Kissinger: "Obama Is Like A Chess Player"

In a long interview with Germany's Der Spiegel, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger compared President Obama to a chess player making an opening move.

SPIEGEL: Do you think it was helpful for Obama to deliver a speech to the Islamic world in Cairo? Or has he created a lot of illusions about what politics can deliver?

Kissinger: Obama is like a chess player who is playing simultaneous chess and has opened his game with an unusual opening. Now he's got to play his hand as he plays his various counterparts. We haven't gotten beyond the opening game move yet. I have no quarrel with the opening move.

Read the whole interview here.

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Comments

[Articulator]

I dont believe Obama clings to an ideology. He is mentally free to plot a course to an end that is not blatantly obvious. Which is totally different from his predecessor whose every move resembled Sherman's march through the Confederacy. Clinging to an ideology makes you unable to objectively asses the current situation. When clinging, as the right wingers do, every event has to be spun in some way to prove the ideology correct. There are those that still believe in an Iraq/Al Qaeda link for instance, for no other reason than it supports the ideology. As time goes on and details blurr, they will be unable to understand otherwise. Learning from the past is impossible when you dont objectively asses what happened.
Obama can also react to the context of the time. To me, raising or lowering taxes depends on the current level of taxation and the economic situation. At one point it is prudent to lower them, and another it may be prudent to raise them. What Obama does this year, may be what is needed now and may be the opposite of what he does and is needed in coming years. At the moment we are trying to fend of another great depression. I would have loved to see Obama arrive in office without inheriting so many anchors around his neck but this is where he has to start. He may be thinking beyond what we see now.

[calirighty]

You are clueless. Obama absolutely has an ideology. His ideology was recently "discovered" by the New York Times. Amazing how they failed to find this BEFORE the election.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/images/nytint/docs/obama-s-1983-college-magazine-article/original.pdf

[chameleon59]

let's see - they discovered an article written by a 23 year old about two anti-war groups on campus. In it, he expressed his hope that no one of his generation would ever have to live through the horror of war. I'm not sure that I'd call that ideology - but if it is, it's not one that I'd take issue with. Even if it were, I'd have to consider how much my beliefs and attitudes have changed since I was 23 in 1983. Anyone who doesn't mature and change between 23 and 49 is a sad case of a human being.

[devanate]

A man doesn't find greatness.
Greatness finds a man in his handling of circumstance.

[SamEllison]

Finally someone that understands what he is saying!

This guy is Strangelove!

[devanate]

Literally!

[HisPetGoat]

Mein Führer...! I can walk!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9ihKq34Ozc

[sosi]

If the supreme leader says so, it must be true; the American people are probably the pawns again...

[Christian]

People have a lot to say about Henry, but read the story and regardless of what you think about him, he is on the money in this interview. And his analysis is smart in this case! Say what you will.

[Wolves50]

In reality, Obama is probably sitting in a Russian hotel room playing ball in a cup and staring at himself in the mirror at this very moment.

[filo]

Reality ??

You should try it sometime.

[rbndc]

You just described G. Dubya Bush perfectly.

[Articulator]

Wasnt Kissinger the only one that Bush was consulting on the war in Iraq? Must be a blow to the neo-cons to have him be ok with Obama.

[CentralVA]

Read the whole story. Kissinger hasn't changed his spots. He has plenty to say that is not entirely complimentary of President Obama.

For example:

"If what he wants to do is convey to the Islamic world that America has an open attitude to dialogue and is not determined on physical confrontation as its only strategy, then it can play a very useful role. If it were to be continued on the belief that every crisis can be managed by a philosophical speech, then he will run into Wilsonian problems. "

[pearlx2]

There's nothing disparaging about that last remark. It's true; Obama himself would agree with those 2 sentences.

[mtracy9]

The reason that Kissinger has curried so much favor from America's elites is because he is basically a hawk on foreign policy, which satisfies conservatives, and is a strong supporter of Israel, and it's hard-line policy on the Palestinian question, which satisfies many self-described liberals.

[SCG]

Kissinger? A case study in amorality.

[jeg]

Which is why he was successful as Secretary of State. International diplomacy is not for the faint of heart. "Speak softly, carry a big stick" is as true today as it was in Teddy Roosevelt's time.

The trick is to convince the other side you're willing to use the stick if you have to, without ever swinging it anything-- G.W. gave that up by actually swinging..­. and missing. Actually, he didn't so much miss as throw the stick into a desert sandstorm, and now we have to get it back.

This analogy may be officially out of control now... or it may be someone's doctoral thesis, I'm not sure which.

[FebM]

I never agreed with Kissinger but he represents a generation where conservatives valued knowledge, education and deep thought.

[cobobs]

He is also detached enough to admire a good game when he sees one.

[pearlx2]

Hard to believe such a generation ever existed "where conservatives valued knowledge, education and deep thought," when you look at conservatives today. WTF happened?

[calirighty]

That's right. Because no one who disagrees with your politics could POSSIBLY have any of those things. Democrats who have changed, not conservatives. Your belief that only your views are correct and that only your views should be tolerated is what's wrong with this country. Not the other way around.

[Montgriz]

well, for starters, those thinking conservatives managed to kill over 50, 0000 US troops, millions of South East Asians on a theory that had no basis for existing..­.those conservatives you admire also murdered Americans protesting­...Kent State? Those same lovable principled people fought against the civil rights movement of the 60s in league with Southern red necks calling themselves Democrats and Dixiecrats­....no...t­he nice Conservatives just did not exist.....­even Goldwater, now an icon claimed it was ok to be an extremist.­....only his later years when his conscience got to him did he recant...

[BCLance]

Kissinger is intelligent and knowledgeable, but many people see his tenure as Secretary of State as a measured study in immorality, not even amorality. The long-term successes of his actual initiatives at State are by no stretch of the imagination successes, even on his terms.

[hangdogit]

Obama is also playing chess against the GOP -- only they're playing checkers.

[keshea01]

no, the gop is playing UNO

[dennissinned]

You sure they're not playing Old Maid?

[Sandmanj]

I dunno - Repubs these days don't seem bright enough even to play checkers.

[jeg]

According to Palin, it's "Go fish".

[pearlx2]

They're playing Crazy 8's.

[Billy Hell]

Obama's ties to Kissinger are no secret. Consider also that Obama sent him to Moscow for a two day discussion with Putin on amongst other things, nuclear non-proliferation, in December last year, while he was still President-Elect.

[JessWonderin]

Explains the Republican frustrations . . . they thought it was checkers . . . .

[Tabasco]

I think it's like the Reti Opening, or a fast break,... or a 3rd down conversion or a stolen base or an approach volley shot.... or..... uh. What were we talking about?

[last word on this]

well, if it took 6 months for opening move we have a long game ahead of us :)

[tb92]

Isn't it nice to have a leader who can see beyond his next trip to the ranch?

[peterg76]

You don't "play your hand" in chess.

[repearwo]

An unfortunate mixed metaphor but the chess game analogy is very good.

[Balzac]

Yeah, Kissinger fails with the mixed chess/poker metaphors. Kissinger is no intellectual genius in my opinion. I think Kissinger is a basically a socially-p­romiscuous elitist. He's good at schmoozing with the powerful and merciless, but he's not a visionary nor a true intellectual.

[billbb]

That was an interview for Der Spiegel (The Mirror), and my suspicion would be that the interview was conducted in German, Kissinger being a native speaker of that language, after all. That would mean the the translation of "playing a hand" in chess should not be taken as the English words of what Kissinger said, but as a translation back from German.

That said, it is interesting to hear Kissinger's take on this, as maybe the last true internationalist still in the Republican party. Obama has been making so many moves all at once that he has been like a chess master playing simultaneous games. And, so far at least, winning the majority of the games.