Rating: 
Summary: Reckless Journalist on a Witch Hunt
Review: This book, and the subsequent Mock-o-mentry, is more of a muckraking tabloid smear than a serious study. Granted, Henry Kissinger is a controversial figure but quite hardly a war criminal. Also, many of Hitches sources are secondary accounts from unreliable and dubious muckrakers like Anthony Summers and Kissinger's political opponents. therefore, the end result resembles something you would read in the taboids while checking out at the Grocery store.
Furthermore, most of Hitchens conclusions are based on generalizations and do not reflect the facts. For instance, the fall of Allende in Chile had more to do with economic conditions than anything Kissinger did, the neutrality of Cambodia is a myth(The NV Communists were in there slaughtering Cambodians), and Anna Chenault could not of kept Thieu from signing a treaty to end the war in 1968. Thieu knew that Hanoi didn't want peace and he barely signed the Paris Peace Accords in 1973.
Thus, there is no logical analysis of the alleged crimes and basically the account turns into a long propaganda-filled rant. No court would accept these demagougic charges. Only a delusional mob looking for a McCarthyesqe witch hunt would support this flimsy and one-sided evidence. But, it looks like the demagougic Hitchens has convinced a number of 'villagers' that Henry is a monster and they're all prepared to lynch first and look at the evidence later. The world is quickly becoming a very scary place...
Rating: 
Summary: No Laws No War Criminals - It Is That Simple
Review: What is a "war criminal"? For all practical purposes it means you lost so you are the criminal, we won we bring peace and freedom. It gives an easy out and a simple legal mechanism to lock up or kill the opposing leaders at the end of hostilities. Here is the problem - there is no consistent set of international laws. As an example, I just read the new book by Brzezinski "The Choice" - excellent book - and he thinks an effective World Court is many decades away. So at the present time we have individuals living in sovereign states that accept only that laws apply to individuals living within states, but the states themselves still have failed to grasp or have intentionally chosen to ignore the concept that sovereign states in dealing among themselves must (also) be governed by a set of international laws. Then when there is a problem anywhere (like Iraq or even Haiti) the first step is to go through a legal process. People like Kissinger in the past, and more recently Wolfowitz have decided on their own that they are above the law or can act with impunity. But even Jimmy Carter shipped material to Afghanistan to support an armed insurrection, and Reagan shipped goods (secretly) to Iraq, Iran and Nicaragua contrary even to US law, not just international laws. So this is a problem that extends well beyond Kissinger. It is somewhat ironic that Jack Straw is condemning Israel in March 2004 for their acts against Hamas while he supports illegal intervention in Iraq in 2003. All in all there is a high degree of arbitrariness and hypocrisy. So it follows that if the US or Britain are to be a democratic examples they must apply consistent legal standards to all international dealings and support international treaties and laws - to the letter of the laws, even if that is inconvenient, takes longer, and does not always result in the short term interests of the US being served. If some sort of international consensus cannot be reached then it is a "war of the jungle", and war crimes will always be an issue. It also follows that Middle East peace and an environment consensus will never be solved which is quite a depressing concept. So it is really a priority to strengthen international laws and institutions. At the moment it is shear nonsense to call Kissinger a war criminal since there are no laws to break. Jack in Toronto
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