Zbigniew Quotes & Sayings

We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Potentially the most dangerous scenario would be a grand coalition of China, Russia and perhaps Iran, an 'anti-hegemonic' coalition, united not by ideology but by complementary grievances. . . . Averting this contingency . . . will require a display of US geostrategic skill on the western, eastern and southern perimeters of Eurasia simultaneously." - Zbigniew Brzezinski, former foreign policy adviser to Barack Obama — F. William Engdahl

We should seek to cooperate with Europe, not to divide Europe to a fictitious new and a fictitious old. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

It is conceivable that at some point a truly united and powerful European Union could become a global political rival to the United States. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Shortly, the public will be unable to reason or think for themselves. They'll only be able to parrot the information they've been given on the previous night's news. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Very early on, near the beginning of my writing life, I came to believe that I had to seize on some object outside of literature. Writing as a sylistic exercise seemed barren to me. Poetry as the art of the word made me yawn. I also understood that I couldn't sustain myself very long on the poems of others. I had to go out from myself and literature, look around in the world and lay hold of other spheres of reality. — Zbigniew Herbert

The first and most important is to emphasize the enduring nature of the alliance relationship particularly with Europe which does share our values and interests even if it disagrees with us on specific policies. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

go upright among those who are down on their knees
those with their backs turned those toppled in the dust

you have survived not so that you might live
you have little time you must give testimony

be courageous when reason fails you be courageous
in the final reckoning it is the only thing that counts

and your helpless Anger - may it be like the sea
whenever you hear the voice of the insulted and beaten — Zbigniew Herbert

I don't feel I was "born American," but my homeland was denied to me after the end of World War II and I craved something I could identify with. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Marxism represents a further vital and creative stage in the maturing of man's universal vision ... The nation-state is gradually yielding its sovereignty ... More intensive efforts to shape a new world monetary structure will have to be undertaken. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

I never exploited my father's role in helping Jews avoid the concentration camps. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

However, if Moscow regains control over Ukraine, with its 52 million people and major resources as well as access to the Black Sea, Russia automatically again regains the wherewithal to become a powerful imperial state, spanning Europe and Asia. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war? — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Too rich to be relevant to the world's poor, [Europe] attracts immigration but cannot encourage imitation. Too passive regarding international security. Too self-satisfied, it acts as if its central political goal is to become the worlds most comfortable retirement home. Too set in its ways, it fears multicultural diversity — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Bipartisanship helps to avoid extremes and imbalances. It causes compromises and accommodations. So let's cooperate. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

We cannot leap into world government through one quick step ... The precondition for eventual and genuine globalization is progressive regionalization because by that we move toward larger, more stable, more cooperative units. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

There are major disappointments with the outcomes of Solidarity: corruption, and major pockets of economic backwardness and even poverty. By and large, though, if there were a choice between the life Poles led in the 1970s and 1980s and now, nobody but a lunatic would say they wanted to have back what they had before. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The momentum of Asia's economic development is already generating massive pressures for the exploration and exploitation of new sources of energy and the Central Asian region and the Caspian Sea basin are known to contain reserves of natural gas and oil that dwarf those of Kuwait, the Gulf of Mexico, or the North Sea. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Because when you kill 300 people, 400 people, who have nothing to do with the provocations Hezbollah staged, but you do it in effect deliberately by being indifferent to the scale of collateral damage, you're killing hostages in the hope of intimidating those that you want to intimidate. And more likely than not you will not intimidate them. You'll simply outrage them and make them into permanent enemies with the number of such enemies increasing. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The world became more aware that America-despite being the hope of many who have the personal drive and ambition to become part of the "American dream"-is beset by serious operational challenges: a massive and growing national debt, widening social inequality, a cornucopian culture that worships materialism, a financial system given to greedy speculation, and a polarized political system — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Today it is infinitely easier to kill one million people than to control one million people. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

We thus find ourselves in the situation that the entire theory of man-made global warming-with its repercussions in science, and its important consequences for politics and the global economy-is based on ice core studies that provided a false picture of the atmospheric CO2 levels. — Zbigniew Jaworowski

The climatically inefficient and economically disastrous Kyoto Protocol, based on IPCC projections, was correctly defined by President George W. Bush as "fatally flawed". This criticism was recently followed by the President of Russia Vladimir V. Putin. I hope that their rational views might save the world from enormous damage that could be induced by implementing recommendations based on distorted science. — Zbigniew Jaworowski

The carpet is too soft. Also the palm tree in the lobby is unbelievable. For a long time the Maitre looks at our faces, shuffling passports in his hands. "Such dark-ringed eyes, such dark-ringed eyes. I knew a merchant from Smyrna, who also had a false front tooth. Nowadays one has to be terribly careful: informers and scorpions are everywhere."

In the elevator we stand facing the mirror, but already at the first jerk we see silvery mildew in the place of our faces. — Zbigniew Herbert

Be courageous when the mind deceives you Be courageous In the final account only this is important — Zbigniew Herbert

Sovereignty is a word that is used often but it has really no specific meaning. Sovereignty today is nominal. Any number of countries that are sovereign are sovereign only nominally and relatively. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

when the Lord built the world
he furrowed his brow
calculated calculated calculated
that is why the world is perfect
and uninhabitable

instead the world of the painter
is good
and full of mistakes
the eye wanders
from one color to another
one fruit to another
the eye mumbles
the eye smiles
remembers

the eye says it is bearable
only if one could
enter inside
there where the painter was
without wings
in slippers that fall off
without Virgil
with a cat in the pocket
a benevolent fantasy
and a hand
that unknowingly
corrects the world — Zbigniew Herbert

Study the world's skin before you set out to look for its heart. — Zbigniew Herbert

We have actually experienced in recent months a dramatic demonstration of an unprecedented intelligence failure, perhaps the most significant intelligence failure in the history of the United States. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

So is blurred
so is blurred
in me
what white-haired gentleman
separated once and for all
and said
this is the subject
this is the object

we fall asleep
with one hand under our head
and with the other in a mound of planets

our feet abandon us
and taste the earth
with their tiny roots
which next morning
we tear out painfully — Zbigniew Herbert

I think it is important to ask ourselves as citizens, not as Democrats attacking the administration, but as citizens, whether a world power can really provide global leadership on the basis of fear and anxiety? — Zbigniew Brzezinski

We cannot have that relationship if we only dictate or threaten and condemn those who disagree. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The ongoing changes in the distribution of global power and mounting global strife make it all the more imperative that America not retreat into an ignorant garrison-state mentality or wallow in self-righteous cultural hedonism — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Technology will make available to the leaders of major nations, techniques for conducting secret warfare, of which only a bare minimum of the security forces need be appraised ... techniques of weather modification could be employed to produce prolonged periods of drought or storm. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The scope of America's global hegemony is admittedly great, but its depth is shallow, limited by both domestic and external restraints. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Forgive me also that I didn't fight like Lord Byron for the happiness of captive peoples that I watched only risings of the moon and museums — Zbigniew Herbert

I think the US has the right to have its own national security policy. I think most Americans would agree with that. And therefore clarity on this issue is important and especially if we commit ourselves, explicitly and bindingly, to Israel's security. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Not to mention the fact that of course terrorists hate freedom. I think they do hate. But believe me, I don't think they sit there abstractly hating freedom. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The dead have need of fairy tales too. — Zbigniew Herbert

Moreover, they [the Central Asian Republics] are of importance from the standpoint of security and historical ambitions to at least three of their most immediate and more powerful neighbors, namely Russia, Turkey and Iran, with China also signaling an increasing political interest in the region. But the Eurasian Balkans are infinitely more important as a potential economic prize: an enormous concentration of natural gas and oil reserves is located in the region, in addition to important minerals, including gold. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The legitimacy of the leadership depends on what that country thinks of its leaders. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

I do not turn to history to draw from it an easy lesson of hope, but to confront my experience with that of others, to acquire something I might call universal compassion, and also a sense of responsibility, responsibility for the state of my conscience. — Zbigniew Herbert

With the more endowed nations constrained by their own higher technological capacity for self-destruction as well as by self interest, war may have become a luxury that only the poor peoples of this world can afford. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

To resolve conflicts, excessive ambitions and one's own fears and aspirationis must be sacrificed. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

An arc of crisis stretches along the shores of the Indian Ocean, with fragile social and political structures in a region of vital importance to us threatened with fragmentation. The resulting political chaos could well be filled by elements hostile to our values and sympathetic to our adversaries. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Ukraine, a new and important space on the Eurasian chessboard, is a geopolitical pivot because its very existence as an independent country helps to transform Russia. Without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be a Eurasian empire. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

As in all things, it is terribly important to have a sense of priorities in what you do. And to make certain that priorities do not clash. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Another threat, less overt but no less basic, confronts liberal democracy. More directly linked to the impact of technology, it involves the gradual appearance of a more controlled and directed society. Such a society would be dominated by an elite whose claim to political power would rest on allegedly superior scientific knowhow. Unhindered by the restraints of traditional liberal values, this elite would not hesitate to achieve its political ends by using the latest modern techniques for influencing public behavior and keeping society under close surveillance and control. Under such circumstances, the scientific and technological momentum of the country would not be reversed but would actually feed on the situation it exploits.
... Persisting social crisis, the emergence of a charismatic personality, and the exploitation of mass media to obtain public confidence would be the steppingstones in the piecemeal transformation of the United States into a highly controlled society. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

We didn't push the Russians to intervene, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

We look a little bit disorderly, indecisive, leaderless. That's a real problem, and that's a problem that concerns me particularly on foreign affairs. The presidency, not just President Obama, but the presidency in recent years has lost some of the terrain that they used to dominate in the making of foreign policy. I think President Obama has to make a serious effort to regain it because he lost some of it himself. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Hegemony is as old as mankind. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

No matter how deeply disturbing the thought of using the environment to manipulate behavior for national advantages to some, the technology permitting such use will very probably develop within the next few decades. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Nation state as a fundamental unit of man's organized life has ceased to be the principal creative force: International banks and multinational corporations are acting and planning in terms that are far in advance of the political concepts of the nation-state. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The Israelis have a lot of influence with Congress, and in some cases they are able to buy influence. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

American power worldwide is at its historic zenith. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

America is now the only global superpower, and Eurasia is the globe's central arena. Hence, what happens to the distribution of power on the Eurasian continent will be of decisive importance to America's global primacy and to America's historical legacy. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

If, after the election, you find a Cy Vance as Secretary of State and a Zbigniew Brzezinski as head of National Security, then I would say we failed. And I'd quit. — Hamilton Jordan

The language of the internet is English, and an overwhelming proportion of the global computer chatter also originates from America, influencing the content of global conversation. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

In the technotronic society the trend would seem to be towards the aggregation of the individual support of millions of uncoordinated citizens, easily within the reach of magnetic and attractive personalities exploiting the latest communications techniques to manipulate emotions and control reason. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Authors I've longed to write like - but realize I actually can't even begin to - include Poe, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Kafka, Daniil Kharms, Witold Gombrowicz, Emily Dickinson, Robert Walser, Barbara Comyns, Ntozake Shange, Camille Laurens, Zbigniew Herbert, and Jose Saramago. — Helen Oyeyemi

I thank You Lord for creating the world beautiful and various and if this is Your seduction I am seduced for good and past all forgiveness — Zbigniew Herbert

The dynamic character of China's nonstatist economic transformation, including its social openness to the rest of the world, is not mutually compatible in the long run with a relatively closed and bureaucratically rigid Communist dictatorship. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The United States can certainly defeat North Vietnam, but the United States cannot defeat a guerrilla war which is being raged from a sanctuary through a pattern of penetration, intervention, evasion, which is very difficult for a technologically advanced country like the United States to combat. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

To increase the zone of peace is to build the inner core of a stable international zone. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Today we are again witnessing the emergence of transnational elites ... [Whose] ties cut across national boundaries ... It is likely that before long the social elites of most of the more advanced countries will be highly internationalist or globalist in spirit and outlook ... The nation-state is gradually yielding its sovereignty ... Further progress will require greater American sacrifices. More intensive efforts to shape a new world monetary structure will have to be undertaken, with some consequent risk to the present relatively favorable American position. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

It cannot be stressed enough that without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire, but with Ukraine suborned and then subordinated, Russia automatically becomes an empire [95]. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Because you can't intervene everywhere, you don't conclude you can't intervene anywhere. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The anti-psychiatrists held various, sometimes conflicting views but one particular line of reasoning is attributable to all of them - they all pitched their arguments against the power of the psychiatric establishment. They argued that the psychiatric diagnosis is scientifically meaningless. It is a way of labeling undesirable behaviour, under the guise of medical intervention. Those who are diagnosed ill are subjected to treatment which is a violation of human rights and dignity. The situation amounts to psychiatry having a mandate to declare some citizens unfit to live in an 'ordinary' community. It claims to cure but the supposed beneficiaries of that cure are often held in hospitals against their will. Within a structure like this it is impossible to understand the real nature of mental suffering and it is just as impossible to develop a coherent system of help. — Zbigniew Kotowicz

We should be therefore supporting a larger Europe, and in so doing we should strive to expand the zone of peace and prosperity in the world which is the necessary foundation for a stable international system in which our leadership could be fruitfully exercised. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Henceforth, the United States may have to determine how to cope with regional coalitions that seek to push America out of Eurasia, thereby threatening America's status as a global power. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

At 2:26 AM on 3 June 1980, Colonel William Odom of the Strategic Air Command alerted National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski that the US nuclear warning system had detected an imminent 220-missile nuclear attack on the US. Shortly thereafter, the automated system revised its projection from 220 missiles to an all-out attack of 2200 missiles. Just before Brzezinski was about to wake up President Carter to authorize a counterattack, he was told that the 'attack' was an illusion caused by 'a computer error in the system'. — Stansfield Turner

Benchmarks are targets that have to be fulfilled. They cannot be fulfilled in an indefinite period of time, so there are timetables in benchmarks." (On the "benchmarks" used by George W. Bush — Zbigniew Brzezinski

When it comes to Jewish sensitivity, I don't find the proposition compelling that non-Jews have no right to comment. We all have the right to comment about each other. And I object when people say that these comments are motivated by anti-Semitism. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Israel's international position is very badly damaged. A country which started off as a symbol of recovery of a people who were greatly persecuted now looks like a country that is persecuting people. And that's very bad. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

It follows that America's primary interest is to help ensure that no single power comes to control this geopolitical space and that the global community has unhindered financial and economic access to it. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

People, governments and economies of all nations must serve the needs of multinational banks and corporations. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

And if the City falls and one survives
he shall carry the City within on the roads of exile
he shall be the City — Zbigniew Herbert

Like so many empires before it, the Soviet Union eventually imploded and fragmented, falling victim not so much to a direct military defeat as to disintegration accelerated by economic and social strains. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

This regionalization is in keeping with the Tri-Lateral Plan which calls for a gradual convergence of East and West, ultimately leading toward the goal of one world government. National sovereignty is no longer a viable concept. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

In fact, an Islamic revival - already abetted from the outside not only by Iran but also by Saudi Arabia - is likely to become the mobilizing impulse for the increasingly pervasive new nationalisms, determined to oppose any reintegration under Russian - and hence infidel - control. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Russia can be either an empire or a democracy, but it cannot be both ... Without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire, but with Ukraine suborned and then subordinated, Russia automatically becomes an empire. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Look at Islam in a rational manner and without demagoguery or emotion. It is the leading religion of the world with 1.5 billion followers. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The most immediate task is to make certain that no state or combination of states gains the capacity to expel the United States from Eurasia or even to diminish significantly its decisive arbitration role. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

One has to define very clearly what one's objectives are, determine in advance how much one is prepared to pay to achieve that objective and then act accordingly. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

For America, the chief geopolitical prize is Eurasia ... Now a non-Eurasian power is preeminent in Eurasia - and America's global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

We have a large public that is very ignorant about public affairs and very susceptible to simplistic slogans by candidates who appear out of nowhere, have no track record, but mouth appealing slogans — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Let's cooperate and challenge the administration to cooperate with us because within the administration there are also moderates and people who are not fully comfortable with the tendencies that have prevailed in recent times. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

There is an element of delusional obsession in the French political elite's preoccupation with the notion that France is still a global power. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

I have no patience for those in the American Jewish community who just go around slandering people as anti-Semites without realizing that what they're doing is really trivializing anti-Semitism. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The key point to bear in mind is that Russia cannot be in Europe without Ukraine also being in Europe, whereas Ukraine can be in Europe without Russia being in Europe. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

More directly linked to the impact of technology, it involves the gradual appearance of a more controlled and directed society. Such a society would be dominated by an elite whose claim to political power would rest on allegedly superior scientific know-how. Unhindered by the restraints of traditional liberal values, this elite would not hesitate to achieve its political ends by using the latest modern techniques for influencing public behavior and keeping society under close surveillance and control. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

I cite these events because I think they underline two very disturbing phenomena - the loss of U.S. international credibility, the growing U.S. international isolation. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

I was confident about America and the idea that in America people can become American without masking their ethnic identity. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Inanimate objects are always correct and cannot, unfortunately, be reproached with anything. I have never observed a chair shift from one foot to another, or a bed rear on its hind legs. And tables, even when they are tired, will not dare to bend their knees. I suspect that objects do this from pedagogical considerations, to reprove us constantly for our instability. — Zbigniew Herbert

There is an element of paranoia in this inclination to view any serious attempt at a compromised peace as somehow directed against Israel. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

It is said that the West had a global policy in regard to Islam. That is stupid. There isn't a global Islam. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Lord
I thank you for creating the world beautiful and various

and for allowing me in Your fathomless goodness to visit places which were not the sites of my daily torments — Zbigniew Herbert

In the long run, global politics are bound to become increasingly uncongenial to the concentration of hegemonic power in the hands of a single state. Hence, America is not only the first, as well as the only, truly global superpower, but it is also likely to be the very last. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

Our world is integrated to an unprecedented degree, while the global political awakening is injecting into interstate relations an intense amount of tension, emotion, even irrationality, which could cumulatively produce circumstances that preclude an effective and genuinely shared universal response to new global problems. — Zbigniew Brzezinski