The official narrative on Kissinger’s death tells you something about the celebration and normalization of US Imperialism

So, Henry Kissinger is finally dead. This is the kind of sentiment that is being expressed, both in the virtual world and amongst many who live in the Global South, where Kissinger was seen as one of the primary architects of US Imperialism since the Nixon Administration.

The notion that Kissinger was an integral part of US Imperialism is nowhere to be found within the narrative in commercial news media since he died on November 29th. I did a quick look at the local daily news sources in Grand Rapids and most of them were just re-printing an Associated Press (AP) obituary for the former Secretary of State and National Security Advisor, like the one that MLive re-posted.

I even looked at the Gerald R Ford Museum website to see if they had a tribute to Kissinger, especially since he played such a significant role during the Vice Presidency and Presidency of Ford. There was nothing about the passing of Henry Kissinger.

It’s possible that the local news and the Ford Museum might run something in the coming days to remember Henry Kissinger, but it would no doubt speak of him as a great statesman and scholar. Greg Grandin, who has written a critical account of Kissinger – Kissinger’s Shadow: The Long Reach of America’s Most Controversial Statesman, wrote an excellent article entitled, A People’s Obituary of Henry Kissinger.

Grandin was also interviewed on Democracy Now on Thursday, where he said:

I mean, we can go into the details, but I do want to say that his death has been as instructive as his life. I mean, if you look at the obituaries and notes of condolences, they just — I mean, they just reveal, I think, a moral bankruptcy of the political establishment, certainly in the transatlantic world, in the larger NATO sphere, just an unwillingness or incapacity to comprehend the crisis that we’re in and Kissinger’s role in that crisis. They’re celebratory. They’re inane. They’re vacuous. They’re really quite remarkable. And if you think of — just think back over the last year, the celebrations, the feting of his 100th anniversary — 100th, you know, birthday, his living to 100 years. I think it’s a cultural marker of just how much — how bankrupt the political class in this country is. So his death is almost as instructive as his life.

I have seen lots of people in my Facebook feed referring to Kissinger as a War Criminal, which I think is accurate, but Grandin also made an excellent point about what is problematic about referring to Kissinger as a War Criminal, stating: 

Christopher Hitchens popularized thinking about him as a war criminal, and that has a way of elevating Kissinger, in some ways, as somehow an extraordinary evil. And it’s a fine line, because he did play an outsized role in a staggering number of atrocities and bringing and dealing misery and death across the globe to millions of people. But there’s a lot of war criminals. I mean, you know, this country is stocked with war criminals. There’s no shortage of war criminals.

This is an important point from Grandin, since one could easily argue that since WWII, every US President and every administration has engaged in war crimes, which is to say that they were a proponent of US Imperialism. In a sense, Kissinger has normalized US Imperialism, which always includes war crimes.

Providing a counter-narrative to Official Sources on Kissinger

For those wanting more than the latest meme on Kissinger’s death, let me offer some of the following sources.

I already mentioned Grandin’s book, Kissinger’s Shadow: The Long Reach of America’s Most Controversial Statesman, plus there is the book by Christopher Hitchens, The Trial Of Henry Kissinger. The book by Hitchens, is what inspired the documentary film, The Trial of Henry Kissinger, which focuses on three main US foreign policy examples that Kissinger played a primary role in – Vietnam/Cambodia, Chile and Indonesia’s invasion of East Timor. 

Then there are the excellent resources by the National Security Archives, which provides hundreds and hundreds of pages of declassified US Government documents involving Kissinger, which you can find here.

The Intercepted has done some important research and writing on Kissinger as well, with a piece on his legacy from Thursday, HENRY KISSINGER, TOP U.S. DIPLOMAT RESPONSIBLE FOR MILLIONS OF DEATHS, DIES AT 100, and an older post entitled, Blood on His Hands: Survivors of Kissinger’s Secret War in Cambodia Reveal Unreported Mass Killings.

The Jacobin Magazine also has numerous articles from a variety of contributors that were posted on Thursday, which are part of a new book you can order from them entitled, Only the Good Die Young. 

Lastly, there is an excellent article from Norman Solomon on CounterPunch, entitled, For Media Elites, War Criminal Henry Kissinger Was a Great Man. In Solomon’s article he quotes the late Anthony Bourdain, who illuminated much about the world’s foods and cultures. As this century got underway, Bourdain wrote: 

“Once you’ve been to Cambodia, you’ll never stop wanting to beat Henry Kissinger to death with your bare hands. You will never again be able to open a newspaper and read about that treacherous, prevaricating, murderous scumbag sitting down for a nice chat with Charlie Rose or attending some black-tie affair for a new glossy magazine without choking. Witness what Henry did in Cambodia — the fruits of his genius for statesmanship — and you will never understand why he’s not sitting in the dock at The Hague next to [Slobodan] Milošević.”