One of the deepest and most disturbing investigations of one of the defining issues of our era.
A revelatory, pull-no-punches history of the War on Terror, from before 9/11 to the present day.
CNN national security analyst and journalist Bergen (The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda’s Leader, 2006, etc.) takes a critical look at all phases of the conflict between the West and al-Qaeda. Drawing on an impressive range of both Western and Islamic sources, the author examines the historical and philosophical underpinnings of the jihadist movement, most importantly as exemplified by Osama bin Laden. Bin Laden’s charismatic appeal arises in part from conscious emulation of the prophet Muhammad, writes Bergen, even as early as his joining the fight to expel the Soviets from Afghanistan. In particular, his personal asceticism, maintained in spite of his great wealth, gives him credibility with the disaffected of the Islamic world and makes it easy for him to recruit candidates for suicide missions. But Bergen argues that bin Laden’s greatest triumph was also the ruination of al-Qaeda, making him the target of the most relentless manhunt of our time and forcing his followers to the margins of civilized society. At the same time, the Bush administration’s response to 9/11 was deeply flawed; the failure to close the trap on bin Laden at Tora Bora left him and his organization free to continue the fight against the West. Then, the Iraq war, against a country that had no part in 9/11, cost the United States an unprecedented level of international support, especially as the Bush administration abandoned the Geneva Convention in its treatment of prisoners. Bergen looks at the lessons learned on both sides of the war, notably the U.S. military’s rediscovery of one of the lessons of Vietnam: Small units working closely with the indigenous population can achieve what large concentrations of conventional force cannot. The author concludes that, simply by surviving so long, bin Laden has created a movement likely to carry on his brand of anti-Americanism for the foreseeable future.
One of the deepest and most disturbing investigations of one of the defining issues of our era.Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-7432-7893-5
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Free Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Quinn, fresh from his exploration of early America in A New World ( p. 535), takes on the early days of gold-rush California through the story of two men whose political and personal rivalry was to end in tragedy. William Gwin was a suave Southerner with a handsome fortune who headed a clique of California Southerners known as the ``Chivalry.'' Quinn amusingly shows how Gwin—determined to get his version of a state constitution through the first state assembly at Monterey and himself elected to the US Senate—had to adapt to the rough democratic manners of California politics. He ceded first place for a while to the coon-skinned frontiersman ``Dr.'' Semple, but nevertheless controlled the assembly from a back seat. David Broderick, on the other hand, could not have been more different: a tough street fighter from the slums of New York determined to lead ``the ignorant and the timid'' against their masters in 1849 San Francisco. While Gwin carefully cultivated his image in political circles, even going so far as to agree to the ban on slavery (while still owning slaves himself back home), rival Broderick joined the firemen of the nascent city and quickly conceived a virulent hatred for the patrician Gwin. For Broderick, as Quinn quips, it was simple: ``Let the Chivalry oppose the Shovelry at its peril.'' The end result was a duel between the two resulting in Broderick's death. Quinn paints an absorbing picture of this strange, hurly-burly society, at once primitive and sophisticated, impoverished and unimaginably wealthy. We see the tent city of San Francisco with its ruthless merchants, Australian street gangs, and its harbor teeming with mastless boats whose crews had run off to join the gold rush. We see the beginnings of modern California—a melting pot of American problems and aspirations. Quinn performs his task in a richly straightforward way, depicting his colorful cast with a keen sense of the delicate meshing of the personal and the historical.
Pub Date: Oct. 19, 1994
ISBN: 0-517-59573-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1994
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This colorful narrative succeeds at bringing four historically distant lives closer to us. Tillyard (The Impact of Modernism, not reviewed) reveals the characters of four well-to-do Englishwomen who rode the shifting cultural currents between 1740 and the onset of the Victorian age. While thorough research accounts in part for the range and reach of Aristocrats, the privileged lives of the four sisters themselves gives the author unusual access to extraordinary stories. As the daughters of the second Duke of Richmond (descended from an illegitimate son of Charles II, he was a a cabinet minister and a gentleman-scientist), these intelligent, well-educated women were exposed to the newest ideas of the 18th century, as well as to the latest plays, books, and fashions. Over the course of their lives, each would make strong choices and live—for better or worse—with the consequences. Against her parents' wishes, Caroline Lennox married for love an ungainly, politically ambitious M.P. who nearly became prime minister of England; their elopement created a scandal in London. Her canny younger sister Emily married the senior peer of Ireland when she was 15; she spent his fortune freely and bore him 19 children. Louisa Lennox wed Ireland's richest man. Sarah, the youngest, was courted by King George III, who ultimately humiliated her by marrying a German princess. The Lennox women bore children who became important cultural figures—indeed revolutionaries; Emily's son Edward participated in the Irish Rebellion of the 1790s. Tillyard is adept at showing how the next generation's radicalism was a product of, as well as a reaction against, the family heritage. Using thousands of letters exchanged among the sisters, their lovers, their children, and their friends, Tillyard reconstructs the sisters' relationships to one another, to the others in their lives, and to the changing culture around them. Although the formal history could be more adeptly integrated, Tillyard generally brings the women and their extraordinary world to life.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1994
ISBN: 0-374-10305-4
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1994
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