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Intellectuals analyze the operations of international systems; statesmen build them.

Henry Kissinger

For the balance of power is never static; its components are in constant flux.
HENRY KISSINGER

Philosophy Power Science
It is one of history’s ironies that Communism, advertised as a classless society, tended to breed a privileged class of feudal proportions.
HENRY KISSINGER

Class History Oneself
If history teaches anything it is that there can be no peace without equilibrium and no justice without restraint.
HENRY KISSINGER

History Justice Peace Teaching
The goal of the tribute system was to foster deference, not to extract economic benefit or to dominate foreign societies militarily.
HENRY KISSINGER

Goal Oppression
The task of the leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been.
HENRY KISSINGER

Himself Leadership Nation People
For Roosevelt, if a nation was unable or unwilling to act to defend its own interests, it could not expect others to respect them. Inevitably,
HENRY KISSINGER

Expectation Nation Respect
It’s a pity both sides can’t lose (commenting on Iran-Iraq war, 1980 – 1988)
HENRY KISSINGER

Lose War
If Chinese exceptionalism represented the claims of a universal empire, Japanese exceptionalism sprang from the insecurities of an island nation borrowing heavily from its neighbor, but fearful of being dominated by it.
HENRY KISSINGER

Fear Insecurity Nation Represent
History is the memory of States.
HENRY KISSINGER

History Memories
in international affairs a reputation for reliability is a more important asset than demonstrations of tactical cleverness.
HENRY KISSINGER

Choice Important Reputation Worth
The nice thing about being a celebrity is that if you bore people they think it’s their fault.
HENRY KISSINGER

Funny Mistake People Thinking Yourself
Intellectuals analyze the operations of international systems; statesmen build them.
HENRY KISSINGER

Intellectual Politics
Covert action should not be confused with missionary work.
HENRY KISSINGER

Action Difference
Woe to the statesman whose arguments for entering a war are not as convincing at its end as they were at the beginning, Bismarck had cautioned.
HENRY KISSINGER

Argument Beginning End War
Since Peter the Great, Russia had been expanding at the rate of one Belgium per year.
HENRY KISSINGER

Greatness Growth War
The absence of alternatives clears the mind marvelously.
HENRY KISSINGER

Absence Mindset

Intellectuals analyze the operations of international systems; statesmen build them.

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Intellectuals analyze the operations of international systems; statesmen build them.

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