed at the end of World War Two. 0:42:21.239 --> 0:42:26.160 Our talents is conceptual more than practical. 0:42:26.719 --> 0:42:29.319 When you came to power, America had had a long 0:42:29.400 --> 0:42:32.200 period where it had been able to lecture the world. 0:42:33.239 --> 0:42:36.000 America was going through great difficulties then, you know, it 0:42:36.080 --> 0:42:37.759 was going through things at the gas price. You had 0:42:37.760 --> 0:42:41.000 all these things going wrong, and America didn't. You had 0:42:41.040 --> 0:42:43.319 to scramble, You had to try and find allies. You 0:42:43.360 --> 0:42:46.400 had to try and make things work. You've had another period, 0:42:46.719 --> 0:42:51.160 you know, from the Berlin Wall onwards, where where America 0:42:51.200 --> 0:42:54.000 seemed very strong. Now again it's it's stuck having to 0:42:54.000 --> 0:42:58.600 make allies having to find balances. Is there a comparison 0:42:58.640 --> 0:42:59.120 there at all? 0:43:00.120 --> 0:43:06.880 We now are living in an in in a world 0:43:07.160 --> 0:43:22.279 of uh unprecedented complexity. Uh the need for allies exists. 0:43:23.360 --> 0:43:28.040 But what allies are supposed to do in given circumstances? 0:43:29.040 --> 0:43:34.120 And now the alliances are supposed to operate when every 0:43:34.239 --> 0:43:39.800 issue has a global component but not not every issue 0:43:40.239 --> 0:43:47.000 has a comparable interest for every country, so that countries, 0:43:47.760 --> 0:43:52.120 they all have a global interest in global h stability, 0:43:52.920 --> 0:44:00.640 but they don't have the same interest in the immediate situation. Secondly, 0:44:00.719 --> 0:44:07.560 there head now when I was given the opportunity to 0:44:07.719 --> 0:44:16.480 participate in policy making, that was essentially the seventies and 0:44:16.480 --> 0:44:24.160 and early eighties, all these issues were discussing, were beginning 0:44:25.040 --> 0:44:29.920 in they were in their infancy and uh so that 0:44:31.239 --> 0:44:36.680 their very existence was in dispute. And one of the 0:44:36.800 --> 0:44:42.800 contributions of Nixon was that he was willing to face 0:44:43.000 --> 0:44:49.600 these new uh, these n new realities. But now they're 0:44:49.719 --> 0:44:57.320 upon us. Uh and in that sense, it's an evolution 0:44:57.760 --> 0:45:03.160 of the problems as huge us in New ques. 0:45:04.200 --> 0:45:06.960 Do you think now America is a worse ally? I mean, 0:45:06.960 --> 0:45:08.759 if you go to if I go to Paris, or 0:45:08.800 --> 0:45:11.839 I go to Chakato. They will say all we hear 0:45:12.000 --> 0:45:15.799 from America is we hear America first, and we hear 0:45:16.000 --> 0:45:17.719 we don't want to do trade deals. We don't want 0:45:17.760 --> 0:45:20.440 to do things with you. There is no there is 0:45:20.480 --> 0:45:22.919 no sense of reaching out. And they would probably say 0:45:22.920 --> 0:45:25.200 that Joe Biden is a little bit more polite than 0:45:26.760 --> 0:45:27.520 they're more helpful. 0:45:27.840 --> 0:45:32.360 They'd invade with in America had shifted to the extens 0:45:33.760 --> 0:45:41.799 So the difference between say, liberal Republicans and Democrats in 0:45:41.920 --> 0:45:47.400 its evident ages was about the degree of a participation 0:45:48.719 --> 0:45:53.800 in which they both say it. In the present period 0:45:54.600 --> 0:45:59.160 did invade they had shifty two. It seems in which 0:46:00.200 --> 0:46:06.880 days an extreme theory of America First, which is applied 0:46:07.000 --> 0:46:10.960 on both sides, but in such a way that it 0:46:11.520 --> 0:46:17.319 that it focuses too much on American interests and not 0:46:17.480 --> 0:46:25.600 on global interests. That is a challenged, but anyone who 0:46:25.640 --> 0:46:31.080 wants to conduct a series American foreign policy must balance 0:46:31.160 --> 0:46:35.279 it two or America will become isolated. 0:46:35.800 --> 0:46:38.640 Do you think the current administration is isk is doing 0:46:39.320 --> 0:46:40.400 a serious job at that. 0:46:41.800 --> 0:46:47.480 I think the current administration is trying to do a 0:46:47.600 --> 0:46:52.319 serious job of that, but it is so afraid of 0:46:52.480 --> 0:46:56.920 attacks on itself, that it doesn't do itself justice. 0:46:57.280 --> 0:47:01.640 You were a Rockefeller Republican. Nowadays there are no Rockefeller Republicans. 0:47:01.640 --> 0:47:04.759 There's there's there's Democrats on one extreme, there's Republicans on 0:47:04.800 --> 0:47:08.640 the other. The center of American politics. The fact it's disappeared, 0:47:08.680 --> 0:47:15.040 do you think that that has dramatic foreign policy locations? 0:47:16.440 --> 0:47:22.120 I think that sender still exists, but it doesn't have 0:47:22.480 --> 0:47:29.000 fully it doesn't. I have an articulate expression here, would you. 0:47:29.000 --> 0:47:31.240 Ever like to see an independent party in America? 0:47:32.080 --> 0:47:35.160 Well, independent bodies in America. I have not had a 0:47:35.200 --> 0:47:40.040 good faith, but I do well think it is important 0:47:41.680 --> 0:47:49.160 to maintained an argument for the philosophy that I have maintained. 0:47:51.719 --> 0:47:56.239 Not because I have maintained it, but because it reflects 0:47:56.320 --> 0:48:06.000 the necessity of a period. And that becomes magnified if 0:48:06.040 --> 0:48:11.560 you consider that we are now in the field of 0:48:11.760 --> 0:48:19.760 artificial intelligence, at the very beginning of a colossal transformation 0:48:21.520 --> 0:48:26.600 of human consciousness, which will have to be built into 0:48:28.760 --> 0:48:29.920 this foreign policy. 0:48:30.440 --> 0:48:33.040 But we have a paradox, don't we. You have these issues, 0:48:33.080 --> 0:48:37.520 you have artificial intelligence, you have climate change, you have 0:48:37.640 --> 0:48:42.840 maybe the global economy where interconnectedness is incredibly important. But America, that. 0:48:44.640 --> 0:48:49.680 Is in the current world. But the essence of what 0:48:51.320 --> 0:48:56.720 I'm concerned about, it's that we have opened the door 0:48:58.080 --> 0:49:04.680 to a dialogue with objects and with machines. That that 0:49:05.400 --> 0:49:12.239 when when the printing press was invented, it transformed to 0:49:12.480 --> 0:49:18.239 human consciousness and said, of what we call now the Enlightenment, 0:49:19.239 --> 0:49:23.439 which has been going on for five hundred years. Now 0:49:23.560 --> 0:49:28.480 we are a these machines. What is the esence of 0:49:28.520 --> 0:49:34.280 these machines? We ask a question of these machines. These 0:49:34.400 --> 0:49:42.480 machines are then capable of encumbaging all the knowledge that 0:49:42.640 --> 0:49:46.560 we have taught them, but that we cannot contain in 0:49:46.680 --> 0:49:52.239 one brain nor one machine. Look at it, give us 0:49:52.280 --> 0:49:56.759 an answer, and we act on the basis of that. 0:49:56.760 --> 0:50:01.520 That is a new reality that has that will be 0:50:01.719 --> 0:50:09.799 studied for decades like the old new reality was when 0:50:11.480 --> 0:50:16.080 the printing credits permitted exchanging information easily. 0:50:16.360 --> 0:50:18.520 But the pretty printing press was at the time of 0:50:19.280 --> 0:50:21.960 nation states or nation states were coming to the fore 0:50:22.400 --> 0:50:26.160 where you had an immediate need to interact with other ones. 0:50:26.200 --> 0:50:29.959 It was part of what appeared AI is coming part 0:50:30.000 --> 0:50:33.160 in it as you described in America, which is not 0:50:33.480 --> 0:50:34.560 is not doesn't have more. 0:50:34.719 --> 0:50:39.440 But I think America will be driven by reality in 0:50:40.040 --> 0:50:45.480 studying what i've and so below all other countries. It's 0:50:45.560 --> 0:50:50.120 not an American thing, but it's become a high tech thing. 0:50:51.160 --> 0:50:58.520 So therefore it will be a dialogue between Therefore, the 0:50:58.560 --> 0:51:03.800 dialogue between America and China will become more important, or 0:51:04.160 --> 0:51:10.400 even more crucial. But it will change the way we 0:51:10.800 --> 0:51:19.280 interpreted reality because due to our achievement, we have found 0:51:19.320 --> 0:51:25.520 the key to a new aspect of reality which we 0:51:25.600 --> 0:51:26.680 didn't know existed. 0:51:28.480 --> 0:51:32.040 One last thing on America, Given the huge complexity of 0:51:32.080 --> 0:51:35.680 what you've described, do you think that a presidential election 0:51:35.880 --> 0:51:40.239 between Joe Biden and Donald Trump offers somebody who is 0:51:40.320 --> 0:51:43.560 capable of dealing with that degree of complexity. 0:51:44.960 --> 0:51:52.600 It's gonna be very difficult. It's it's it's a painful question. 0:51:54.120 --> 0:52:02.680 We have to live with what exists, and we mustn't 0:52:02.760 --> 0:52:05.799 turn our disputes into civil wars. 0:52:06.280 --> 0:52:09.840 You're listening to a special conversation with distinguished diplomat and 0:52:09.880 --> 0:52:13.160 former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. We'll have more 0:52:13.160 --> 0:52:16.200 of that conversation next. 0:52:17.480 --> 0:52:20.640 The third part of our conversation centered on Asia, perhaps 0:52:20.640 --> 0:52:23.920 the place where Kissinger's had the most enduring impact for 0:52:24.000 --> 0:52:28.000 most people now that impact is represented by China, which 0:52:28.080 --> 0:52:30.760 Kissinger and Richard Nixon helped open up to the West. 0:52:31.000 --> 0:52:33.560 But his first encounter with Asia, and the area of 0:52:33.600 --> 0:52:37.040 his life is critics focus on, was into China. I 0:52:37.160 --> 0:52:40.080 put it to Kissinger that although Nixon and he plainly 0:52:40.080 --> 0:52:43.480 inherited a mess in Vietnam in nineteen sixty eight, by 0:52:43.560 --> 0:52:47.280 nineteen seventy five, North Vietnam had taken control of Saigon 0:52:47.600 --> 0:52:51.239 in Cambodia, which America had bombed, was a disaster. I 0:52:51.280 --> 0:52:54.720 asked him whether from the perspective now of nearly fifty years, 0:52:54.920 --> 0:52:57.200 there was anything he would have done differently. 0:52:59.160 --> 0:53:06.879 Honestly, leave, We did the best we could. We inherited 0:53:06.960 --> 0:53:11.960 the war in which five hundred and fifty thousand Americans 0:53:12.600 --> 0:53:17.080 now five hundred thousand were in place, and fifty thousand 0:53:17.280 --> 0:53:22.640 more had already been ordered to go there, and we're 0:53:22.840 --> 0:53:29.200 on the way UH to go there. In America, public 0:53:29.280 --> 0:53:35.479 opinion had turned in a significant way against the war 0:53:35.960 --> 0:53:42.440 and in violent demonstrations UH in the seats, among out 0:53:42.680 --> 0:53:51.799 the international public. Everybody was against the war, but they 0:53:51.880 --> 0:54:01.080 also were for Americas defending them. So our gradibi around 0:54:01.120 --> 0:54:08.839 the world depended accidents today on our ability to perform 0:54:10.440 --> 0:54:17.040 the tasks we had assigned ourselves. We have comparable problems 0:54:17.120 --> 0:54:27.040 today in issues in Taiwan and elsewhere Ukraine. So our 0:54:27.440 --> 0:54:32.200 resistant was to try to end the war under condition 0:54:33.840 --> 0:54:39.280 in which we a in which the control over their 0:54:39.280 --> 0:54:44.760 own destiny became fell more and more into the hands 0:54:44.800 --> 0:54:53.520 of the South Vietnamese. We gradually withdrew our troops, conducted negotiations, 0:54:54.600 --> 0:55:02.279 but also conducted enough military operations so that our adversary 0:55:03.600 --> 0:55:09.920 now quasi ally, but our then adversary did not become 0:55:10.960 --> 0:55:15.600 convinced that he could take over. Uh. We did not 0:55:15.800 --> 0:55:20.440 want in afghan what Lady was in Afghanistan style withdrawal, 0:55:21.560 --> 0:55:26.160 which was for twenty five hundred people. We had five 0:55:26.280 --> 0:55:30.800 hundred and fifty thousand people, bloss a million armed. We 0:55:30.960 --> 0:55:38.600 in amazing place. So was it at every stage conducted 0:55:40.120 --> 0:55:44.759 with the absolutely would say a better way at any 0:55:44.880 --> 0:55:50.080 one point we didn't think so. I still don't think so. 0:55:50.400 --> 0:55:57.600 But uh, I'm open to that argument. But but what 0:55:57.880 --> 0:56:05.239 is meant by better? We reduced American casualties substantially, so 0:56:05.320 --> 0:56:08.719 that by the last year of the war they were 0:56:08.760 --> 0:56:13.560 in the thousands. UH. When the Nixon administration came in. 0:56:13.719 --> 0:56:20.880 They were reduced to less than a hundred in the 0:56:21.000 --> 0:56:25.720 last year of the war, and we withdrew from ground 0:56:25.880 --> 0:56:34.400 combat within two years, at all times maintaining a negotiation. 0:56:37.080 --> 0:56:46.800 The irreducible demand we had was an autonomous democratic government 0:56:48.280 --> 0:56:53.640 in South Vietnam that was not granted until the last 0:56:54.120 --> 0:56:56.719 three months of the war, which is why they were 0:56:56.800 --> 0:57:00.840 the last three months of the war. At that point 0:57:00.920 --> 0:57:05.719 we settled, But then the next question became could we 0:57:05.880 --> 0:57:13.480 maintain the settlement. We believed that we could maintain the 0:57:13.680 --> 0:57:21.360 settlement as we did in South Korea, against all but 0:57:21.600 --> 0:57:26.840 an all out invasion from the North, at which point 0:57:26.920 --> 0:57:34.720 alliance issues were a varis. But we believed against foreseeable infiltrations, 0:57:36.160 --> 0:57:42.120 we could maintain the autonomy of the of the government 0:57:43.440 --> 0:57:49.040 and we could maintain it against even significant attacks. But 0:57:49.160 --> 0:57:57.520 then Watergate occurred within two months of the settlement, and 0:57:58.520 --> 0:58:05.160 the Congress, reflecting public opinion, forbade any kind of military 0:58:05.360 --> 0:58:13.080 action in over in Near Vietnam. At that point, uh 0:58:14.320 --> 0:58:21.040 we d it w had become and had destroyed the basis. 0:58:22.360 --> 0:58:28.280 It was painful. It was the saddest moment of my 0:58:28.480 --> 0:58:35.560 public life when I had to sit in the Security 0:58:35.640 --> 0:58:46.200 Advisor's office and recommend the final withdrawals, and I published 0:58:46.240 --> 0:58:53.200 in my memoirs conversations with President Ford to show how 0:58:53.240 --> 0:59:02.640 painful he found it to agree to these recommend I 0:59:02.680 --> 0:59:07.640 think the time we gained enabled us. By the time 0:59:07.760 --> 0:59:14.120 the war was ended, we had already opened to China, 0:59:14.560 --> 0:59:18.840 and that in turn, or China had opened to us. 0:59:19.960 --> 0:59:24.120 Either way, but that was the crucial turning point of 0:59:24.240 --> 0:59:33.240 the Cold War, and also a created a structure from 0:59:33.320 --> 0:59:42.440 which we could have maintained or at least given the 0:59:42.520 --> 0:59:49.680 vietnamse a reasonable chance. During the debates and the pressures, 0:59:50.480 --> 0:59:54.680 many things were said that can now be s used 0:59:55.760 --> 0:59:59.680 to indicate different views. But this was our resential views, 1:00:00.920 --> 1:00:07.480 and I'm sure that any later books that are written 1:00:07.520 --> 1:00:11.919 on the subject that have access to material will see 1:00:12.040 --> 1:00:15.640 that this was what we thought and acted on. 1:00:16.320 --> 1:00:18.160 It's pretty quick on that. You think the in the end, 1:00:18.280 --> 1:00:21.320 the end, and the end justified all the collateral damage 1:00:21.360 --> 1:00:22.040 of hanging on that. 1:00:22.440 --> 1:00:27.400 No, the energy for us, uh, the end we were 1:00:27.560 --> 1:00:32.960 aiming for was an honorable piece. By honorable peace, we 1:00:33.200 --> 1:00:37.000 meant a piece in which we did not turn over 1:00:37.200 --> 1:00:42.040 the people who had relied on us to the domination 1:00:42.400 --> 1:00:47.720 of those whom they had fought relying on our promises. 1:00:48.880 --> 1:00:56.040 That was our definition of the end. We honestly believed 1:00:57.480 --> 1:01:06.040 that we had achieved that, and in presenting his proposal, 1:01:06.160 --> 1:01:12.040 the North Vietnam Meets negotiated, Lee Doctor. The crucial point 1:01:12.400 --> 1:01:18.760 was in October nineteen seventy two when the North Vietnam 1:01:18.840 --> 1:01:24.920 Meets negotiated turned over a proposal and then ready to 1:01:25.040 --> 1:01:29.960 DS and said this is essentially what President Nixon has 1:01:30.120 --> 1:01:38.080 proposed in January. At that point I asked for a recess. 1:01:39.720 --> 1:01:43.520 And my closes associated that point was a man called 1:01:43.720 --> 1:01:49.560 Vinceton Lot Hm went on to a distinguished career, and 1:01:49.640 --> 1:01:54.680 he had sort of resigning at the time we uh 1:01:55.000 --> 1:02:00.720 fought in Cambodia. And I told him, then you have 1:02:00.760 --> 1:02:04.960 two choices. You can go outside and walk around with 1:02:05.080 --> 1:02:12.400 a blacket, oh, you can help end it work. And 1:02:12.520 --> 1:02:17.600 so at that moment I turned to Winston or such 1:02:17.640 --> 1:02:22.000 Americans at that point, and I turned to him and 1:02:22.120 --> 1:02:25.600 I said, we've done it. Turned out to be a 1:02:25.680 --> 1:02:31.920 sad statement, because yeah, we hadn't, because we could not 1:02:32.160 --> 1:02:42.520 maintain the domestic support that was needed to sustain it. Ah. 1:02:42.560 --> 1:02:48.880 But the effort if the effort had not been made, 1:02:49.360 --> 1:02:51.880 and if we had gone to either of the other 1:02:52.080 --> 1:02:59.880 extreme solutions, one of it was to go all out 1:03:01.200 --> 1:03:06.000 upon coming into office before the ground had been laid 1:03:06.120 --> 1:03:16.200 with Russia and China, or to withdraw unconditionally and tried 1:03:16.240 --> 1:03:21.880 to extricate hundreds of thousands of troops while the enemy 1:03:22.120 --> 1:03:27.480 was still around them. In the foe mened local people 1:03:27.800 --> 1:03:34.440 might have turned against us. Was uh was not U 1:03:35.760 --> 1:03:40.000 was not acceptable, and there were no other terms that 1:03:40.680 --> 1:03:47.040 could have been n uh n uh negotiated. That was 1:03:47.120 --> 1:03:56.240 the reality ah that we faced, and so in retrospect 1:03:57.920 --> 1:04:06.640 President Nixon came to believe and actually I thought already 1:04:06.760 --> 1:04:10.840 at that time we should have considered a more all 1:04:10.920 --> 1:04:19.160 out military solution at the beginning. But reflecting about it, 1:04:19.240 --> 1:04:24.280 at the time we had had assassinations in America HM 1:04:24.320 --> 1:04:30.400 and already violent demonstrations. That was probably more theoretical than practical. 1:04:31.600 --> 1:04:36.040 So that was our thinking, of course, that it's all 1:04:36.160 --> 1:04:37.720 below it's been debated. 1:04:38.640 --> 1:04:41.240 The other bit, which you you mentioned as being in 1:04:41.320 --> 1:04:46.600 part a reason why staying there made sense was China. 1:04:46.880 --> 1:04:49.440 From that point of view, you went there, you hope it. 1:04:49.560 --> 1:04:55.680 Was important for us to show we ended up it 1:04:56.800 --> 1:05:02.080 convinced that a country of the magnitude of China and 1:05:02.160 --> 1:05:05.840 the history of China could not be kept out of 1:05:05.880 --> 1:05:10.320 the international system, and that we could not keep it 1:05:10.360 --> 1:05:14.240 out of the international system, that it would find a 1:05:14.280 --> 1:05:22.920 way to enter it, and so we began effort to 1:05:24.600 --> 1:05:31.320 open relations. At that moment, China had withdrawn all its 1:05:31.360 --> 1:05:41.240 ambassadors from every country in the world except to Poland 1:05:41.480 --> 1:05:51.800 and Egypt. And Poland was maintained in the Geneva Agreement 1:05:51.920 --> 1:06:01.520 of nineteen fifty four as a contact point between America 1:06:01.560 --> 1:06:11.120 and China, and negotiations began on a regular patis, that is, 1:06:11.480 --> 1:06:15.600 between the ambassadors. That there were one hundred and sixty 1:06:15.640 --> 1:06:22.600 two meetings between nineteen fifty four and nineteen seventy one, 1:06:23.000 --> 1:06:27.160 none less and more than a day, because each began 1:06:28.640 --> 1:06:36.040 with the Chinese demanding the immediate return of Taiwan to 1:06:36.240 --> 1:06:44.240 China and with the Americans demanding that the UH China 1:06:45.640 --> 1:06:53.000 affirm its commitment to a commitment to a peaceful evolution 1:06:54.480 --> 1:07:00.640 of the process. Neither demand was accepted, and so we 1:07:00.800 --> 1:07:09.920 began from that basis and then went through many contortions 1:07:11.360 --> 1:07:18.360 to establish contact and exploring many e ways of possibly 1:07:18.520 --> 1:07:25.280 doing it, and finally found a way when President Nixon 1:07:25.760 --> 1:07:35.440 told Yakub Khan in Pakistan that we wanted contact, that 1:07:36.080 --> 1:07:40.080 to convey to the Chinese that we wanted a real dialogue, 1:07:40.680 --> 1:07:48.960 and we emphasized it by sending an embarassador in Poland, 1:07:50.120 --> 1:07:57.200 the impacted in Poland to approach the Chinese embassador at 1:07:57.240 --> 1:08:03.800 any social function which all impacted and were invited, which 1:08:03.840 --> 1:08:09.880 turned out to be a Yugoslav fashion show, and one 1:08:10.000 --> 1:08:20.240 normally doesn't associate with Yugoslavia. But we uh approached him, 1:08:20.439 --> 1:08:28.960 and it was at that moment we the embattlor a 1:08:29.040 --> 1:08:33.840 few weeks later drove up to our office to our 1:08:33.920 --> 1:08:39.719 empathy and said they were ready to begin negotiations. Those 1:08:39.800 --> 1:08:44.160 other contortions through which things were conducted at the time, 1:08:45.960 --> 1:08:54.840 but from there we worked together with China on the 1:08:54.920 --> 1:09:02.400 specific problem of enabling in a dire which gave for 1:09:02.520 --> 1:09:10.040 us something additional to think about, and then led to 1:09:10.160 --> 1:09:15.160 the eating of the Cold War and the culmination of 1:09:15.200 --> 1:09:24.960 the Vietnamese agreements and subsequent evolution of Journeese American relations. 1:09:25.120 --> 1:09:27.960 There's always a metaphor. Well, I think the first time 1:09:28.000 --> 1:09:29.720 you said we were in the foothills of a new 1:09:29.760 --> 1:09:32.440 Cold War and then we went up to the mountain passes. 1:09:33.200 --> 1:09:36.400 Then the world was on a precipice looking over. But 1:09:36.560 --> 1:09:40.439 each time we talk, the relationship between America and China 1:09:40.479 --> 1:09:43.000 seems to be worse. Is that Is that true today? 1:09:44.000 --> 1:09:47.160 I say we are now at the top of the precipice, 1:09:49.160 --> 1:09:54.280 and one of the big problems is both sides needed 1:09:54.280 --> 1:09:59.000 to step back from it several days. If one of 1:09:59.040 --> 1:10:04.760 them stepped ba back, it is falling. So both have 1:10:04.960 --> 1:10:10.280 to decide to take the tension out of this situation. 1:10:12.200 --> 1:10:21.000 But there's an inherent diff difficulty in that relationship. China 1:10:21.080 --> 1:10:24.160 had been a great country for much of its story, 1:10:25.360 --> 1:10:30.880 but in the period that prior to the assumption of 1:10:31.000 --> 1:10:39.519 relations in the terms of measuring power uh China was 1:10:40.240 --> 1:10:44.919 much weaker hm than the U than the United States. 1:10:46.080 --> 1:10:52.559 Its capacity was to stir up difficulty all over the 1:10:52.600 --> 1:11:01.440 world by using its diplomatic and potential commercial in influence. 1:11:02.360 --> 1:11:07.799 As China grew in strengths, which was inherent in opening 1:11:07.840 --> 1:11:20.040 the relationship uh it's it c gained the capacity of 1:11:20.120 --> 1:11:26.800 threatening the United States. In the nature of modern technology 1:11:28.479 --> 1:11:35.840 and the nuclear age from the beginning raised the issue 1:11:36.360 --> 1:11:42.719 that countries developing nuclear weapons and the capacity to deliver 1:11:42.880 --> 1:11:48.640 them HM were able to inflict the amount of damage 1:11:48.760 --> 1:11:55.120 that would normally require years of warfare, so that therefore 1:11:55.160 --> 1:12:03.160 their capacity to influence actions by threats grew. That was 1:12:03.320 --> 1:12:07.760 the dilemma of the nuclears to begin with, and it 1:12:07.960 --> 1:12:13.400 was one reason why many of us thought negotiations for 1:12:13.560 --> 1:12:21.960 the reduction of that that were important. So with respect 1:12:22.120 --> 1:12:30.160 to Chinese American relations MM and China grew stronger, and 1:12:30.240 --> 1:12:35.600 as the American debate became more complicated, as we've discussed 1:12:35.720 --> 1:12:44.920 earlier mm UH, and as the Chinese governments changed over 1:12:44.960 --> 1:12:55.880 the years, UH, the tension became harder and harder to manage, 1:12:56.400 --> 1:13:02.240 and on the American side, it became him it's object, 1:13:02.360 --> 1:13:08.559 which it had not been, of domestic politics, so that 1:13:08.800 --> 1:13:14.840 candidates are now influenced by the degree of which their 1:13:14.880 --> 1:13:22.680 opponents can accuse them of selling out of China HM. 1:13:22.760 --> 1:13:32.800 So that it's the current problem, however, and it is 1:13:32.880 --> 1:13:40.559 a unique situation in the sense that the biggest threat 1:13:40.920 --> 1:13:45.839 of each country it's the other. That it's the biggest 1:13:45.880 --> 1:13:51.360 threat to China, it's America in their perception, and the 1:13:51.479 --> 1:13:56.439 same it's true here that the Chi that the biggest 1:13:56.479 --> 1:14:07.280 threat on the other hand, ors have become either unwinnable 1:14:09.920 --> 1:14:16.439 with the advanced weapons or venerable only at courts said 1:14:16.960 --> 1:14:24.640 out of proportion and so out of port efforts to negotiate, 1:14:24.720 --> 1:14:26.880 which China and I've been urging them. 1:14:27.680 --> 1:14:31.080 There's one interesting thing you said. You pointed out there 1:14:31.080 --> 1:14:35.040 in America that politics has changed because successive yet leaders 1:14:35.479 --> 1:14:39.479 and the elections people fight. In China, you've had one leader. 1:14:39.800 --> 1:14:42.800 You've a jaging thing now for over ten years. So 1:14:42.960 --> 1:14:45.720 the fact that it's got worse in China is that 1:14:46.280 --> 1:14:49.479 his fault. What what is has he gone in the 1:14:49.520 --> 1:14:50.160 wrong direction? 1:14:51.360 --> 1:14:58.120 Well, what he has done is the so called wolves diplomacy, 1:14:59.280 --> 1:15:04.400 en which China needs leader. Chinese diplomats were urged in 1:15:04.439 --> 1:15:09.960 effect to throw around their weight the in re s 1:15:10.520 --> 1:15:20.400 so in relations with say Australia, which of a dramatic 1:15:20.720 --> 1:15:27.920 reduction of Chinese trait because of some political and other 1:15:29.280 --> 1:15:33.799 statements that had been made. It's a problem with little 1:15:33.800 --> 1:15:41.240 bit comparable to what we did cussed before about Germany 1:15:41.400 --> 1:15:47.320 before nineteen fourteen, that Germany had suddenly became a great 1:15:48.800 --> 1:15:57.439 power and after it t h pit Mark at first 1:15:57.600 --> 1:16:04.280 had to h Ye did not know how to apply 1:16:04.400 --> 1:16:09.640 it in a way that translated into diplomatic results. 1:16:10.200 --> 1:16:13.000 You described Deng Shaping, for instance, as a great man. 1:16:13.120 --> 1:16:15.120 Do you think of Jijinping as a great man? 1:16:17.280 --> 1:16:27.080 Well, T is dung Chapin had finished his that had 1:16:27.280 --> 1:16:31.679 finished its destiny or its role. 1:16:33.720 --> 1:16:34.960 H t. 1:16:36.600 --> 1:16:43.240 Came in after a cultural revolution which wiped out many 1:16:43.360 --> 1:16:54.800 of these experienced leaders, and I don't describe him now 1:16:55.200 --> 1:17:01.320 as a great man, but I think he's foul doing golds, 1:17:02.840 --> 1:17:09.560 which might earn him the title and the American president 1:17:09.920 --> 1:17:16.360 if they achieve a real balancing of relationship between the 1:17:16.439 --> 1:17:17.160 two countries. 1:17:17.280 --> 1:17:20.519 What chances do you see of of an invasion of 1:17:20.520 --> 1:17:24.120 Taiwan sometime in the next three four years on the 1:17:24.160 --> 1:17:26.559 current trajectory of relations. 1:17:26.680 --> 1:17:31.840 Well, on the current trajectory of relations, I think some 1:17:32.400 --> 1:17:40.840 military conflict it's probable, But I also think the current 1:17:40.920 --> 1:17:50.040 prajectory of relations must be altered and full the beads 1:17:50.200 --> 1:17:57.400 preceding our discussion, there have been signs on both sides 1:17:58.840 --> 1:18:04.160 of trying to end them. They have not yet actually 1:18:04.400 --> 1:18:13.280 engaged in the sort of dialogue that that I suggest it, 1:18:14.840 --> 1:18:18.519 but I think they're moving towards it, and I leave 1:18:18.640 --> 1:18:21.840 my mind open in relation to the outcome. 1:18:22.600 --> 1:18:24.720 The other thing which has happened is that China has 1:18:24.800 --> 1:18:30.000 got more involved in things beyond its traditional region. You know, 1:18:30.000 --> 1:18:34.480 you've seen China talking to Zelensky. You saw China brokering 1:18:34.520 --> 1:18:38.080 a kind of truth between I Iran and Saudi Arabia. 1:18:38.160 --> 1:18:42.519 It should be an inevitable part of these discussions that 1:18:42.680 --> 1:18:47.080 both sides explained to each other what their core interests 1:18:47.080 --> 1:18:53.800 are and determine how do I handle situations in which 1:18:53.880 --> 1:18:59.920 they are core into its clash and I would hope 1:19:00.360 --> 1:19:07.960 to resolve into its in which CoInc it's class without conflict, 1:19:09.040 --> 1:19:14.600 or managed to avoid situations of clerging coincines. 1:19:15.240 --> 1:19:17.600 At the moment, you have India, which seems to be 1:19:17.640 --> 1:19:22.120 a non aligned country. It is not on one side 1:19:22.200 --> 1:19:25.000 or the other. Would would it? Would a younger Kissinger 1:19:25.080 --> 1:19:27.439 now focus from an American point of view of trying 1:19:27.479 --> 1:19:31.320 to bring India, which will be the next great power, 1:19:31.520 --> 1:19:32.840 onto the American side. 1:19:33.640 --> 1:19:41.600 I have no. I have not dealt with India for 1:19:45.080 --> 1:19:49.559 in terms of years, even longer than I've dealt with China, 1:19:49.760 --> 1:19:54.280 and at the early period of my dealing with India, 1:19:54.920 --> 1:20:01.000 their non alignment or a suit of considerable irritation because 1:20:01.040 --> 1:20:04.800 it took the form of lecturing arts on the virtues 1:20:04.880 --> 1:20:09.120 of non alignment. That choice was open to them, but 1:20:09.320 --> 1:20:13.320 not to us. When you are in a cold war, 1:20:14.200 --> 1:20:17.160 you can retreat from it and say you're not going 1:20:17.200 --> 1:20:24.240 to choose non alignment. But in the decades Wi which 1:20:24.280 --> 1:20:30.560 I've dealt with India said, since I think their policy, 1:20:31.080 --> 1:20:42.320 their current policy is extraordinarily thoughtful, and I have great 1:20:42.400 --> 1:20:52.439 respect for their foreign minister, who is a very i 1:20:52.479 --> 1:20:58.559 would say brilliant executor of that of that policy. India 1:20:58.680 --> 1:21:04.240 is a great power, and over the decades ahead, it 1:21:04.320 --> 1:21:10.479 will grow very comfortably to China, maybe not quite of 1:21:10.600 --> 1:21:14.000 the same string, but it doesn't matter at that point 1:21:14.960 --> 1:21:22.320 exactly it it will be of sufficient strength to uh 1:21:22.600 --> 1:21:32.839 sud itself, and so it performs best when it defends 1:21:32.880 --> 1:21:40.160 its own interests, which overlap many of ours. Our interests 1:21:40.200 --> 1:21:44.400 as a great power are to prevent any country from 1:21:44.600 --> 1:21:50.719 dominating the world or its regions in such a way 1:21:50.840 --> 1:21:56.960 that we lose our influence. To achieve important objective. 1:21:57.720 --> 1:22:01.240 You're listening to a special conversation with distinguished diplomat and 1:22:01.320 --> 1:22:04.599 former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. We'll have more 1:22:04.600 --> 1:22:06.640 of that conversation next. 1:22:09.920 --> 1:22:13.200 The final part of our conversation focused on legacy and 1:22:13.280 --> 1:22:18.000 the personal side. Henry Kissinger has remained a pretty private person. 1:22:18.560 --> 1:22:22.320 In an age where leaders like to play on emotional narratives, 1:22:22.960 --> 1:22:26.680 he has, as we shall shortly see, tended to suppress 1:22:26.720 --> 1:22:31.320 his backstory even when it might win him sympathy. One 1:22:31.439 --> 1:22:34.160 constant in the three decades that I've known him has 1:22:34.200 --> 1:22:37.360 been football. His first question on seeing me was why 1:22:37.400 --> 1:22:41.000 had Leicester City, my football team, just been relegated from 1:22:41.040 --> 1:22:44.760 the Premier League. He has followed Firth, which itself got 1:22:44.800 --> 1:22:48.839 relegated from the Bundesliga last year since he was a boy. Indeed, 1:22:48.880 --> 1:22:51.240 he and his brother were beaten up by Nazi thugs 1:22:51.320 --> 1:22:55.080 for trying to sneak into a game. You have lived 1:22:55.080 --> 1:22:58.720 one hundred years and Firth is yet to win the Bundesliga. 1:22:59.040 --> 1:23:01.240 How long would you have to live for that to happen? 1:23:01.439 --> 1:23:06.639 Oh, it would come close to the definition to giving 1:23:06.720 --> 1:23:08.640 us a definition of infinity. 1:23:10.000 --> 1:23:13.200 I've read a lot of things you've written, and nothing 1:23:13.360 --> 1:23:15.720 quite as sort of powerful as this. And it's it's 1:23:15.800 --> 1:23:18.880 in Neil Focuson's book. It was a private essay you 1:23:18.960 --> 1:23:23.679 wrote when you visited our concentration camp. When you age, 1:23:23.680 --> 1:23:26.400 I think just twenty two, and especially you meet this 1:23:26.560 --> 1:23:30.639 inmate called Felxama, and you say, Felix Samer, your foot 1:23:30.640 --> 1:23:33.519 has been crushed so that you can't run away. Your 1:23:33.560 --> 1:23:36.720 face is forty, your body is ageless. Yet all your 1:23:36.720 --> 1:23:39.920 certificate reads is sixteen. And I stand there with my 1:23:40.000 --> 1:23:43.360 clean clothes and make a speech to you and your comrades, Felixamer. 1:23:43.840 --> 1:23:48.400 Humanity stands accused in you, I, Joe Smith, human dignity. 1:23:48.479 --> 1:23:51.639 Everybody has failed you. You should be preserved in cement 1:23:51.800 --> 1:23:54.840 up here on the hillside for future generations to look 1:23:54.920 --> 1:23:58.799 upon and take stock human dignity. Objective values have stopped 1:23:58.840 --> 1:24:02.320 at this barbedoir. As long as conscience exists as a 1:24:02.360 --> 1:24:05.800 conception in the world, you will personify it. Nothing done 1:24:05.840 --> 1:24:09.080 for you will ever restore you. You are eternal in 1:24:09.120 --> 1:24:12.040 this respect. Obviously had a very profound experience in you. 1:24:12.120 --> 1:24:14.600 But if something you chose to keep so private for 1:24:14.600 --> 1:24:17.240 a long time is that do you think that's a 1:24:17.240 --> 1:24:20.040 different way of people seeing Henry Kissinger. 1:24:20.160 --> 1:24:26.439 It was a feeling that its concentration camp evoked in me. 1:24:26.960 --> 1:24:36.840 I wrote that within a week of having seen the 1:24:37.400 --> 1:24:44.720 level of dehumanization that we can imagine that people were 1:24:44.760 --> 1:24:54.439 too weak to hurt the god that kept them and 1:24:54.560 --> 1:24:59.360 be killed some people by mistake by giving them solid food. 1:25:02.320 --> 1:25:07.040 A but it so I wrote that for myself. I 1:25:07.080 --> 1:25:14.680 had no intention of publishing it, because feelings about humanity 1:25:17.280 --> 1:25:24.160 can affect your own actions. A biographer discovered it mm 1:25:24.280 --> 1:25:28.439 not among papers I gave him, but it ref It 1:25:29.280 --> 1:25:40.120 reflects an underlying reality that we have to recognize its 1:25:40.280 --> 1:25:48.680 lurking behind our technical capacities, and that we need to 1:25:51.160 --> 1:26:00.679 contain and prevent from breaking and to you, to prevent 1:26:00.840 --> 1:26:04.639 the bearing side from breaking out. 1:26:05.640 --> 1:26:07.439 When you look back at your life now from one 1:26:07.479 --> 1:26:10.040 hundred year point of view, do you think that has 1:26:10.120 --> 1:26:13.960 been the core of it? Is trying to do that. 1:26:15.120 --> 1:26:22.759 It's been an important core of it. But I don't advertise. 1:26:22.120 --> 1:26:24.599 It on that thing. I know you're you're one hundred, 1:26:24.640 --> 1:26:28.240 you're talking about writing two more books. But how if 1:26:28.280 --> 1:26:30.320 not for that, how would you like to be remembered. 1:26:31.200 --> 1:26:40.519 It's out of my control. I tried to do. They're 1:26:40.560 --> 1:26:43.439 best I could within the frameburg that we. 1:26:43.479 --> 1:26:46.720 Have did good, Henry Quest, thank you very much for 1:26:46.760 --> 1:26:50.040 talking to Bloomberg. A very delayed happy birthday, Thank you 1:26:50.200 --> 1:26:50.599 very much,