Series in Diplomacy
Books in Diplomacy
Colossus
From the bestselling author of The Ascent of Money and The Square and the Tower Is America an empire? Certainly not, according to our government. Despite the conquest of two sovereign states in as many years, despite the presence of more than 750 military installations in two thirds of the world’s countries and despite his stated intention "to extend the benefits of freedom...to every corner of the world," George W. Bush maintains that "America has never been an empire." "We don’t seek empires," insists Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. "We’re not imperialistic." Nonsense, says Niall Ferguson. In Colossus he argues that in both military and economic terms America is nothing less than the most powerful empire the world has ever seen. Just like the British Empire a century ago, the United States aspires to globalize free markets, the rule of law, and representative government. In theory it’s a good project, says Ferguson. Yet Americans shy away from the long-term commitments of manpower and money that are indispensable if rogue regimes and failed states really are to be changed for the better. Ours, he argues, is an empire with an attention deficit disorder, imposing ever more unrealistic timescales on its overseas interventions. Worse, it’s an empire in denial—a hyperpower that simply refuses to admit the scale of its global responsibilities. And the negative consequences will be felt at home as well as abroad. In an alarmingly persuasive final chapter Ferguson warns that this chronic myopia also applies to our domestic responsibilities. When overstretch comes, he warns, it will come from within—and it will reveal that more than just the feet of the American colossus is made of clay.
Complicity with Evil: The United Nations in the Age of Modern Genocide
A seasoned foreign correspondent shows how the UN privileges its own neutrality and interests above its founding mission of protecting humanity, with predictably tragic consequences From the killing fields of Rwanda and Srebrenica a decade ago to those of Darfur today, the United Nations has repeatedly failed to confront genocide. This is evinced, author and journalist Adam LeBor maintains, in a May 1995 document from Yasushi Akashi, the most senior UN official in the field during the Yugoslav wars, in which he refused to authorize air strikes against the Serbs for fear they would “weaken” Milosevic. More recently, in 2003, urgent reports from UN officials in the Sudan detailing atrocities from Darfur were ignored for a year because they were politically inconvenient. This book is the first to examine in detail the crucial role of the Secretariat, its relationship with the Security Council, and the failure of UN officials themselves to confront genocide. LeBor argues the UN must return to its founding principles, take a moral stand and set the agenda of the Security Council instead of merely following the lead of the great powers. LeBor draws on dozens of firsthand interviews with UN officials, current and former, and such international diplomats as Madeleine Albright, Richard Holbrooke, Douglas Hurd, and David Owen. This book will set the terms for discussion when UN Secretary General Kofi Annan steps down to make room for a new head of the world body, and political observers assess Annan’s legacy and look to the future of the world organization.
Inside the Cold War: Loy Henderson and the Rise of the American Empire 1918 - 1961
Although less remembered than some of his colleagues, American diplomat Loy Henderson often stood in the thick of controversy during his distinguished forty-year career. An uncompromising and frequently contentious anti-communist, Henderson left his unmistakable imprint on many crucial policy decisions, ranging from the delay of recognition of the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s, to the Truman doctrine of the 1940s, to the overthrow of the Mosadeq government of Iran during the 1950s. Now, in this fascinating biography, H.W. Brands recounts Loy Henderson's far-flung diplomatic career and, in doing so, opens a window onto the entire Cold War Era. Henderson's ascent to a position of major influence among American foreign-policy makers paralleled the rise of the United States to unprecedented influence in global affairs, with anti-communism providing much of the impetus and rationale in both cases. Henderson acquired his life-long preoccupation with the communist menace--a preoccupation that reflected his psychological make-up and personal history, as well as the objective actions of Soviet leaders--in Moscow in the mid-1930s, when he served with the first group of American diplomats posted to the Soviet Union. He witnessed directly the terror and brutality of the Stalinist system, and he spent the rest of his career agitating against anything that might facilitate the spread of that system. Henderson's refusal to compromise his convictions threw him repeatedly into conflict with his superiors--as during World War II, when he warned that Soviet cooperation was a cynical and passing phenomenon, and in the fight over American support for the creation of Israel, when he predicted that American backing for the Zionists would alienate the Arabs and lay the Middle East open to Soviet penetration. In each instance, Henderson's outspokenness led to professional exile; but each time he succeeded in working his way back to the center of the decision-making process. Brands's compelling narrative captures the drama of some of the key developments in international politics in the twentieth century. We find Henderson sifting the rubble of World War I in Eastern Europe, taking a front-row seat at the Moscow purge trials, assessing the future of awakening Iraq during World War II, orchestrating America's cold-war assumption of Britain's imperial burden in Greece and Turkey, challenging the neutralism of India's Nehru during the Korean war, and engineering the restoration of the shah of Iran. Brands's tale, based on Henderson's personal and official papers, and on the papers and recollections of many of Henderson's associates, is more than a biography; it is a chronicle of the most eventful period in recent American and world history, told through the life of one of the individuals who helped make the period so dramatic.
Negotiation: An Alternative to Hostility
This first address of the Carl Vinson Memorial Lecture Series at Mercer University is a masterful assessment of the difficulties of resolving disputes. President Carter's guidelines for establishing a more stable peace in the world are concise and imaginative without sacrificing their essential practicality.
The Churchill Complex
From one of its keenest observers, a brilliant, witty journey through the "Special Relationship" between Britain and America that has done so much to shape the world, from World War II to Brexit. It is impossible to understand the last seventy-five years of American history, through to Trump and Brexit, without understanding the Anglo-American relationship, particularly the bonds between presidents and prime ministers. FDR of course had Winston Churchill; JFK had Harold Macmillan, his consigliere during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Ronald Reagan found his ideological soul mate in Margaret Thatcher; and George W. Bush found his fellow believer, in religion and in war, in Tony Blair. Today, the bond between Donald Trump and Boris Johnson illuminates the populist uprisings in both countries, as well as a new kind of Special Relationship that goes against everything it once stood for. Remembering the past, even its most glorious moments, can be as misleading as forgetting it. Over and over, in the name of freedom and democracy, British and especially American leaders have evoked Winston Churchill as a model for brave leadership (and Nevillle Chamberlain to represent craven weakness). As Ian Buruma shows, in his dazzling, short tour de force of storytelling and analysis, the myths of World War II too often resulted in bad policies and foolish wars. But The Churchill Complex is much more than a reflection on the weight of Churchill's legacy and its misuses. At its heart are shrewd and absorbing character studies of the president-prime minster dyads, which in Ian Buruma's gifted hands serve as a master class in politics, diplomacy, and the personal quirks of our leaders. It has never been a relationship of equals: from Churchill's desperate cajoling and conniving to keep FDR on his side in World War II, British prime ministers have put much more stock in the relationship than their US counterparts. After the loss of its once-great empire, Britain clung to the world's greatest superpower as a path to continued relevance and leverage. As Buruma shows, this was almost always fool's gold, and now, the alliance has floundered on the rocks of isolationism. The Churchill Complex may not have a happy ending, but as with Ian Buruma's other works, piercing lucidity is its own lasting comfort.
The Truth About Camp David
The collapse of both sets of Arab-Israeli negotiations in 2000 led not only to recrimination and bloodshed, with the outbreak of the second intifada, but to the creation of a new myth. Syrian and Palestinian intransigence was blamed for the current disastrous state of affairs, as both parties rejected a "generous" peace offering from the Israelis that would have brought peace to the region. The Truth About Camp David shatters that myth. Based on the riveting, eyewitness accounts of more than forty direct participants involved in the latest rounds of Arab-Israeli negotiations, including the Camp David 2000 summit, former federal investigator-turned-investigative journalist Clayton E. Swisher provides a compelling counter-narrative to the commonly accepted history. The Truth About Camp David details the tragic inner workings of the Clinton Administration's negotiating mayhem, their eleventh hour blunders and miscalculations, and their concluding decision to end the Oslo process with blame and disengagement. It is not only a fascinating historical look at Middle East politics on the brink of disaster, but a revelatory portrait of how all-too-human American political considerations helped facilitate the present crisis.
The Truth About Camp David
The collapse of both sets of Arab-Israeli negotiations in 2000 led not only to recrimination and bloodshed, with the outbreak of the second intifada, but to the creation of a new myth. Syrian and Palestinian intransigence was blamed for the current disastrous state of affairs, as both parties rejected a "generous" peace offering from the Israelis that would have brought peace to the region. The Truth About Camp David shatters that myth. Based on the riveting, eyewitness accounts of more than forty direct participants involved in the latest rounds of Arab-Israeli negotiations, including the Camp David 2000 summit, former federal investigator-turned-investigative journalist Clayton E. Swisher provides a compelling counter-narrative to the commonly accepted history. The Truth About Camp David details the tragic inner workings of the Clinton Administration's negotiating mayhem, their eleventh hour blunders and miscalculations, and their concluding decision to end the Oslo process with blame and disengagement. It is not only a fascinating historical look at Middle East politics on the brink of disaster, but a revelatory portrait of how all-too-human American political considerations helped facilitate the present crisis.
The Truth About Camp David
The collapse of both sets of Arab-Israeli negotiations in 2000 led not only to recrimination and bloodshed, with the outbreak of the second intifada, but to the creation of a new myth. Syrian and Palestinian intransigence was blamed for the current disastrous state of affairs, as both parties rejected a "generous" peace offering from the Israelis that would have brought peace to the region. The Truth About Camp David shatters that myth. Based on the riveting, eyewitness accounts of more than forty direct participants involved in the latest rounds of Arab-Israeli negotiations, including the Camp David 2000 summit, former federal investigator-turned-investigative journalist Clayton E. Swisher provides a compelling counter-narrative to the commonly accepted history. The Truth About Camp David details the tragic inner workings of the Clinton Administration's negotiating mayhem, their eleventh hour blunders and miscalculations, and their concluding decision to end the Oslo process with blame and disengagement. It is not only a fascinating historical look at Middle East politics on the brink of disaster, but a revelatory portrait of how all-too-human American political considerations helped facilitate the present crisis.
The Use of Force After the Cold War(With: Reynolds S. Kiefer,Darren J. Pierson,Darren Pierson)
The end of the Cold War created a near-euphoria that nations might resort less to military force and that the Doomsday nuclear clock might stop short of midnight. Events soon dashed the higher of these hopes, but the nature of military force and the uses to which it might be put did appear to be changing. In this volume eleven leading scholars apply their particular expertise to understanding what (if anything) has changed and what has not, why the patterns are as they are, and just what the future might bring. Together, the authors address political, moral, and military factors in the decision to use or avoid military force. Case studies of the Gulf War and Bosnia, analyses of the role of women in the armed forces and the role of intelligence agencies, and studies of inter-branch and inter-agency tensions and cooperation inform the various chapters. A strong and thoughtful introduction by H. W. Brands provides the context that ties together the themes and perspectives. Scholars in this distinguished collection include Stephen Biddle, Alexander L. George, J. Bryan Hehir, Andrew Kohut, Andrew Krepinevich, James M. Lindsay, Charles Moskos, Williamson Murray, Bruce Russett, Tony Smith, and Susan L. Woodward. The volume will help scholars, policy makers, and concerned citizens contemplate national alternatives when force threatens.
Uncouth Nation: Why Europe Dislikes America
No survey can capture the breadth and depth of the anti-Americanism that has swept Europe in recent years. From ultraconservative Bavarian grandmothers to thirty-year-old socialist activists in Greece, from globalization opponents to corporate executives--Europeans are joining in an ever louder chorus of disdain for America. For the first time, anti-Americanism has become a European lingua franca. In this sweeping and provocative look at the history of European aversion to America, Andrei Markovits argues that understanding the ubiquity of anti-Americanism since September 11, 2001, requires an appreciation of such sentiments among European elites going back at least to July 4, 1776. While George W. Bush's policies have catapulted anti-Americanism into overdrive, particularly in Western Europe, Markovits argues that this loathing has long been driven not by what America does, but by what it is. Focusing on seven Western European countries big and small, he shows how antipathies toward things American embrace aspects of everyday life--such as sports, language, work, education, media, health, and law--that remain far from the purview of the Bush administration's policies. Aggravating Europeans' antipathies toward America is their alleged helplessness in the face of an Americanization that they view as inexorably befalling them. More troubling, Markovits argues, is that this anti-Americanism has cultivated a new strain of anti-Semitism. Above all, he shows that while Europeans are far apart in terms of their everyday lives and shared experiences, their not being American provides them with a powerful common identity--one that elites have already begun to harness in their quest to construct a unified Europe to rival America.
Why Are We at War?
Beginning with his debut masterpiece, The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer has repeatedly told the truth about war. Why Are We at War? returns Mailer to the gravity of the battlefield and the grand hubris of the politicians who send soldiers there to die. First published in the early days of the Iraq War, Why Are We at War? is an explosive argument about the American quest for empire that still carries weight today. Scrutinizing the Bush administration’s words and actions, Mailer unleashes his trademark moral rigor: “Because democracy is noble, it is always endangered. . . . To assume blithely that we can export democracy into any country we choose can serve paradoxically to encourage more fascism at home and abroad.” Praise for Why Are We at War? “We’re overloaded with information these days, some of it possibly true. Mailer offers a provocative—and persuasive—cultural and intellectual frame.” — Newsweek “[Mailer] still has the stamina to churn out hard-hitting criticism.” — Los Angeles Times “Penetrating . . . There’s plenty of irreverent wit and fresh thinking on display.” — San Francisco Chronicle “Eloquent . . . thoughtful . . . Why Are We at War? pulls no punches.” — Fort Worth Star-Telegram Praise for Norman Mailer “[Norman Mailer] loomed over American letters longer and larger than any other writer of his generation.” — The New York Times “A writer of the greatest and most reckless talent.” — The New Yorker “Mailer is indispensable, an American treasure.” — The Washington Post “A devastatingly alive and original creative mind.” — Life “Mailer is fierce, courageous, and reckless and nearly everything he writes has sections of headlong brilliance.” — The New York Review of Books “The largest mind and imagination [in modern] American literature . . . Unlike just about every American writer since Henry James, Mailer has managed to grow and become richer in wisdom with each new book.” — Chicago Tribune “Mailer is a master of his craft. His language carries you through the story like a leaf on a stream.” — The Cincinnati Post