Kissinger on Legitimacy

IT is very rare nowadays for a scholar to enter the arena of politics. True, Amintore Fanfani once wrote books on social theory and Ludwig Erhard taught economics; Gunnar Myrdal became a cabinet minister and Professor Masaryk was president of Czechoslovakia—but they are the exceptions. Yet before World War I it was not unusual for a high political or administrative position to be filled by the cultured gentleman who, though not precisely a scholar, wrote well, spoke several languages, had read most of the important books, and would eventually compose his memoirs without the aid of a ghostwriter. Such men seldom go into politics any more, and the genuine scholar can hardly tear himself away from his books. Henry Kissinger, however, is a scholar, a man of political action, and a statesman—a breed that has practically died out in this age of proletarian tyranny. I knew this interesting man when he taught at Harvard and edited Confluence, a quarterly review of high quality and truly international scope to which I contributed several articles.

As I watched Mr. Kissinger on Austrian television a few weeks ago furiously denouncing his detractors in the United States, I was reminded of the violent wave of protest he touched off this spring by saying that there have been few really legitimate governments in Europe since 1918. Europeans were understandably upset by the tone and context of that statement, but they might have been less upset if they had studied Mr. Kissinger’s book on Metternich, A World Restored, and had seen just how much his thought is influenced by the great historian Guglielmo Ferrero.

EK

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Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn

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Franklin Delano Roosevelt

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IT is very rare nowadays for a scholar to enter the arena of politics. True, Amintore Fanfani once wrote books on social theory and Ludwig Erhard taught economics; Gunnar Myrdal became a cabinet minister and Professor Masaryk was president of Czechoslovakia—but they are the exceptions. Yet before World War I it was not unusual for a high political or administrative position to be filled by the cultured gentleman who, though not precisely a scholar, wrote well, spoke several languages, had read most of the important books, and would eventually compose his memoirs without the aid of a ghostwriter. Such men seldom go into politics any more, and the genuine scholar can hardly tear himself away from his books. Henry Kissinger, however, is a scholar, a man of political action, and a statesman—a breed that has practically died out in this age of proletarian tyranny. I knew this interesting man when he taught at Harvard and edited Confluence, a quarterly review of high quality and truly international scope to which I contributed several articles.

As I watched Mr. Kissinger on Austrian television a few weeks ago furiously denouncing his detractors in the United States, I was reminded of the violent wave of protest he touched off this spring by saying that there have been few really legitimate governments in Europe since 1918. Europeans were understandably upset by the tone and context of that statement, but they might have been less upset if they had studied Mr. Kissinger’s book on Metternich, A World Restored, and had seen just how much his thought is influenced by the great historian Guglielmo Ferrero.