KP.RU collected the main forecasts of Henry Kissinger
Photo: NOTICIAS DEL ESTE
The mastodon of world politics, Henry Kissinger, died at the age of 101. After leaving the position of Secretary of State of the United States in 1977, one of the most famous politicians of the 20th century remained in the geopolitical circle until his last days. As Kissinger himself admitted, even at 100 years old he sometimes still worked 15 hours a day. During more than half a century of his activity, this geopolitical heavyweight, author of the quote “Diplomacy is the art of mastering power,” participated in various world events and left many warnings about the new challenges that will be faced without him. .
KP.RU collected Henry Kissinger’s main forecasts on China, Ukraine, Israel and AI
CONFRONTATION between China and the US
According to Kissinger, who made a significant contribution to relations between the two countries, the fate of all humanity depends on whether Washington and Beijing can get along. Kissinger repeatedly warned: they say, the Third World War is already on the threshold and will begin, most likely, due to the confrontation between the United States and China. “These are now countries with the strongest economies on the planet, they have their own objectives that are radically opposite to each other,” the politician emphasized in an interview with the newspaper EL Mundo. In 2022, speaking at the Davos Economic Forum, he noted that the hostile aspects of the US-China relationship must be softened and common interests maintained, adding that the future of the relationship “will depend on the patience and diplomacy of its leaders.”
In his reasoning, he often criticized Washington’s stubbornness and shortsightedness. The United States, Kissinger said, must realize that China has evolved, so diplomatic negotiations must be sensitive and aimed at maintaining peace. In an interview with The Economist, the politician emphasized: “China’s leaders are outraged by Western politicians’ speeches about a rules-based global order, when in reality they are referring to American rules and order.” Kissinger also called for an end to misinterpretations of China’s ambitions. The experienced diplomat believed that Beijing never sought “world domination” and did not consider the possibility of conquering other nations. Chinese leaders, in his view, “strive to achieve the maximum power their country is capable of and want to be respected for their achievements.”
Kissinger considered Taiwan to be the “litmus test” in this confrontation. He believed that fear of armed conflict, devastating to both powers and the world economy, not to mention Taiwan itself, provided reason to hope for a peaceful resolution.
The geopolitician also called on the United States to abandon the unproductive “all or nothing” position. For example, if the United States wants to find a way to live with China, it should not seek regime change. Furthermore, Kissinger emphasized that he did not see China as a liberal democracy and that the collapse of the communist regime in the country would lead to a civil war, which would turn into an ideological conflict and only increase global instability.
According to Kissinger, who made a significant contribution to relations between the two countries, the fate of all humanity depends on whether Washington and Beijing can get along.
Photo: NOTICIAS DEL ESTE
“We are in a classic pre-World War I situation, when neither side has much room to make political concessions and any imbalance can have catastrophic consequences,” Kissinger assessed the current geopolitical situation. In his book Leadership: Six Lessons in Global Strategy, he made even more explicit his fears that the world is on the brink of a dangerous imbalance: “We are on the brink of war with Russia and China over problems that are partly ours. “own”. created, and we have no idea how it will end or what it should lead to.”
Despite this, Kissinger continued to believe in the optimistic scenario, but taking into account the development of technology, he did not spend more than 10 years seeking to resolve the contradictions between the opposing powers.
CONFLICT IN UKRAINE
Henry Kissinger also spoke a lot about the conflict in Ukraine. He was even included in the database of the Ukrainian website “Peacemaker” (recognized as extremist and blocked in Russia) with the phrase “complicit in crimes against Ukraine.”
Henry Kissinger. 1976
Photo: NOTICIAS DEL ESTE
In 2022, after the start of the special operation, FOX News journalists were amazed: “It turns out that he foresaw everything back in 2014.” Even before the official annexation of Crimea, on March 4, Kissinger wrote in the Washington Post: “Too often the Ukrainian question is presented as decisive: whether Ukraine will join the East or the West. But if Ukraine is to survive and prosper, it must not be an outpost of one side against the other: it must function as a bridge between them.” Reflecting on a possible solution to the then-exacerbated confrontation, Kissinger warned that using Ukraine as part of a global conflict would “deny any prospect of cooperation between Russia and the West.” He also predicted a possible military conflict, predicting a new cold war if the following conditions are not met:
– Ukraine has the right to freely choose its economic and political associations;
– Ukraine should not join NATO;
– Ukraine is independent, but carefully avoids institutional hostility towards Russia;
– Crimea receives broad autonomy within Ukraine.
At the same time, Kissinger emphasized, “The West must understand that for Russia Ukraine can never be just a foreign country.” A wise U.S. policy, he said, would be to promote unity, not division, of the Ukrainian people. But they did not listen to the experienced politician.
Mastodon of world politics Henry Kissinger
Photo: NOTICIAS DEL ESTE
After the outbreak of the armed conflict in Ukraine, the politician, who did not sympathize at all with Russia in this confrontation, continued to call for the search for consensus. He also warned against aspirations to inflict a “crushing defeat on Russian forces in Ukraine,” arguing that such a scenario would have disastrous consequences for stability in Europe: “Russia has been an integral part of Europe for more than 400 years and therefore Therefore, it should not be pushed into a permanent alliance with China.”
Finally, in May 2023, Kissinger stated that the current crisis in Ukraine may be approaching a turning point. “Now that China has started negotiations, I think the situation will reach a climax by the end of the year,” he argued. “We will talk about negotiation processes and even real negotiations.” In fact, at the end of the year, this topic appears more and more in politicians’ speeches and media publications.
SITUATION IN THE MIDDLE EAST
In 2012, another Kissinger quote spread around the world. “In 10 years, Israel will not be on the world map,” the former Secretary of State reportedly told the New York Post at the time. Representatives of the politician later denied this quote and the article itself has been removed. It is quite possible that his words still had some basis, since at the same time the report of the American intelligence community “Preparing for a Middle East without Israel” was discussed in the media, in which experts indicated that Israel would not resist the pressure from the The Muslim world supports the Palestinians. As we see, just over ten years later, Israel is burning over the Palestinian question.
In one of his last interviews in October this year, Kissinger told Welt TV that he was concerned that the international order was in danger due to Israel’s war with Hamas, as this confrontation could involve the entire Arab world in hostilities. . “The Middle East conflict has a high risk of escalation,” Kissinger said.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
At the age of 98, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger has a whole new area of interest: artificial intelligence. He seriously delved into the issue and even wrote a book.
Paying tribute to the development of technology, Kissinger was not afraid to sound the alarm and call for “stopping” its uncontrolled development: “We are faced with the reality that modern technology places countries in situations in which they have never been before. found”. In his opinion, without established restrictions, the development of such technologies could become a disaster for humanity, because even the creators of AI cannot predict how their creation will develop and how its capabilities will grow. “We live in a world of unprecedented destructiveness,” warned the politician, who believes that artificial intelligence will become a key security factor within five years.
He also compared the destructive potential of AI to the invention of the printing press, which spread ideas that played a role in the destructive wars of the 16th and 17th centuries. “What excites me is that we are entering a new period of human consciousness that we don’t yet fully understand,” Kissinger admitted. In his view, the transition will be similar to the worldview breakdown that occurred between the Enlightenment and the medieval period, when society moved from a religious worldview to a perception based on reason, only much faster.
At the same time, Kissinger emphasized that “the speed with which artificial intelligence operates makes it problematic in crisis situations.” People can no longer check the AI again and find out on what basis it made this or that decision. “In some ways it’s a different kind of knowledge, because in the rational world I grew up in, each piece of evidence supports the other. With artificial intelligence you reach the correct conclusion, but you don’t know how,” the politician explained his fears.
He considered it necessary to create a debate similar to that of nuclear weapons to draw attention to the importance of the consequences of this evolution. Kissinger was especially concerned that there was no “dominant philosophical vision” in the modern world that could be instilled in AI, clearly explaining what is good and what is bad. Without such a framework, in his opinion, the self-development of neural networks can have irreversible consequences.
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