Interesting things happen when you are a self described socialist and you attend the Rockefeller University. That's right, the Rockefeller University. Whether or not you've heard of it is, for once, irrelevant. The name is all the information you need. Yes, it's the Rockefellers, like the Center, like Chase Manhattan Bank, with its connections to the world bank and beyond; the Rockefellers, who made their money breaking every anti-trust law possible and yet have the fucking balls to have an 'informative' board just inside the main door to the school entitled 'The Art of Getting and the Art of Giving'. Yes, my education is being funded by the union-breaking-blood-money of one of our nations most famous and infamous families, and I understand the precarious place that places my politics around here.

Additionally, the Rockefeller Family has had an illustrious relationship with the Kissinger family. Who convinced the US government to let the Shah of Iran come into the country for medical treatment but David D. Rockefeller (who will one day, God willing, hand me my doctoral diploma) and Henry A. Kissinger. And none other than Nancy Kissinger, the good Doctor's wife, is a longstanding member of the Rockefeller board. The Kissingers are, from my understanding, consistently the largest donors to the Rockefeller graduate school.

It should not be shocking, therefore, that Henry Kissinger would be invited to Rockefeller to speak. It should also not be surprising that I would be entirely disgusted by one of the 20th century's most notorious war criminals (arguments to follow) would be invited to speak at my institution of higher education. I am all for freedom of speech, but can we not draw the line at inviting a man with this much blood on his hands to campus? And now that the truth about his policies and, from an international law point of view, crimes has largely been revealed, why are we taking anything this man has to say about policy decisions seriously?

Just a quick reminder of some of Kissinger's accomplishments, feel free to skip this section if you already know or simply don't care (although you fucking should care):

Under Nixon, Kissinger was the chief architect of the war in South East Asia. It should be stated that he was widely credited with halting the talks that could have ended the war in 1968 to help ensure that Nixon would ultimately be elected. Kissinger orchestrated the bombing of Cambodia that was almost certainly illegal under international law and that killed some where on the order of 600,000 civilians. He was also involved in the mass bombing campaigns in Vietnam and the use of defoliating chemicals, such as agent orange, that had an unspeakable impact on the civilian population of the region.

Kissinger is also reported to have given tacit approval for Indonesia's invasion of East Timor. What is known, however, is that due to President Ford and Kissinger's policies, the weapons that the Indonesian government needed to pursue their policy were supplied by the US, even though the White House knew the weapons would not be used in accordance with international law. East Timor was brutally occupied until 1999 when the Clinton administration ceased the military aid that Indonesia required and an international peace keeping force was installed. The reports of deaths range from the tens to hundreds of thousands East Timorese, again killed with weapons supplied by the US.

Finally, the case where Kissinger has actually received the most attention from courts at home and abroad. In 1973 the Chilean military, led by Pinochet, overthrew the democratically elected government of Chile. The US, under Nixon with Kissinger as Secretary of State, had worried that the socialist government of Allende in Chile put American interests at risk. While the American role in the coup is still debated, Kissinger himself admits to "help(ing) them" and "creat(ing) the conditions as great as possible". In the violence that followed the coup, many loyal to Allende were tortured and killed. The governments of France, Spain, Argentina, Chile and Uruguay, and several US based civil cases, have sought to question Kissinger under oath about his involvement in this coup. He has patently refused all questioning.

So yeah, Kissinger, in my eyes, is a pretty bad dude. Whether or not you agree that communism was a major problem that had to be defeated in the early 1970s, I hope we can all agree that orchestrating a bombing spree that kills hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians simply cannot be justified. And yet, this man, who willingly flaunted international law, not only walks free but is still an advisor to major policy makers, and is still invited to give distinguished lectures at prestigious universities.

So naturally my cute little socialist ass wants to get my rabble rouse on and, because we cannot stop him from coming to campus, at least make it known that there are sections of our community who do not approve of Dr. Kissinger, not one bit. Turns out there is a section of the community, and it consists of about six people.

We organized, and we fliered, and we argued, and he came. Turns out Dr. Kissinger didn't come to talk, but rather to be interviewed. And who better to interview him than his very own former PhD student and modern day sycophant Leslie Gelb. Kissinger was welcomed by the introduction, "Whether you agree with him or not, you must admit that Kissinger is one of the great minds of the 20th century." Clearly no opposing views would be proposed, or difficult questions asked. Kissinger talked for under an hour largely about Chinese intentions and the situation in the middle east. Much of what he said seemed partially credible. His slow, accented speech and subtle wit certainly endeared him to the majority of the crowd. At times it was difficult to remember the larger than life crimes this man is accused of committing with the use of his pen on paper. Is this short, heavy, cute old man really the embodiment of evil that he is reported to be.

Yes.

I woke up when he was talking about Iran. He said that, contrary to popular belief, the US and Iran weren't always at odds. We got along just fine, he said, when the Shah was in power. Well yes, Henry, we did. But of course we did, since he was our despotic puppet. And the CIA was directly involved in the coup that placed him in power, overthrowing the democratically elected government that wanted to use Iranian resources for.... IRANIANS. And the Shah was not terribly popular, to say the least, and was overthrown in 1979 leading to the government that now exists. So yes, we got along great with Iran as long as we, and not the people of Iran, were governing.

Then the rest of the talk came back to me, the cute quips fell away, the old body stopped instilling sympathy. US as the indispensable force. US interests trump any other consideration. China seen through the lens of US hegemony. Dido the middle east. What an oppressive and historically dangerous world view! Yes, Kissinger is a man who can, and has, put US interests above the lives of hundreds of thousand of civilians.

I will skip over the question and answer section, and the deference exhibited by the audience. I want to move on to my dinner with the war criminal.

At these lectures students and postdoctoral fellows along with members of the board and professors, are invited to dine with the speaker and continue the discussion in a less formal setting. Because I am always in front of my email and respond in t-minus 2 seconds, i often get to attend these dinners. They can be interesting and intimate, a chance to ask questions of some of the great thinkers in our country. I do not consider Henry Kissinger a great mind. After the lecture I had had just about enough, and I didn't want to go to dinner. I was convinced by a faculty member, also attending, who encouraged me to ask a tough question.

Kissinger is, thank God, not at my table. Given his generous giving to our institution and his wife's membership on the board, me throwing food at him and attempting a citizens arrest would probably not have gone down too well. We eat, we argue amongst ourselves about the role of the US as the world's supreme power (why is it so hard for Americans to understand that this immediately subjugates other countries to secondary roles and is inherently oppressive?!?!?! come on folks!). And then the questioning beings again. Again complete deference to this man who certainly MUST be posed one uncomfortable question.

I raise my hand. I decided not to ask about the moral minefield that is South East Asia, although I consider it likely the most interesting and pertinent topic. Instead I ask if, as Christopher Hitchens postulates, the arrest of Pinochet in Spain made Kissinger worried that scrutiny would reveal potential breaches of international law in his conduct and why he had thus far refused to answer questions posed by justices in France and Spain regarding the Chile coup.

Kissinger did not like my question. He seemed not to understand. He looked to the moderator. He ranted a bit about Hitchens, called much of his book a fabrication. He asked what specifically I was asking about and I said the charge that the US provided material support to the military insurgents in Chile both before and after the coup. He went into his talking point on this question, that he was involved early on in 1970 but had no involvement, direct or indirect, in the coup. This is at least partially contradicted by unclassified documents in which he and Nixon discuss the situation.

Kissinger then looks at me, argues that a civil discussion can be had about whether the right policies were enacted in Chile, but it is not a criminal matter. Never mind international law. Never mind foreign justice systems investigating the legality of the US role. Never mind the transcripts that include talk of 'neutralizing' a Chilean general unwilling to go along with the military take over.

Then the best bit. Kissinger looks at me. Tells me if i do any research on my own I would see the truth, and not what Christopher Hitchens says is the truth (never mind the declassified documents), and tells me that I've basically asked an insulting question and he doesn't have time to go into it any further.

If I made a few moments of Henry Kissinger's life unpleasant, maybe the day wasn't a total loss.