The monkey and the organ-grinder
Between 1969 and 1973 Henry Kissinger conducted secret negotiations with North Vietnamese diplomats in an effort to negotiate a face-saving end to the Vietnam War for President Nixon.
Kissinger was undoubtedly very bright, he had three degrees from Harvard and had written a raft of papers and books on international diplomacy and arms control. Kissinger also rated himself as a formidable negotiator. When a journalist asked him what personal qualities it took to be a diplomat Henry replied,
“Knowledge of what I am trying to do. Knowledge of the subject. Knowledge of the history and psychology of the people I am dealing with. And some human rapport…To have some human relations with the people I am negotiating with. This takes some rough edges off. They will make concessions they wouldn’t otherwise make.”
In his first secret meeting with North Vietnamese diplomats in Paris he believed he had made progress. He reported back to Nixon the North Vietnamese had signaled possible concession.
Later Kissinger had to admit, the North Vietnamese had agreed to “nothing more than a willingness to hold future secret discussions at unspecified future dates.”
Xuan Thuy Hanois’s representative “had no authority to negotiate. His job was psychological warfare,” Kissinger later concluded.
Kissinger had made the elementary error of confusing “the monkey with the organgrinder.”
The dangers of negotiating with someone who has no authority is something we all need to guard against.
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