February 28, 2021: updated commentary: Notes on Between Two Ages by Zbigniew Brzezinski: PDF, EPUB/PDF/HTML

Comments on Between Two Ages by Zbigniew Brzezinski
By Alan Mercer

(From Between Two Ages: America’s Role in the Technetronic Era, 1970, The Viking Press, New York)

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Background

The acknowledgments are dated 1969.   The back cover describes Brzezinski as “the director of the Research Institute on Communist Affairs and Professor of Government at Columbia University.”

The movie “Invisible Empire: A New World Order Defined” contains more information about Brzezinski.    Author and former Canadian diplomat, Peter Dale Scott, is interviewed for the film, and for one of the extras, and states that they were in the same class together at McGill University in Montreal, Canada.

There is a long bio at the Center for Strategic and International Studies website. Much of the bio relates facts that occur after Between Two Ages was written.   Extracting part of it, Brzezinski was a member of the

“Policy Planning Council of the Department of State from 1966 to 1968 … director of the Trilateral Commission from 1973 to 1976 … From 1977 to 1981, Dr. Brzezinski was national security adviser to President Jimmy Carter. In 1981, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his role in the normalization of U.S.-China relations and for his contributions to the human rights and national security policies of the United States. He was also a member of the President’s Chemical Warfare Commission (1985), the National Security Council–Defense Department Commission on Integrated Long-Term Strategy (1987–1988), and the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (1987–1989). In 1988, he was cochairman of the Bush National Security Advisory Task Force, and in 2004, he was cochairman of a Council on Foreign Relations task force that issued the report Iran: Time for a New Approach. Dr. Brzezinski received a B.A. and M.A. from McGill University (1949, 1950) and Ph.D. from Harvard University (1953)….”

According to the New York Sun (http://www.nysun.com/national/despite-criticism-obama-stands-by-adviser/62534/), Zbigniew Brzezinski has also been a top foreign policy adviser for Barack Obama.

It’s too long to get into here, but in a 1998 interview, translated from French and published by Counterpunch, Brzezinski explains how the Carter administration began the aid to the Mujahadeen before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.   Relevant Youtube videos: here (amazing speech by Brzezinski to the Mujahadeen) and here (see photos and a quote from another of Brzezinski’s books).   Also I noticed a series, Our Own Private Bin Laden which looks very relevant.

Continued: Part 2
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