Recently, White House tapes made public after being out of the purview of the secrecy law revealed that former US President Richard Nixon is talking about Indians with great disregard and that he and his National Security Advisor How did Henry Kissinger’s bigotry affect America’s policies towards India and South Asia while he was president. In the New York Times, Professor Gary Bass of Princeton University wrote, “While Americans are struggling with racism and power problems, recently made White House tapes made by President Richard M. Nixon and his National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger Are a living example of bigotry.
Bass has written this column titled “The Terrible Cost of Presidential Racism”. Bass, the author of the book ‘The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger and a Forgotten Genocide’, wrote in his column, ‘The records in these tapes reveal the entire range of American policies towards South Asia during Nixon’s tenure for Indians. Their hatred and sexual distraction were affected. ‘ Nixon belonged to the Republican Party and was the 37th President of the United States from 1969 to 1974.
Bass says the tapes made public are a record conversation between Nixon, Kissinger, and the then White House Chief of Staff Heldman in the Oval Office in June 1971, with Nixon saying in a very ‘toxic tone that Indian women are undoubtedly the world’. I am the most unattractive. ‘
According to the tapes, Nixon described Indians as ‘most sexless (not wanting sex)’, despised and pathetic.
Bass writes, “During a private holiday from the controversial White House summit on November 4, 1971 with India’s Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, the then world’s rarest female leader, the President spoke to Kissinger about his sexual devotion to Indians.
Referring to Indians, Nixon told Kissinger, ‘For me, they calm my sexual excitement. Henry, tell me, how they increase the sexual excitement of other people. Along with this, Bass writes that in the meantime Kissinger responds in an almost indescribable tone ‘It did not distract the President from his subject.’ At the same time, in the midst of a discussion on Indo-Pak tension with Kissinger and Foreign Minister William Rodger in November 1971, when Roger (Indira) is talking about threatening Gandhi, the President says, “I don’t understand how he was a child We do.’
Bass writes in the New York Times that Kissinger showed himself as having risen above Nixon’s White House racism but in these tapes he appears to be ‘involved in bigotry, though not based on these tapes Can be done whether he was really with the prejudices of the President or did it just to please him.
For example, on June 3, 1971, Kissinger was full of ‘hatred’ towards Indians as India sheltered millions of Bengali refugees who had fled the Pakistani army. Kissinger blamed the Indians for the influx of refugees and criticized all Indians, saying, “They (Indians) are sorting people (from the garbage heap to something useful).”
