Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

gaodawei.wordpress.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 309 posts

Re: The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

#11

Post by ggm »

woooooo wrote: post #6
Invictus0 wrote: post #4

What's interesting about this?

It's a major turning point in geopolitics, involving two political genius war criminals having a remarkably frank and honest exchange of views. They're batting around the idea of Japan going Soviet at one point. I was fascinated.

There's a hold out Japanese communist movement, from pre ww2

There's also a truly bizarre subculture of pro North Korean longterm Japanese resident people.

It would not surprise me that in the 70s anyone in politics could believe a soviet Japan was possible. The Baath party slaughtered the Iraqi communists in the sixties, Indonesia slaughtered The Sukharno supporting communists along with passive support from the UK and Australia and USA, British forces in Malaysia were expelling 40,000 villagers for communist sympathies, communist rebels in the Philippines were firing up, and the Vietnam war embroiled Vietnam, Lao, Cambodia in the same torment. Allende would die in Chile inside the next two years: a Marxist government had been in power for a year.

Re: The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

#12

Post by MPlus88 »

woooooo wrote: post #6
Invictus0 wrote: post #4

What's interesting about this?

It's a major turning point in geopolitics, involving two political genius war criminals having a remarkably frank and honest exchange of views. They're batting around the idea of Japan going Soviet at one point. I was fascinated.

[dead]

Re: The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

#13

Post by ggm »

DirectorKrennic wrote: post #10

On Dunkirk: > Chairman Mao: They shouldn’t have attacked Moscow or Kiev. They should have taken Leningrad as a first step. Another error in policy was they didn’t cross the sea after Dunkirk. > Dr. Kissinger: After Dunkirk. > Chairman Mao: They were entirely unprepared. > Dr. Kissinger: And Hitler was a romantic. He had a strange liking for England. > Chairman Mao: Oh? Then why didn’t they go there? Because the Briti…

Angus Calder has a quote I can't recall about the "fight them on the beaches" speech Churchill gave, somebody in the house of commons said something to the effect "well we will be flinging beer bottles at them, it's all we've bloody got" and indeed the home guard was being taught how to make Molotov cocktails by ex Spanish civil war volunteers, and parading with pikes. A three man suicide squad technique was deviced to jam tank tracks with a baulk of wood, climb onto the tank top and set off a sticky bomb or a Molotov cocktail.

Getting 350,000 men and some materiel back from Dunkirk was a big deal.

Mao had similar concerns in the long March. Just surving was half his battle.

Re: The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

#14

Post by dontupvoteme »

Invictus0 wrote: post #4

What's interesting about this?

Are you daft? It's two of the greatest/most-importants minds of the 20th century meeting in the post ww2 era.

From the western side - Kissinger is arguably right up there with Machiavelli, his influence is immutable. and Mao sort of made modern china.

Re: The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

#16

Post by totetsu »

Invictus0 wrote: post #4

What's interesting about this?

> What brings us together is a recognition of a new situation in the world and a recognition on our part that what is important is not a nation's internal political philosophy. What is important is its policy toward the rest of the world and toward us

Re: The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

#18

Post by DirectorKrennic »

gedy wrote: post #8
Invictus0 wrote: post #4

What's interesting about this?

Also that Henry Kissinger is still alive and turned 100 few weeks ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Kissinger

Fun fact: Kissinger has lived for so long that Commodore BASIC, SQL, Apple DOS, and the TCP/IP protocol were all created after he retired from government service. Not after he was born, but after he retired.

Re: The Mao-Kissinger Meeting of 1973

#19

Post by samstave »

dontupvoteme wrote: post #14
Invictus0 wrote: post #4

What's interesting about this?

Are you daft? It's two of the greatest/most-importants minds of the 20th century meeting in the post ww2 era. From the western side - Kissinger is arguably right up there with Machiavelli, his influence is immutable. and Mao sort of made modern china.

You left out the Evil multiplier.

These are also two of the most vile things to live in the last 500 years. Their great minds are what allowed them to get away with the murder hundreds of millions.

Post reply on HN