Henry A. Kissinger Men Quotations

The defining issue is that the government in Taiwan was considered to be the government of all of China, and the authorities in Beijing were not recognized as a government of China. So Taiwan was the residuary for all of China.

Well it did not make excessive sense to say that 20 million people are the recognized government of a billion people that have their own institutions. We did not change it in the sense that we said this has to end, but there was a U.N. vote that transferred the legitimacy of China from Taiwan to Beijing. Beijing was recognized as the government of all of China. Then, under President Carter, we followed what the U.N. had already done eight years earlier.

I have great respect for the Taiwanese. They have done an extraordinary job. But it was not a sustainable position to say that the legitimate government of China resides in Taiwan, which at that time didn't have much contact with the mainland.

The American formal position has been that we oppose violence by governments against their people. That principle should not be abandoned.

The nuclear weapons were not useful for the achievement of political objectives.

Left to its own devices, the State Department machinery tends toward inertia rather than creativity; it is always on the verge of turning itself into an enormous cable machine.

The key decision for a statesman is whether to commit his nation or not. There is no middle course. Once a great nation commits itself, it must prevail. It will acquire no kudos for translating its inner doubts into hesitation.

Where position is felt to be a birthright, generosity is possible (though not guaranteed); flexibility is not inhibited by a commitment to perpetual success.

We are all the President's men.

Over time even two armed blind men in a room can do enormous damage to each other, not to speak of the room.

Diplomats operate through deadlock, which is the way by which two sides can test each other's determination. Even if they have egos for it few heads of government have the time to resolve stalemates, their meetings are too short and the demands of protocol too heavy.

Henceforth the adequacy of any military establishment will be tested by its ability to preserve the peace.

[The New World Order] cannot happen without U.S. participation, as we are the most significant single component. Yes, there will be a New World Order, and it will force the United States to change it's perceptions.

John Paul II was one of the greatest men of the last century. Perhaps the greatest.

Art is man's expression of his joy in labor.

Peace depends ultimately not on political arrangements but on the conscience of mankind.

You should not go to war for the privilege of withdrawal. You need to define your objective and the outcome, and it cannot be the removal of one man.

The superpowers often behave like two heavily armed blind men feeling their way around a room, each believing himself in mortal peril from the other, whom he assumes to have perfect vision.

The one thing man fears is the unknown. When presented with this scenario, individual rights will be willingly relinquished for the guarantee of their well-being granted to them by a World Government, a New World Order.

There is no realism without an element of idealism.

Any international system must have two key elements for it to work. One, it has to have a certain equilibrium of power that makes overthrowing the system difficult and costly. Secondly, it has to have a sense of legitimacy.

Donald Rumsfeld is the most ruthless man I have ever met? and I mean that as a compliment.

For my generation the relationship with Europe was the central point of American foreign policy. Even during my time in government there was disagreement, sometimes very strong disagreement. But they were all like arguments within a family. I am not sure if the generation which doesn't have these experiences has the same view of things.

We are here because cooperative relations with China are in the American national interest. Every president for 30 years has come to that conclusion, and a rejection of this agreement would be a vote for an adversarial relationship with the most populous nation of China.

Today, America would be outraged if U.N. troops entered Los Angeles to restore order. Tomorrow they will be grateful! This is especially true if they were told that there were an outside threat from beyond, whether real or promulgated, that threatened our very existence. It is then that all peoples of the world will plead to deliver them from this evil. The one thing every man fears is the unknown. When presented with this scenario, individual rights will be willingly relinquished for the guarantee of their well-being granted to them by the World Government

I believe -- and certainly from everything I've been told about him -- that he's an honorable enough man so that he will carry out his assignment with ability and with care.