A finely detailed story of American presidents and their relationship to the world of espionage and intelligence. In this sweeping history of the American intelligence community, Andrew demonstrates how the idiosyncracies and experiences of individual leaders—from the exploits of George Washington as spy and spymaster during the Seven Years and Revolutionary wars to George Bush's serving as CIA director—shaped the nature and use of the intelligence services. For instance, the great respect Eisenhower gained for aerial intelligence before and during the D-Day invasions translated during his presidency into the creation of the world's best overhead reconnaissance service. On a stranger note, FDR was so taken with the idea that the Japanese were frightened by bats that he ordered his intelligence services to research the possibility of a surprise bat attack on Japan. Andrew (History/Cambridge Univ.; Her Majesty's Secret Service, 1986, etc.) shows that Americans were latecomers to the intelligence game; only in the first decade of the Cold War did the US become an intelligence superpower. Andrew clearly knows his way around the dark corridors of the history of espionage. He details the actions of the intelligence agencies in the most significant events of the 20th century, including the attack on Pearl Harbor, the planning for the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion, and American preparations for the Gulf War. Andrew chides American presidents— by the late 20th century, the most informed leaders in the history of the world, he says—for taking their intelligence services for granted or expecting too much from them. He also warns those Americans who, given the fall of the Soviet Union, would cut the funding of the CIA, that in the postCold War period intelligence will be more important than ever. Andrew has a sharp sense of the importance and impact of intelligence and a flair for creating a colorful historical tapestry. (37 b&w photos, not seen)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-06-017037-9
Page Count: 672
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1994
BOOK REVIEW
Grounding his story in documentary and fragmentary archaeological evidence, British archaeologist Hume (Martin's Hundred, 1982) tantalizingly reconstructs the history of the earliest English settlements in America. The British drive for colonies grew out of England's 16th- century rivalry with Spain; hence the earliest English settlements in America were planted in the midst of the ``Terra Florida'' that explorers had claimed for the Spanish crown. After some abortive attempts to create an English foothold in the New World, Sir Walter Raleigh sent more than 100 English colonists under gentleman-artist John White to lay claim to the land the Elizabethans called ``Virginia.'' They landed in Roanoke, in what is now North Carolina, in July 1587. After establishing a fort and colony, White and some members of the group returned to England. When several more English ships arrived in Roanoke in 1589, the colony had vanished with few, cryptic traces. Hume painstakingly reviews the sparse evidence, both from contemporary journals and from modern forays over the site, of the Lost Colony: Almost surely, the settlers were massacred by Indians, although little evidence exists today either of their presence at Roanoke or of their fate. Similarly, Hume tracks the more successful but often tragic history of the Jamestown settlement from its birth in 1607, using artifacts and journals of the period to trace the colony's growth from its unpromising beginning as a small disease-ridden group of adventurers into a prosperous community. Hume focuses particularly on the relationship between the settlers and the Indians, which went from mutual idealization to demonization within a few years. This culminated in the 1622 slaughter by the Indian chief Opechancanough of English settlers in the area around Jamestown and an English backlash against the natives that spelled the ultimate doom of their culture. Hume breaks little novel historical ground, although he eloquently recounts the archaeological record and brings alive the lost settlements of the early American past with wit and style. (164 illustrations) (Book-of-the-Month Club selection)
Pub Date: Sept. 20, 1994
ISBN: 0-394-56446-4
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1994
The reclamation of an 18th-century New Hampshire farmstead over the past 25 years provides an enchanting ``natural sequel'' to Eighty Acres, the author's popular 1990 memoir of growing up on a Michigan farm. Jager, a former Yale philosophy professor, and his wife bought the Cape Codstyle farmhouse and 100 acres near Washington, N.H., in 1966. Though they did not move in full-time until the late 1970s, renovation began almost immediately, as did Jager's research into the place and the surrounding community. They christened the spread ``Lovellwood,'' after the mountain that looms over the property. The house had been abandoned for years, and the woods were beginning to reclaim pastures and meadows, while some sections simply lay fallow. Jager learned that Ebenezer Wood, a Revolutionary War Minuteman, was the ``original settler'' on the place in 1780, or '81. When he began work on the interior, he discovered Wood's original framing—``built to last forever''—of pine, spruce, and hemlock beams, held together by oak treenails, or trunnels, as they were called. He exposed those beams, removing layers of wallpaper and cow-hair- and horsehair-bound plaster. Jager also discovered (while mowing the lawn) the original hearthstones Wood had chiseled from the local granite. They had been ``ditched'' by the Powers family, who'd bought the place in 1857, when they remodeled at the turn of the century. While the refurbishing of the house is the central topic, Jager also offers a look at contemporary country living and rural New England politics. He strings together several lovely natural history pieces, such as his eloquent proclamation on his love for the woods; his fond, reasoned farewell to deer hunting; and his cornucopian description of the forest's encroachment on a lush meadow he's trying to save. A joy: like getting a letter from a modern-day Thoreau, one who takes sensual pleasure in writing, and has his feet planted firmly on the soil.
Pub Date: Oct. 18, 1994
ISBN: 0-8070-7062-9
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Beacon Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1994
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