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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 May 2006
In an interview with Oriana Fallaci in 1972, Henry Kissinger, asked about the influence of Machiavelli on his thought, denied that the Florentine adviser of princes had had any influence on him at all:
'There is really very little of Machiavelli's one can accept or use in the contemporary world. . . . If you want to know who has influenced me most, I'll answer with two philosophers' names: Spinoza and Kant. Which makes it all the more peculiar that you choose to associate me with Machiavelli.' [The New Republic, 16 December 1972, page 21)
We may suspect, of course, that if Kissinger had learned anything at all from Machiavelli, the last thing he would want to do, given Machiavelli's reputation as a teacher of evil, would be to admit it. If a leader cannot actually be virtuous, Machiavelli tells us, he must at least try to seem virtuous (unless, in the particular circumstances, seeming vicious will be more helpful in maintaining his position).
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