The Trial of Henry Kissinger

Rating:
Summary: The War Criminal's War Criminal
Review: In this breezy but extremely well researched little book, Christopher Hitchens convincingly argues that Henry Kissinger is a war criminal according to published American and International legal standards. Hitchens builds his case not from a moral or political point of view but from a purely legal one based on evidence that Kissinger was responsible for acts of genocide, assassination, and unlawfully interfering with government operations both in the United States and in foreign countries. Hitchens documents how Kissinger's ignominious resume spans the globe and includes the mass murder of civilians in East Timor, Pakistan, Greece, Cyprus, Chile, Argentina, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.

In places such as Chile and Argentina, according to Hitchens, Kissinger merely supervised the assassination of democratically elected heads of state and the establishment of brutally repressive and murderous military dictatorships. His accomplishments were more significant in East Timor where, with his help, one third of the population was murdered, and in Indochina where he not only colluded in the murder of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese but also in Cambodia and Laos where under his guidance, Nixon illegally extended the war and waged it almost purely against the civilian population.

Conservatives or self-styled realists might refute Hitchens by arguing that Kissinger's genocidal resume is merely the result of his practicing a brutal but necessary variant of realpolitik. But as Hitchens' gleefully points out, few Kissinger lovers including Kissinger himself are unwilling to do this for two reasons: first because they are unwilling to face the legal consequences of linking the man to his murders and second because in many cases, while Kissinger's actions personally benefited him and his patrons, they in no way helped the United States. For example, in 1968 Kissinger helped to sabotage the Johnson administration's peace plan in order ensure a Nixon presidential victory and his own appointment as Secretary of State. Four years later he successfully brokered THE SAME PLAN only by this time, twenty thousand more American troops had been killed along with hundreds of thousands of civilians in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. The only people who benefited from this were Nixon and his top officials including Kissinger.

It is for these reasons and others, according to Hitchens, that Kissinger has gone to great lengths to cover his tracks, by censoring documents or bequeathing them to the Library of Congress under the condition that they remain sealed until his death. While Kissinger enjoys a sort of morbid celebrity status at home, he is less at ease abroad where at least once he has been legally detained to answer questions about his responsibility for the "disappearance" of foreign nationals.

The importance of this book lies not so much in its condemnation of Henry Kissinger, but in the lessons it holds for Americans in these troubled times. As of this writing, many Americans are asking themselves why their nation is so hated around the world, and whether its forthcoming invasion of Iraq is based on genuine national security concerns or the self interest of the ruling elite. Sometimes the answers to such questions are found not so much in the present but in the past. Henry Kissinger's career, as chronicled in this book, provides us with many hints and direct answers to some of our most troubling questions today.

Rating:
Summary: Dont be fooled by my rating...
Review: In totality this book is excellent and covers aphoristically within small bounds many grounds with detailed/ specific support and reference to appropriate documents. Nevertheless I have several major criticisms. The volume (thickness) of the book was rather disappointing in that not much content (well none at all actually) was available on Kissinger's earlier existence including none on his alleged double spy/ espionage roll with the USSR (see Capell, A. F. 1974 or 1992 'Henry Kissinger, Soviet agent'). Other exclusions also include BNL (Banca Nazionale del Lavoro who provided Iraq with over $4 billion in unreported loans) scandal as at the time under investigation by Committee On Banking involving Kissinger Associates and more explicitly Mr Kissinger himself on BNL Advisory Board since 1985 and up to his proclaimed February 22, 1991 as he had been marked stating to Financial Times on April 26th with evidence, reports ( even one by 60 minutes at the time ) and findings which proved this claim to be false (surprise surprise). Not to side track however, there other criticism that I have more regarding Mr Hitchens style ( this being the second book of his that I have had the privilege to read). The appendix is rather poor and Bibliography/ Referencing nonexistent! I would like to have direct access to all referenced documentation - where may I find them ? what is the exact source ? This is something most agitating about this book much like Hitchens others. I think if this had even been attempted and the appendix a little more developed then the overall density of the book would have been a little more rewarding for the money that one has paid as well its prestige/ resource value in ones library. Nonetheless its size makes for a great book to be enjoyed by all and consuming not much of your time to complete.

This is a must read book not only by those in the field of Humanitarian Rights but by all those who seek too see the gradual unfolding of the truth and perhaps evidently the justice that may/ should hopefully prevail from it. Furthermore this book does well to reassure that the criminals of today may not easily escape the discrepancies within their own track record and conduct even in light of their title and awards such as those of the Nobel Peace Prize being shamefully given to individuals as such.

Rating:
Summary: Can and will be used in a Court of Law
Review: In uncovering Kissinger's input to undermine yet another nation state, the author notes "any late disclosure by [American] officialdom will contain material that is worse than even the cynics suspected". And so it is with the details of Kissinger's involvement, as Vice-President and later Secretary of State, unraveled by Hitchens in this outstanding piece of investigative journalism. Anyone, from those who have simply a hint, to those who have suffered directly as a consequence (Cambodians, East Timorians, Bangladeshis, Chileans, US Vietnam War Veteran families: please stand up) will be appalled by the blood on Kissinger's hands.

Slim in volume but mammoth in scope, it takes no more that 150 pages for the author to do the following:

1) Deconstruct the tidy, respectable image of this "elder-statesman". 2) Flesh out the significant details and Kissinger's involvement in crafting the policies that have led to the a catalogue of state-terrorism, including for starters: Deliberate Genocide of Civilians, Assassination of elected leaders of state, incitement of mass murder, gagging of the Press (the US Press, incidentally). 3) Presents a case and a useful body of evidence that, one hopes, can and will be used in a court of law by governments and bodies to bring Kissinger to book.

Milosovic is facing court, Pinochet has been made to do the defence dance and many of the leaders that were brought into power as a result of Kissinger's "realpolitik" have been made to account for their crimes. But the USA has still not found it convenient to drag its own delinquent politicos out into the open, let alone subpoena them to court. Perhaps the time has come for the worm to turn.

Are you listening Mr. Kissinger?

Rating:
Summary: The Trial of Henry Kissinger
Review: Investigating in turn Kisinger's involvement in the war in Indochina, mass murder in Bangladesh, planned assassinations in Santiago, Nicosia & Washington DC, & genocide in East Timor, & drawing on first hand testimony, previously unpublished documentation, & broad sweeps through material released under the Freedom of Information Act, Hitchens mounts a devastating indictment of the ex-Secretary of State & National Security Advisor.

Rating:
Summary: The Trial of Henry Kissinger
Review: Is former secretary of state and Nobel Peace Prize winner Kissinger a war criminal? Hitchens, a journalist (the Nation, Vanity Fair) and author (Hostage to History: Cyprus from the Ottomans to Kissinger), believes that Kissinger committed crimes around the world, from Cambodia to Bangladesh to Chile. With the recent detention of Chile's August Pinochet and the international interest in prosecuting Serbia's Slobodan Milosevic, Hitchens theorizes that the era of "sovereign immunity" for state crimes has ended. He would limit Kissinger's prosecution to "offenses that might or should form the basis of a legal prosecution: for war crimes, for crimes against humanity and for offenses against common or customary or international law." Hitchens relies on congressional hearing testimony, transcripts of the infamous Nixon tapes, and the memoirs and papers of Nixon, Ford, and Reagan administration officials to support his case against Kissinger. Although there is limited attribution of the quoted and referenced documentation, the substance of the material makes an intriguing case. Recommended for political science and international relations collections.

Rating:
Summary: Irony
Review: It is ironic that a man who so prided himself on scrutinzing scholarship, as in the case of his essays on Joan Peters "From Time Immemorial," should write a book so unscholarly. This book is nothing but an angry diatribe against someone who Mr. Hitchens seems unable to view in a fair light. After reading the book I checked to see where Mr. Hitchens had gotten all of his information and facts from. I was shocked to find that in a book that was billed as so important and such a revelation, that he had so few footnotes and refrences. Much of his information is put forth so that you simply have to "take his word for it." This is something that should never have to occur in serious scholarship. A man's arguments should be both well supported by facts and logically sound.
This is another problem I have with the book. Even if you take the man's arguments at face value, something hard to do, they lacks anything close to a logical semblence. He ties Mr. Kissenger to these horrid acts all the while forgetting that it was not Mr.Kissinger who committed them. Should a gun-maker be executed if a deranged man murders someone with a weapon he made? Obviously not.
In the end, the product that Mr.Hitchens puts out is a really unfortunate one, something that pulls readers in to find it truthful, not because of facts or logic, but pure sensationalism. I'm willing to listen and be swayed by any well put together and fact-filled argument about anything, this unfortunately, isn't one of those.

Rating:
Summary: selective facts
Review: It would seem hitchens has a specific vendetta against kissinger as if the others in the administration weren't cultivating foreign policy. This is a smear.

Rating:
Summary: A vehicle for examining US foreign policy at its worst
Review: Midway through Hitchens' examination of Kissinger there is little doubt left that were Kissinger not a US citizen, he would surely be subject to the same level of examination by the UN, the ICC and over a dozens nations whose citizens his policy advising have affected. Only his immunity provided by the most powerful nation in the world keeps him out of prison.
Hitchens takes the same approach throughout every chapter, contrasting the different versions of history as presented by DOD documents obtained by the FOA and those given by Nixon, Kissinger and US military officials themselves. The process is thorough and extremely reliable, considering that most of the documentation of Kissinger's deadly foreign policy dealings from Cambodia to Chile are provided by the same department that allowed these atrocities to happen 30 years ago.
Reading about all the backpedaling and evasion of accountability on Kissinger's part throughout the years is enough reason to buy this book.
The only word of warning I would give is that this is not a book for newcomers to the world of US foreign policy in the 1970s. Be prepared for some serious time/subject leaps, especially in the sections on Bangladesh and E. Timor, due in part to Hitchens' quick and assuming writing style and in part to the fact that this stuff never exactly gets talked about in your "average" history lesson. Read your history first and then come to this book.
The only question I had left at the end is where Hitchens got the picture for the cover.

Rating:
Summary: Searing Indictment Of Henry Kissinger For War Crimes!
Review: One of the most memorable scenes in the original "Godfather' movie was a sequence in which Michael (played by Al Pacino), now firmly insinuated in the evil machinations of the family business, travels to rural New England to try to attempt to persuade Kate (played by Diane Keaton) to marry him. When she complains about his father's business and the violence associated with it, Michael says that his father is no different than any other powerful men, like a governor or senator. Kate looks at him with surprise and contempt, claiming governors and senators don't have people killed. With those cold dark eyes, Michael says, "Now Kate, who is being naive?"

Such a cynical recognition of the motives and methods of some of our leaders informs this insightful book by journalist Christopher Hitchens, who does the reader a yeoman's service in detailing the evidence mounting against Henry Kissinger for crimes against humanity. Chief and foremost of these many such incidents involves Kissinger's willful disregard for the welfare of American soldiers in harm's way in Vietnam, where his actions and policies served to both derail a possible settlement in the fall of 1968 (thereby condemning an additional 40,000 servicemen to unnecessary death in the fields and jungles of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos), and also extended a state of war over additional areas such as Cambodia and Laos for strictly political purposes, thus creating the conditions for millions of unnecessary and unfruitful deaths as well as unimaginable destruction for Americans, Cambodians, Laotians, and Vietnamese over the next several years.

Yet Hitchens' indictments of Kissinger's malice and misdeeds do not end here, but extend to many other situations and sets of circumstances, such as the involvement in the overthrow of Chile and the murder of Chile's elected President, Allende, as well as the sponsorship of murder and mayhem on the part of a plethora of indigenous dictators and potentates, ranging from Indonesia's Suharto to the Greek Cypriots, from Bangladesh to Angola. Everywhere Hitchens peered beneath the neatly papered-over official record, Kissinger's bloody fingerprints emerged, staining the truth with his personal brand of Realpolitik, extending his malevolence toward innocent bystanders who got in the way of his global ambitions. And the irony of all this is that despite all the evidence indicating there is more than adequate evidence of Kissinger's culpability and participation in many acts of genocide and murder, Kissinger is still held in such high esteem by so many unsuspecting Americans.

Of course, in point of fact, Kissinger is not alone. Others belong to this select group of indictable Americans culpable for their participation in crimes against humanity, including Robert McNamara, William Westmoreland, and William Rogers, along with many others who operated more anonymously in service to the bloody policies of the Johnson and Nixon administrations. Yet among these people, no one deserves the humiliation and discrediting as much as Kissinger, who should be charged, tried, and ultimately executed for his actions.Hang him high, as a beacon and a memorial for the memory of all the innocent victims he left in his terrifyingly reckless wake. This is a book that will illustrate just how heinous his actions while supposedly serving the country actually were. I highly recommend this book.

Rating:
Summary: SADSACK CASE IN THAT KISS ONLY CAME IN AT END!!
Review: Read Henry Kissinger's Ending the Vietnam War, if you want to know a little more than tripe about what really happened, at least in Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos. Kennedy's predecessors started the war,Kennedy actually expanded the war, Johnson got cold feet and the liberals lost their earlier goals; Nixon invited Kissinger, who had been working with Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, to come and help him extricate us honorably, having only met him once. Extremists like to forget who all was involved!! That Kissinger has never been questioned for what he did except by the conspiratorial theorists should tell you something. Get real and read a little history. Kissinger came in at the point of trying to win the end honorably; but the protestors and liberals pushed so ugly that all those poor cambodians and vietnamese fell to communism. I'm afraid the ruckus pointed out in this book was mostly caused by these protesters, protesting against the democratically chosen majority, and THEY have something to account for, in more than one way!! So sad; but at least the left should get a few basic facts right. Duh. . (For more balanced info on kissingerand the controversial author of this reviewed book, check out Wikipedia, the online free encyclopedia. On the Kissinger page, scroll down to Accusations, click on the author of this very book and see what they have to say about him!)