Losing too many strong politcal figures lately.
8 Likes
Happy Birthday Henry!!! A great man!!
Except for Chile.
4 Likes
May he get what he deserves in the afterlife.
6 Likes
And Cambodia.
4 Likes
And Bangladesh.
3 Likes
Yes. All the war crimes …
2 Likes
A friend and I have been having an interesting discussion about how our kids have so much knowledge and a much more negative view than we have of him. I mean I wasn’t even a teen when he was at his height of influence so too young to be aware and too recent for my history classes.
Hmm. I remember knowing in high school (at the very latest) that this guy had a lot to answer for. And that was in the '80s. Everyone I know in my age cohort who has anything to say about his death is saying “good riddance.”
2 Likes
I graduated at 17 in 1980 so those intervening years probably made the difference.
2 Likes
I had that same conversation with my husband this morning. Saw some “good riddance” posts on Facebook. I need to do some reading.
“Only the good die young” seems apt in this case.
3 Likes
Possibly because so many of his misdeeds were kept classified and hidden for so long, his contemporaries or near-contemporaries never heard of stuff like the mass murder of civilians in Cambodia while it was happening.
Very likely reporting back then was full of praise for him, while later generations got a more complete story.
2 Likes
Lots of negatives in this thread, so here are some positives (in one case, a positive aspect of a negative event):
- Helped open relations with China
- Came up with “detente” in dealing with the Soviets, which helped to keep our fingers away from the big red button. Eventually, Capitalism/the West won, as the Soviets ran out of money.
- Helped to end the Yom Kippur war
- Gave the green light to stop a Marxist takeover in Argentina (we were still Team America: World Champions of Capitalism, and still battling the Soviets, for context)
3 Likes
Yes, he did some very good things diplomatically. However, that doesn’t cancel out the things he did that were not good (in fact, they were very bad). We should reflect on history honestly, because not doing so leads to repeating mistakes.
5 Likes
Of course. I figured i’d mention some of the more positive things to which he contributed. (Chile, of course, was controversial because, though a Marxist, the leader apparently had been elected)
I don’t get “Marxist, but…” There is no “but” about it. He WAS elected, and he cared far more for the people of Chile than the monster, Pinochet, we replaced him with.
3 Likes
At that time there was great pressure to stop the spread of Marxism/Communism, and in his position, Kissinger probably couldn’t just ignore it.
Well, assassinating a democratically elected president and installing a military dictator is never a good look.
7 Likes
I actually looked it up today, and apparently Allende took his own life… though the (Wiki) article mentioned that there remains some dispute surrounding the circumstances of his death.