What's Wrong with Henry Kissinger's Foreign Policy

1975 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-100 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard A. Falk
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Third World ◽  
World Order ◽  
World Politics ◽  
State System ◽  
Single Individual ◽  
Henry Kissinger ◽  
The Third ◽  
Political Independence ◽  
The Third World

A Hero of Our Time, gentlemen, is indeed a portrait, but not of a single individual; it is a portrait composed of all the vices of our generation in the fullness of their development. Mihail Lermontov, ‘The Author's Introduction’, A Hero of Our Time (1958). This article analyzes the reasons why Henry Kissinger has exercised such an extraordinary influence upon all sectors of world politics. It argues that Mr. Kissinger's role has not been beneficial because it has reflected his indifference to issues of morality and justice and his insensitivity to the obsolescence of the state system. To overcome Kissingerism is absolutely necessary for the achievement of political independence in the Third World and the sort of global reform which will be needed for the construction of a just and peaceful world order capable of meeting present challenges.

Angola: The Present Opportunity

1988 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-18
Author(s):  
John A. Marcum
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Third World ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
Henry Kissinger ◽  
The Third ◽  
Secretary Of State ◽  
Gulf Of Tonkin ◽  
The Third World ◽  
Present Opportunity

As remote and improbable a venue for a crisis in American foreign policy as Quemoy or the Gulf of Tonkin, Angola (1975) came to assume a Munich-like symbolism in the calculations of Americans who perceived a threat of Soviet expansionism into the third world during the latter years of the Brezhnev era. Smarting from a political/military shutout in Angola that came on the heels of a humiliating American exodus from Saigon, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger pointed to Angola as the “principal” cause of a deterioration in U.S.-Soviet relations. Subsequent policy confrontations over Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Nicaragua and Cambodia reinforced this perception of Angola as the beginning of the end of detente.

Political Change in Latin America: A Foreign Policy Dilemma for the United States

1986 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Viron P. Vaky
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Third World ◽  
Political Change ◽  
The United States ◽  
World Politics ◽  
The Third ◽  
General Relevance ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Third World ◽  
First Time

In 1968 Henry Kissinger wrote: “A mature conception of our interests in the world … would deal with two fundamental questions: What is it in our interest to prevent? What should we seek to accomplish?” (Kissinger, 1974: 92) Whatever its general relevance, that passage is an apt description of the lens through which American policymakers have contemplated the phenomenon of political change in the Third World. Those are the first questions they tend to ask.The rationale for this particular concept of foreign policy tasks has its roots (1) in the complexities of an increasingly interdependent world in which world politics have become truly global for the first time in human history, and (2) in the deep antagonisms embedded in the US/Soviet relationship. Because nuclear realities .have placed a cap on the way in which the two superpowers confront and contend with one another, conflict between them tends to get pushed to the periphery and to take place in indirect ways.

4. American foreign policy during the Cold War

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Saull
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Third World ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Korean War ◽  
Historical Developments ◽  
The Third World ◽  
The Cold War

This chapter offers a theoretically informed overview of American foreign policy during the Cold War. It covers the main historical developments in U.S. policy: from the breakdown of the wartime alliance with the USSR and the emergence of the US–Soviet diplomatic hostility and geopolitical confrontation,to U.S. military interventions in the third world and the U.S. role in the ending of the Cold War. The chapter begins with a discussion of three main theoretical approaches to American foreign policy during the Cold War: realism, ideational approaches, and socio-economic approaches. It then considers the origins of the Cold War and containment of the Soviet Union, focusing on the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan. It also examines the militarization of U.S. foreign policy with reference to the Korean War, Cold War in the third world, and the role of American foreign policy in the ending of the Cold War.

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