I would say the greatest was Deng Xiaoping. At his age, to admit that he was wrong ... you need a great man to do that and to convince or override his Old Guard colleagues and say, now we go this different way.
LKY’S VIEW OF the dynamics behind contemporary historical events is complex. As any sophisticated man or woman knows, no one factor can explain all that happens in life, whether economics, game theory, culture, or even a Higher Power. But he is certain that great leaders at the top of their game can push history in desirable directions. Because he is a proponent of government elitism—always assuming the elite is highly qualified, deeply motivated and un-craven, which is one assumption—it is logical that he would find value in the Great Man Theory of History.
“Who were some other great men you’ve met?”
“I would say the greatest was Deng Xiaoping. At his age, to admit that he was wrong, that all these ideas, Marxism, Leninism, Maoism, they are just not working and have to be abandoned, you need a great man to do that and to convince or override his Old Guard colleagues and say, now we go this different way.”
Many Westerners would gasp at the thought of putting Deng on such a pedestal. After all, the most powerful communist leader since Mao was a known killer of political opponents. When he served under Mao he oversaw executions, gulags and famines made far more deadly by murderous state indifference. As Mao’s successor, he was the power at the throne in 1989, infamously pulling the trigger at Tiananmen Square that left at least several thousand unarmed Chinese civilians dead.
These well-known facts notwithstanding, Lee’s admiration is driven by an appreciation of Deng’s boldness in abandoning the debilitating ideology of communist economics for a mélange of opportunistic neo-capitalist or classic-entrepreneurial reforms. The historic effort was to wind up lifting hundreds of millions of Chinese out of poverty and bringing realistic hope to China for the first time in a very long time. The Singapore leader’s apparent tolerance of all things Deng may at times seem shocking, but it is consistent with his larger view that methods of government vary from culture to culture, and cannot be condemned out of hand if the net result is steady and/or dramatic improvement in the lot of the people. As a kind of pessimistic progressive, he doubts that any sizable omelet can be made without smashing a lot of eggs; what’s more, he accepts that getting all your eggs in order (and in a kitchen hot-house like China) is not ordinarily a tea-time process.
I then raise the issue of new studies and internal revelations that seek to cut Deng down to size by raising serious questions about his true commitment to reform.
“And you don’t buy the recent memoir revelation that there was less there than meets the eye?”
“He was?”
I repeat: “That there was less there than meets the eye in terms of his conversion to economic reform?”
“No, no, no. [I don’t buy] that Zhao Ziyang had started it in the western part of China. Yes, Zhao Ziyang [then a very high government official, well-known reformer, and Mao critic within top leadership circles] has started some market economics in the west, but Zhao Ziyang would not have had the clout to bring the whole leadership around and say, do this. I mean, there must have been many little signs to him that if you go towards a competitive market economy, it will work better because people want to work for themselves, not for the benefit of others. When they came here [and visited us in Singapore], that clinched it.”
I slip this in: “It’s like you suggested to him, sure, here in Singapore, the Chinese people are doing well. But back at home there’s a whole lot of Chinese people not doing well. So, what’s the difference between Singapore and China? It’s the system, right?”
Lee, nodding vigorously in agreement while still coughing: “As he opened up, he saved China.”
That is a breathtaking encomium to think about it: one man saved China. LKY stops here and executes a body movement that is so expressive and typical of him. I’ve seen it many times. It conveys something of a total physical and mental commitment to getting his answer exactly right. He takes your question, internalizes it, pivots 45 degrees away from you, kind of runs it up and down his internal body computer, then pivots back at you in the reverse 45-degree direction, and, with his hands out and up, like a conductor about to cue the orchestra, presents his view.
His thinking about China is based on two factors. One is his pragmatism: China exists and what are we going to do about it? The second is that China is Chinese, which on the whole he thinks a good thing. LKY is anything but pro-communist, to say the least; but anyone who would wish gargantuan China and its 1.4 billion people a condemnation to continual disaster, disease and dissolution is either evil or insane. And anyone who would have underestimated Deng, that little chain-smoking midget of a man, was to be proven as wrong as anyone could be.
I would say the greatest was Deng Xiaoping. At his age, to admit that he was wrong ... you need a great man to do that and to convince or override his Old Guard colleagues and say, now we go this different way.
Lee goes on, in an undertone of almost palpable anger: “At first he was condemned by the West.” Deng wanted to reform the country without undermining order, which might risk another monumental Cultural Revolution-like catastrophe. “They would have preferred him to be a Gorbachev and then see that China is in ruins.” He laughs. “And so then they patronized Deng,” he adds, shaking his head wearily.
Lee appreciates the late Deng not only as the strong leader of a sprawling country almost impossible to lead, but also as an historic Chinese leader whose rule began the corrective process of reversing European humiliation. Strong Chinese rule, under this vision, is not only an inevitability but also a necessity. In any positive Darwinian progression, the Chinese civilization would naturally rise to the top, along with other more capable races.
As that process proceeds in accordance with some historical rhyme and rhythm, the United States and the People’s Republic of China are forced to co-exist as sometimes-cooperating, sometimes-competing centers of gravity planted in the ground of (one dearly hopes) planetary stability. The latter half of the 21st century may well prove to be Asia’s time for dominance, as the 19th was the European Century. But that’s not going to evolve overnight by any means, and for the foreseeable future, the visionary quality and leadership capabilities of the United States will be central to world affairs, as of course they were during the last century, the well-named American one.
So, Lee worries as much about the top dogs in America as in China. As empathetic, if not chauvinistic, as Lee is about the Chinese surge, he is not one to assume America is finished anytime soon. A great admirer of entrepreneurial Americans, especially when they are at their most pragmatic and decent, he probably cares who is president at any one time as much, if not more, than the average American.
I ask: “So who is the greatest United States president that you’ve seen?”
“That I have seen?”
“Yeah. To whom you were close enough to make an assessment.”
His answer will surprise very many Americans.
“But for the misfortune of Watergate, I would say Richard Nixon. He had a realistic view of the world. He was a great analyst, realistic, but also a tactician to get things done. But this need with wanting to know everything and to make sure he got re-elected became obsessive. And, too, I think he was ill served by his two aides. What were they called?”
“Haldeman and Ehrlichman?”
“Yeah. I mean, they should have said, forget it, makes no difference.” But Nixon had to discover every single thing his political opponents were up to.
I say: “President Nixon ultimately didn’t have the character to get out of his own way.”
“No, he need not have done that. He was bound to win anyway.”
LKY wasn’t the only Asian leader sorry to observe Nixon’s unceremonious abdication from Washington—in a helicopter. If you poll the Asian elite of his generation, Nixon would probably be no worse than near the top of the list of American presidents who’ve impacted Asia positively. Especially among non-communist Asian leaders, the American war in Vietnam was much less unpopular than with the U.S. public.
But for the misfortune of Watergate, I would say Richard Nixon. He had a realistic view of the world. He was a great analyst, realistic, but also a tactician to get things done.
The opening to China, as preliminary as it was, continues to be viewed by many in Asia as an historical master stroke.
The main motive of Nixon and Kissinger was not to cater to Asian priorities or to be cool cats with China, to be sure, but to discomfort the Soviet Union as much as possible. But the collateral benefit was enormous: to open up a new chapter in Washington-Beijing relations.
Nixon first visited with LKY in 1967, before the California congressman (and once-defeated presidential candidate) went to the White House on his second try. The career Republican—and, it needs to be noted, career communist critic—trolled around the world to beef up his international portfolio (that is, to seem more like a statesman to the American voter). In particular, Harvard Professor Henry Kissinger, who was to become Nixon’s national security advisor and then secretary of state, had recommended the Singapore stop.
I ask LKY to look back through the decades: “I mean, what strikes me in your written memoirs about Nixon is, according to you, how much he listened to you.”
“Yes, of course.”
Well, modesty probably isn’t my strongest suit, either.
I say: “But Americans, of course, are not known necessarily as being good listeners.”
“He not only listened, he took notes.”
“That’s what I’m doing!”
He brushed off the pale effort at humor like old lint: “No, he asked me about Mao. So, I gave him a graphic assessment of what I thought Mao was doing. I said that Mao is painting on a mosaic with 5,000 years of history behind the mosaic. He’s painting his picture on it. The rains will come. What he’s said will be washed away, what’s been settled for 5,000 years will remain. This is Confucius.”
That was a striking image: that the DNA of the culture remains far more deeply embedded than some modern ideological flimflam.
Me asking: “You think they’ll ever take that gosh-awful picture [of Mao] down in Tiananmen?”
“Eventually, but not now. I mean, that’s the present ruling elite’s label of legitimacy. He freed China from feudalism.”
In 1969, at the White House, LKY met with Nixon a second time. The father of modern Singapore reiterated his view that the feral Cultural Revolution would someday peter out, as would many of Mao’s ill-conceived ‘campaigns’ to transform China, but that the U.S. intervention in Vietnam must not end too quickly.
Note that Nixon and Kissinger endured fierce domestic criticism for the turtle-pace of their reluctant withdrawal from Vietnam; but, according to Lee’s advice at the time, slowing it down was exactly the way to go. One wonders about the enormity of the impression of Lee’s views on Nixon and Kissinger!
Lee supported a policy that was known as Vietnamization—equipping the anti-communist Vietnamese to fight the communists themselves. Lee sincerely believed that an abrupt U.S. forces pullout would have emboldened the Vietnamese communists, their allies and their sympathizers to knock over one Southeast Asian country after another like, well, wavering dominos. Lee is second to no one I know in his view that the Marxist-Leninist is first and foremost interested in seizing and keeping power. Everything else (economic development, social justice) is much further from the heart.
Note that Kissinger’s secret visit to Beijing in 1971 to prepare for Nixon’s secret visit in 1972 was not by any means the sole reason for Asia’s high regard for the former Harvard professor. It was also his well-articulated sense of world political dynamics as being so deeply rooted in history and culture that significant change does not come easily, and often arrives convulsively. In this regard the Kissinger mind-set seemed more Asian than American.
“And from the standpoint of secretary of state, I take it that you’re a fan of Kissinger?”
“Sorry?” I catch him fiddling with the heat pad again.
“You’re a fan of Kissinger, right?”
“Yes,” and then he added another name of a Republican president’s secretary of state—George Shultz: “They’re both stable, they’re comprehensive in their approach. Kissinger has the advantage of being more expressive with words. George Shultz hasn’t quite got the same literary style. He’s very precise. So, he hasn’t got the free-flowing, colorful, contrapuntal balance of Kissinger’s German balanced, rounded, long phrases.”
Me saying: “Well, not only that, but someone who knows George well says that George is so parsimonious with words that when he’s talking, you almost get the feeling that he feels he has to part with $5 out of his own pocket for every extra word he uses.”
But LKY wasn’t buying that oft-told jibe about Shultz.
By contrast, Clinton’s secretaries of state never struck LKY as anything very special. The question is pushed not to make the case that, were he an American he’d be a Republican rather than a Democrat. Rather, it is aimed at showing the degree to which he is comfortable appraising ‘foreign talent’, and the extent to which Singapore’s fortunes ride on the abilities of the U.S. superpower elite to perform at a high level.
I tease this out: “Basically in foreign policy, Clinton wasn’t that strong, was he?”
“Well, Warren Christopher was not much. Then Madeleine Albright was not better.”
“She was worse?”
“She did not have the historical depth of Henry Kissinger.”
I say: “In public Christopher was probably bland, but at least he was very competent, and then, let’s see who else we’ve had? Then Bush had, as you would say, there was Cheney and Rumsfeld, really running it. Condi was...”
“And Colin Powell was pushed aside.”
He said it with sadness. LKY cares about the caliber of the elites running the top countries because he believes the priorities, conduct and decisions of the global elite are essential to securing a better future. Singapore without its governing elite would not be where it is today. Irrational democracies sometimes do little more than legitimize mob rule or policy preferences, not the surest route to quality governance; even at their best, they are hard put, in his view, to compete with truly qualified, non-corrupt and well-motivated elites.
Me asking: “Speaking of which, who’s the worst American president you had seen up close?”
“Carter. He’s a good God-fearing man. When you are the president of America to ruminate at Camp David, then come down to say Americans were in deep difficulties...”
“The infamous malaise speech in 1979.”
“No, your job as a leader is to inspire and to galvanize, not to share your distraught thoughts. You make your people dispirited.” For Lee, serious, competent governance requires making difficult policy choices and seeing them through to effect, even against strong opposition and the tide of public opinion.
“Is the second worst that you’ve seen Bush Jr., George W?”
“I would not put him the second worst. I would say Bush Jr.had melancholy advisers.”
Interesting choice of word—melancholy.
Then LKY throws out a really fine insight: “Bush Jr. knew he didn’t have much experience. It is virtue to know yourself.”
I mention that, prior to the Bush Jr. years, many Americans had a high view of Cheney, with his extensive experience in Congress and the Executive.
He nods—and wishes not to add anything more there. He has just zipped up his mouth!
I mention the 41st president of the United States, 43rd’s father.
“He was a balanced, thoughtful man. Unfortunately he had this thyroid problem during his re-election campaign and showed he had lost energy. Had he not been lethargic, he could have won. He had governed well; he had fought the first Iraq War well. The economic downturn couldn’t be helped.”
No, your job as a leader is to inspire and to galvanize, not to share your distraught thoughts. You make your people dispirited.
I jab in: “He also ran up against a phenomenal domestic politician, Bill Clinton.”
“No, had he not lost his energy, he would have won.”
I suggest again: “Well, the economy seemed to be tanking then.” Americans will well remember the Clinton campaign-staff motivational mantra in running against the senior Bush: “It’s the economy, stupid.”
“The economic downturn couldn’t be helped.”
I let that go, not agreeing—and he knew that I doubted his view—then saying: “Interesting. Well, what do you think of Clinton?”
“Very clever man, very political, likeable fellow because he’s got that outgoing personality.”
“Yeah, terrific personality.”
“When he talks to you, you are the most important person in the world. But I think, it’s generally true, he breaks the rules.”
“Too much American freedom?”
“Well, in his case, it’s partly his character. I don’t know. I mean, he had a difficult childhood and so on, so forth.”
I let the psychoanalysis go. But I am struck by two things.
One is his clinical analysis of the vaunted Clinton charm. It is clear that life had somehow immunized him to it. Legend has it that former China President Jiang Zemin also was immune to Clinton’s charm offensives, which, allegedly, he found quite offensive. But other than Zemin and LKY, there is only one other major world political figure publicly known to have found nothing whatsoever charming about the Arkansas charm-machine. That was George W. Bush, his successor.
I would say Bush Jr. had melancholy advisers.... [He] knew he didn’t have much experience. It is virtue to know yourself.
Question: so, besides their Clinton immunology, what in the world do LKY, Zemin and Bush Jr. have in common?
Think about it.
The other notable edge to Lee’s views is his complete contempt for a ruler who would be brought down by misconduct with a woman. His own public conduct with—and attitude about—women is evidently without controversy. There has never been a breath of scandal. His own writings reveal a near-worship toward his mother, and infinite love for his wife of many decades. His government’s social, political and economic policies have always forcefully favored equality of opportunity and achievement. They have created a women’s professional class that never existed on the island 50 years ago. It will take another generation or so, perhaps, for that equality to reach the very tip of the top of Singapore; but increasingly Singaporean women are in the driver’s seat. Unlike affirmative-action apologists, LKY would never rush women into top positions just for appearance’s sake; but he fully expects women to be well-represented in the next generation of Singapore leaders.
The motive was not so much ideology as practicality. LKY’s government was able to double the size of its (relatively tiny) adult workforce simply by enforcing policies to eliminate discriminations that hold women back. By the 80s and 90s, Singaporean women comprised world-class achievers in many professional fields. They were so capable and outstanding that they sometimes scared away potential suitors—Singaporean Chinese men who were culturally unprepared to relate to their partners as flat-out, even-up socioeconomic equals.
LKY once confided to me that he secretly admired the Japanese for slowing down this advance in order to maintain cultural continuity. There are a number of reasons why Singapore now has one of the lowest birth rates in Asia, but one of them is this: some powerhouse women scare the living daylights out of some Singaporean men. At the same time, Japan’s economy, on idle for two decades now, might have done better had women been more dynamically integrated in the workforce.
Singapore felt it had no choice. In the mid-60s, when it was forced out of a two-year trial federation with Malaysia, it was suddenly on its own—sink or swim. And so, the otherwise conservative Confucian culture didn’t have the luxury of going Japanese-slow on anything. In addition, the social and economic liberation of women (Chinese and family-oriented Confucian culture notwithstanding) fit well within Lee’s merit-driven instincts.
So I push on: “Well, luck of the draw, but the reason I’m asking these questions is not only because I’m interested in what you actually think, but also just look at the American system and our allegedly terrific system of democracy. Have we produced the best?
“Let me just look at Singapore. You used to have Kishore Mahbubani at the UN, and he was terrific. Before that, you had Tommy Koh, and he was terrific. Your long-running lady diplomat, Chan Heng Chee, in Washington, is terrific. I mean, they’ve all punched above their weight. I’m a fan of George Yeo, your foreign minister, and I don’t know the rest of your camp, but you have some terrific people.
“I mean, Charlene Barshefsky [Clinton’s trade adviser] used to tell me that when you go to these international trade conferences and it would be like two in the morning and somebody will say, what’s the precedent for X or Y, and then everyone would turn to the Singapore delegation for the answer, because it was always the best prepared delegation. I mean, here’s a system that produces that quality and we just produce...”
He smiles, obviously proud of the international teams Singapore puts out for people to see: “Well, that’s the nature of your political appointments. You know, you’ve got to appoint people who have donated to the campaign, or to re-election ... appoint people you’re obliged to. Where you have a free hand and appoint the most competent, then it’s different.”
“That’s consistent with your theme, it seems to me, of the limitations of democracy?”
He answers cautiously, for this is obviously sensitive ground: “Well, I think the presidential system is less likely to produce good government than a parliamentary system. In the presidential system, your personal appearance on TV is decisive, whereas in a parliamentary system, the prime minister, before he becomes the prime minister, has been a member of parliament, and probably a minister, and in Britain the people have sized you up over a period of time, you know, and they have come to certain conclusions as to what kind of a person you are, what kind of depth you have, what kind of sincerity you have in what you say.
“So, the party then chooses the man most likely to lead them to victory the next time round. They choose the man with the most political weight and also the administrative capacity to get his policies implemented so that after five years, they can win again. Your presidents, I mean, like Jimmy Carter ... my name is Jimmy Carter, I’m a peanut farmer, I’m running for president. The next thing you know, he was the president!”
“We had a peanut as president, right?”
“I mean, my first meeting with him was a shock, you know?”
“Why?”
“He did me the favor of seeing me within a month after taking office. So, he’s quite new. His aides must have said he [this Singapore guy] is worth seeing. It was a five-minute photo ops ... at the mantlepiece, photo ops. It was all choreographed. Then photographers out, seven minutes tête-à-tête, then full meeting. What did he raise? ... Why do you want this improved Hawk? I said, what’s that? ‘Improved Hawk, it’s an improved version of the surface-to-air missile.’ I said, because it’s an advance on what we have. [I guffaw loudly at this.] He said, it’s high technology, do you need it? I said, we think we do, but if you have any trouble at all, I’d get it from the British. I said, it’s not a matter of life and death.
“So, we went through the main meeting, one hour, the balance of one hour, and he had a laundry list and he went through all the laundry list, all the irrelevant small things. Whereas I’ve been discussing with Nixon and with Ford; Ford was really Henry Kissinger running the [foreign-policy] show, all the big issues in East Asia, where is it heading, how is it going, where is Southeast Asia going to fit in all this?”
LKY sighs: “I left bemused, and he gave me a book, his campaign book called Why Not The Best? So, I went back to the hotel. I said, let’s find out what he’s like. I was astounded. He recounted how, as a boy, the father gave him a penny or whatever to put into the pew box, and instead of putting one in, he took a penny out. So, the father then thrashed him. I said, why does the man do that? Having done it, how does telling the world that he was a petty thief help?”
I couldn’t help myself, and had to slip this in: “He also did an infamous interview with Playboy magazine and the famous quote was, they asked him, he was married to Rosalyn, if he ever had physical feelings for other women? And he said, ‘Sometimes I have lust in my heart,’ and a lot of people said, wow, that’s an odd place to have lust!”
(Laughter erupts in the room; the two invisible aides are alive and breathing after all!)
LKY saying: “There’s something not quite right about him. Then he went before Rickover, the admiral of the submarine fleet. So, the admiral said, what was your place in Annapolis? He said 167th or whatever. So, Rickover said, ‘Why not the best?’ ”
The crusty, plain-speaking Rickover would say something like that, I thought to myself, then to Lee: “In a way the blunt-talking Rickover is your spiritual brother!”
He says nothing, of course.
Well, I think the presidential system is less likely to produce good government than a parliamentary system.
Like the famous headstrong American tank commander, General George S. Patton (or for that matter, President Harry S. Truman), Hyman S. Rickover, the four-star admiral who invented the nuclear-powered submarine, was not for mincing words. And so his mouth would sometimes get him in trouble. But Americans, by and large, love the man of courage who says exactly what he thinks. LKY is no fan of one-man, one-vote, but in America his electability quotient would be high, for the very same reasons Americans so adored Patton and Rickover.
I do not know of any person who is most like me.
Which rumination leads me to push the thought in another way: “Is there anyone alive today who is most like you?”
A long pause here: “I do not know of any person who is most like me.”
You have to laugh. He is smart. And possibly ... yes ... unique.