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A review by alok_pandey
The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a Forgotten Genocide by Gary J. Bass
4.0
First of all, Mr. Bass deserves a big bow simply for the effort he put in this book. Get this, almost 45% of the length of the ebook I read are just references!! Bass waded through innumerable books and journals to get his facts right and place them in context in addition to transcribing thousands of hours of White House official tapes and extracting relevant stuff out of it then. This book is no minor feat.
Now, about the book. Meticulously written by, it narrates the events during the 1971 crisis, that happened primarily between March and December, that led to Indo-Pak war and creation of an independent Bangladesh.
The book’s primary concern is the ogre forgotten and overlooked genocide perpetrated by the Pakistani state on (then) East Pakistani subjects, and that after denying them a justifiably and democratically won autonomy.
The second bigger concern is the role of American government in consistently propping up and supporting Pakistani generals to serve their own interests wrt China, cold-blooded cold war calculations and an unmissable hatred that reeks of shocking prejudice and almost verges on mind-numbing racism towards India and Indians, particularly coming from Nixon and Kissinger.
Reading through the transcripts, you often can’t believe that the conversation was done in the most powerful office of one the then superpowers of the world. Decisions, including those that decided the fate of other nations and communities, were made at whim and often by using twisted facts and ignoring protocols. A public office was used as private fiefdom and Congress was blindsided while blatantly violating the laws.
Henry Kissinger, is widely reviled today and going by his words in the cables, I can definitely see why. He has often been touted as one of the messiahs of realpolitik and to some extent it appeared so as well. But, in many instances, that is so not true and many of his viewpoints and decisions look plain stupid and illogical driven solely by a false sense of intellectual-superiority. There were times when even Nixon and his own staff started doubting his sanity.
The book doesn’t have that much detailed analysis on Indian thoughts and views during the period and the author provides the reason for that too as the lack of availability of exhaustive references and much of Indira-era document are still not declassified. That, if it were available, would have made the book next to perfect to understand the crisis in a comprehensive sense. Regardless, the book is still one of the best sources available on the subject and will be sourced by future works for a long time, in my opinion.
Now, about the book. Meticulously written by, it narrates the events during the 1971 crisis, that happened primarily between March and December, that led to Indo-Pak war and creation of an independent Bangladesh.
The book’s primary concern is the ogre forgotten and overlooked genocide perpetrated by the Pakistani state on (then) East Pakistani subjects, and that after denying them a justifiably and democratically won autonomy.
The second bigger concern is the role of American government in consistently propping up and supporting Pakistani generals to serve their own interests wrt China, cold-blooded cold war calculations and an unmissable hatred that reeks of shocking prejudice and almost verges on mind-numbing racism towards India and Indians, particularly coming from Nixon and Kissinger.
Reading through the transcripts, you often can’t believe that the conversation was done in the most powerful office of one the then superpowers of the world. Decisions, including those that decided the fate of other nations and communities, were made at whim and often by using twisted facts and ignoring protocols. A public office was used as private fiefdom and Congress was blindsided while blatantly violating the laws.
Henry Kissinger, is widely reviled today and going by his words in the cables, I can definitely see why. He has often been touted as one of the messiahs of realpolitik and to some extent it appeared so as well. But, in many instances, that is so not true and many of his viewpoints and decisions look plain stupid and illogical driven solely by a false sense of intellectual-superiority. There were times when even Nixon and his own staff started doubting his sanity.
The book doesn’t have that much detailed analysis on Indian thoughts and views during the period and the author provides the reason for that too as the lack of availability of exhaustive references and much of Indira-era document are still not declassified. That, if it were available, would have made the book next to perfect to understand the crisis in a comprehensive sense. Regardless, the book is still one of the best sources available on the subject and will be sourced by future works for a long time, in my opinion.