On November 30, local time in the United States, former U.S. diplomat Henry Kissinger died of old age at the age of 100. For most Chinese people, if it weren't for his visit to China in July this year, Kissinger would have been a distant historical memory in textbooks, when Kissinger's visit to China triggered a historical discussion about his impact on Sino-US relations.
Objectively speaking, Kissinger has been far away from the front-line political game of the United States for a long time, and he has only assumed the role of a conduit and a window to more accurately convey the thoughts and opinions of the leaders of China and the United States. This is not to deny Kissinger's importance, and his ability to assume this communication function shows that there are very few people who can enjoy the trust of high-level people in China and the United States today.
Compared to the common issues in today's **,This article focuses more on the second half of Kissinger's life and the long-term turn in the U.S. policymaking community, which is the only way to understand Kissinger's full picture.
Academics or politicians
Political practice has always been a thorny issue in political philosophy. No matter how much the scholar argues, it is always akin to learning to swim on the shore without participating in the actual political operation. This is also one of the original triggers for the emergence of Plato's philosopher-king thoughtSince then, countless philosophers have tried to merge the two paths together to achieve the unity of theory and practice.
However, due to the issue of identity, most philosophers are more likely to act as staff members or chief thinkers. For example, Locke, who is considered the "father of liberalism", was the brains and confidant of the Whig leaders at that time, and even participated in the conspiracy to overthrow the rule of the Stuart dynasty. Edmund Burke, the founder of conservatism and a member of the House of Commons, clearly went further, but he only briefly held ministerial positions during his lifetime, and did not become the true core of political functioning.
The academic institutional changes of the 19th century took a different path. Most political researchers have been transformed into university professors in the modern sense. They are mainly responsible for the study of politics, but most are not directly involved in politics, and Kant is the typical representative of this path.
The turn of the 19th century led to the growing popularity of the concept of political science, or the concept of political neutralityPolitics is treated as an object that can be completely objectified for study and classification. Born in the 20th century, Kissinger was born within this framework. His Ph.D. studied the Congress of Vienna and the foreign politics of the post-Napoleonic period. In this Ph.D.**, we can already get a glimpse of some of Kissinger's basic concernsThat is, to despise chaos, to recognize the compromise and balance between the great powers, and to ignore the periphery.
Kissinger taught at Harvard University for more than a decade from 1954 to 1969. Although he has published many works and received widespread attention from the outside world, he is rarely discussed within the academic community. This is not due to pure academic biasKissinger's work is very much realistic, but the changes in reality also make his work prone to obsolescence. While his work is widely read, it also lacks sufficient depth. As Walt, a professor at Harvard University and a master of contemporary realism, put it, "Judging purely from the point of view of a scholar, Kissinger is not a member of the pantheon." ”
Kissinger exhibits a certain Burke-esque temperament. Later, he became more and more inclined to study specific policy issues rather than macro academic issues. It was his in-depth study of Vietnamese policy issues, coupled with his association with the Council on Foreign Relations, that led him to join Nixon in 1968. During his tenure as an advisor, Kissinger built a strong influence over Nixon. This influence has led him to serve as both adviser and secretary of state (roughly equal to Blinken and Sullivan in one), achieving a seamless connection between the White House and the White House.
Kissinger's cunning and flexibility helped him navigate a series of important political events. He could choose to reconcile with China in order to change the geopolitical balance of the Cold WarIt is also possible to bomb Cambodia and Laos with impunity in order to cut off North Vietnam's supply lines. In China, because of Kissinger's role in establishing diplomatic relations between China and the United States, he is considered an old friend of the Chinese people and is given a relatively positive evaluation. Internationally, Kissinger's historical assessment is a bit more complicated. Especially in the eyes of the progressive wing of today's Democratic Party, Kissinger is a ruthless executioner with no morals, and the corpse of his policies is taller than the Himalayas.
How to evaluate Kissinger's policies in the seventies of the last century is a complex issue. Returning to the question of scholars and politicians, Kissinger, who has held the ** position for a long time, has obviously completed the complete transformation from a scholar to a politician, and Harvard University has also canceled Kissinger's chair because his public service leave has expired. But Kissinger himself apparently didn't care about thatAfter quitting, he started a policy consulting firm that bears his name, and it is another legacy that Kissinger eventually left to the United StatesWe'll get to that later.
The failure of the grand strategy
There is no doubt that the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States is considered the most important part of Kissinger's diplomatic legacy. The establishment of diplomatic relations was based on a game that is familiar today, in which the United States needed to change the geopolitical balance by uniting with China in order to accumulate a competitive advantage with the Soviet Union. This kind of thinking is also summarized as the so-calledThe idea of "grand strategy".
The establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States and the collapse of the Soviet Union were seen as the result of grand strategic thinking. In this kind of thinking, most countries are on the margins and do not have much leverage to play. Just like the Vietnam War, in the view of grand strategic thought, the Vietnam War was more of a geopolitical game between the United States and China and the Soviet UnionThe lives of three million Vietnamese are only a collateral result of this game.
With the victory of the Cold War, this kind of macro strategic thinking was regarded as one of the reasons for the victory, and Kissinger was therefore regarded as an important player in grand strategic thinking. The realization of this strategy after the Cold War has not been as good as expected, and the Middle East issue and Sino-US relations are the two main axes.
George W. Bush has established a neoconservative-based strategy since taking office. The Iraq war in 2003 was the focus of this grand strategy. George W. Bush hopes to reshape the geopolitical rules of the Middle East through the Iraq War, extend the American-style democratic system to Middle Eastern countries that still have a majority of military and monarchical monarchies, and finally realize effective US control over the Middle East region.
This grand strategy was seen by the vast majority of people at the time as a powerful policy in line with American power, and even Kissinger himself supported the 2003 Iraq war. As a result, the United States was bogged down in a costly war and had to announce the withdrawal of its troops. The geopolitical situation of the United States in the Middle East has not improved, but has led to the growing of Iran in the Middle East and the strengthening of its influence in Iraq and Syria.
The U.S.-China relationship is an even more critical reason why grand strategic thinking is increasingly bankrupt in the United States. The establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States is based on the basic game framework of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, and after the end of the Cold War, the strategic value of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States needs to be re-anchored. This eventually translates into what is known as a strategy of peaceful evolution.
This strategy believes that with the continuous deepening of Sino-US economic and trade relations and the improvement of China's economic strength, a huge middle class will be cultivated. After gaining economic rights, this class will naturally seek further political rights, which will eventually lead to the transformation of our country into a Western-style democracy under internal influence. This line of thinking became a common understanding in US political circles during the Clinton years, and eventually translated into a long-term US policy toward China.
The problem is that with the continuous rise of our country, the situation envisaged by the United States has not appeared, but China has become an increasingly non-negligible challenger to the United States in the industrial chain and geopolitics. Kissinger, who has long stood on the cusp of Sino-US friendship theory, has also become a typical example of being criticized. According to Kissinger's own grand strategic theory, the United States needs to avoid the emergence of an equal competitor, but Kissinger's post-Cold War policy of engagement has led to China's accelerated emergence into a more powerful competitor. In other words, the idea of grand strategy itself is a product of self-contradiction.
More crucially, the U.S. policy community has begun to collectively reflect on the feasibility of the idea of grand strategy itself. Fundamentally, grand strategic thinking is to formulate policies in units of 20 or even 30 years. The problem is that humans obviously don't have such a powerful ** ability. Just as no one expected Evergrande to rise so brilliantly and decline so quickly twenty years ago, the shining point of today's grand strategy is likely to be the reason for the bankruptcy of tomorrow's strategy. In Drezner's words, "Today's great strategists often become tomorrow's cautionary tales."
Or, furthermore, any long-term policy of twenty or thirty years is beyond the scope of human rational activity, and the half-life of policymaking can only be calculated in years. In other words, if the United States had not indulged in grand strategic thinking, it would not have fallen into more than 20 years of stagnation in its relations with China after the Cold War.
Whether the U.S. policy community's reflection on grand strategy is justified is a question that needs further academic discussion, but it is clear that Kissinger's diplomatic legacy, as the mainstream is believed to be, is now in shaky straits. This is not only a change in Sino-US relations, but also a change in US policy thinking, whether subjective or objective, the United States, which is now polarized by the struggle between the two parties, can no longer carry out any real long-term strategy. In contrast, the other legacy mentioned above may leave a more lasting mark.
Kissinger's alternative legacy
Today's mainstream discussion of Kissinger focuses on the first half of his life. However, the first half of his growth lasted for fifty years, which is enough to cover the merits and demerits of the lives of quite a few people. As mentioned above, he was born in Germany and immigrated to the United States because of the rise to power of the Nazi Party;He became a professor at Harvard by studying international relations, and then entered the White House, becoming Nixon's adviser, and eventually became secretary of state. During this period, he led a series of important political practices, and showed flexibility and brutality in the typical style of realism. The establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States was the most important event, which ultimately changed the balance of the geopolitical game of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union.
The work he did in the second half of his life and the "legacy" it brought to the United States are less discussed than the first half of his life.
Compared to his predecessor Marshall, Secretary of State, Kissinger after quitting the ** founding consulting firmCommitted to transforming their best service experience into lucrative projects after exiting. Marshall's ethics required him to refuse to use his political influence in retirement for rich pay, arguing that there were a number of potential conflicts of interest. Kissinger, on the other hand, keenly noticed that this was the only way to maintain his fame and fortune after withdrawing from the first line, and further promoted the expansion of the revolving door of politics and business. Now, all the seniors are aware that they have a closer bridge between their power and moneyPolicy consulting firms have become an inevitable part of the political game in Washington, D.C.
Looking at the composition of the current Biden** is a very interesting example. Westexec is a policy consulting firm that was only founded in 2017, but it has already made a splash in just a few years. The current US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, is the co-founder of Westexec, a Washington, D.C.-based policy consulting firm that announced his exit in 2020. Julian Smith, a senior adviser to Westexec, became the top US representative to NATO. The remainder became the director of national cyber, a former White House press secretary, and an assistant secretary of defense. Westexec's Executive Assistants are also assigned to positions such as Scheduling Supervisor and the Executive Office of the International Development Agency. To hedge against the bipartisan shift, Westexec has also recruited many former Trump** members, such as the former director of international intelligence and the deputy director of the CIA.
Giving these facts is not to blame Kissinger himselfThis is the result of the way the United States itself operates politically, and Kissinger just pushed it with his handGrab your own interests and influence from it. These micro-level changes are part of Kissinger's legacy, which is why he is still seen as a conduit between China and the United States at the age of 100. Consulting firms are not limited to the best and largest companies in the country;They also provide advisory services to foreign countries, including our own. Decades of long and continuous consulting services have maintained the long-standing trust of Kissinger in both countries**. As for consulting companies and the revolving door of politics and business, we will publish another article to discuss it later.
The progressive faction of the Democratic Party and the Rednecks of the Republican Party are many different, but find common ground in Kissinger's consulting firm. They all believe that this is an erosion of American democracy and a detriment to American national interests. Kissinger's approach actually further legitimizes power-for-money trading, amplifying the influence of large corporations and foreign countries on the United States.
Objectively speaking, this concern has its validity. However, this is not the focus of this article, which is related to the controversy over whether or not equality is considered a fundamental political idea. What this article is trying to emphasize is that Kissinger's legacy of consulting is likely to be more enduring than his diplomatic legacy. Even if Trump shouts deep state, it may be difficult to reverse the bipartisan community that has established solid interests. In classical times, the aristocracy's own estates were a natural way to limit this exchange;But in an age of mass politics, it seems difficult to demand that everyone have the virtues of Marshall.