In 1970 my father met with Henry Kissinger and urged him to read the McNamara study, later known as the #PentagonPapers. “But do we really have anything to learn from this study?" #Kissinger asked. "After all, we make decisions very differently now.”
Conversation
My father said: "#Cambodia didn’t look all that different.” Kissinger replied: "Cambodia was undertaken for very complicated reasons.” My father: "Henry, there hasn't been a rotten decision in this area for 20 years which wasn't undertaken for very complicated reasons."
Thinking about this story in light of the end of the war in #Afghanistan, spanning 20 yrs, 4 admins. “Do we really have anything to learn from history?” From the Russians in Afghanistan, the French in Indochina, our own war in #Vietnam? “We make decisions very differently now."
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