319 Quotes by Henry A. Kissinger

Kay ennobled all of her human relationships, ... In the pain of this moment, none of us would trade places with those whose lives were never touched by Kay Graham.

I would say the special experience of American wartime policy in the last 40 years, from Vietnam on, is that the war itself became controversial in the country and that the most important thing we need in the current situation is, whatever disagreements there may be on tactics, that the legitimacy of the war itself does not become a subject of controversy. We have to start with the assumption, obviously, that whatever administration is conducting a war wants to end it.

I would have said, before the World Trade Center events, that he would try to get a normal relationship with China - making clear to China what the limits are of what America can accept, but also showing understanding for some of Chinese necessities. I thought he was moving towards the position that I have more or less advocated.

I think the only way to go is to do what they think is the right thing and explain it as well as they can to the American people, as the president is attempting to do with these speeches. The public will not forgive you for losing even if it seems to reflect what they thought they wanted.

Create the impression of endless willingness to compromise and you almost invite deadlines. That's the challenge we now have in North Korea and have had in North Korea for 10 years. In this sense, diplomacy and foreign policy and other elements of political activity have to be closely linked and have to be understood by the negotiators

It is always easy to divide the world into idealists and power-oriented people. The idealists are presumed to be the noble people, and the power-oriented people are the ones that cause all the world's trouble.

It is not unreasonable for us to desire some options. Some Europeans, I know, believe it is necessary that we guarantee our own destruction to give them the assurances they claim they need. However, to deprive ourselves of options is to paralyze us. ... What do we mean by control of escalation?

Many of the scientists have believed that their contribution to ending the nuclear race is not to let any new weapons to be developed.

Of course, in principle, they're against it. We are the ones that keep asking them what they think about it. I think their basic concern is a land-based missile defense of Taiwan hooked into the American communications and other systems, which in effect would make Taiwan then an outpost of the United States. That is a concern they frequently express. A missile defense shield of the United States, while they may not like it, it is not a big obstacle to our relationship.