Sinomania!

How many times and in how many ways can Harvard buddies Henry Kissinger and Samuel Huntington recycle their tired and incredibly dated weltanschung? The Wahington Post dutifully gave Kissinger column space for an op-ed yesterday that, thankfully, is getting little attention – you can’t find it even at the WaPo website. In his banal opinion Kissinger desperately tries to breathe life into the Atlantic Alliance saying, yet again, that “we” face a clash of civilizations only this time clearly defining the struggle of our times (as W might say) as between “us” and Islam. Kissinger’s urgent purpose is to be ready now before we face a nuclear showdown in the middle east. But why the urgency? Israel is armed to the teeth (given it’s itty-bitty size relative to its neighbors) with nukes and Islam already has the bomb in Pakistan. Does Kissinger want (expect?) European support for a preemptive strike on Iran?

Most pointedly, Kissinger says that the great war of civilisations cannot be stopped by "ad hoc bargaining over Security Council resolutions; rather, the Security Council resolutions should emerge from an agreed strategy." Hmmm. What's preventing a unified strategy now? Ahhh, possible veto from permanent members Russia and China? Of course, if it's "civilizations" we're talking here than it is plain to see that the odd man out is China, since Russia, despite all its failings, can pass for "Western."

[Below, our Iraq puppet and the President of Iran, the day after 9-11. Clash of civilizations indeed.]


Kissinger thinks there is a dangerous “erosion of nation states” currently. What a bunch of hooey – the USA, Britain, Japan, Iran, Israel, China, all of these countries are fiercely nationalistic at the moment. Where is the evidence for this clash of civilizations? Global financial capitalism and the unstoppable spread of American consumerism is the reality today. Convergence is happening under our noses, not the opposite. As the premier China policy cryptgatekeeper Kissinger is more responsible than anyone for creating and fostering confrontation with the Chinese not cooperation. When Cold War warriors like Kissinger finally expire we just might make some progress.