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Let me make my point about Vietnam. When the Nixon initiation came into office, there were 550,000 Americans in combat. And ending the war was not a question of turning off a television channel. And so, debating on how we got there and what judgments were made was not going to help us.

Henry A. Kissinger

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More quotes by Henry A. Kissinger

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People are generally amazed that I would take an interest in any form that would require me to stop talking for three hours.
Henry A. Kissinger
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History is not, of course, a cookbook offering pretested recipes. It teaches by analogy, not by maxims. It can illuminate the consequences of actions in comparable situations, yet each generation must discover for itself what situations are in fact comparable.
Henry A. Kissinger
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The real distinction is between those who adapt their purposes to reality and those who seek to mold reality in the light of their purposes.
Henry A. Kissinger
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I believe in freedom of expression, and I believe that societies thrive when they permit freedom of expression.
Henry A. Kissinger
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Before there was the Soviet Union that could inflame matters. Now you have states not as powerful as the Soviet Union, but states like Iraq, like Iran, and to some extent Syria, having made it possible for some of these groups to operate. So it is a very difficult situation.
Henry A. Kissinger
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In the hands of a determined Secretary, the Foreign Service can be a splendid instrument, staffed by knowledgeable, discreet, and energetic individuals. They do require constant vigilance lest the convictions that led them into a penurious career tempt them to preempt decision-making.
Henry A. Kissinger
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For the Soul of France is masterful history, brilliantly researched, and hard to put down.
Henry A. Kissinger
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A little uncertainty is good for everyone.
Henry A. Kissinger
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Let us fashion together a new world order.
Henry A. Kissinger
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Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.
Henry A. Kissinger
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We have to be careful in negotiating with Iran that we don't create the impression among the Arab states and the Sunni states that we are working on a condominium between Iran and the United States, because that will panic them and drive them into making their own arrangement.
Henry A. Kissinger
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Historically when there is a rising power like China, it has usually led to confrontations between the rising power and the existing dominant powers. And when you have a shift of the center of gravity of world affairs from the Atlantic to the Pacific, then you have an additional element.
Henry A. Kissinger
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In the 1960s, I would have considered China with its CPC an ideologically more dynamic country than the Soviet Union. But the Soviet Union was strategically more threatening.
Henry A. Kissinger
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The greatest need of the contemporary international system is an agreed concept of order.
Henry A. Kissinger
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This is awful. Do it again.
Henry A. Kissinger
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I also do not believe that the United States can let itself be driven into a political role by escalating terrorism, and therefore, the leaders of the Arab world and Arafat should do their utmost to put an end to this and then the United States should do its utmost to produce a political solution.
Henry A. Kissinger
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The convictions that leaders have formed before reaching high office are the intellectual capital they will consume as long as they continue in office.
Henry A. Kissinger
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What we in America call terrorists are really groups of people that reject the international system
Henry A. Kissinger
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Almost every peace process that has gone on between the Arab side and Israel, the United States has been somewhat isolated because most of the countries in the world, what they really want is to accept the Arab peace plan or so-called peace plan, which in its present form would lead to the destruction of Israel.
Henry A. Kissinger
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The history of things that didn't happen has never been written.
Henry A. Kissinger