Hewitt regards former Secretary of State Henry Kissenger's book, On China, as MUST READING for the foreign policy elite, every executive doing business in China, and every student hoping to do so someday. Hewitt writes:
Saturday July 9 marks the 40th anniversary of Henry Kissinger’s secret trip to China that began the process of opening the relationship between the United States and the People’s Republic and culminated in Richard Nixon’s visit to Beijing in February, 1972.
“There are two slightly different purposes in writing the book,” Kissinger told me in a wide-ranging interview yesterday (transcript here.)
“One is to explain how Chinese think about international affairs to non-Chinese,” he continued. “Not to explain the Chinese point of view so much as to explain the way of thinking, the different concepts of time, and the different concepts of deterrence and defense that the Chinese have.”
The second purpose is aimed at the Chinese.
“Now as far as the Chinese are concerned, what my book might do is show them how their actions are interpreted by other countries, and therefore, to the extent that they care about what other countries think, to enable them to conduct a policy that leads to cooperation rather than confrontation, if that is the decision they have made.”
Whether this second purpose is accomplished only Chinese officials can tell us, but Kissinger’s first mission is fully achieved and the result is alarming. . .
What was chilling to me was Hewitt's next-to-last paragraph:
The most troubling aspect of the book is its brisk review of the emerging “triumphalist party” inside the PRC. Proponents of this view argue that an epic duel is now underway between the U.S. and China, and that the West’s weakness is revealed by the financial crisis of 2008. This aggressive nationalism could mutate into something like the Japanese militarism of the early 20th century with, Kissinger told me, the same sort of results as that unhappy chapter. [more . . .]
Read Hewitt's interview with Kissenger about the book. It makes for fascinating reading.