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War and the American Presidency | 
 enlarge | Author: Arthur M. Schlesinger
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  15 reviews
Sales Rank: 354573
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.4 x 0.6
ISBN: 0393327698
Dewey Decimal Number: 327.160973
EAN: 9780393327694
ASIN: 0393327698
Publication Date: October 10, 2005
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Product Description
"Historical reflections that deftly challenge the political and ideological foundations of President Bush's foreign policy."—Charles A. Kupchan, New York Times
In a book that brings a magisterial command of history to the most urgent of contemporary questions, two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., explores the war in Iraq, the presidency, and the future of democracy. Describing unilateralism as "the oldest doctrine in American history," Schlesinger nevertheless warns of the dangers posed by the fatal turn in U.S. policy from deterrence and containment to preventive war. He writes powerfully about George W. Bush's expansion of presidential power, reminding us nevertheless of our country's distinguished legacy of patriotism through dissent in wartime. And in a new chapter written especially for the paperback edition, he examines the historical role of religion in American politics as a background for an assessment of Bush's faith-based presidency.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
 Good history,but boring. February 17, 2008
Mr. Schlesinger's book is good in some regards. But I have to agree with an earlier reviewer about the rambling on at the end of the book.
The best aspect of the book is the history of American presidents and the process of engaging in war. An example being Truman setting the precedent of "the president possessing the inherent power to go to war."
The author effectively explains the differences between preventive and pre-emptive war.
The history of close presidential elections was used as a segue to the electoral college topic.
His chapter on the electoral college was very good! He detailed the history of and changes made to the electoral college. The "national bonus plan" is intriguing and a possible solution to the anomoly of a candidate winning the popular vote while losing the presidency due to different results from the electoral college.
This book was good on some level,but had some boring areas that left me disappointed overall.
 What We Needed to Know in 2002. November 17, 2006
29 out of 34 found this review helpful
"In 1998, Donald Rumsfeld, [Paul] Wolfowitz, [Richard] Perle were among the eighteen signers of an open letter to President Clinton arguing that regime change in Iraq 'needs to become the aim of American foreign policy'." This quote from world-respected author and one-man political think tank, Arthur Schesinger shows that these individuals were looking for an excuse that 9/11 gave them, to invade Iraq. They began beating the tocsins of war shortly after to create their vision of a middle eastern democracy under a pax americana.
Arthur Schlesinger points out in detail how the Bush administration pressured the CIA for raw intelligence from which they would make an interpretation, how the reasons for invading Iraq kept changing, and how the White House kept contradicting previous statements. The reader can only come to the conclusion that the Bush Doctrine is an utter failure, the invasion of Iraq was not to fight terrorism but to satisfy a right-wing vision, that we were lied to about an association between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin-Laden, that we lied to about WMD. Even after this collaboration and weapons failed to materialize, Schlesinger states "the Bush administration is left with liberation, which it had once deemed an insufficient justification for putting American lives at risk."
I found the first three chapters captivating, but I gave this four stars because of a need to keep a dictionary by my side. The author's vocabulary far exceeds mine, and those of fewer words may find this annoying or challenging. I was also annoyed by the author's use of French without translation: "Nous Sommes Tous Americains." (We are all Americans.) In some places, I had to stop and absorb his insight--a more worthwhile pursuit.
But, if you are looking for a powerful and persuasive argument against our government and its actions, Arthur Schlesinger gives it to you. Read it, and soak it up. Finally, remember the words of George Bush:
"There was no viable exit strategy....Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the United Nations mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression that we hoped to establish."
That was from George Herbert Walker Bush (41)!
The Bush Doctrine and the Future of Democracy July 6, 2006
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
Arthur Schlesinger is a writer and historian who has authored many books and served some time in government. He is a Pulitzer Prize winning author and a person who has earned respect over the years for his insight into government, history, and the important issues of the day.
In this book, Schlesinger spends most of his time talking about the decision to go to war against Iraq and its long term effects on the American people and the democratic way of life. Some of the book's analysis deals with war in general terms but the author spends the bulk of his time talking about the Iraqi conflict and the Bush administration's approach to war. Everyone already knows about the phony "weapons of mass destruction" charge and how it was used to justify the invasion. Schlesinger is a critic of this decision but he actually gives credit to Bush in one respect: He doesn't necessarily think that Bush made up the story. Rather, he thinks the decision was based on faulty information that should have been recognized as faulty but was accepted in its entirety. Bush and his administration were anxious to go after Saddam so they were willing to quickly accept anything that would justify moving the U.S. closer to war. Lost in all of this, of course, was the pursuit of the real enemy: Osama Bin Laden. Bush and his cabinet dismissed the hunt for Osama as soon as they found a reason to go after Iraq.
Even though this book is primarily written about the decision to go to war and how the approach to war has changed over the years, there is also a good deal of talk about democracy in general and how the Bush administration's policies will affect democracy in the future. Schlesinger accurately states that democracy, capitalism, property rights, and personal freedom all go hand in hand and that many of these components of freedom are being diminished gradually by the Bush administration. He also states that the trends in recent history show that the twentieth century ended with more democratic societies than at any other time in the past. But rather than serve as a cause for celebration, this increase in Democratic societies will continue to be tested. Democracy still faces many challenges from different factions who want their idealism forced on the rest of the world. Among these, Schlesinger seems most worried about the problems with religious fundamentalism and extremism. These are, indeed, great threats to democracy not just in Islamic lands but also here in the USA as fundamentalists of various Christian stripes try to blend their interpretation of religion into the law of the land.
Another area of concern that is covered in this book is that of the Electoral College and the election of 2000. Schlesinger, like many other Americans, doesn't want to see the same situation occur where the people's choice- the candidate with the greatest popular vote- didn't win the election. This has now happened four times in America's relatively short history and some type of reform needs to take place to ensure it doesn't happen again. Rather than simply advocate the elimination of the Electoral College and a direct election by popular vote, Schlesinger offers some different alternatives to the problem, some of which I had never heard before.
The Electoral College reform offers some good, original thought but other than this, most of what is contained in "War and the American Presidency" is old news and it's the type of analysis that I have read dozens of times by dozens of different authors. Schlesinger writes well and he expresses himself in a humble yet intelligent way, showing respect to everyone- even those with whom he disagrees. But there is little material in this book that hasn't already been covered by other authors.
This book offers some good reading, even if it does rank low on the originality scale. It is a quick read and because it is so brief (only 141 pages not counting the index- short enough that I read it in one day), it reads like a university lecture. The dialogue in this book seems like it came directly from a lecture series and while this isn't necessarily a bad thing, it means that the book offers too little depth to be taken as seriously as it should be.
"War and the American Presidency" isn't really long enough to be completely effective. But it does offer some good reading material and some persuasive conclusions. For these reasons, I'm going to give this book a marginal recommendation and a rating of three stars. It could have been much better with more attention to detail and about twice as many pages. But it is still ok and it does offer some good, respectful criticism of the Bush administration and its misguided approach to foreign policy.
Disappointing On Many Levels...Even When You Agree With Him December 30, 2005
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
If he had not been the author of The Imperial Presidency, you wouldn't be reading so many reviews of Arthur Schlesinger's latest work. The technique of identifying recurrent historical patterns in the nature of Presidential power and comparing them to the current office-holder worked extremely well in Schlesinger's classic discussion of how White House resources triumphed over hostile Congresses under Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon. It is neither well-executed nor particularly effective in Schlesinger's analysis of George W. Bush's manipulation of a basically compliant Congress to pursue a unilateralist foreign policy. As other reviewers note, there is little that is particularly innovative in the Bush administration's actions in Iraq other than the scale of the intervention (compared to Johnson in the Dominican Republic, Reagan's abortive effort in Lebanon and more successful invasion of Grenada, etc.). What is different is the extent of the miscalculation, both of the enemy and of world reaction. In his three chapters on foreign policy, Schlesinger hardly touches upon these issues, but instead launches into a passionate defense of the success of multilateralism in addressing previous conflicts and problems. In fact, the author never really explains why US multilateralist belief in the efficacy of alliances ever became transformed into unilateralism. At the same time, former congressman Lee Hamilton performed superior historical analysis in his recent work, A Creative Tension, in addressing the systemic issues that influence the balance between congressional and White House influence in times of conflict.
Schlesinger's criticism of Attorney General John Ashbrook's attacks on civil liberties in the name of national security and his diatribe against the electoral college, which occupy about a third of the work, are neither original nor timely. In fact, a good argument can be made that the electoral college in 2000 did exactly what it was supposed to do...prevented the election from reflecting the interests of urban and ethnic coastal minorities at the expense of the suburban, small town, and rural majorities. The fact that so many Americans voted against their personal interests for a President who could be characterized as shallow in thought and elitist in sympathy is unfortunate and even tragic,..but that's democracy.
 What A Long Slide from Camelot August 25, 2005
3 out of 9 found this review helpful
Succinct, sensible, scholarly not sneering...if only George II had chosen the likes of Mr. Schlesigner for his advisors instead of the neocon nincompoops who've set in motion the waning of our military & economic power, influence, and prestige. The accident of history that gave us a president with no sense of history along with a messianic mission has done more damage to our country than the communists of past or the terrorists of present.
This book cries out to be read by every thoughtful, reflective, informed American. So much for any sales in Crawford, even though it's only 7 chapters and 150 pages...perhaps if W. could read a chapter a week he'd finish while still on vacation!
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