A provocative account of the state of Asian geopolitics and US foreign policy in Asia. Drawing on decades of business and political experience, William H. Overholt argues that there is a tension between America's continuing Cold War attitudes and its national interests that poses severe problems for US policy.
Nancy Bernkopf Tucker brings together a wide range of interviews on these and other issues, recorded by the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training, with key players in the making and execution of U.S. policy towards China since World War II. Historical events such as Nixon's trip to China, the Tiananmen Massacre, and the recurring Taiwan Straits crises come to life as never before. Por…
The title of this volume suggests itself from Stevenson's own phrasing in an address at a dinner held in his honor and celebrating the creation of the Stevenson Foundation in the Herbert Lehman Institute of Ethics at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Because of his lifetime search for such an ethic, Stevenson's statement is pertinent: "War is no longer rational, we say, yet the respon…
The United States and its Western allies donate millions of dollars in emergency aid to alleviate the effects of the Ethiopian famine. Despite this aid, the Marxist regime in Ethiopia continues resolutely hostile to the United States and a firm friend to the Soviet Union whose emergency aid has been minimal. Moreover, the regime is pressing ahead vigorously with its socialist programs of po…
The United States is in danger of acting as world vigilante, venturing out into a dangerous neighbourhood when its interests are visibly threatened. The current doctrine of unilateral self-interest is perfectly coherent, even defensible in the short term; but the long term it is dangerous, even to American interests.
"In America's Secret War, George Friedman identifies the United States' most dangerous enemies, delves into presidential strategies of the last quarter century, and reveals the real reasons behind the attack of 9/11- and the Bush administration's motivation for the war in Iraq. It describes in detail America's covert and overt efforts in the global war against terrorism: not only are U.S. armie…
The heart of The Grand Chessboard is Brzezinski's analysis of the four critical regions of Eurasia and of the stakes for America in each arena - Europe, Russia, Central Asia, and East Asia. The crucial fault lines may seem familiar, but the implosion of the Soviet Union has created new rivalries and new relationships, and Brzezinski maps out the strategic ramifications of the new geopolitical r…
A Plastic Nation examines the immense role of Thai nationhood in domestic and international politics. Although in fact ill-defined, Thainess, or khwampenthai, has been consistently used by Thai leaders to legitimize their power and to defend their economic interests. Not only has the assertion of Thainess been deeply rooted in the private interests of those in power, it has been deployed as par…
The government of Myanmar, considering the many "distortions" contained in foreign accounts, in recuperating its history set up the Myanmar historical commision in the 1950s to delve into the past by way of what is commonly know in Myanmar as "living history".
For over a quarter century, Iran has been one of America's chief nemeses. Ever since Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew the Shah in 1979, the relationship between the two nations has been antagonistic: revolutionary guards chanting against the Great Satan, Bush fulminating against the Axis of Evil, Iranian support for Hezbollah, and President Ahmadinejad blaming the U.S. for the world's ills. The une…