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

Henry Kissinger

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 state is a fragile organization, and the statesman does not have the moral right to risk its survival on ethical restraint.
HENRY KISSINGER

Moral Right Risk Survive
The mindset for walking lonely political paths may not be self-evident to those who seek confirmation by hundreds, sometimes thousands of friends on Facebook.
HENRY KISSINGER

Evidence Friendship Lonely Mindset Path Walk
It has the added advantage of being true.
HENRY KISSINGER

True
Order always requires a subtle balance of restraint, force, and legitimacy.
HENRY KISSINGER

Force Rule
Policy is the art of the possible, the science of the relative.
HENRY KISSINGER

Art Policy Possible Science
If chess is about the decisive battle, wei qi is about the protracted campaign. The chess player aims for total victory. The wei qi player seeks relative advantage.
HENRY KISSINGER

Decision Seek Victory
We live in a wondrous time, in which the strong is weak because of his scruples and the weak grows strong because of his audacity.
HENRY KISSINGER

Growth Live Strong Time Weakness
Postcolonial countries. All have sought to overcome the legacy of colonial.
HENRY KISSINGER

Oppression Rule
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
In his essay, ‘Perpetual Peace,’ the philosopher, Immanuel Kant, argued that perpetual peace would eventually come to the world in one of two ways, by human insight or by conflicts and catastrophes of a magnitude that left humanity no other choice. We are at such a juncture.
HENRY KISSINGER

Human Humanity Nature Peace Philosophy World
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
History is the memory of States.
HENRY KISSINGER

History Memories
For nations, history plays the role that character confers on human beings.
HENRY KISSINGER

Character History Human Nation Play
The reason that university politics is so vicious is because stakes are so small
HENRY KISSINGER

Politics Reason
Power without legitimacy tempts tests of strength; legitimacy without power tempts empty posturing.
HENRY KISSINGER

Empty Power Strength

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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