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Dear Friends and Supporters,

We join with millions of Americans to pay our respects to Dr. Henry Kissinger, who passed away last night at age 100. He served for 4 years as an honorary advisor to With Honor Action. At the bottom of this email, please find 4 excerpts of videos we recorded together.

Marine WWII veteran and former Secretary of State George Shultz, served on our Advisory Board and introduced me to Dr. Kissinger in 2018, shortly after we established With Honor. They were friends, and we had a memorable conversation together once about trust that echoes in Secretary Shultz's final op-ed ([link removed]) from December, 2020: "The 10 most important things I've learned about trust over my 100 years."

I met Dr. Kissinger for the first time in his apartment in New York shortly after Secretary Shultz's introduction. I read Walter Isaacson's biography about him in advance, and we spoke about a chapter in his life that Dr. Kissinger rarely spoke about publicly, but that shaped his leadership in profound ways: his service in WWII.

Dr. Kissinger fled Germany at age 15 with his father, a school teacher, and his mother and brother. The Army drafted him in 1943, naturalized him, and deployed him to the Battle of the Bulge as a private. He joined the Counter-Intelligence Corps, attained the rank of sergeant, and he earned a Bronze Star. The medal citation notes his work arresting former Gestapo members who had carried out the Holocaust: "Sgt. Kissinger ... established chains of informants reaching into every phase of civilian life, resulting in the detection and arrest of numerous persons identified as enemy agents engaged in espionage and sabotage."

This chapter in Isaacson's book is worth revisiting in its entirety. I think Dr. Kissinger would have appreciated me sharing the following excerpt in particular:

"Kissinger also played on German pride, perfecting a trick commonly used in the Counter-Intelligence Corps. He would tell each suspected Nazi, 'We know you're not that important, you're just a small fry,' until the suspect's pride would cause him to erupt that he was in fact a high-ranking local Nazi.

Kissinger did not savor revenge. Despite what the Nazis had inflicted on his family and his fellow Jews, he soon lost his stomach for arresting Gestapo members. 'After a while, it got too messy picking up so many Gestapo--wives were crying, children clinging. So I sent an MP (military police) around with my Nazi all over lower Saxony. I think I brought in more Gestapo this way than all the rest of the Army.'

On the impact of his service in WWII, Isaacson quotes Dr. Kissinger and his younger brother Walter:

"'It was an Americanization process,' said Kissinger. 'It was the first time I was not with German Jewish people. I gained confidence in the Army.' .... Says his brother, Walter: 'Both of us found our way, got ourselves going, became who we are, because of our time in the service."

The video excerpts below in his own words build on these sentiments, and speak to why he believed in our mission to fight our debilitating polarization in Congress with principled veterans who serve with the courage to be bipartisan. We are grateful for his service to With Honor and in so many roles to our nation throughout his remarkable career.

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Dr. Henry Kissinger speaks at the With Honor Action Memorial Day Tribute with the Arlington Ladies in 2020.

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Dr. Henry Kissinger speaks at a With Honor Action Tribute to the late Secretary of Defense Ash Carter in April 2023.
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Dr. Henry Kissinger recalls his relationship with John McCain, what it meant to his life, and the challenging moment we face now as a nation during his remarks at a dinner at the McCain Institute in November 2023.

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Dr. Henry Kissinger speaks about the October 7th Hamas attacks on Israel at a McCain Institute dinner on October 12th, 5 days after the attacks.

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With Honor fights polarization in Congress by supporting principled veterans across party lines who pledge to service with integrity, civility, and courage. Learn more about our work at WithHonor.org

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