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Power without legitimacy tempts tests of strength; legitimacy without power tempts empty posturing.

Henry Kissinger

The Art of War articulates a doctrine less of territorial conquest than of psychological dominance; it was the way the North Vietnamese fought America.
HENRY KISSINGER

Art Fight War
What distinguishes Sun Tzu from Western writers on strategy is the emphasis on the psychological and political elements over the purely military.
HENRY KISSINGER

Strategy Writing
Poor old Germany. Too big for Europe, too small for the world
HENRY KISSINGER

Big World
Empires have no interest in operating within an international system; they aspire to be the international system.
HENRY KISSINGER

Goal Nation Reality
Behind the slogans lay an intellectual vacuum.
HENRY KISSINGER

Intellectual Politics
History is the memory of States.
HENRY KISSINGER

History Memories
A country that demands moral perfection in its foreign policy will achieve neither perfection nor security
HENRY KISSINGER

Moral Perfection Policy Security
A country whose security depends on producing a genius in each generation sets itself a task no society has ever met.
HENRY KISSINGER

Genius Security
A Harvard study has shown that in fifteen cases in history where a rising and an established power interacted, ten ended in war.
HENRY KISSINGER

End Establishment History Power Rise War
The issues are too important to be left for the voters.
HENRY KISSINGER

Important Issue Vote
The Soviet Union would never be bound by agreements, Deng warned; it understood only the language of countervailing force.
HENRY KISSINGER

Force Language Understand
Don’t be too ambitious. Do the most important thing you can think of doing every year and then your career will take care of itself.
HENRY KISSINGER

Ambitious Care Career Important Thinking
America has no permanent friends or enemies, only interests
HENRY KISSINGER

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

Philosophy Power Science
Americans hold that every problem has a solution; Chinese think that each solution is an admission ticket to a new set of problems.
HENRY KISSINGER

Perspective Problem Thinking
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

Power without legitimacy tempts tests of strength; legitimacy without power tempts empty posturing.

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Power without legitimacy tempts tests of strength; legitimacy without power tempts empty posturing.

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