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

[FGDinVA]

Here is his "secret code" message to Bush/Cheney:

"Fear is not a good motivation for statesmans­hip."

[anothervoice]

...or governance. Or public policy.

[Moshe]

George W. was playing checkers.

And he was really, really bad at it.

[DestinationsUnknown]

wonder how many of his supporters had a her with him

[RJII]

George was playing Jenga. And we all knew the outcome, except his st.u.p.i.da$$

[helonias]

Wrong analogy

Try patty cakes.

[in4success]

more like go fish with checkers.

[thinkingwomanmillstone]

I am not sure it was checkers i think it was Go fish.

[thinkingwomanmillstone]

and SP's gone fishin'.

[HansB]

Kissinger sounds very thoughtful, but one strange passage caught my eye:

"Cynics treat values as equivalent and instrumental. Statesmen base practical decisions on moral convictions. 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. But I believe more suffering has been caused by prophets than by statesmen.­"

Do I read correctly that in the first two sentences, statesmen are idealists (as opposed to cynics who are power-oriented), and in what follows it is the statesmen who are power-oriented (as opposed to idealists and prophets)?

[AlexFTW]

That's the impression I got from it. Confusing. But it's Kissinger so probably not without some underlying code or purpose to it.

[FGDinVA]

I think if he were writing an essay, he would have organized his thoughts a bit better.

[imusintheevening]

I don't think he is classifying whether it is cynics or statesmen that are the idealists or power-oriented people, just that they all exist, so presumably each can be either, but he is criticizing religious doctrine as having caused more suffering than sovereign leaders.

[FGDinVA]

Yes. You put that into words very well.

[Gib]

Highly debatable, unless, for example, you consider Hitler's Nazi ideology and Mao's Communist ideology to be religions. In this case the word loses its meaning.

[mairs]

I'm tending to believe that he was placing statesmen in the middle, as those who base practical decisions on moral convictions, but not being idealistic per se.

[Otaku1031]

I don't remember who said this, but to paraphrase, "Everybody does everything in order to get laid."

Kissinger himself stated that power is the greatest aphrodisiac. Are the power-oriented troublemakers simply lacking a fulfilling sex life?

[johnfrum]

Oh boy.
Dr Stranglove reappears. Great.
Just exactly what did this clown ever get right?

[johnfrum]

ummm, make that Strangelove

[DestinationsUnknown]

Glad you finally realize this

What a joy to watch

[OlHippie]

I have often said if my only choices to run foreign policy were Bush and Rice, Bush and Baker, Reagan and Haig, or Nixon and Kissinger, I'd chose NIxon and Kissinger in a heartbeat.

[imusintheevening]

I agree. Both have their pathos but they were the most intelligent and informed pair.

[Tom S Cedar Mill]

I agree. And, funny thing, those were the days I voted Republican.

[dax49]

kissinger is nothing but a social climbing death merchant who did incalulable damage to our country

[NYC80]

Yes, Kissinger also works for the same money masters as your messiah does.

[Bobzmcishl]

I agree with Kissinger on most of his points and it was nice to see an intelligent interview for a change. Obama resisted the pressure to immediately intervene in Iran's internal affairs, and he has opened a good dialogue with the Muslim world -none of this would have occured in a McCain administration. Kissinger's assessment of the Versaille agreements are pretty well accepted now by most historians. We treated Germany much better after WWII than we did after WWI. Obama is the chess player that Bush wasn't. Kissinger has generally been very complimentary of Obama and not so kind to George W. Bush.

[FGDinVA]

And I agree with you!

[BlueZoo]

Ditto! Chess is an intellectual game that takes great skill to play well. Kissinger played it in bringing the Viet Cong to the table and it's good to see Henry the K complimenting the President on his skill.

[Deadgnome]

As much as we on the left tend to despise Kissinger, he's a brilliant man, and he operates with logic most of the time. I wonder what those abstract GOPPERS think of this? Oh wait, I bet you the majority won't even see this interview. Good post Huff. Actually something interesting to read.

[tompoe]

ABC gives yet one more war criminal a platform to spew his garbage.

[lawrencemuh]

more like MASTER CHESS PLAYER!!!

[chrisfrmchi]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SISUIhprOa8

He knows exactly whats going on.

[ezeflyer]

Kiss my assinger.

[SwingVoter]

As a chess player myself, I have been trying to tell you guys that Obama is playing chess and he plays well. Very calculative and does not panic.

[Taxi]

Multi-tier chess, considering the multiple catastrophes Bush has handed him both nationally and internationally.

[dynwitch]

Starting to believe.

[1088]

While the nay sayers are playing checkers, Obama is playing chess! Yes, indeed!!