Surprise, Security, and the American Experience (Joanna Jackson Goldman Memorial Lectures on American Civilization & Government) [Hardcover]

If I could give this book no stars at all I would. Gaddis abandons the mantle of a historian completely in this overtly patriotic eulogy to American expansionism. (See the final line in the conclusion: he relays an anecdote about a student who asked him on 11th Sept whether it would be ok now to be patriotic. Gaddis concludes the book with the line,"Yes, I think it would".)

Gaddis argues that American expansionism--both across North America and overseas--has only ever been an attempt to find security against constant threats to the United States. For example, he argues that Native Americans were the 19th century equivalent of terrorists, who threatened the security of the US. In fact the Native Americans, who occupied the country long before the European settlers arrived, were slaughtered indscriminately in a simple case of genocide. Instead, Gaddis claims that this expansion amounted to an "empire of liberty" from the East to West coast. His critique completely omits economic factors that drove expansionism, which is probably why he is so quiet on the issue of slavery: that would put rather a blot on the "empire of liberty" thesis, along with the Native Americans.

He goes on to argue that the rise of American power in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries led to an extension of the "empire for liberty" overseas (although not an empire in the literal sense obviously). The abstractness of his thesis allows Gaddis to ignore many of America's actual policies, such as the standard US Cold War practise of supporting brutal authoritarian regimes around the world as long as they were anti-communist (see, for a very small selection of examples,Pinochet/Chile; the Shah/Iran; Somozas/Nicaragua; Saudi Royal Family to this day; Mobutu/Congo; Saddam/Iraq) plus assassinations and coups against leaders/governments that Washington disliked (e.g. Guatemala 1954; Iran 1953; Chile 1973; Nicaragua 1980-1988). Where are these cases in Gaddis' thesis? Nowhere, because his argument would be unsupportable if he addressed them.

Finally, it is beyond belief that a professional historian could claim that the Bush administration's post-9/11 actions were solely the result of a recalibration of security threats that came about after 9/11. Even most standard accounts of the Iraq War now include a chapter or so about the origins of these policies in the 1990s. Many members of the Bush administration spent several years before they entered office lobbying for the policies (prevention, Iraq, unilateralism where necessary)that Bush implemented ostensibly as a result of 9/11. These policy preferences were favoured by Bush's advisors years before 9/11 and for Gaddis not to acknowledge this is intellectual dishonesty.

It says everything that after reading this book, President Bush invited Gaddis to the White House for a chat. I'm sure Bush enjoyed the book because it's certainly not designed to hold the actions of his administration up to serious or genuine scrutiny.

Extremely pithy (it took only two hours to read) and very insightful. Transformed my understanding of how (some, influential) Americans see the world. Highly recommended for any foreigner trying to understand contemporary American foreign policy.

This is quite possibly the single greatest book I have ever read on the subject of America's role in the world. For those who have read Robert Kagan's "Paradise and Power", this book is an ideal companion for placing current American Foreign Policy in context. You may not like what he says, but you should be in awe of how he does it. As a student of a Master course in International Relations, I can safely say that this book is essential for understanding Amercia's past, present and future. it also comes highly recommended by the Economist.
Buy it and enjoy it.