Kissinger Revelations the Stuff of Nightmares

Marc Cooper (Opinion, June 3) succinctly illuminates Henry Kissinger’s role and complicity in Augusto Pinochet’s sadistic regime, and rightfully so. Looking beyond Chile, one also finds ample evidence in Kissinger’s heavy involvement in the brutal antics in East Timor, Cyprus and Bangladesh. But perhaps more than all of these murderous fiascoes is his extension of the Vietnam War.

Bob Haldeman (Richard Nixon’s chief of staff), in his memoir, revealed his notes from a 1970 meeting wherein Kissinger convinced Nixon not to pull out of Vietnam until just prior to his reelection campaign in ‘73, understanding full well that a U.S. pullout would lead to negative political ramifications in South Vietnam (a Communist takeover), thereby jeopardizing Nixon’s chances for a second term. Over 22,000 Americans and well over 500,000 Asians were killed between the date of that meeting and our eventual pullout. The fact that the final agreement between North and South Vietnam in 1973 was the same agreement proposed at the Paris peace talks in 1968 lends credence to Kissinger’s warped and self-serving rationalization for extending and expanding that bloody conflict into Laos and Cambodia.

Cooper suggests that the current struggles of Pinochet will surely haunt Kissinger’s midnight nightmares. Considering the recent revelations of his other sinister escapades, he may find it difficult to sleep at all.

Matt Giorgi

Brea

How ironic that a man who escaped a likely death at the hands of the Nazis should himself become a suspected human rights violator.

Tim Swanson

Torrance