Book Description
The history of America's political, military, and intellectual involvement in the Middle East from George Washington to George W. Bush.
From the first cannonballs fired by American warships at North African pirates to the conquest of Falluja by the Marines—from the early American explorers who probed the sources of the Nile to the diplomats who strove for Arab-Israeli peace—the United States has been dramatically involved in the Middle East. For well over two centuries, American statesmen, merchants, and missionaries, both men and women, have had a profound impact on the shaping of this crucial region. Yet their story has never been told until now. Drawing on thousands of government documents and personal letters, featuring original maps and over sixty photographs, this book reconstructs the diverse and remarkable ways in which Americans have interacted with this alluring yet often hostile land stretching from Morocco to Iran, from the Persian Gulf to the Bosporus. Covering over 230 years of history, Power, Faith, and Fantasy is an indispensable work for anyone interested in understanding the roots of America's Middle East involvement today. 68 illustrations; 4 maps.
Customer Reviews:
A Bumpy Magic Carpet Ride.......2007-09-29
Michael B. Oren makes history come to life in this saga that begins and ends with Dartmouth.
John Ledyard fled Dartmouth to escape a life in the ministry and circuitously sailed and debarked ships until Eurpoean connections landed him in Egypt, where he explored the Nile. Nathaniel Fick graduated from Dartmouth and became a Marine Corps Captain, where he also landed in Egypt as a stopover before being stationed in Kuwait and fighting in Iraq.
Covering the two centuries between, Oren leads us through a parade of U.S. Presidents, beginning with those faced with Barbary State piracy, imprisonment and ransom demands made on a spanking new nation with no navy. The transformation to a vital young power with its own "sea legs" is neither slick nor linear, with a few tragi-comic hiccoughs along the way.
Oren takes us through the stages of fascination with the exotic Middle East, brought to us with an admixture of horror from the likes of Herman Melville and Mark Twain; and Oren holds the mirror up to our eyes to behold tourists in parasols vandalising ruins for souvenirs, a parade of mutual shock and awe working both was between the visitors and the host natives.
We sit in on the plans of Christian restorationists, zealously dedicated to hastening the re-settlement of Jews in a Palestinian homeland of their own; and we are invited to explore the reactions of Palestines existing populations. Missionaries abound in a geographical setting were proselytizing might cost one his head. We also meet the likes of Samuel Marinus Zwemer and Hannibal Hamlin, who prefer reaching out to young Middle Eastern minds rather than capturing their souls, with marvelous, lasting effects and long-term economic benefits to the United States.
Oren weaves a tapestry of the real and the imgined, and the enhanced: Lawrence of Arabia, "A Thousand and One Arabian Nights," Little Egypt, "Innocents Abroad," and Sol Bloom's Cairo recreation at the Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1893.
Oren gives us a slide show, a side show and living history, ever taking care to counterbalance each perceptable bias with a counterweight, exploring both [all] sides of this sometime blinding prism.
The book is a must for one who wants a sound, vibrant social history of human relations in the Middle East, replete with promising and failed strategies. For those deeply academic history purists who like their history "straight," that's fine - this gives you some mahogany, a place to rest your glass.
I loved this book.......2007-09-25
I loved this book. There was so much to learn.
One thing is clear.... the Muslims can never be trusted, should never be trusted.
The disaster that is our Arabist State Department is testiment to what happens when money is put before what is right.
Understanding the depth and length of American Mideast involvement.......2007-09-09
The first remarkable thing about this very remarkable book is that it traces an over two- hundred year involvement of the U.S. with the Middle East which most people, including myself, did not really know very much about. It shows that in the early days of the U.S. it was involved in dealing with a threat of blackmail and terror from the Barbary Pirates, not unlike those faced today. President Jefferson quite heroically at that time refused to give in to the blackmail, and pay protection money to the pirates as he saw there would be no end to it. Instead he took the action to create a U.S. Naval Force which would operate far from home, and which eventually did lift this threat to America's trade and commerce.
Oren looks at the power relations between the U.S. and the Middle East, but also looks at the part 'faith' has played. Here he reveals just how long the American involvement in working toward a Jewish restoration in the Holy Land was. It preceded that of the modern Zionist movement. He also shows how Faith led to American involvement in other areas of the Middle East, for instance in building the American Universities in Beirut and Egypt. One irony of this story is that the generation of founding Zionist Christians often had descendants who would become opponents of the cause of Jewish restoration.
Oren also looks at the role of Myth, the often romanticized and unrealistic way in which Americans have seen the Middle East.
He is a wonderful storyteller, and a very judicious and careful scholar. While he certainly reveals sympathy to the role of the Americans in helping establish a Jewish state, he by no means paints the relations as uniform and simple. He indicates numerous instances where American leaders have worked against the policies Israel considered to be in its best interest. He tells in a fascinating way of how President Truman against the advice of all his most powerful advisors, made the decision to support the founding of the Jewish state.
Oren provides a tremendous amount of interesting information which will be new to most readers. His account of the Melville and Twain visits to the Holy Land are a prime example of this.
This is a wonderful, highly readable and informative book which should be in the library of everyone who wishes to understand the role of America in the Middle East.
A Very Good Read.......2007-09-05
I bought this book expecting an insightful book, and the content filled my expectations. The author does a sufficient job in providing information without being dry and most importantly, with little detectable bias. With a topic like this, it would be prudent to be a little reserved regardless of the authors background but there was no propaganda involved. Overall it is a good read, smooth flow, continuity and can make you feel a little more knowledgeable apart from what you hear on the news every day.
Nothing New Under the Desert Sun.......2007-08-28
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered because most Muslims in the Middle East seem to hate Americans? Take comfort from the fact that most of them have hated most of us for at least the two hundred years we have sought to engage them. We have preached, pleaded, prodded, provoked and punished, and nothing has worked for any length of time. As this and many other works on relations between Muslims and the "Infidels" have demonstrated beyond doubt, we persist in believing not only that we can convert them to our religious views, but that there is a good chance that we can all "get along", you know, "live and let live".
The main reason is our refusal to acknowledge that Islam is as much a political as a religious regimen. Politcally and religiously, it has always provided for the accommodation of Christians and Jews: they must pay a tax for living in a Muslim hegemony and acknowledge its supremacy. What could be simpler?
Further, "democracy" is as foreign to the Middle Eastern Muslim mind as the concept of religious tolerance. It is no accident that in the Middle East the only democracy worthy of the name is that of Israel nor that the price Israel and the rest of the world have paid for the novelty is the seemingly perpetual unrest that literally surrounds the country.
The principal value of this wonderfully well-written book is to demonstrate and explain America's long history of involvement in the Middle East which dates back a lot longer than most, even well-informed, readers will have guessed. Its principal-if implicit-message is that there's much of that history yet to be written and, by extension, that out inevitable further exertions are not likely to be any more consistent or consistently fruitful than have our previous endeavors. While some readers (including me) might weary a bit of the extended discussion of our early, mostly military and missionary, involvement, dating back to the turn of the 19th Century, it proves central not only to Oren's wide-screen view of that involvement over the intevening period, but also crucial to his examination of our motives and missteps. The aptness of the title, "Power, Faith, and Fantasy", may be demonstrated in our current situation in Iraq: we had the power to oust Saddam and his army in short order; the Administration's faith in the rightness of our cause was sincere and well-intended; and the chimera of a democratic government in Iraq serving to light and lead the benighted Middle East will turn out to be pure fantasy. I would venture that neither we nor our children will live to see a peaceful Middle East at harmony with the world. But this book makes a very valuable contribution to understanding why that is true. Fell better now?
Book Description
With over one million novels in print, New York Times best-selling author Joel C. Rosenberg has been called "eerily prophetic" and a "modern Nostradamus" for his uncanny ability to write political thrillers that come true. In his first nonfiction book, this evangelical Christian from an Orthodox Jewish heritage takes readers on an unforgettable journey through prophecy and current events into the future of Iraq after Saddam, Russia after Communism, Israel after Arafat, and Christianity after radical Islam. You won't want to miss Joel's exclusive interviews with Israeli, Palestinian, and Russian leaders, and previously classified CIA and White House documents. Similar to the approach Joel takes in his novels, his desire is to draw readers into stories, anecdotes, and predictions in a way that builds confidence that allows Joel to share his faith in Jesus Christ and the reliability of Scripture as a guide to understanding the past and the future. Drawing on his experience in Washington, his own exclusive interviews with world leaders, and his astute political acumen, Joel makes sense of the events surrounding the Middle East. He connects information in a way that will make you understand and really care about the world's most important events and how they impact your life--from gas prices to your bank account.Epicenter is about: Change--big changes, dramatic changes, changes that will transform the world as we know it. Answers--what the changes are underway in the world's most important countries. Insight--readers will understand the trajectory of world events by being taken inside the governments of Iran, Iraq, Russia, China, and more. Accessibility--aimed for a wide audience in both the general and Christian markets. Faith--Joel shares his faith in Jesus Christ and the reliability of Scripture. Epicenter will answer questions like: Will Iraq go from bad to worse? Will Israel and her Arab neighbors find peace, or is another major Middle East war just around the corner? If the new, post-Soviet Russia is our friend, why is the Kremlin creating a new class of thermonuclear weapons and building an alliance with radical Islam?
Customer Reviews:
What the future holds!.......2007-10-17
This is a very infromative book and spot on about future events. The headlines daily prove the accuracy of this book.
Epicenter.......2007-10-17
For those who are willing to use the third len to view world events, this book is a must read. Joel Rosenberg has done a good job correlating the world events with Biblical prophecies. Those who have ears must listen.
Epicenter.......2007-10-17
A must read for anyone who wants to view future events relative to Bible Prophesy. I was especially moved to look into the mind of a Messianic Jew. The author is right on!
Epicenter.......2007-10-17
Interesting information - don't know how much is true. A lot of chest thumping by the author. The evangelical ending kind of turned me off. If I'm going to find Jesus, it will not be through reading a novel. I think that Mr. Rosenberg has some intertesting takes on some recent world event - all probably driven by some really unbelievable coincidences and turns of history. Broader picture?, I think he's on to something. Whether God comes and reaks havoc as decribed in the Bible is anyone's guess. Overall, not a bad read - but then you put the book away and go on to something else.
More than biblical prophecy!!.......2007-10-16
I listened to this book on a whim and I have to tell you that even if you're not the super religious type, you have simply got to pay attention to the many warning signs Mr Rosenberg points out. He is well informed and appears to be well connected. At least read (or listen) to this book and then form your own opinions. Call it what you want ... but a really big confrontation is coming and it's sooner than most of us ever expected. Americans have to wake up and stop foolishly thinking we're safe or untouchable any longer. If 9-11 didn't open your eyes what will it take? A nuclear attack on US soil? Don't be surprised if that happens within the next 5 years.Epicenter: Why the Current Rumblings in the Middle East Will Change Your Future
Amazon.com
The crowning achievement of Jimmy Carter's presidency was the Camp David Accords between Israel and Egypt, and he has continued his public and private diplomacy ever since, winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his decades of work for peace, human rights, and international development. He has been a tireless author since then as well, writing bestselling books on his childhood, his faith, and American history and politics, but in Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, he has returned to the Middle East and to the question of Israel's peace with its neighbors--in particular, how Israeli sovereignty and security can coexist permanently and peacefully with Palestinian nationhood.
It's a rare honor to ask questions of a former president, and we are grateful that President Carter was able to take the time in between his work with his wife, Rosalynn, for the Carter Center and Habitat for Humanity and his many writing projects to speak with us about his hopes for the region and his thoughts on the book.
A big thank you to President Carter for granting our request for an interview.
An Interview with President Jimmy Carter
Q: What has been the importance of your own faith in your continued interest in peace in the Middle East?
A: As a Christian, I worship the Prince of Peace. One of my preeminent commitments has been to bring peace to the people who live in the Holy Land. I made my best efforts as president and still have this as a high priority.
Q: A common theme in your years of Middle East diplomacy has been that leaders on both sides have often been more open to discussion and change in private than in public. Do you think that's still the case?
A: Yes. This is why private and intense negotiations can be successful. More accurately, however, my premise has been that the general public (Jewish, Christian, and Muslim) are more eager for peace than their political leaders. For instance, a recent poll done by the Hebrew University in Jerusalem showed that 58% of Israelis and 81% of the Palestinians favor a comprehensive settlement similar to the Roadmap for Peace or the Saudi proposal adopted by all 23 Arab nations and recently promoted by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Tragically, there have been no substantive peace talks during the past six years.
Q: How have the war in Iraq and the increased strength of Iran (and the declarations of their leaders against Israel) changed the conditions of the Israel-Palestine question?
A: Other existing or threatened conflicts in the region greatly increase the importance of Israel's having peace agreements with its neighbors, to minimize overall Arab animosity toward both Israel and the United States and reduce the threat of a broader conflict.
Q: Your use of the term "apartheid" has been a lightning rod in the response to your book. Could you explain your choice? Were you surprised by the reaction?
A: The book is about Palestine, the occupied territories, and not about Israel. Forced segregation in the West Bank and terrible oppression of the Palestinians create a situation accurately described by the word. I made it plain in the text that this abuse is not based on racism, but on the desire of a minority of Israelis to confiscate and colonize Palestinian land. This violates the basic humanitarian premises on which the nation of Israel was founded. My surprise is that most critics of the book have ignored the facts about Palestinian persecution and its proposals for future peace and resorted to personal attacks on the author. No one could visit the occupied territories and deny that the book is accurate.
Q: You write in the book that "the peace process does not have a life of its own; it is not self-sustaining." What would you recommend that the next American president do to revive it?
A: I would not want to wait two more years. It is encouraging that President George W. Bush has announced that peace in the Holy Land will be a high priority for his administration during the next two years. On her January trip to the region, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has called for early U.S.-Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. She has recommended the 2002 offer of the Arab nations as a foundation for peace: full recognition of Israel based on a return to its internationally recognized borders. This offer is compatible with official U.S. Government policy, previous agreements approved by Israeli governments in 1978 and 1993, and with the International Quartet's "roadmap for peace." My book proposes that, through negotiated land swaps, this "green line" border be modified to permit a substantial number of Israelis settlers to remain in Palestine. With strong U.S. pressure, backed by the U.N., Russia, and the European Community, Israelis and Palestinians would have to come to the negotiating table.
1/18/2007
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From Publishers Weekly
The term "good-faith" is almost inappropriate when applied to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a bloody struggle interrupted every so often by negotiations that turn out to be anything but honest. Nonetheless, thirty years after his first trip to the Mideast, former President Jimmy Carter still has hope for a peaceful, comprehensive solution to the region's troubles, delivering this informed and readable chronicle as an offering to the cause. An engineer of the 1978 Camp David Accords and 2002 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, Carter would seem to be a perfect emissary in the Middle East, an impartial and uniting diplomatic force in a fractured land. Not entirely so. Throughout his work, Carter assigns ultimate blame to Israel, arguing that the country's leadership has routinely undermined the peace process through its obstinate, aggressive and illegal occupation of territories seized in 1967. He's decidedly less critical of Arab leaders, accepting their concern for the Palestinian cause at face value, and including their anti-Israel rhetoric as a matter of course, without much in the way of counter-argument. Carter's book provides a fine overview for those unfamiliar with the history of the conflict and lays out an internationally accepted blueprint for peace.
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Book Description
Following his #1 New York Times bestseller, Our Endangered Values, the former president, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, offers an assessment of what must be done to bring permanent peace to Israel with dignity and justice to Palestine.
President Carter, who was able to negotiate peace between Israel and Egypt, has remained deeply involved in Middle East affairs since leaving the White House. He has stayed in touch with the major players from all sides in the conflict and has made numerous trips to the Holy Land, most recently as an observer in the Palestinian elections of 2005 and 2006.
In this book President Carter shares his intimate knowledge of the history of the Middle East and his personal experiences with the principal actors, and he addresses sensitive political issues many American officials avoid. Pulling no punches, Carter prescribes steps that must be taken for the two states to share the Holy Land without a system of apartheid or the constant fear of terrorism.
The general parameters of a long-term, two-state agreement are well known, the president writes. There will be no substantive and permanent peace for any peoples in this troubled region as long as Israel is violating key U.N. resolutions, official American policy, and the international "road map" for peace by occupying Arab lands and oppressing the Palestinians. Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel's official pre-1967 borders must be honored. As were all previous administrations since the founding of Israel, U.S. government leaders must be in the forefront of achieving this long-delayed goal of a just agreement that both sides can honor.
Palestine Peace Not Apartheid is a challenging, provocative, and courageous book.
Customer Reviews:
Disappointed.......2007-10-17
Jimmy Carter is a great humanitarian, Christian and scholar, but I was so disappointed in several of his statements in this book. I am a liberal Christian like Carter, but one who knows that what is going on between Palestine and Israel is not in the least like Apartheid in South Africa. I can only continue to pray that at some point Palestine's leaders will begin to truly negotiate for peace. Palestinian extremists are doing their own people a grave disservice.
Truth telling is not popular . . ........2007-10-16
Jimmy Carter has proven to be our best ex-President, by any standards. In this book he presents his point of view on one of the thorniest issues facing the world since the the Israeli State was born. One thing to know is that Carter, though sophisticated in world events, for sure, and politics, nevertheless sees the world through his own lenses which are coated with a scratch resistant brand of Christian morality. I don't say this in a perjorative sense at all.
Taken on its merits both Carter's recounted history of the problem and attempts at its solution are well ordered and expressed, and as someone who lived in Israel for a year, I believe accurate. What is most fascinating is the reaction of those ultra-Zionists from both the Jewish and the fundamentalist Christian worlds for whom Israel cannot be criticized. The reaction is all about the use of the term apartheid.
Whatever your reaction to the use of the word or the criticism of its use, this book is a must read for anyone that wants to understand the nature of the the intractable problems there and in the Palestinian territories. However, don't think that Carter's point of view is complete. It's not complete, no, but important. I would love to hear what Carter has to say about the geopolitical influence of Western prosperity in the middle east in general, and how it affects this 50 year old problem in particular.
I wonder, as I always do, how our policies would shift if we all paid taxes in direct proportion to our wealth so that the tax burden were more fairly distributed away from the suffering middle class and toward those who benefit most from our society and polical order.
A voice for peace and hope that must not be neglected.......2007-10-15
Jimmy Carter was perhaps the must successful US president in forging a lasting peace agreement in the Middle East, the fruits of which both Israel and Egypt enjoy to this day. In this book he explores the basic requirements for a 2-state solution between Palestine and Israel, and the major obstacles in the face of such a solution. The book is largely accurate, fair, and balanced.
The book's major strengths and weaknesses stem from Carter's character: He is a diplomat and not a visionary. He talks to and acutely listens to all parties, understanding and reconciling their complex points of view rather easily. This willingness to talk to everyone is what has made him so successful in making peace. Unfortunately the book does not stray very far from the hackneyed 2-state solution. It does not even discuss the one-state solution similar to what worked well for South Africa, Bosnia, Europe, and here in the USA. I recommend you augment your reading of this book with "One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse", by Ali Abunimah, as well as the books by Mazin Qumsieh, Virginia Tilley, etc.
full of misrepresenations.......2007-10-10
this book should be labeled fiction. Jimmy has refused to debate (or even appear on the same stage) of critics who have questioned statements in the book he has presented as fact. very sad.
THE BRAVEST PRESIDENT EVER.......2007-10-10
In a country where a minimal critic against Israel would be labeled as "Anti-Semitism, " by writing this book, President Jimmy Carter shows his commitment to the principles of human rights. As usual, he is attacked by Israelis because of telling the truth.
GOD BLESS AMERICA, GOD BLESS JIMMY CARTER!
Book Description
From Afghanistan and Iraq to Europe and the United States we are engaged in one of the most heated wars of all time. In this incisive new book, the man that has been called--the only one to understand the mind of the jihadist--shows that the most important battle is actually taking place in the hearts and minds of the world's population. This is the war of ideas, where ideology is the most powerful weapon of all. Phares explores the beliefs of two opposing camps, one standing for democracy and human rights, and the other rejecting the idea of an international community and calling for jihad against the West. He reveals the strategies of both sides, explaining that new technologies and the growing media savvy of the jihadists have raised the stakes in the conflict. And most urgently, he warns that the West is in danger of losing the war, for whereas debate and theorizing rarely translate into action here, ideas and deeds are inextricably linked for the forces of jihad.
Customer Reviews:
Required reading by every self-respecting journalist........2007-08-23
The facts will set you free. Well researched. Bluntly honest. A very readable treatment of Islamofacism every self-respecting journalist should read. It is now on my short list of books that correctly shape one's understanding of this century's principal narrative.
Great Read!.......2007-06-13
We need more literature like this that expounds on our current situation and dilemma our children will soon face.
The War of Ideas: Jihadism against Democracy .......2007-05-07
This is a very scholarly book. This is not a rabble rouser. It is an excellent book to gain understanding of "Jihadism against Democracy"
Book Description
A sweeping and dramatic history of the last half century of conflict in the Middle East from an award-winning journalist who has covered the region for over thirty years, The Great War for Civilisation unflinchingly chronicles the tragedy of the region from the Algerian Civil War to the Iranian Revolution; from the American hostage crisis in Beirut to the Iran-Iraq War; from the 1991 Gulf War to the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. A book of searing drama as well as lucid, incisive analysis, The Great War for Civilisation is a work of major importance for today's world.
Customer Reviews:
Wonderful, honest and shocking.......2007-10-07
The book "The great war for civilisation", by Robert Fisk, is wonderful, mostly for its vivid and honest telling of the history the author has lived in thr last 40 years.
Even not having finished its reading (it's a 1,100 pages book!), I can see the author does not leaves "stone on stone" (translated from a Portuguese sentence). He show how ignorant people of developed countries can be (to make a monument in Vincennes, indiana, USA, to USS Vincennes, which blowed up a civil plane, killing 290 people, is terrible!), and how dishonest governments like Reagan's and Thatcher's were. Please, divulge this book!
A Great Book for Civilisation.......2007-10-06
It's hard to exaggerate when trying to accord sufficient praise for this great book. As a pure work of journalistic reportage it seems impossible to beat, let alone come near to its level of sincerity, humanity and scope. I don't know how Mr. Fisk was able to collate and make such sense of so much material, and survive the ordeal.
Whatever one's own proclivities may be in the world of politics and religion, I don't think anyone could quarrel with the author's many observations, which are so clearly animated by an overriding sense of outrage at the callous and sensless brutality which he has so often witnessed in person in the countries where he has been a reporter.
He tries his best to be impartial, and indeed it is virtually impossible to know where the truth lies in a world of spin and manipulation. However, he clearly shows a penchant for the Muslim argument in the Middle East, and certainly there must be a lot to be said in his favour, even if he is not always wholly convincing.
This, however, is but a quibble compared with the might and majesty of this splendid book, which I would recommend anyone who is in any way concerned with the Arab world to read, and learn from.
Detailed and well-written account.......2007-10-03
Fisk's narrative pulls no punches, and does a superb job of recounting events ranging from the Iran-Iraq War to the Armenian genocide the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan to the Palestinian Israeli conflict to the current War in Iraq -- as well as many other events relevant to the contemporary Middle East (and U.S. foreign policy in the region).
I found the account to be depressing at times, but for those who are looking for a thought-provoking, and engaging narrative this is a great place to start. No easy answers, and plenty of information to digest. The best kind of reading.
A Must Read.......2007-09-02
I read every word in this book. At first I was skeptical that it could all be true, but on completion I believe it is. I highly recommend this book to all.
It is an excellent way to learn just how big a mistake was made by the US and GB in trying to overthrow the goverment in Iraq and establish a puppet democracy.
grat book, must read if u wanna learn about the middle east.......2007-08-29
here is a writer who lived in the middle east, who walked the streets and breathed the air, who talked to all the big heads and saw all the battles...he is not your typical expert who appear on CNN/Fox News... he has in-depth knowledge, i wish alan dershowitz can learn from him
read this and pitty the nation
Book Description
Since the Holocaust, it has been almost impossible to hide large-scale crimes against humanity. In our communicative world, few modern catastrophes are concealed from the public eye. And yet, Ilan Pappe unveils, one such crime has been erased from the global public memory: the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in 1948. But why is it denied, and by whom? The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine offers an investigation of this mystery.
Customer Reviews:
Yet ANOTHER CASE of JEWISH SAVAGERY and HUMILIATION towards the"PALESTINIAN HOLOCAUST.".......2007-10-02
You will have to stop reading at times to wipe the tears coming from your eyes like Niagara Falls. Get a huge box of tissues for this gut-wrenching story of the daily brutal, humiliating and savage treatment against the women and children of Palestine. I started reading about the fate of the Palestinians with Carters book "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid. Carter's book is a great and objective overview of the Palestinians Holocaust. Bush, Rice and Cheney will be rightfully humiliated in History books and in posterity for turning their backs and 'allowing' these atrocities to go on and on and on.... Right now as you read this review, The Palestinian Holocaust is in full terror. I'm 'not' giving up on the idea, that America will soon be "Good 'ole America again." Read this book.
What the U.S. Press Refuses to Show.......2007-09-30
A clear and concise view of the Palestinian holocaust, a view that the American media refuses to show.
Unspeakable evil finally expressed in words.......2007-09-26
The unspeakable evil that has been committed against the Palestinian people in 1948, and the unspeakable evil that is still being committed against the Palestinian people, has at last been expressed in words.
Amidst the vast zionist propaganda machine created to cover up horrendous atrocities, at last we have a book that gives us the truth. This book, with all its shocking details, is the best book I have read on the Palestine/Israel conflict, though it made very grim and painful reading. Ilan Pappe has given the world a wonderful gift in the writing of this book, one that could play a major role in bringing world peace, once all the facts that Pappe presents are known. His sources include the Israeli Archives and Ben Gurion's diaries, as well as eye witness accounts of what happened in 1948, and is continuing today.
If anyone wants to know what the conflict in the Middle East is all about, just read this book; every member of Congress, and every member of the general public should know how our billions of tax dollars that we send to Israel each year are being spent.
History you Must Know.......2007-09-15
If you have not read ETHNIC CLEANSING OF PALESTINE you do not know the history of Palestine, nor can you understand the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. As part of a new group of Israeli historians, Ilan Pappe reveals previously secret Israeli documents. The cleansing of Palestine of its Arab inhabitants began long before 1948, and continues today. Step by step the plans to cleanse the land, and the entire infrastructure with the cleansing details -- 1927 land surveys, The Red House, the Consultancy, Plan Dalet, Plan D -- is spelled out by Pappe. This is a painful read, but a necessary one to understand the Middle East.
Honest & Excellent.......2007-09-14
Very excellent book that shows part of the sufferings of Palestinians written by a very honest person
Book Description
Radical Islam has long desired to seize Jerusalem and cut it off to Christian and Jewish believers. In his revealing new book, The Fight for Jerusalem, bestselling author and former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations Dore Gold explains why the battle for Jerusalem is intensifying today. Gold shows why only Israel can preserve its holy places for Christians, Jews, and even Muslims, and why uncovering Jerusalem's past-and the truth of biblical history-can be the key to saving its future.
Customer Reviews:
A politically charged yet thoughtfully reasoned exhortation .......2007-10-06
Former Israel ambassador to the U.N. (among his many other credentials) Dore Gold presents The Fight for Jerusalem: Radical Islam, the West, and the future of the Holy City, a serious-minded discussion of the future of Jerusalem, a city holy to Christians, Jews, and Muslims. The Fight for Jerusalem makes a convincing argument that for Jerusalem to be a free city where all faiths can be practiced, it will have to remain under Israeli sovereignty, because the United Nations cannot be relied upon to protect it and the Muslim Palestinians have become increasingly affected by a branch of radical Islam that seeks to eliminate other faiths from Jerusalem, not co-exist with them. Drawing upon meticulous scholarly research, The Fight for Jerusalem addresses how Palestinians are destroying archaeological evidence of ancient Jewish presence in Jerusalem, particularly on the Temple Mount; how Western diplomatic concessions strengthen the apocalyptic speculations of radical Muslims; how the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza brought more power to Palestinian extremists at the expense of Palestinian moderates; why negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority over the status of Jerusalem have little chance of creating an agreement; and much more. It should be noted that The Fight for Jerusalem specifically denounces the religious intolerance radical Islam, and recognizes that the majority of the Muslim world is not radical, though The Fight for Jerusalem decries the increasing power that radical Islamic factions have. A politically charged yet thoughtfully reasoned exhortation on how Jerusalem, a potential focal point of radical Islam's jihad against the West, can best be preserved for future generations.
More In This Vein Needed.......2007-07-12
Mr. Gold has had an intriguing history of exposing through historical precedents and context the most interesting institutions. This book is no exception with Jerusalem, the city in the Middle East that can perhaps be said to represent the modicum of freedom and Western values that exists there, and why it's imperative that it be held and protected against any antithetical forces surrounding it, either there or abroad.
Dore Gold does the reader and novice (or even university-educated) reader a great and grandiose service by documenting not just how long the Jews have been living in modern Israel, but showing us just how long they've been under attack, kept as slaves, as Dhimmis, whipped commodities of Europe's countries, and generally how it all started. The Bar-Kochba revolution against the just-turned Roman imperialists is a great account, told with brevity, but demonstrating what the Jews have been through just to hold on to their tiny piece of land, and how many empires have swept through it.
A previous writer said that there's blame on both sides to the conflict, and that giving away land to the anarchistic Palestinian terror groups is being open minded. I would pose the question that Dore Gold answers for us: If Jerusalem and its surrounding environs were given over eventually to Arabic, Islamic forces, there would be no tolerance of religion whatsoever for any soul in the land. Already, the last Christians are fleeing any part of Israel that is controlled by Palestinian faction groups, whose version of Islam doesn't even allow for Fatah's to promulgate.
There are previous accusations that Gold's sources are flimsy. Since when are speeches of those involved, podcasts of the same, and books irrelevant and not conducive to research? What's omitted from some critics' reviews is the presentation of vast amounts of historical and recent archeological surfacing that has vindicated those who taught us about the unified Davidic Kingdom and the tribes of Israel before his time. If you don't read more than the first 2 chapters, you're already richly rewarded by gaining a historical eye covering about 1400 years of Israelite history.
I think one of the most important misnomers that have stuck with us is that the land of ancient Canaan/Israel was only named Palestine by the Romans once they began establishing exploratory garrisons. They aptly named it after "Philistines" who had residence there still after so many quasi-empiric swaths through Israel.
Dore Gold might be a nationalist-rightist when it comes to Israel, but how do we coin the conservative label when Gold's main theme for the conflict is encouraging us to look at what happens every time Israel DOES cede land that THEY held onto by being the victor of a grossly-agressive war by the major Arabic countries. Look at Hamas in Gaza, exterminating all their Fatah "brothers," showing us that the muhajadeen applies to their own kind as well.
Gore's book is a real justice and service that lends some researched wisdom as to what's been happening in Israel, and how other Arabic nations are overwhelmingly complicit in the plight of the Palestinians. What else can we expect from a people who declare all of Palestine theirs by right, have rejected statehood 3 times, and have it in their charter (Hamas, Fatah) and educational materials (The PA) to disregard Jews as human and an unregognizing of Israel's right to live and survive? As we've seen, we can't expect much, only chaos, wasted Western money that helped almost no Palestinian when it's in their hands, and a drive to throwback tribalism that knows no bounds as to the glories of fighting Jews and infidels. This is a great history book that should be on everyone's shelves, even if you wish to "hear no evil,see no evil," which I like to call "disagreeing" with it.
Again, if there is to be any alternative to religous and secular tolerance in the Middle East, it has proven only to be in Israel, and the state's poliltical and religious flag, Jerusalem, cannot be given over or divided if it is to remain that way. Dore Gold has made that painstakingly clear, and it gives us great hope to see the victories of Israel against forces that would see it otherwise--which is most of the world.
excellent analysis of issues about Jerusalem.......2007-06-27
Dore Gold writes with typical clarity concerning the issues concerning Jerusalem, including the battles going back through the ages. If you want to get a readable, informative history, then get this book.
Propaganda passing for scholarly research.......2007-06-05
Dore Gold is one of the hardline political opeatives who worked for Ariel Sharon and found Sharon's moderating politics towards the end of his political careeer not to his liking. Gold's view of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is quite close to the ultra-nationalist politics of Likud. For him, any compromise with the Palestinians enourages more terror. Hamas are no better than the Taliban. If Israel gives them an inch of Jerusalem they will take a mile and turn Jerusalem into the capital of the new world-wide Muslim caliphate.
Despite miles of footntoes, Gold relies for evidence on surprisingly flimsy reeds: podcasts, websites, sermons and books are the proof he uses to claim that there is a worldwide Muslim conspiracy to take over Jerusalem and the rest of the western world.
If you're a neocon or a hardline supporter of the Israeli right, you'll love this book. It will confirm all yr worst fears of Arabs. But if you try to keep an open mind about this conflict and find both fault and favor with both sides, then steer clear. This is a propaganda tract that passes itself off as a thoroughly researched scholarly tome.
The fight for Jerusalem and the clash of civilizations .......2007-05-16
This book is divided into three sections. In the first the religious dimension of Jerusalem is considered. The meaning of Jerusalem for Ancient Israel, for Christianity , and for Classical Islam are accurately and fairly outlined. In the second part of the book which considers the diplomatic struggle over Jerusalem, there is chapter devoted to the Birth of 'Modern Israel', one to 'Jerusalem, the Palestinian Arabs and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan', and one to the 'Arab- Israel Peace Process.' The third and most important section of the book is devoted to Radical Islam and Jerusalem. There is a chapter on 'Destruction of the Holy Sites', one on 'Jerusalem as Apocalyptic Trigger for Radical Islam, one 'The West and the Freedom of Jerusalem'.
In this third section of the book Gold gives a short history of the development of Radical Islam. He tells of the Islamic destruction of the religious sites of other faiths, from the largest Buddhist statues in the world in Afghanistan to sites in the heart of the Arab world. He shows how Western diplomatic concessions have not led to moderation but rather an intensification of fanaticism by radical Islamists. He tells the story of the Muslim destruction of important archaeological remains in Jerusalem. He shows how radical Islam's obsession with Jerusalem is another manifestation of the clash of civilizations between radical Islam and other religious faiths and civilizations.
The demonstrating of Islamic disrespect and destruction for the Holy Places of others is at the heart of his argument that Jerusalem must remain undivided under Israeli rule. Additional evidence for this claim is given by the Palestinian reaction to Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and the Shiite Hizbollah's reaction to Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon. Both of these withdrawals did not lead to moderation and peace, but rather to more violence against Israel. Gold shows how the Islamist Palestinians have when given civilian control over a city or area persecuted and led to the exile of its Christians .The most blatant example is Bethlehem which has not simply lost its Christian majority but seen the greatest share of its Christian population leave the City. Gold says that had Israel in September 2000 relinquished control over the Old City of Jerusalem to the Palestinians the result would have been the destruction of a a good share of it. Gold also considers the possibility of internationalization of the Holy City , and provides convincing evidence that the U.N. could not handle this job effectively any more than it handled the job in Rwanda or Bosnia. Gold also points to the inherent prejudice of the U.N. against Israel, and says it could never be a fair and efficient manager of the Holy Sites.
This book makes a very strong case for Israel's maintaining exclusive control of the city.
But the arguments it presents focus more on the negatives of Islamic control than the positives of Israeli control. I would have liked to see more expansive treatment of how Israel has enhanced the city since taking over the Old City in 1967.
Nonetheless this is a must read for those for whom Jerusalem, and its future, is dear.
Book Description
Saddam is gone, Arafat is dead, and a new Iraq is rising. But when a suicide bomber strikes Washington and assassinations unfold from London to Los Angeles, Jon Bennett and Erin McCoy are drawn back into a world of terror they thought was over. At the heart of the mystery lies a 2,000-year-old scroll describing unimaginable treasures that could lead to the Third Jewish Temple. Some call it history’s greatest treasure map. Others call it a road map to Armageddon. But the time to find the truth is running out fast.
Customer Reviews:
An enjoyable Treasure Hunt.......2007-10-11
Very interesting read. I always like Mr. Rosenberg's books as they not only entertain but also inject history with a dash of current events. A contemporary novel with a Da Vinciesque treasure hunt twist. Bad guys, current political intrigue, a race to find a lost treasure and voilà you have a good suspense thriller. The plot was excellent, my only critique was the story line was a tad weak. A little too much shoot-em-up bang bang by ex-government operatives. I mean how do retired out-of-play government agents get access to so much classified information and use of top secret spy toys? Mr. Rosenberg needs to scale back on this or bring back the 2 protagonists, Jon and Erin Bennett, into full government employ. That would give a little more credence to the story. But hey, I'm nitpicking here. The plot was good and I like how Mr. Rosenberg educates his readers on Jewish history and the Temple Mount.
Basically, the plot revolves around the rise of Iraq as a world economic superpower, and the increased Israeli pressure to rebuild the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. Between the two global forces is the hunt for the Temple's massive treasure and the Ark of the Covenant. The Copper Scroll is the treasure map and like in the Da Vinci code Jon and Erin are on the hunt. Unlike many of today's Da Vinci lite books the Copper Scroll actually delivers in the end.
The Copper Scroll is the 4th book in the Rosenberg middle east political saga. You can get by without reading the prior 3 but it could cause a little confusion at times. Mr. Rosenberg does a good job of keeping the reader updated from the previous books but still it can cause some confusion. The ending is excellent and of course lends itself to another book in the mega saga.
No gratuitous violence, language, or sex.
Good read, recommended.
The Copper Scroll.......2007-09-17
I have read all of Joel Rosenberg's books now (including the new Epicenter). Each book was fascinating and brought you up to current events and our world problems today. This book was very good and I could not put it down; however I was disappointed in Joel swaying from bible facts (as the story centers around the scroll and finding the ark. It was beginning to sound like one of Jennings "End Times" books on the last half of his series which I no longer could purchase or read. Hope Joel doesn't sway too far away from the bible facts on his next book due in March 2008 "Dead Heat".
Another really good book........2007-09-01
As usual Joel Rosenberg writes a fast-paced novel full of things that could be today's headlines.
The best so far.......2007-08-30
This last book in the series leaves you wanting to read the next one but where is it? I've read the series and enjoyed this one the most. Having traveled in Israel I could picture in my mind's eye many of the places described in this novel. It is a very interesting premise.
Contrived.......2007-08-28
I purchased this book because I like mysteries based on historical events or puzzles (DaVinci Code, Romanov Prophecy, etc.) and the discovery of the Copper Scroll is a documented find in the same geographical area as the Dead Sea Scrolls. I have also read the Left Behind Series and a few other end times books. I did not think the book was in the best of either genre. I found this book's events to be too contrived to hold my attention and be believable. I would have liked more surprises; the plot twists were predictable. I did enjoy it anyway.
Book Description
Israel is smaller than New Jersey yet captures a lion's share of headlines. It looks like one country on CNN, a very different one on al-Jazeera. The BBC has its version, The New York Times theirs. But how does Israel look to Israelis? The answers are varied, and they have been brought together here in one of the most original books about Israel in decades. From battlefields to bedrooms to boardrooms, discover the colliding worlds in which an astounding mix of 6.8 million devoutly traditional and radically modern people live. You'll meet "Arab Jews" who fled Islamic countries, dreadlock-wearing Ethiopian immigrants who sing reggae in Hebrew, Christians in Nazareth who publish an Arabic-style Cosmo, young Israeli Muslims who know more about Judaism than most Jews of the Diaspora, ultra-Orthodox Jews on "Modesty Patrols," and more. Interweaving hundreds of personal stories with intriguing new research, The Israelis is lively, irreverent, and always fascinating.
Customer Reviews:
Eye-Opening, Balanced. Astounding insights,.......2007-06-17
There is no other book on Israelis like this. It's very balanced, filled with fascinating insights into the lives of ordinary Israeli women, men and children from vastly different backgrounds. It's fun to read and reread. You'll smile, laugh and cry as you visit discos, battlefields and internet cafes, synagogues and mosques, learning about these hyper modern and very traditional Jewish, Muslim, Christians and Druze -- all Israelis.
This well researched masterpiece truly helps you understand what TV and newspaper reporters are not telling you. Every reporter based in the Middle East should read this book before letting the cameras roll. The Israelis is excellent for tourists, arm chair travelers, students, teachers, and diplomats.
No wonder it's sold all over the world.......2007-05-09
You can't say you know much about Israel without reading this engaging, entertaining, original book. It's really fun to read, balanced and packed with fascinating information.
I hear about Israel on the news nearly everyday-- but until I read this absorbing book, I never knew much about regular Israeli people. The author lets all kinds of young Israelis speak. Female soldiers, Israeli Arabs and Israel Christians and religious and non religious Jews. My friend in Berlin told me about it -- she says The Israelis is selling like hotcakes in Germany.
Incredible Book.......2007-02-23
If you are looking to learn about the real mix if people that we call the Israelis this is the book to read. Having been to Israel and returning aagain for 6 weeks this summer I now have a better insight into the people I met and will be with again. A beautiful book about a beautiful country and its people.
The Israelis: Ordinary People in an Extraordinary Land.......2007-01-05
I thought that I understood the dynamics of Israel in our world today. After reading this book, I can only take my hat off to all of the people in that country that are making it work. Ms. Rosenthal's work is so thorough and yet so interesting to read. I feel better after reading this book that the people living in Israel today will be able to withstand all of the forces that are against them in the troubled world today.
Well written and fun to read -- rich human stories.......2006-12-21
The author put quite a bit of work into writing "The Israelis" - and it shows. This book is especially useful for anyone truly interested in challenging their perceptions built up through a lifetime of mainstream media coverage of Israel.
I read most of the book on a flight to Israel. I found the information immediately useful in better understanding that complex society then finished it on my flight back.
In the amazing timing category, I had just read the chapter on Israel's ultra-Orthodox and their belief that Israel should not have been founded as a secular state (believing that only Messiah should do so) when I was amazed to see a TV news report showing four ultra-orthodox Jews standing next to Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at his Holocaust denial conference. Some of the ultra-Orthodox community believes the Holocaust happened as God's punishment to the Jews for not being religious enough. It seems inconsistent to, on one hand participate in a Holocaust denial conference, and on the other believe that the Holocaust was somehow God's punishment, but there they were in Teheran. If it were not for having just read "The Israelis" I would have had no idea why.
I highly recommend this book for anyone wishing to better understand Israel.
Book Description
Invariably, armies are accused of preparing to fight the previous war. In Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife, Lieutenant Colonel John A. Nagl—a veteran of both Operation Desert Storm and the current conflict in Iraq—considers the now-crucial question of how armies adapt to changing circumstances during the course of conflicts for which they are initially unprepared. Through the use of archival sources and interviews with participants in both engagements, Nagl compares the development of counterinsurgency doctrine and practice in the Malayan Emergency from 1948 to 1960 with what developed in the Vietnam War from 1950 to 1975.
In examining these two events, Nagl—the subject of a recent New York Times Magazine cover story by Peter Maass—argues that organizational culture is key to the ability to learn from unanticipated conditions, a variable which explains why the British army successfully conducted counterinsurgency in Malaya but why the American army failed to do so in Vietnam, treating the war instead as a conventional conflict. Nagl concludes that the British army, because of its role as a colonial police force and the organizational characteristics created by its history and national culture, was better able to quickly learn and apply the lessons of counterinsurgency during the course of the Malayan Emergency.
With a new preface reflecting on the author's combat experience in Iraq, Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife is a timely examination of the lessons of previous counterinsurgency campaigns that will be hailed by both military leaders and interested civilians.
Customer Reviews:
COIN.......2007-09-27
Haven't read the book quite yet. I plan to get it done by the time I am to attend CCC though.
Terrific Research and Analysis!.......2007-09-05
For this reader, Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife's value centers on two main premises: 1) those who fail to learn the lessons of history are condemned to repeat them; and, 2) a large, monolithic organization such as the U.S. Army will struggle to adapt unless it adopts a learning culture. Both relate to the U.S. Army's experience in Viet Nam. It is clear that the U.S. Army has only recently begun to learn from its earlier failures fighting a stubborn insurgency in 2004-06 and to implement strategy and tactics appropriate to the situation.
Eminently readable for an Oxford PhD thesis, what sets Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife apart from many other books attempting to explain the failures in Viet Nam is the degree to which the author supports his arguments. He combines exceedingly thorough research befitting a PhD thesis with fully developed and clearly articulated arguments. By examining the British Army of the Malay Campaign and the U.S. Army fighting in Viet Nam in terms of their organizational cultures - that is, the degree to which they promoted learning, flexibility, and adaptability - the author does a superb job of explaining why the British were successful in defeating the communist insurgency on the Malay Peninsula and why the Americans failed in South Viet Nam.
Of course, Nagl has his detractors. There are those who would suggest that the conflict in Malaya in the 1950s differed markedly from the conflict in Viet Nam in the 1960s and early 1970s. For instance, the Viet Cong were able to leverage a well-funded, well-organized, and well-trained North Vietnamese army against the U.S. Army in South Viet Nam. By contrast, the British really only had to confront a communist insurgency in Malaya. However, those readers who point to the dissimilarities in the two conflicts are really missing Nagl's point.
The author's contention that the British Army eventually succeeded in defeating a thinking, adaptive enemy is instructive. In Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife, we are told that for any institution to be successful when faced with new and decidedly different operational challenges, it must be capable of learning and adapting. This includes everything from changing strategy and tactics to completely reorganizing. In fact, it may even need to develop a whole new set of core competencies. In the context of armed warfare, this may mean viewing victory through a different lens. As members of the Bush Administration have readily pointed out, the war in Iraq will not end with a formal surrender aboard a U.S. battleship. More to the point perhaps, Nagl's work compels us to think differently about how we define success in a counterinsurgency.
For the U.S. Army currently operating in Iraq, adapting really means moving away from war fighting strategy and tactics appropriate to a linear battlefield and more toward an approach that better recognizes the nature of the threat. The current threat in Iraq is more socio-political than military. In fact, it is now an article of faith that for our counterinsurgency efforts to be successful, U.S. war fighters must win the hearts and minds of the local populace. If the local Iraqi citizens believe they are more secure and hence can live productive lives, they will be more willing to cooperate with the "occupying" Army. That cooperation will take the form of alerting nearby ground troops to the presence of Al Qaeda fighters and Sunni insurgents.
For any large military organization, adapting to an entirely different threat characterized by a highly complex and dynamic situation involving ethnosectarian conflict, religious persecution, and violent criminal activity such as we see in Iraq today requires tremendous innovation and agility. As Nagl points out, the British were able to eventually embrace change and pursue an effective counterinsurgency strategy while facing a similar set of conditions. He argues persuasively that British and Malay counterinsurgency forces eventually were structured to respond quickly to the communist insurgent threat precisely because they were quite flexible. In large part, the Brits' success can be traced to their approach to counterinsurgency warfare in that era - centralized command with decentralized control. This approach recognizes that the fight is really very different in each province and therefore strategy and tactics will need to be different to attain success.
As Nagl points out, to enjoy the kind of success the Brits had in Malaya, the U.S. Army "will have to make the ability to learn to deal with messy, uncomfortable situations an integral part" of its organizational culture. It must, per T.E. Lawrence, be comfortable "eating soup with a knife." Additionally, as a previous reviewer states quite clearly, "it must be ready to work with outside resources as well, such as the United Nations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and various religious institutions."
Overall, Nagl offers terrific analysis. This work should be required reading for all officers of all branches of the U.S. military.
Counterinsurgency Mandatory Reading.......2007-07-21
Since the Iraq War effort collapsed into something other than a simple liberation of oppressed people, I have tried to gain insight into our problems there by studying books on Iraq's current situation, on US foreign relationships, ancient and recent Mesopotamian history, Israeli and Palestinian Middle East history, and historic counterinsurgency successes and failures in various parts of the World.
Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife is the most illuminating that I have encountered. Col. John A. Nagl very meticulously converts knowledge obtained in writing his Masters and Doctorate theses into a readable analysis of military success in Malaya and non-success in Vietnam.
You must read his preface to the paperback edition both before and after reading the book; this in fairness to our gallant folks serving in the Middle East. You must also abandon any hopes you may have for a blood-and-guts exposé of battleground behavior.
This is science, not sensationalism.
I wish that our military AND our civilian leaders had been able to study this book and to do serious, long-term advanced planning for Iraq based upon it. I am convinced that such luxury would have placed us in a vastly different position than our current one.
Counterinsurgency.......2007-07-03
This book is an excellent review of the successful British counterinsurgency war in Malaysia and the unsuccessful US counterinsurgency in Vietnam. The author draws the correct conclusion that it is necessary to win the support of the people. The author misses the important lesson that the British war cost Britain probably 100 dead vs. the Vietnam cost to the US of 50,000. The second lesson that the author should have learned is that it is critical to keep our casualties low. It is better to take a long time (like the British did - 12 years) that to suffer higher casualties.
Insightful Book for military buff.......2007-06-18
I bought a copy of this book for my boyfriend, serving in the US Army. He enjoys it, recommended it to his fellow officers.
Books:
- Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
- Projections of Power: Framing News, Public Opinion, and U.S. Foreign Policy (Studies in Communication, Media, and Public Opinion)
- Putin's Russia: Life in a Failing Democracy
- Reaping the Whirlwind: The Taliban Movement in Afghanistan
- Reclaiming Our Children: The Healing Solution for a Nation in Crisis
- Russian Strategic Thought toward Asia (Strategic Thought in Northeast Asia)
- Shattered Consensus: The True State of Global Warming
- Social Work, Social Welfare And American Society
- Superpower Syndrome: America's Apocalyptic Confrontation with the World
- Terrorism, Freedom, and Security: Winning Without War
Books Index
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General
| United States
| Americas
| History
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| Books
Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East
Betrayal: France, the Arabs, and the Jews
Infidel
America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It
The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage)
