"The Kissinger Cables": WikiLeaks Releases 1.7M Historical Records 199
An anonymous reader writes to note the latest large-scale document release from WikiLeaks: "The cables are all from the time period of 1973 to 1976. Without droning about too many numbers that can be found in the press release, about 200,000 of the cables relate directly to former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. These cables include significant revelations about U.S. involvements with fascist dictatorships, particularly in Latin America, under Franco's Spain (including about the Spanish royal family) and in Greece under the regime of the Colonels. The documents also contain hourly diplomatic reporting on the 1973 war between Israel, Egypt and Syria (the 'Yom Kippur war'). While several of these documents have been used by U.S. academic researchers in the past, the Kissinger Cables provides unparalleled access to journalists and the general public. 'The illegal we do immediately; the unconstitutional takes a little longer.' — Henry A. Kissinger, U.S. Secretary of State, March 10, 1975."
Please, please! (Score:5, Funny)
'Fascist Dictatorship' is verging on hate speech. Please use the term 'Stability-Enhanced Administration' or 'American Regional Security Ally'.
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'Fascist Dictatorship' is verging on hate speech.
Dictatorship of the Proletariat should be no more loved a term than "Fascist Dictatorship," but for some reason it gets a pass [dennisprager.com]. That should be the last thing that happens, given the record - 100,000,000 killed [harvard.edu] in the last 100 years. (And don't look now - North Korea might just be warming up.)
The 1970s, when many of the communications were written, were probably both the high point of Communist and Soviet Power [youtube.com] and the struggle between Communism and freedom. It is unlikely that Communism would have collap
Re:Please, please! (Score:5, Insightful)
Murdering democratically elected governments and replacing them with genocidal dictatorships that cused hundreds of thousands of victims doesn't sound like freedom to me, you psychopathic hypocritical bastards. And you'll still be surprised that the civilized world hates you. Fucking sociopathic criminals.
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Murdering democratically elected governments and replacing them with genocidal dictatorships that cused hundreds of thousands of victims doesn't sound like freedom to me,
And that is why we oppose Communism. Or were you going to try to make a mistaken point about somewhere else.... Iran maybe? You need to check the historical record - democracy in Iran was gone before the Shah was returned to power. Mosaddeq has dissolved the parliament and was ruling by decree, and ignored the constitutional power of the Shah to remove the Prime Minister, arresting those sent to him and causing the legitimate head of state, the Shah, to flee. Mosaddeq was a tyrant by definition.
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Woohoo! We replaced one tyrant with another. Now that's striking a blow for freedom! Operation Ajax had nothing to do with fighting communism, and everything to do with preserving the profits of British Petroleum (nee Anglo-Iranian Oil Company).
Re:Please, please! (Score:5, Insightful)
The 1970s, when many of the communications were written, were probably both the high point of Communist and Soviet Power [youtube.com] and the struggle between Communism and freedom.
Is a struggle between Communism and freedom really what was going on back then?
Re:Please, please! (Score:5, Insightful)
It was a struggle between which type of control of the population would win. The Communist methods are obviously reprehensible, caused millions of deaths and ultimately failed. The western methods of exerting control over the general public are much less odious, but just as effective in the end. Either way, the people at the top own us, and we do what they want us to do.
I have some hope though, when I see information like this released to the general public. It's a great thing to see the workings behind the scenes so we can get a better understanding of what was actually going on.
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Would you call primitive jungle cannibals morally reprehensible, or would you instead try to compare them to the aztecs, or pre-agrarian Mesopotamians who struggled to survive.
The point being is that if you want to compare communism to capitalism, you have to compare them to something more analagous, like perhaps early industrial america for example. Remember how we used to have slavery, used to give disease innoculated blankets to native americans, and used to use perform medical experiments on poor blacks
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Saying Soviet Russia was a communist country is like saying the United States is a democratic country. USA is a democratic republic. Soviet Russia was far from a communist state. I realized that everyone thought Soviet Russia was communist, but they're the same dumbasses saying that about China now. China is far to privatized to ever claim it communist. Maybe I'm being an idealist...
It was great learning that the United States saved the world in WWII. Not so fun learning that USA and it's allies were at fa
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Even the Soviets didn't call themselves a Communist state, they called themselves Socialists. They aspired to a Communist state but didn't think they had gotten there. Their brand of Socialism was of course very Totalitarian pretty damn quickly.
The real problem with Communism in my opinion is that it makes it far too easy for totalitarian individuals to take over and inflict their will on their fellow citizens. Stalin killed millions, more than Hitler and the Fascists I believe, albeit in a less organized m
Re:Please, please! (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, it's freedom, as explained by Richard M Nixon's head:
"We enjoy so much freedom, it's almost sickening. We're free to chose which hand our sex-monitoring chip is implanted in. And if we don't want to pay our taxes, why, we're free to spend a week with the Pain Monster."
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This is very easy to understand by looking at Korea. In South Korea, people protest against the government, the US, North Korea, or pretty much anything that they care to, and not much happens. In Communist North Korea, if you make a joke about the Great/Dear/New Leader, you and three generations of your family are likely to be sent to a prison camp where the one of the biggest questions you will face is will you be able to catch enough rats to eat, or pull enough kernels of corn from manure [businessinsider.com], to avoid dea
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It used to be the same thing in both sides of the korean border up to 1970's, and to a lesser degree up to 1987. Selective memory.
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The 70s are a long time ago, and South Korea is free now, isn't it? North Korea still isn't, and may not be in our lifetime. I don't believe that South Korea was ever as bad as North Korea, harsh though it may have been long ago. And North Korea certainly didn't help the South by tunneling, sending commandos to kill people, and various infiltrations.
Selective memory and attention.
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You think thats a feature in communist countries only? Try saudi arabia or thailand, you know, our capitalist allies. Heck you could even make the case of Julian Assange. The difference is that we have a media machine, and the illusion of choice in our democracy, so that real opposition isn't a threat to the status quo.
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"Could people in West Germany travel to the East? Could people in the East travel to the West? Was the Berlin Wall designed to keep people in or out? The Korean DMZ? The island of Cuba?
Discuss."
Wrong week. This is the week of the political Hasbeens.
Re:Please, please! (Score:4, Insightful)
"So, when will Wikileaks start releasing Soviet and Communist archive material? Thats right, Assange probably doesn't consider them "bastards" to be crushed. Well, he going to Ecuador if he can, isn't he?"
Assange is retreating to Ecuador because many of those "free Western" democracies you seem so fond of have given him little choice.
Selective memory and selective outrage (Score:2)
The following human rights problems continued: isolated unlawful killings and use of excessive force by security forces, sometimes with impunity; poor prison conditions; arbitrary arrest and detention; corruption and other abuses by security forces; a high number of pretrial detainees; and corruption and denial of due process within the judicial system. President Correa and his administration continued verbal and legal attacks against the independent media. Societal problems continued, including physical aggression against journalists; violence against women; discrimination against women, indigenous persons, Afro-Ecuadorians, and lesbians and gay men; trafficking in persons and sexual exploitation of minors; and child labor.
I don't know if that claims are true. Probably they are since all those problems are endemic to almost all the countries of Latin America, we differ sadly only in a matter of degree but:
Do you know that Mexico is and has been for the last 6 years the most dangerous country for the press, when not in only in Latin America, in the whole world? Do a Google search about Regina Martínez (RIP), Lydia Cacho, Carmen Aristegui and Anabel Hernández for starters. The mexican bloodbath with at least 100,000
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The following human rights problems continued: isolated unlawful killings and use of excessive force by security forces, sometimes with impunity; poor prison conditions; arbitrary arrest and detention; corruption and other abuses by security forces; a high number of pretrial detainees; and corruption and denial of due process within the judicial system.
Wait, is this quote about the USA or Ecuador?
Those who live in glass houses...
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Re:Intellectual Midgets. (Score:5, Informative)
True, the cheerleading for North Korea and China on Slashdot is almost embarrassing.
Absent, but embarrassing.
I have to wonder at the thought processes of somebody who, when you say "Y'know, our support of Operation Condor was really pretty disgusting", somehow hears "I love Communism so much that I'd kiss Uncle Joe right on his death camps! Viva La DPRK!" and begins frothing at the mouth...
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True, the cheerleading for North Korea and China on Slashdot is almost embarrassing.
Absent, but embarrassing.
I have to wonder at the thought processes of somebody who, when you say "Y'know, our support of Operation Condor was really pretty disgusting", somehow hears "I love Communism so much that I'd kiss Uncle Joe right on his death camps! Viva La DPRK!" and begins frothing at the mouth...
Well there's yer problem - you assumed that "thought" was involved. Who needs to think when Fox News and Rush can do it for you?
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I have to wonder about the thought process of somebody who objects only to terror and repression to put down Communism, but not by Communism. What is it that actually troubles them, the terror, or the anti-Communism? There are far too many that object to terror only till their faction gets into power.
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I see it as a hardwired nervous system like a jellyfish has...
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Re:Intellectual Midgets. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Intellectual Midgets. (Score:5, Insightful)
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I doubt even 2% of Slashdot readers have the intellectual capacity to understand the context of these communications. Instead, like the AC above me, they will spout leftist talking points. While at the same time condemning the West for their actions, they are in full support of regimes like North Korea and China, which have inflicted 100 times the deaths and misery than anyone can accuse the West of doing.
[citation needed]
You're awfully quick with statements about those whose mental capacity you so blithely dismiss, but you neglect completely to support your remarkable blanket statements. Probably figured we were to slow to catch that, I guess. Here's a tip, consider it a given that not everyone who disagrees with you is a moron, nor do they all think "the same way". I know that those shades of gray don't resolve well through the lens of Fox News, but at least try to do some thinking for yourself before y
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The full quote re: illegal/unconstitutional (Score:5, Insightful)
My initial reaction was to think, "at least he admits it, privately."
After I thought about it for a half a minute, this quotation made my day. I realized that the people of the United States had passed a law [wikipedia.org] that put a man like that in fear. Add one point in the "democracy" column!
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He sounds like he's joking there. I suspect that Kissinger was smart enough, and...er... ethically dis-inhibited enough, to be a truly epic troll when he felt like it.
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. In hindsight we can laugh at such ideas as Vietnam being run out of Russia one week, then China the next, when what seems like the incredibly obvious reality now is that it was being run out of Vietnam.
In hindsight we can laugh at such ideas as Al-Qaeda being run out of Afghanistan one week, then Pakistan the next, when what seems like the incredibly obvious reality now is that it was being run out of...
Why do people keep mistaking machination for happenstance? Cognitive dissonance?
Re:The full quote re: illegal/unconstitutional (Score:5, Insightful)
Notice what he said. "I'm afraid to say things like that".
Say, not do. He's obviously not worried about doing illegal and unconstitutional things - he just doesn't want to talk about them.
Re:The full quote re: illegal/unconstitutional (Score:5, Interesting)
You know who got that law passed? People like Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked a trove of *historical* documents; Ralph Nader, the father of the modern progressive movement; and Frank Church, an Idaho Democrat who lead the charge to clean up Nixon's mess. How is it, some 30 years later, that their modern-day counterparts are spending life in a military prison, reviled by their own party, and hiding in the embassy of a 3rd world country?
I think this was the "Yes we can" part of Obama's 2008 campaign message. I guess he should have cleaned house [youtube.com].
Re:The full quote re: illegal/unconstitutional (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact that you call it "Nixon's Mess" shows that you're precisely part of the partisan yammering class.
If you think Nixon was doing ONE THING that hadn't been done in spades by LBJ and Kennedy before him, you're hopelessly naive. Ike, perhaps not, but let's recall that - for example - Nixon's assertion that his tapes were inviolable Presidential material was BORN of his observation as a young congressman of the success of that tactic by Ike during the McCarthy hearings. (Ike *despised* McCarthy, and when State Dept files may have exonerated/validated some of his claims, Ike moved the cabinets wholesale into the Oval Office and claimed 'executive privilege' - an assertion the Senate witch hunters were happy to validate...).
When Tricky Dick tried it, the rules of course changed....
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I'm not sure I understand your point... I know that these behaviors preceded Nixon... the leak itself outlined the abuse of executive powers of prior presidents. The original leaks had nothing to do with Nixon himself and Nixon administration even encouraged the publicity of the leaks to some extent because they made Kennedy look bad.
Nixon got in hot water because his hired goons to broke into Ellsburg's psychologists office. The pull-out from Vietnam didn't happen because of anything directly contained
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Are we talking about the same Nixon that sabotaged the peace talks to end Vietnam war in 1968 for political gains?
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Ok, so now they don't say things like that anymore, and just continue to do so covertly. That's not exactly one point in the democracy column. All FOIA does is ensure that badness is not documented. It does not prevent it from happening. To do that requires true transparency, and I don't think you're going to find any politician that's really interested in THAT. The problem began when people started running for office rather than being selected by the people. You look at George Washington and he never
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Re:The full quote re: illegal/unconstitutional (Score:5, Funny)
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Kissinger (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Kissinger (Score:5, Insightful)
Wait, so "They are playing dirty" makes "We are playing dirty" right?
Siding with scoundrels tends to return and bite you in the ass. Osama is the proof (and he did win with 9/11. Look at your law and your freedoms today.)
Re:Kissinger (Score:5, Informative)
Osama is one way it can return and bite you. The other way it can hurt you is with what the spooks call "blowback", as demonstrated most thoroughly in Iran and the US-supported Shah: We support the thugs, the people hate the thugs, so there's a popular revolt that replaces the thugs, and for some reason the new guys thoroughly hate us.
Some other examples of where this dynamic comes into play:
- Chile (thanks to Pinochet)
- Venezuela (after the botched coup against Chavez)
- Nicaragua and Panama (thanks to Manuel Noriega, another CIA asset)
- El Salvador (with US-sponsored death squads)
- Cuba (the US strongly supported the brutal Batista, which is why Castro hated us so much)
- Lebanon (our support of Israeli cluster bombs in Beirut and the like bolsters Hezbollah)
- Vietnam (they still are mad about the "killing millions of them and leaving land mines and chemical weapons all over the place" thing)
- Iraq (we thought they had WMDs because we had sold them the weapons in question)
- in the near future, Afghanistan
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Re:Kissinger (Score:5, Insightful)
If the US had had more interest in actually promoting democracy and democratic changes when promulgating its foreign policy, the result would have been more democratic countries that used the US as a model, or at least viewed it in a positive way. On those few occasions when the US has acted in a manner that reflected its own ideals, this has often been the result.
Sadly US foreign policy has usually been shortsighted, focused on advancing US corporate interests and ensuring "stability" in a region - with "stability" usually being in the form of a brutal dictatorship. Things that should at least theoretically not be in keeping with US ideals. Apparently its more important that say US Sugar keeps its control over the sugar industry than the people of the Dominican republic get to have democratic rule and fair laws etc. Mostly it seems the US ideals are seen as being for US citizens only, and that its okay if the rest of the world suffers wars, massacres, dictatorships, etc to make that possible. This is why so many foreign countries dislike the US so much in the end.
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Err, as opposed to what other countries do...that promote the interests of their citizens above all others?
Isn't that really what the basic function of a government is? To promote its interest above others in the world, when you get down to it?
Re:Kissinger (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't that really what the basic function of a government is?
The basic functions of a government are supposed to be:
- Prevent citizens from robbing, killing, raping, vandalizing, etc each other.
- Prevent other countries from sending people to rob, kill, rape, vandalize, etc its citizens.
Neither of those require oppressing people who live in other countries.
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My point was that the US has often pushed a foreign policy that claimed to be enacted to promote democracy in other countries, fighting the war against Communism etc etc. This is playing on Americans justifiable pride in the ideals which gave birth to their country and its constitution as justification for actions which are not in keeping with those ideals or that documents great principals. If you claim the moral high-ground you ought to act in a manner that indicates you really believe your ideals.
Of cour
Smedley Butler (Score:2)
A hundred years and nothing has changed.
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You mention Vietnam, but everything I have seen shows them as still liking us. I never figured that out.
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Wait, so "They are playing dirty" makes "We are playing dirty" right?
Siding with scoundrels tends to return and bite you in the ass. Osama is the proof (and he did win with 9/11. Look at your law and your freedoms today.)
But Mom! Nikita and Leonid did it too!
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If the US did play entirely by the rules, the USSR would win the Cold War. The USSR was a fascist country, although the red sort of fascism, and observed no rules in its quest for dominance over Eurasia. I am glad the West's only country capable of standing against the USSR had politicians like Dr Kissinger that were focused on winning.
And we sir, are currently paying the price.
One of the prices is the hatred towards us. Hatred that made a few folks fly planes into some towers back in 2001. The existence of the TSA and PATRIOT Act can be traced right back to this guy and his cohorts. Hatred that allows terrorists and dictators to build a following and allows them to stay in power.
Bin Laden and Castro wouldn't have been able to do what they did if they didn't have the US as the focal point to blame for the problems that they and their pe
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And in the meantime, those people, like Kissinger, lived or are living a nice fat happy life.
And hundreds of thousands were brutally murdered (or worse) when those people (i.e. the USA) replaced their democratically elected governments with fascist dictatorships *in the name of fucking freedom*.
Maybe if someone fucking *apologized* there would be a bit less resentment. I doubt it, though.
Re:Kissinger (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know how happy Kissinger is or the rest of his ilk. I do know that nations can not take treaties with the US seriously at all. Just the example of the treaties signed with native American peoples alone are enough to force me to believe that treaties with the US are worthless.
It is all very depressing. But I suspect that without slavery, forced labor, creation of deliberate poverty to force low wages, and usurping land and generally scheming to rob the world blind I doubt that the US would ever have existed at all. Human history seems to be all about this evil mindset. The Apache rampaged and attacked others and took what they wanted as normal practice. The later immigrants into the Americas did no differently at all. The one difference is that the Apaches did not hide what they did at all. Even admitting that such things go on is dangerous for Americans. Dr. King is an example of what our government can do when people speak out.
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You are not going far enough. That line can be drawn from Eisenhower and Kermit Roosevelt (Ted's grandson) the CIA operative who convinced the Shah to participate in a coup, to Hezbollah, and 9/11. The Shah was a coward who never would have agreed without British/US pressure. After the first coup failed he fled to a vacation home, then the first place with a British Embassy (Iraq).
The British were pissed that they (Mossadegh and parliament) were nationalizing the Anglo-Persian oil company. They were rippin
Re:Kissinger (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, and here I was thinking of an alternative where we managed to partner with people who weren't corrupt murderous assholes who we could train to fight without having our own weapons and training used against us.
Who am I kidding? The only two possible choices [wikipedia.org] for dealing with the USSR were bin Laden and Santa Claus! We did the best we could!
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since you seem to be sympathetic to the former U.S.S.R
Clearly anybody who criticizes actions that led to blowback that has severely harmed the US and its citizens is sympathetic to the USSR. What next, Churchill was a Nazi sympathizer because he thought the bombing of Dresden was a mistake?
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Its a much more comfortable world when you see things only in black and white, and know that God (tm) is on your side no matter what you do. :P
Its much harder for those people to understand that you can support Democracy while simultaneously criticizing some aspect of the way its being conducted.
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We supported the USSR to defeat the Axis Powers. So yeah.
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*I* am in Schrodinger's box...or am I?
Schrodinger was in the cat's box.
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If we were to do the right thing, we need to lower our right stuff, so then the realy wrong people are tasked with doing what's right.
It doesn't make sence...
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Instead, thanks to the magnanimous USofA we had the luxury of enjoying the freedom of being mass murdered by the fascist dictatorships you fucking hipocritical criminals replaced our democratically elected governments with. The world would almost certainly be a better, more free place if you fuckers had all been nuked into oblivion.
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Jeezus, someone needs a history lesson. You are a brainwashed fool.
There were no good guys. There are no good guys. You chose a side, and it happens to be one the most aggressive and violent side in history, so you get to pretend your history is 'truth'. But you're a fool for painting the kaleidoscope of history and winners and losers in black and white. You're a large part of the reason the rest of the world hates us - you don't have the wherewithal to comprehend other perspectives or insights.
Btw - I'm on
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Re:Kissinger (Score:5, Insightful)
The USSR was a fascist country, although the red sort of fascism
Red fascism? Is that supposed to be an oxymoron? Fascism and communism were mortal enemies. You might want to look up a minor historical incident called World War II.
What fascism and communism did have in common was that they were both totalitarian. Words have a meaning; use them appropriately.
I am glad the West's only country capable of standing against the USSR had politicians like Dr Kissinger that were focused on winning.
And how was Henry focused on winning? By sabotaging peace negotiations and prolonging the Vietnam war so Nixon could win in 1968? The Vietnam war was a quagmire for the US and as such the USSR loved it. They could grind down the US just by shipping a few weapons to North Vietnam. Hence he was giving aid to our enemies - the Constitutional definition of treason.
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And how was Henry focused on winning? By sabotaging peace negotiations and prolonging the Vietnam war so Nixon could win in 1968?
In Kissinger's worldview, the Democrats were part of the ongoing effort of Communists to take over the US, so it was absolutely imperative that they not be allowed to win.
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Fascism and communism were mortal enemies
- no, you are mistaken.
Stalin and Hitler were mortal enemies, not fascism and communism. Fascism and communism are one and the same, with fascism being a slightly more efficient version of communism, because at least fascists recognised that allowing SOME people who supported the regime to own and operate private property (as monopolies of-course) and pay taxes was a more preferable way to run businesses than to run them by a committee of non-owners making meaningless decisions and not having anything per
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It was not about ideology that the fascists and the communists were fighting, it was about resources and influence.
Exactly, it's not about the ideology. Fascism and communism are actually wonderful ideas. The problem was the competition for resources and influences.
Let's break that down: competition for resources
Competition is competitive.
What are resources and influence? Capital
And are these national governments regulated by some higher centralized power? No, there's no world government regulating them. Governments are free as individuals were free free in 19th century US
So put this all together, all the death and dest
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the Bolsheviks ran on a platform of freedom, freedom from the capitalists in fact, and debt slavery from private property owners. "competitive free markets" typically lead to extracting all surplus value, which is why property rights were used to justify slavery in america, and why the environment has gone to shit.
look up positive and negative liberty and this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty#Freedom_as_a_triadic_relation
this if you would like a genuine discussion of marx
http://www.youtube.com/user/bren
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There is a thing called a 'dictionary' that you might want to investigate. Communism, fascism, and socialism are all DIFFERENT things. Dramatically different. Of course none of them are free market lunacy so I suppose it might be a bit much for you to understand, but they really aren't the same at all.
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What quest for dominance?
Oh, you mean this one [wikipedia.org]?
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The USSR was a fascist country,
OK, and so is the USA. Our Fearless Leader[s] make unconstitutional and even downright traitorous decisions on a daily basis, selling us up the river for their own short-term benefit. Now what?
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I am glad the West's only country capable of standing against the USSR had politicians like Dr Kissinger that were focused on winning.
Sure you're glad — you're a normal person. You don't have tiger blood and Adonis DNA.
Henry Kissinger was on a drug... It’s called Henry Kissinger. It's not available because if you try it, you will die. Your face will melt off, and your children will weep over your exploded body. If you borrowed Kissinger's brain for five seconds, you’d be like, "Dude! Can’t handle it, unplug this bastard!’"
When it came to the USSR, defeat was not an option. They picked a fight with a warlock.
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If the US did play entirely by the rules, the USSR would win the Cold War. The USSR was a fascist country, although the red sort of fascism, and observed no rules in its quest for dominance over Eurasia. I am glad the West's only country capable of standing against the USSR had politicians like Dr Kissinger that were focused on winning.
Why is it that so many continue to think that the ends justify the means, when in reality the means applied determine what you end up with? The ends don't justify the means, the means determine the ends.
"Without droning" (Score:2)
Monty Python's song (Score:3, Funny)
Henry Kissinger
How I'm missing yer
You're the doctor of my dreams.
With your crinkly hair and your glassy stare
And your Machiavellian schemes
I know they say that you are very vain
And short and fat and pudgy but at least you're not insane!
Henry Kissinger
How I'm missing yer
And wishing you were here!
Henry Kissinger
How I'm missing yer
You're so chubby and so neat.
With your funny clothes and your squishy nose
You're like a German parakeet.
All right so people say that you don't care
But you've got nicer legs than Hitler
And bigger tits than Cher!
Henry Kissinger
How I'm missing yer
And wishing you were here!
I also always remember Tom Lehrer's comment that political satire died when they gave Kissinger the Nobel Peace Prize.
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I also always remember Tom Lehrer's comment that political satire died when they gave Kissinger the Nobel Peace Prize.
He was wrong. Instead, the Nobel committee simply began providing sufficient political satire, such that no one else had to provide any. As evidence I give you Obama's Nobel for Heroic use of Drones.
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Actually, Obama's Nobel Prize was for nothing in particular. They'd decided to give it to him before he went all drone-happy.
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Exactly, he'd only just been elected.
I think they were trying to convince him to live up to that prize...something he's failed miserably at.
The moral of the story... (Score:3)
The moral of the story is that once you realise the "alright" president/prime minister/premier/whatever is actually up to all sorts of no-good, then the ones you don't think so much of are positively up to their necks in it.
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The moral of the story is that once you realise the "alright" president/prime minister/premier/whatever is actually up to all sorts of no-good, then the ones you don't think so much of are positively up to their necks in it.
Umm, 1973-76 would place these cables in the Nixon administration, with some later Ford material. Ford may have been feckless enough to secure 'alright' status; but did Nixon ever qualify as anything other than a nasty piece of work?
Re:The moral of the story... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:The moral of the story... (Score:4, Informative)
I'm no Ford fan(he just had such a short term and relatively bland reputation that he seemed a viable candidate for a "eh, ok" designation); but Nixon isn't a saint even by those standards. His petty politicking around the Paris Peace accords cost us(not to mention the poor bastards who lived there) a substantial bill in blood in Vietnam.
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From the documents released a few years ago Ford was bribed (donation to Republican party) by the leader of Indonesia to put pressure on Australia and other nearby nations to stay out of Indonesia's invasion of East Timor.
Cite? Not that I'm terribly skeptical, just that I'd like to read up on it.
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Foreign policy wise, Nixon was pretty good. Normalizing relations with China while not abandoning Taiwan is an example of something that could have become a festering wound that he avoided.
Re:The moral of the story... (Score:5, Informative)
Normalizing relations with China while not abandoning Taiwan is an example of something that could have become a festering wound that he avoided.
To give the devil his due, there are certain things that Nixon/Kissinger did right. You mentioned one of them. Others are détente and SALT I. But those are no reason to loose sight of the corrupt, murderous, and possibly outright treasonous things that they also did. History is full of such contradictions. For example, nobody likes to mention that without Stalin's forced industrialization in the 1920's and 30's, the Nazis probably would have won.
Mostly already available, but not the point (Score:2)
The previous declassification Executive Order 12958 signed in 1995, under the Clinton administration, was resisted by officials in the Defense Department and the U.S. intelligence community. The reclassification program was started in the fall of 1999 (Executive Order 13142). Security concerns were heightened by the Wen Ho Lee case, and "alleged" inadvertent release of nuclear secrets by the State Department.[1] 55 boxes of material were removed to the classified storage area on the sixth floor.[2]
It sought to be covert for as long as possible, but was revealed by the National Security Archive in February 2006.[3] By that point over 55,000 pages had already been reclassified, many dating back more than 50 years.
During the George W. Bush administration the scope of the program widened (Executive Order 13292), and was scheduled to end in March 2007.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._reclassification_program [wikipedia.org]
Still today (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Think outside the box. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, I believe Machiavelli wrote a separate book on republics, which I haven't read, but the closest relevant chapter in _the Prince_ is probablyChapter IX [constitution.org], where he says:
I'm aware that Machiavelli's name is a synonym for ruthlessness, but if you actually read what he wrote, there's a lot more to it than that. He wrote a lot about the importance of gaining and keeping the people's support. So, I do not think Kissinger by and large took the right lessons from Machiavelli. Now, Lyndon Johnson, *there's* a true student of Machiavelli!
Re:Think outside the box. (Score:5, Insightful)
What Machiavelli talked about was how to achieve and hold power. That requires the people's support. But a Machiavellian, like any true politician, does it for his own sake, not for theirs -- and Machiavelli thus talked about how to reconcile this fundamental selfishness with the need to keep the people's support.
The problem comes when there is a distinction between enacting policies that benefit the people, and feigning to so just in order to get their support while actually not having their best interests at heart. This is why transparency in governance is the ultimate enemy of politicians and yet the only thing that gives government a shade's chance of actually serving the public.
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if you read the cables, it doesn't read like a Stephen King novel
And how did you expect a raw dump of 200,000 cables to read? Let me know when you've read and studied all of them.
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LOL of course not.
Wikileaks has already demonstrated that they're willing to skew the data and completely misrepresent data if that misrepresentation supports their political views.
As has the US government. Which is why no good student of history relies on a single source.
And while the "Collateral Murder video", as originally released, was as much a piece of propaganda as any US government release, Wikileaks has a much better track record when it comes to raw dumps. Not necessarily because they're unbiased, but because they don't have the resources to edit them. If nevertheless the US government believes the cables have been selectively released, I'll look forward to their release o
Re:Constitutional Republic VS DHS and Oath Breaker (Score:4, Informative)
Usually called a Constitutional Republic. Real democracy will eat you
Warning: the English language is subject to change over the centuries. Right wingers and libertarians particularly take note. In the 18th century the word "democracy", without further qualification, generally referred to direct democracy. We are currently the 21st century (check your calendars if you doubt it). At this time, and for many years, the term "democracy" has taken on a more general meaning, and may refer to either direct or representative democracy, with or without a constitution. This may be verified by using a new type of reference called a "dictionary".
If you can't find anything more substantial to complain about than your fetish for using 18th century meanings for certain words, do you actually have anything to say?
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Taiwan and Japan? What did they ever to do support NK? You're really off your rocker.