China had never had to deal in a world of countries of approximately equal strength, and so to adjust to such a world, is in itself a profound challenge to China, which now has fourteen countries on its borders, some of which are small, but can project their nationality into China, some of which are large, and historically significant, so that any attempt by Chinese to dominate the world, would involve in a disastrous for the peace of the world.
Interpretation
China faces a complex challenge in adjusting to a world with equally powerful nations.
Henry A. Kissinger highlights the unique geopolitical challenge faced by China as it navigates relationships with fourteen neighboring countries. The quote emphasizes the balance of power and the potential consequences of any aggressive actions taken by China towards global dominance, underlining the importance of cooperation for maintaining world peace.
In practice
In a discussion about international relations, one might quote this to emphasize the need for careful diplomacy with rising powers.
Every civilization that has ever existed has ultimately collapsed. History is a tale of efforts that failed, or aspirations that weren’t realized. So, as a historian, one has to live with a sense of the inevitability of tragedy.
Blessed are the people whose leaders can look destiny in the eye without flinching but also without attempting to play God.
It was a Greek tragedy. Nixon was fulfilling his own nature. Once it started it could not end otherwise.
The absence of alternatives clears the mind marvelously.
If peace is equated simply with the absence of war, it can become abject pacifism that turns the world over to the most ruthless.
What political leaders decide, intelligence services tend to seek to justify.
When war becomes the most profitable course of action, we can certainly expect more of it.
We know one another. This is the present. There is no past and no future. Here I am washing my hands, and the cracked mirror shows me to myself, suspended as it were, in time; this is me, this moment will not pass.
I feel like I could be likened to an old hound circling on a rug for the last five years.
Reality is a cliché from which we escape by metaphor.
Our humble service attitude in our life is what determines what effect chanting will have on our consciousness. Otherwise we can be chanting for millions and millions of births before we actually achieve the goal.
Coffee makes us severe, and grave and philosophical.
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