Accused: Henry Kissinger
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Accused: Henry Kissinger |
| Original title | The Trials of Henry Kissinger |
| Country of production | France , USA , UK , Denmark , France , Canada , Australia |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 2002 |
| length | 80 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Eugene Jarecki |
| script |
Alex Gibney , Christopher Hitchens |
| production | Alex Gibney, Eugene Jarecki |
| music | Peter Nashel |
| camera |
Greg Andracke , Mark Benjamin , Gary Grieg , Christopher Li , Brett Wiley |
| cut | Simon Barker |
| occupation | |
| |
Accused: Henry Kissinger is an American documentary from the year 2002 , based on the book The Trial of Henry Kissinger by Christopher Hitchens is based. The film was directed by Eugene Jarecki . In the original, the actor Brian Cox actsas the narrator.
Like the book, the film deals with war crimes and illegal covert operations , for which the former security advisor to the US President and later US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger is said to have been responsible or jointly responsible.
background
After East Timor's independence and the end of the right-wing military dictatorships in many Latin American countries in the 1980s and 1990s, politically motivated crimes from the past of these countries began to be dealt with. In this context, from around the 1990s, the USA's joint responsibility for state crimes was increasingly investigated by courts and investigative journalists . Courts in France, Spain and several Latin American countries wanted to summon Kissinger and question him about his involvement in the human rights violations in Latin America, in particular the violent disappearance and murder of hundreds of thousands of people, the so-called Desaparecidos , by the US-backed military regimes in Chile and Argentina especially in the 1970s. Kissinger never followed these court summons.
For information on the role of Kissinger and the US in Latin America, see: Relations between Latin America and the United States # US support for authoritarian rule
content
Hitchens justified the writing of the original book The Kissinger Files with the fact that he was of the opinion that Kissinger was a very fearful man who was startled by the arrest of the Chilean General Pinochets . In 1998, ex-dictator Augusto Pinochet was arrested in London on charges of crimes during his rule in Spain. The film essentially deals with the allegations against Kissinger that have been made by various politicians, journalists, human rights experts and lawyers from all over the world. Author Hitchens, other journalists, human rights activists, and friends of Kissinger such as Alexander Haig have their say . In addition, archive recordings of Kissinger, who himself did not participate in the film, are recorded.
Comments on Hitchens' allegations
Kissinger himself
Kissinger comments on Hitchens' attacks by mentioning that he also criticized Mother Teresa and Jackie Kennedy and also denied the Holocaust . He wasn't going to do Hitchens a favor of answering him. Hitchens himself then announced that he would sue Kissinger for defamation, in particular for his allegation of Holocaust denial .
Other journalists
The investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said that Kissinger's "dark side" was "been very, very dark." The editor-in-chief Lewis Lapham of Harper's Magazine , which printed excerpts from Hitchens' book "The Kissinger Files", said of Kissinger's reaction that he had no substantive arguments against the publication and content of the book other than insults.
Alexander Haig
Former Kissinger employee and later US Secretary of State Alexander Haig said he was disgusted by Hitchens. He asks the interviewee to pay attention to Hitchens' background without going into detail about what he means by that. He calls this disrespectfully as a sewage pipe suckers ( sewer pipe sucker ).
Structure and plot
Kissinger's life is shown in brief excerpts: He grew up as a German Jew in Fürth in the 1920s and 1930s. At school he was teased and beaten up for being smaller and smarter than everyone else. In particular, he suffered from the ever-increasing anti-Semitism , which was intensified by the propaganda of the National Socialists . In 1938 his father decided to leave Germany and immigrate to the USA. Kissinger served in the US Army and was stationed in Germany as a soldier in the American military administration.
The career and rise of Kissinger as security advisor under President Nixon is briefly presented. Kissinger's intelligence and political talent are explicitly highlighted by the filmmaker.
Allegations in detail
Area bombing in Vietnam and Cambodia
Kissinger is accused of numerous crimes related to the Vietnam War . In particular, Hitchens accuses him of ending the war far too late for strategic reasons. Because of his foreign policy reputation, he let the war escalate more and more. In this context, a satirical program is shown in which a Kissinger doppelganger says that the best moment in his career was receiving the Nobel Peace Prize for ending the Vietnam War in 1973. The biggest failure was in 1975, when the Vietnam War actually ended.
In connection with this, the authors of the film emphasize the excessive bombing of Vietnam in December 1972 ( Christmas Bombing ), as well as the 500,000 deaths, 2 million refugees and the destruction of livelihoods that were a result of the illegal bombing of Cambodia . The rise of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge , which resulted in up to 3 million deaths, is portrayed as a direct result of the weakening of the Cambodian government that this caused . Hitchens called the Christmas bombing a "mass murder from the air" and said at the same time that there wasn't enough marble in the USA to engrave the names of the murdered Vietnamese in a memorial.
Kissinger himself is shown how he justifies the bombing of Cambodia: The Viet Cong would have seized parts of Cambodia at that time and from there carried out attacks against the USA in South Vietnam in violation of international law . Kissinger called it “absurd” to put up with such behavior.
Indonesian invasion of East Timor
The treatment of Vietnam and Cambodia is followed by an episode on Kissinger and President Ford's behavior towards Indonesia's head of state Haji Mohamed Suharto , whom the two explicitly gave the go-ahead for immediately before his military invasion and annexation of East Timor . With Washington's backing and arms deliveries, Suharto marched into East Timor. This practice was in violation of an American law, the Arms Export Control Act . This restricted the US's right to export arms when a country is not directly threatened. A violation of this was that there was no threat of an invasion of Indonesia by East Timor. The annexation of East Timor resulted in thousands of human rights violations and murders of the civilian population. The film shows survivors in East Timor wondering why no one helped them in the face of human rights violations and the massacres of the Indonesian military.
Coup in Chile
In Chile , the democratic election of the socialist politician Salvador Allende threatened US interests, especially the American copper industry. Allende wanted to nationalize the copper deposits whose mining rights were held by US companies. Kissinger said that if the irresponsibility of the Chilean people led to an election for Allende, they would have the right to intervene. Haig also justifies the behavior of the American government by stating that they did not want to tolerate any further Marxist regime in its hemisphere.
Kissinger prepared a conspiracy that "should shock the Chileans". In his memoir, Kissinger claims that he had nothing to do with the events in Chile, which official American documents refute. General René Schneider , who was loyal to the Chilean constitution and who would not have participated in a coup by right-wing pro-American military officials, was identified as the enemy of the United States. A kidnapping of Schneider was prepared. Criminals were recruited and given weapons and money by the CIA. Schneider was murdered while attempting to kidnap. In the film, Haig tries to downplay the significance of these events and says that they “only wanted to kidnap” him. Kidnapping is only a crime if you have base motives. Hitchens commented on this with the remark that no public prosecutor would give a murderer credit if he, standing next to the corpse, wanted to talk himself out of the fact that he only wanted to kidnap the victim.
An investigative commission, the Church Committee , questioned Kissinger about the events in Chile. The result of the investigation was that Kissinger was informed about every step of the kidnapping plan and had supported it. Shortly before the kidnapping, Kissinger claims to have revoked this plan. Former companions accuse Kissinger expressly of lying.
Wiretapping scandal
Furthermore, employees are shown who express their indignation that they were bugged by or with the knowledge of Kissinger.
Balance sheet
At the end of the film it is noted that the USA has implemented the principle of world law and has forced other countries to ratify it, but believes that it does not have to adhere to it itself. Seymour Hersh is quoted as saying that Henry Kissinger would in some moments realize the crimes he had committed and regret that Kissinger had to live with this memory.
criticism
- Matt Langdon: “You may feel compelled to watch the film twice or pick up a book on the subject. Two good reasons to make this a must see film. ” (German: You feel compelled to see the film twice or to read a book on the subject. Two good reasons that make the film a“ must-see ” have-seen-him-film ". )
- In his film review, film critic Roger Ebert asks himself whether it was the right choice to make Kissinger chairman of a committee after September 11, 2001 , which deals with the investigation of terrorist attacks.
Web links
- The Trials of Henry Kissinger ( Memento from January 8, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) YouTube video (English)
- Accused: Henry Kissinger YouTube video (German, 8 parts)
- Accused: Henry Kissinger in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The Trials of Henry Kissinger on Rotten Tomatoes
Individual evidence
- ↑ HELLMUTH VENSKY: Late honor for Victor Jara: Pinochet's henchmen tortured and shot him. 36 years after his death, the Chileans give popular and protest singer Victor Jara a dignified burial - in ZEIT on December 5, 2009
- ↑ Article in the Guardian
- ↑ a b c filmcritic.com engl. Website ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Kissinger's website ( Memento of the original from May 29, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ A b Film review by Roger Ebert
