Is he dead? Yes he is! - Kissinger dead at 100

[Malifice]

Almost every definition of the Holocaust recognises it as being from 1941-1945: when Nazi Germany invaded the USSR - losing the massive food subsidies they were receiving from Stalin to keep the peace - and realised that they couldn't feed everyone in their territories, so decided the easiest solution was to kill all of the Jews.

Thats totally ignoring the literally tens - if not hundreds- of thousands of Jewish people killed by einstatzgruppen prior, plus the tens of thousands more imprisoned in camps, and every single Jewish person in Nazi Europe who had been stripped of property, citizenship, rights, employment and more, starting 8 years prior.

Your definition means a Jewish person who avoided being shot by the SA, while l having their synagogue burnt down, being sent to a Concentration camp, having their property confiscated, being treated as a literal enemy of the State, forced into unemployment and literally living in Nazi Germany while Hitler was up and about, but managed to escape is 'not a Holocaust survivor'.

At what point watching Schndlers list would you say a Jewish person who managed to escape the increasing persecution to the UK could claim to be a Holocaust survivor?

Only if they managed to climb out of the ovens unscathed?

I mean * man. Your definition is mental.

 

[Chief]

Everyone seems to hate him.



3 or 4 million deaths?

Gross.

 

[Happy Mastenator]

T

No, if you survived the direct attempts by the Nazis to kill you, then you can say you're a Holocaust survivor.

Not saying his family didn't suffer hardships, but let's not dress it up, shall we?

This is a bad take.

 

[Happy Mastenator]

So Kissinger is responsible for the Socialist Khmer Rouge?

One minute he bombed the Socialists too much.

The next minute he didn't bomb them hard enough.

Well no but also yes.

Cambodia in large part fell into mass killings and genocide due to his (and the USA) meddling.

It was a lot less likely that what happened in Cambodia would have happened if not for the bombing.

 

[The Passenger]

Rot in hell campaigner...

But then paradoxically, let me say Kissinger become a lightning rod for the bolts of electricity many others should also have felt.

If Kissinger doesn't come into beaurucratic power, I still think the Cambodian bombing happens and Pinochet takes over Chile, amongst other things.

The idea that if Kissinger is never around, that none of that s**t never happens is just pure fantasy. Literally it's pure fantasy

The US since WW2 have been campaigners and their peak level of campaigner was the mid 70s whilst HK was at his political peak... So naturally he gets called a campaigner... But I reckon he is taking the heat for a lot worse campaigners out there.

But still... Rot in hell campaigner.

 

[Happy Mastenator]

A thread for the deaths of all those arseholes who should have died a long time ago.

Welcome to the club Henry Kissinger. Good *en riddance.

Edit: to be updated with new names as and when deserved.

Edit: this clip is the spirit animal of this thread. Guessing she’s talking about Maggie thatcher but applicable to the people that should make an appearance here

Initial post updated. Loving the lady’s comments in the clip

 

[Saint]

Rot in hell campaigner...

But then paradoxically, let me say Kissinger become a lightning rod for the bolts of electricity many others should also have felt.

If Kissinger doesn't come into beaurucratic power, I still think the Cambodian bombing happens and Pinochet takes over Chile, amongst other things.

The idea that if Kissinger is never around, that none of that s**t never happens is just pure fantasy. Literally it's pure fantasy

The US since WW2 have been campaigners and their peak level of campaigner was the mid 70s whilst HK was at his political peak... So naturally he gets called a campaigner... But I reckon he is taking the heat for a lot worse campaigners out there.

But still... Rot in hell campaigner.

Kissinger was a campaigner himself, but also the number 1 Campaigner supporter and defender. Pinochet sought approval from the US before his takeover and they granted it, then supported him for a long time after. Same with almost all of the dictators the US supported.

The US supporting massively oppressive regimes (encouraging oppression) and providing the means to do it either led to poverty for many people, or massive over-reactions (see Khmer Rouge, Cuba etc).

The US made Governments choose a side and if you didn't fully side with them, Kissinger sent in the weapons and the CIA and the diplomatic cover.

 

[schneebly111]

So noone is going to lay any blame on the Soviets or China here?

The Cold war was all the fault of the Seppos?

The Cold War was a disastrous serious of conflicts across the globe with many bad actors.

But I guess from an Australian perspective we're continuously told the Americans and the West are the "good guys", they stand for "freedom and democracy" against the "evil commies".

Of course real students of history knows the US and the West has plenty of blood on their hands and has supported evil regimes to prop up their own interests.

 

[carltonchelsea]

Is Mal really attempting to defend one of the greatest kill count psychopaths we’ve ever created, in part, because he and his parents escaped Nazi Germany?
FMD, this human faeces should have met a bullet to the forehead or noose in the early 70’s, before his reign of terror and deathporn spread across the world in the real deep state secretive U.S foreign policy to destroy democracy in the name of cheap resources.
The fact his bloodline continues is a dark tumour!
He is an enemy of the Earth!

 

[BlueE]

Even the NYT 'gift' op-ed details his rotted and twisted legacy becoming the example for the US security state.

Opinion | Henry Kissinger, the Hypocrite

He was as much a creation of the American national security state as he was its author.

www.nytimes.com

 

[EagleMan87]

Thats totally ignoring the literally tens - if not hundreds- of thousands of Jewish people killed by einstatzgruppen prior, plus the tens of thousands more imprisoned in camps, and every single Jewish person in Nazi Europe who had been stripped of property, citizenship, rights, employment and more, starting 8 years prior.

Your definition means a Jewish person who avoided being shot by the SA, while l having their synagogue burnt down, being sent to a Concentration camp, having their property confiscated, being treated as a literal enemy of the State, forced into unemployment and literally living in Nazi Germany while Hitler was up and about, but managed to escape is 'not a Holocaust survivor'.

At what point watching Schndlers list would you say a Jewish person who managed to escape the increasing persecution to the UK could claim to be a Holocaust survivor?

Only if they managed to climb out of the ovens unscathed?

I mean * man. Your definition is mental.

It's not my definition Mal.

And I thought you were better than to resort to histrionics; you don't have to have the label 'Holocaust Survivor' to have suffered under the Nazis.

 

[Malifice]

It's not my definition Mal.

And I thought you were better than to resort to histrionics; you don't have to have the label 'Holocaust Survivor' to have suffered under the Nazis.

No, I stand by my definition, which is THE definition.

The Holocaust commenced on 30/1/1933, with Hitler coming to power. That's the accepted starting point.

Kissinger and his family literally fled Germany in 1938, 5 years into Nazi Rule, 3 years after the Neurenberg laws were enacted, and the same year as Kristallnacht (where 30,000 Jewish people were sent to Dachau Concentration camp as 'partisans').

Timeline of the Holocaust: 1933-1945​

1933​

January 30	Adolf Hitler appointed Chancellor of Germany
March 22	Dachau concentration camp opens
April 1	Boycott of Jewish shops and businesses
April 7	Laws for Reestablishment of the Civil Service barred Jews from holding civil service, university, and state positions
April 26	Gestapo established
May 10	Public burning of books written by Jews, political dissidents, and others not approved by the state
July 14	Law stripping East European Jewish immigrants of German citizenship

1934​

August 2

Hitler proclaims himself Führer und Reichskanzler (Leader and Reich Chancellor). Armed forces must now swear allegiance to him

1935​

May 31	Jews barred from serving in the German armed forces
September 15	"Nuremberg Laws": anti-Jewish racial laws enacted; Jews no longer considered German citizens; Jews could not marry Aryans; nor could they fly the German flag
November 15	Germany defines a "Jew": anyone with three Jewish grandparents; someone with two Jewish grandparents who identifies as a Jew

1936​

March 3	Jewish doctors barred from practicing medicine in German institutions
March 7	Germans march into the Rhineland, previously demilitarized by the Versailles Treaty
June 17	Himmler appointed the Chief of German Police
July	Sachsenhausen concentration camp opens
October 25	Hitler and Mussolini form Rome-Berlin Axis

1937​

July 15

Buchenwald concentration camp opens

1938​

March 13	Anschluss (incorporation of Austria): all antisemitic decrees immediately applied in Austria
April 26	Mandatory registration of all property held by Jews inside the Reich
July 6	Evian Conference held in Evian, France on the problem of Jewish refugees
August 1	Adolf Eichmann establishes the Office of Jewish Emigration in Vienna to increase the pace of forced emigration
August 3	Italy enacts sweeping antisemitic laws
September 30	Munich Conference: Great Britain and France agree to German occupation of the Sudetenland, previously western Czechoslovakia
October 5	Following request by Swiss authorities, Germans mark all Jewish passports with a large letter "J" to restrict Jews from immigrating to Switzerland
October 28	17,000 Polish Jews living in Germany expelled; Poles refused to admit them; 8,000 are stranded in the frontier village of Zbaszyn
November 7	Assassination in Paris of German diplomat Ernst vom Rath by Herschel Grynszpan
November 9-10	Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass): anti-Jewish pogrom in Germany, Austria, and the Sudetenland; 200 synagogues destroyed; 7,500 Jewish shops looted; 30,000 male Jews sent to concentration camps (Dachau, Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen)
November 12	Decree forcing all Jews to transfer retail businesses to Aryan hands
November 15	All Jewish pupils expelled from German schools
December 12	One billion Marks fine levied against German Jews for the destruction of property during Kristallnacht

His family got out just in time.

On the following year on 30/1/1039 (the 7th anniversary of coming to power) Hitler used his speech to the Reichstag to announce the annihilation of the Jews of Europe. The same year, Poland was invaded, the Einsatzgruppen death squads were running around murdering Jewish 'partisans' by the thousands, the Polish Ghettoes were formed, and the armbands were required to be worn by Jewish people in German occupied lands.

From there, it got worse. Much worse.

If Kissingers family hadn't have escaped in '38, they'd be almost certainly dead.

 

[Malifice]

The Cold War was a disastrous serious of conflicts across the globe with many bad actors.

But I guess from an Australian perspective we're continuously told the Americans and the West are the "good guys", they stand for "freedom and democracy" against the "evil commies".

Of course real students of history knows the US and the West has plenty of blood on their hands and has supported evil regimes to prop up their own interests.

There were two ideologies struggling for dominance. Socialism and (free market) Liberalism.

It's not a question of who is good or evil (that's a subjective question). The reality of the situation was that the Soviet Union were funding and propping up Socialist regimes all over the globe (including in Latin America, Eastern Europe, parts of Africa, and Southeast Asia). The Seppos were doing the exact same thing themselves, by opposing Socialist control.

The Yanks do nothing, and we're all living in a Socialist shithole.

As to the morality of America in opposing the Russians, there are arguments for and against.

You have to remember; this was all happening at a time where the major protagonists had 50,000 nukes pointed at each other as well.

It's easy to say, 'we shouldn't have gone into Vietnam' because of the immense human casualties. But what would the world look like if America was isolationist instead? There would be unitary party socialist tyrannies everywhere, with arguably even more casualties.

Would we be as quick to judge Kissinger, if instead of opposing the Soviets propping up Socialist regimes everywhere, he was instead opposing a (hypothetical) undefeated Nazi Europe, controlled by Germany, propping up Fascist regimes everywhere?

 

[carltonchelsea]

No, I stand by my definition, which is THE definition.

The Holocaust commenced on 30/1/1933, with Hitler coming to power. That's the accepted starting point.

Kissinger and his family literally fled Germany in 1938, 5 years into Nazi Rule, 3 years after the Neurenberg laws were enacted, and the same year as Kristallnacht (where 30,000 Jewish people were sent to Dachau Concentration camp as 'partisans').

Timeline of the Holocaust: 1933-1945​

1933​

January 30	Adolf Hitler appointed Chancellor of Germany
March 22	Dachau concentration camp opens
April 1	Boycott of Jewish shops and businesses
April 7	Laws for Reestablishment of the Civil Service barred Jews from holding civil service, university, and state positions
April 26	Gestapo established
May 10	Public burning of books written by Jews, political dissidents, and others not approved by the state
July 14	Law stripping East European Jewish immigrants of German citizenship

1934​

August 2

Hitler proclaims himself Führer und Reichskanzler (Leader and Reich Chancellor). Armed forces must now swear allegiance to him

1935​

May 31	Jews barred from serving in the German armed forces
September 15	"Nuremberg Laws": anti-Jewish racial laws enacted; Jews no longer considered German citizens; Jews could not marry Aryans; nor could they fly the German flag
November 15	Germany defines a "Jew": anyone with three Jewish grandparents; someone with two Jewish grandparents who identifies as a Jew

1936​

March 3	Jewish doctors barred from practicing medicine in German institutions
March 7	Germans march into the Rhineland, previously demilitarized by the Versailles Treaty
June 17	Himmler appointed the Chief of German Police
July	Sachsenhausen concentration camp opens
October 25	Hitler and Mussolini form Rome-Berlin Axis

1937​

July 15

Buchenwald concentration camp opens

1938​

March 13	Anschluss (incorporation of Austria): all antisemitic decrees immediately applied in Austria
April 26	Mandatory registration of all property held by Jews inside the Reich
July 6	Evian Conference held in Evian, France on the problem of Jewish refugees
August 1	Adolf Eichmann establishes the Office of Jewish Emigration in Vienna to increase the pace of forced emigration
August 3	Italy enacts sweeping antisemitic laws
September 30	Munich Conference: Great Britain and France agree to German occupation of the Sudetenland, previously western Czechoslovakia
October 5	Following request by Swiss authorities, Germans mark all Jewish passports with a large letter "J" to restrict Jews from immigrating to Switzerland
October 28	17,000 Polish Jews living in Germany expelled; Poles refused to admit them; 8,000 are stranded in the frontier village of Zbaszyn
November 7	Assassination in Paris of German diplomat Ernst vom Rath by Herschel Grynszpan
November 9-10	Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass): anti-Jewish pogrom in Germany, Austria, and the Sudetenland; 200 synagogues destroyed; 7,500 Jewish shops looted; 30,000 male Jews sent to concentration camps (Dachau, Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen)
November 12	Decree forcing all Jews to transfer retail businesses to Aryan hands
November 15	All Jewish pupils expelled from German schools
December 12	One billion Marks fine levied against German Jews for the destruction of property during Kristallnacht

His family got out just in time.

On the following year on 30/1/1039 (the 7th anniversary of coming to power) Hitler used his speech to the Reichstag to announce the annihilation of the Jews of Europe. The same year, Poland was invaded, the Einsatzgruppen death squads were running around murdering Jewish 'partisans' by the thousands, the Polish Ghettoes were formed, and the armbands were required to be worn by Jewish people in German occupied lands.

From there, it got worse. Much worse.

If Kissingers family hadn't have escaped in '38, they'd be almost certainly dead.

No, I stand by my definition, which is THE definition.

The Holocaust commenced on 30/1/1933, with Hitler coming to power. That's the accepted starting point.

Kissinger and his family literally fled Germany in 1938, 5 years into Nazi Rule, 3 years after the Neurenberg laws were enacted, and the same year as Kristallnacht (where 30,000 Jewish people were sent to Dachau Concentration camp as 'partisans').

Timeline of the Holocaust: 1933-1945​

1933​

January 30	Adolf Hitler appointed Chancellor of Germany
March 22	Dachau concentration camp opens
April 1	Boycott of Jewish shops and businesses
April 7	Laws for Reestablishment of the Civil Service barred Jews from holding civil service, university, and state positions
April 26	Gestapo established
May 10	Public burning of books written by Jews, political dissidents, and others not approved by the state
July 14	Law stripping East European Jewish immigrants of German citizenship

1934​

August 2

Hitler proclaims himself Führer und Reichskanzler (Leader and Reich Chancellor). Armed forces must now swear allegiance to him

1935​

May 31	Jews barred from serving in the German armed forces
September 15	"Nuremberg Laws": anti-Jewish racial laws enacted; Jews no longer considered German citizens; Jews could not marry Aryans; nor could they fly the German flag
November 15	Germany defines a "Jew": anyone with three Jewish grandparents; someone with two Jewish grandparents who identifies as a Jew

1936​

March 3	Jewish doctors barred from practicing medicine in German institutions
March 7	Germans march into the Rhineland, previously demilitarized by the Versailles Treaty
June 17	Himmler appointed the Chief of German Police
July	Sachsenhausen concentration camp opens
October 25	Hitler and Mussolini form Rome-Berlin Axis

1937​

July 15

Buchenwald concentration camp opens

1938​

March 13	Anschluss (incorporation of Austria): all antisemitic decrees immediately applied in Austria
April 26	Mandatory registration of all property held by Jews inside the Reich
July 6	Evian Conference held in Evian, France on the problem of Jewish refugees
August 1	Adolf Eichmann establishes the Office of Jewish Emigration in Vienna to increase the pace of forced emigration
August 3	Italy enacts sweeping antisemitic laws
September 30	Munich Conference: Great Britain and France agree to German occupation of the Sudetenland, previously western Czechoslovakia
October 5	Following request by Swiss authorities, Germans mark all Jewish passports with a large letter "J" to restrict Jews from immigrating to Switzerland
October 28	17,000 Polish Jews living in Germany expelled; Poles refused to admit them; 8,000 are stranded in the frontier village of Zbaszyn
November 7	Assassination in Paris of German diplomat Ernst vom Rath by Herschel Grynszpan
November 9-10	Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass): anti-Jewish pogrom in Germany, Austria, and the Sudetenland; 200 synagogues destroyed; 7,500 Jewish shops looted; 30,000 male Jews sent to concentration camps (Dachau, Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen)
November 12	Decree forcing all Jews to transfer retail businesses to Aryan hands
November 15	All Jewish pupils expelled from German schools
December 12	One billion Marks fine levied against German Jews for the destruction of property during Kristallnacht

His family got out just in time.

On the following year on 30/1/1039 (the 7th anniversary of coming to power) Hitler used his speech to the Reichstag to announce the annihilation of the Jews of Europe. The same year, Poland was invaded, the Einsatzgruppen death squads were running around murdering Jewish 'partisans' by the thousands, the Polish Ghettoes were formed, and the armbands were required to be worn by Jewish people in German occupied lands.

From there, it got worse. Much worse.

If Kissingers family hadn't have escaped in '38, they'd be almost certainly dead.

It’s almost a pity in his case.
He is quite literally the American Hitler, his kill numbers of innocent civilians outnumber the 3rd Reich scumbag, the philosophical issue arises that Hitler had a manifest and belief system, Kissinger had no belief, no reason, no ideology apart from vengeance for losing in Vietnam, we’ll probably never know, as psychopaths rarely elucidate their actions.
Weird the sword you’ve fallen on here guv!

 

[Malifice]

Kissinger had no belief, no reason, no ideology apart from vengeance for losing in Vietnam

No, that's simply not the case.

Kissinger was trying to stop the Soviet Union from establishing global Socialism, while trying to avert WW3.

Soviet involvement in regime change - Wikipedia

In the aftermath of World War II, the Soviet government struggled with the United States for global leadership and influence within the context of the Cold War. It expanded the geographic scope of its actions beyond its traditional area of operations. In addition, the Soviet Union and Russia engaged in foreign electoral intervention in the national elections of many countries. One study indicated that the Soviet Union and Russia engaged in 36 interventions in foreign elections from 1946 to 2000.

The ultimate aim of the Soviet Union was global Communism. It's a key component in much Marxist thought:

World revolution is the Marxist concept of overthrowing capitalism in all countries through the conscious revolutionary action of the organized working class. For theorists, these revolutions will not necessarily occur simultaneously, but where and when local conditions allow a revolutionary party to successfully replace bourgeois ownership and rule, and install a workers' state based on social ownership of the means of production. In most Marxist schools, such as Trotskyism and Communist Left, the essentially international character of the class struggle and the necessity of global scope are critical elements and a chief explanation of the failure of socialism in one country.

The end goal of such internationally oriented revolutionary socialism is to achieve world socialism, and later, a communist society.[1][2]

World revolution - Wikipedia

An isolationist USA would have resulted in scores of countries converting into Socialist shitholes, with the gulags and killing fields and all the 'good stuff' you get with Marxism/ Leninism.

Get enough of them, and you have an even bigger problem.

Again, would we be so critical of Kissinger and the USA if (instead of opposing the Soviets implementing Socialist regime change around the globe) they were instead opposing Salaffi Jihadis implementing Fundamentalist nation States left right and center, or opposing an undefeated Nazi Germany propping up Fascist nation States globally?

 

[Happy Mastenator]

There were two ideologies struggling for dominance. Socialism and (free market) Liberalism.

It's not a question of who is good or evil (that's a subjective question). The reality of the situation was that the Soviet Union were funding and propping up Socialist regimes all over the globe (including in Latin America, Eastern Europe, parts of Africa, and Southeast Asia). The Seppos were doing the exact same thing themselves, by opposing Socialist control.

The Yanks do nothing, and we're all living in a Socialist shithole.

As to the morality of America in opposing the Russians, there are arguments for and against.

You have to remember; this was all happening at a time where the major protagonists had 50,000 nukes pointed at each other as well.

It's easy to say, 'we shouldn't have gone into Vietnam' because of the immense human casualties. But what would the world look like if America was isolationist instead? There would be unitary party socialist tyrannies everywhere, with arguably even more casualties.

Would we be as quick to judge Kissinger, if instead of opposing the Soviets propping up Socialist regimes everywhere, he was instead opposing a (hypothetical) undefeated Nazi Europe, controlled by Germany, propping up Fascist regimes everywhere?

lol. That’s quaint.

 

[Malifice]

lol. That’s quaint.

The seppos also propped up far right governments as well, but sorry to tell you the victorious powers of WW2 were the Commies of the Soviet Union (and China), and the free Market liberals of the USA, France and the UK.

The Cold war was then fought basically along those same lines.

 

[Theseventhhamster]

His longevity in the war crimes game has to have him in the GOAT conversation.

 

[rank and file]

His longevity in the war crimes game has to have him in the GOAT conversation.

No question,he was the GOAT
Henry Kissinger: 10 conflicts, countries that define a blood-stained legacy

 

[ferball]

Good.

Don't let the door hit your arse on the way out campaigner.

 

[sdfc]

No, that's simply not the case.

Kissinger was trying to stop the Soviet Union from establishing global Socialism, while trying to avert WW3.

Soviet involvement in regime change - Wikipedia



The ultimate aim of the Soviet Union was global Communism. It's a key component in much Marxist thought:



World revolution - Wikipedia

An isolationist USA would have resulted in scores of countries converting into Socialist shitholes, with the gulags and killing fields and all the 'good stuff' you get with Marxism/ Leninism.

Get enough of them, and you have an even bigger problem.

Again, would we be so critical of Kissinger and the USA if (instead of opposing the Soviets implementing Socialist regime change around the globe) they were instead opposing Salaffi Jihadis implementing Fundamentalist nation States left right and center, or opposing an undefeated Nazi Germany propping up Fascist nation States globally?

So the ends justify the means. Going on a bombing campaign because you don't get your way at the negotiating table is war crime however you cut it.

Mind you so was firebombing German and Japanese cities.

 

[Chicken Treat]

Good riddance.

 

[Geelong_Sicko]

An isolationist USA would have resulted in scores of countries converting into Socialist shitholes,

Who's to say that Socialism without anything to react against wouldn't become more benevolent? The US blueprint always seems to be 'bombard Socialist economies with outside-sponsored insurgency and economic sanction so they get bogged down on military spending instead of social spending'.

Because Socialism isn't about wealth accumulation it means Socialist economies always implode when meeting outside pressure, and become Shitholes. But what if that pressure wasn't there?

 

[Happy Mastenator]

The seppos also propped up far right governments as well, but sorry to tell you the victorious powers of WW2 were the Commies of the Soviet Union (and China), and the free Market liberals of the USA, France and the UK.

The Cold war was then fought basically along those same lines.

Was more a comment that “free market” liberalism is a misnomer when it comes to describing what the USA, England and France were about.

 

[Mofra]

No, that's simply not the case.

Kissinger was trying to stop the Soviet Union from establishing global Socialism, while trying to avert WW3.

Soviet involvement in regime change - Wikipedia



The ultimate aim of the Soviet Union was global Communism. It's a key component in much Marxist thought:



World revolution - Wikipedia

An isolationist USA would have resulted in scores of countries converting into Socialist shitholes, with the gulags and killing fields and all the 'good stuff' you get with Marxism/ Leninism.

Get enough of them, and you have an even bigger problem.

Again, would we be so critical of Kissinger and the USA if (instead of opposing the Soviets implementing Socialist regime change around the globe) they were instead opposing Salaffi Jihadis implementing Fundamentalist nation States left right and center, or opposing an undefeated Nazi Germany propping up Fascist nation States globally?

There is no genuine defence of US involvement in the Vietnam War, which was really just an extension of Vietnam's desire for self rule after defeating the French during the war of Indochina. The (US) invented "South Vietnam" was a short-lived puppet state, not some long lost desire to split the country in 2.

Nor is there any defence of the widespread bombing of Laos and Cambodia , nor Kissinger getting into bed with the Chicago schoolers to state right-wing coups all over South America (Pinochet/Allende in Chile the most famous example).

Kissinger was a monster and is largely recognized as such. I agree with Bourdain:

“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 Milošević.”​