Intelligence is not all that important in the exercise of power, and is often, in point of fact, useless.
Interpretation
Power does not always require intelligence and can sometimes thrive without it.
This quote suggests that intelligence may not be a crucial factor in effectively wielding power. In many political and leadership contexts, the ability to influence, manipulate, or control may overshadow intelligence as a necessary tool for success. Kissinger implies that those in power often operate based on practical considerations rather than intellectual capability, pointing out the complexities and perhaps flaws in leadership dynamics.
In practice
In a speech about political strategy, one might say, 'As Kissinger noted, intelligence is not all that important in the exercise of power.'
Every civilization that has ever existed has ultimately collapsed. History is a tale of efforts that failed, or aspirations that werenβt 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.
For the employee, the goal is to have full access to necessary information and as much independent decision-making ability as possible. For the entrepreneur, the goal is to grant as much information and independent decision-making ability to employees or contractors as possible.
The idea is not to block every shot. The idea is to make your opponent believe that you might block every shot.
We have no desire to be the world's policeman. But America does want to be the world's peacemaker.
A leader is not someone who says: Follow me.......A leader is someone who says: I'll go first.
If you hire people just because they can do a job, they'll work for your money, but if they believe what you believe, they'll work for you with blood and sweat and tears.
Firstly, you must always implicitly obey orders, without attempting to form any opinion of your own respecting their propriety. Secondly, you must consider every man your enemy who speaks ill of your king; and thirdly, you must hate a Frenchman, as you do the devil.
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