Back in the day, the media pretty much loathed Henry Kissinger as a tool of the even-more-loathed Nixon administration. Funny how they rehabilitate him as an expert when they like – or can twist – what he is saying these days.
TOKYO: Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who helped engineer the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam, said Sunday the problems in Iraq are more complex than that conflict, and military victory is no longer possible.
He also said he sympathizes with the troubles facing U.S. President George W. Bush.
"A 'military victory' in the sense of total control over the whole territory, imposed on the entire population, is not possible," Kissinger told The Associated Press in Tokyo, where he received an honorary degree from Waseda University.
The faceless, ubiquitous nature of Iraq's insurgency, as well as the religious divide between Shiite and Sunni rivals, makes negotiating peace more complex, he said.
"It is a more complicated problem," Kissinger said. "The Vietnam War involved states, and you could negotiate with leaders who controlled a defined area."
I really don't think anyone really thought that a pure military solution was ever possible, short of completely annihilating the opposition and anyone else who got in the way. That is not – and has never been – the way America operates. (Unlike a lot of other nations – some of whom the left appears to admire). The solution has always been a lot more complicated than a strictly military one. And that is exactly what Kissinger said – the AP headline is seriously misleading. What he actually says if you read the quotes is that it is a lot more than force that needs to be applied. This is a surprise? This is a shocking "exclusive" revelation?
(As an aside, I never much cared for Kissinger, his style or his way of doing business in the world. Which, of course, means nothing, but I thought I'd mention it.)
The key here is “imposed on the entire population”. We’ve never tried to do that…that would have been the goal of those who wanted to send another 150,000 troops there. It has always been the strategy to have the Iraqis rule themselves. How we get there has been the problem.
Considering that Mr. Special K is one of the ‘Realists’ who have not bothered to even begin and address such things when he had the opportunity to do so, I find it very nice that he now complains that others didn’t bother to think about such things… when *he* couldn’t be bothered when walking the halls of power.
Apparently the Big Special K is still a bit on the clueless side about post-war policy and what it takes to help a people stand up for themselves. But that is what you get when economic stability is put in front of freedom and liberty.