A work of fine research, peer review and precise, evenhanded writing that is standing the test of time.
The third edition of this solid, comprehensive military history of the United States, first published in 1984, reworks the era from the Korean War onward and includes the requisite additions wrought by the “global war on terrorism.”
In this clearly structured, concisely written work, Millett (History/Univ. of New Orleans; The War for Korea, 1950-1951, 2010), Maslowski (History/Univ. of Nebraska; Armed with Cameras: The American Military Photographers of World War II, 1993, etc.) and Feis (History/Buena Vista Univ.; Grant's Secret Service, 2002, etc.) proceed chronologically, as the nation’s commitment to civilian control of military policy became more nationalized and competitive with internal growth. The authors move across a wide terrain, including coverage of the colonial militiamen, the forging of the “common defense” by the two branches of the government, legislative and executive, as specified under the Constitution, the country’s national expansion through the Civil War, birth of the American “empire” through the two world wars, and Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. Maslowski has masterly reorganized coverage of the Korean War, which allowed the Truman administration to substitute victory for rearmament in a major way. The war also provided the “political context” for development of NATO and a more active military role in Asia. The authors are stern with President Reagan’s wild-spending “Star Wars” initiative and the “waste, fraud, and abuse in the procurement process”; with Clinton’s “avoiding war and inviting future conflicts”; and with George W. Bush’s inexperience and alarming staff of hawkish neoconservatives. The authors discuss technological innovations, policy and operations in depth, and they urge the Obama administration to manage a policy less dependent on the whims of “domestic politics” and more reliant on “expert advice from their civilian and military professionals.”
A work of fine research, peer review and precise, evenhanded writing that is standing the test of time.Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4516-2353-6
Page Count: 736
Publisher: Free Press
Review Posted Online: June 20, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.
Rootin’-tootin’ history of the dry-gulchers, horn-swogglers, and outright killers who populated the Wild West’s wildest city in the late 19th century.
The stories of Wyatt Earp and company, the shootout at the O.K. Corral, and Geronimo and the Apache Wars are all well known. Clavin, who has written books on Dodge City and Wild Bill Hickok, delivers a solid narrative that usefully links significant events—making allies of white enemies, for instance, in facing down the Apache threat, rustling from Mexico, and other ethnically charged circumstances. The author is a touch revisionist, in the modern fashion, in noting that the Earps and Clantons weren’t as bloodthirsty as popular culture has made them out to be. For example, Wyatt and Bat Masterson “took the ‘peace’ in peace officer literally and knew that the way to tame the notorious town was not to outkill the bad guys but to intimidate them, sometimes with the help of a gun barrel to the skull.” Indeed, while some of the Clantons and some of the Earps died violently, most—Wyatt, Bat, Doc Holliday—died of cancer and other ailments, if only a few of old age. Clavin complicates the story by reminding readers that the Earps weren’t really the law in Tombstone and sometimes fell on the other side of the line and that the ordinary citizens of Tombstone and other famed Western venues valued order and peace and weren’t particularly keen on gunfighters and their mischief. Still, updating the old notion that the Earp myth is the American Iliad, the author is at his best when he delineates those fraught spasms of violence. “It is never a good sign for law-abiding citizens,” he writes at one high point, “to see Johnny Ringo rush into town, both him and his horse all in a lather.” Indeed not, even if Ringo wound up killing himself and law-abiding Tombstone faded into obscurity when the silver played out.
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.Pub Date: April 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21458-4
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020
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