Having underestimated for months the gravity of the situation in East Pakistan, Kissinger swung in the opposite direction: with Russian backing, the million-man Indian army was going to destroy all of Pakistan, he warned.14 With Nixon’s acquiescence, there ensued two frantic weeks of activity by the national security advisor based on exaggerated fears that the entire structure of his diplomacy might collapse, with a valued ally destroyed, the Soviet Union unleashed, and their new Chinese friends disillusioned by American weakness.
