Hand in Hand With Kissinger: A Review of Hillary Clinton’s Review

Posted on Sep 11, 2014, By Sonali Kolhatkar

If Hillary Clinton’s latest book, “Hard Choices,” was not an obvious enough sign of her presidential aspirations, then her recent Washington Post review of Henry Kissinger’s new book, “World Order,” seems to have sealed the deal. In it, Clinton builds on her already hawkish tenure as secretary of state to prove she can bang the drums of war harder than President Obama and that she can embrace a diplomatic approach so iron-fisted as to put her in the same league as a man that Christopher Hitchens called “a war criminal.”

Clinton begins by asserting that Kissinger’s view of the world is in line with hers and Obama’s because it “largely fits with the broad strategy behind the Obama administration’s effort over the past six years to build a global architecture of security and cooperation for the 21st century.” She continues in this same vein later, proudly stating that “what comes through clearly in this new book is a conviction that we, and President Obama, share: a belief in the indispensability of continued American leadership in service of a just and liberal order.”

Kissinger was Richard Nixon’s national security adviser and secretary of state—a position he continued under President Gerald Ford. There have been books written (Hitchens, Gary J. Bass, Lubna Z. Qureshi), a film made by Academy Award-winning director Alex Gibney based on Hitchens’ book, and countless articles (such as this one), published on the subject of Kissinger’s criminality during his policymaking years. Yet Clinton calls him a “friend” whose counsel she “relied” upon while she served as secretary of state under Obama from 2009 to 2013. She makes no mention of how her opinion of him has obviously evolved from the critical views she held in her youth.

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It appears as though Clinton worries about appearing “soft” on foreign policy. She explains how, as secretary of state, she “us[ed] all the tools of foreign policy, even those sometimes dismissed as ‘soft.’ ” Her review sends a clear message that she can be just as tough as Kissinger, and tougher than Obama.

There are other hints. In Atlantic national correspondent Jeffrey Goldberg’s analysis last month of Clinton’s foreign policy, based on an interview with Clinton, he writes that “she finds [Obama’s] approach to foreign policy overly cautious, and she made the case that America needs a leader who believes that the country, despite its various missteps, is an indispensable force for good.” And of course, Clinton wants to be that leader.

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http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/hand_in_hand_with_kissinger_a_review_of_hillary_clintons_review_20140911