Welcome to our book review site go-pdf.online!
You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
Making War, Thinking History
In examining the influence of historical analogies on decisions to use--or not use--force, military strategist Jeffrey Record assesses every major application of U.S. force from the Korean War to the NATO war on Serbia. Specifically, he looks at the influence of two analogies: the democracies? appeasement of Hitler at Munich and America's defeat in the Vietnam War. His book judges the utility of these two analogies on presidential decision-making and finds considerable misuse of them in situations where force was optional. He points to the Johnson administration's application of the Munich analogy to the circumstances of Southeast Asia in 1965 as the most egregious example of their misuse, b...
Appeasement Reconsidered: Investigating the Mythology of the 1930s
The appeasement of Nazi Germany by the western democracies during the 1930s and the subsequent outbreak of World War II have been a major referent experience for U.S. foreign policymakers since 1945. From Harry Truman's response to the outbreak of the Korean War to George W. Bush's decision to overthrow Saddam Hussein, American presidents have repeatedly affirmed the lesson of Munich and invoked it to justify actual or threatened uses of force. However, the conclusion that the democracies could easily have stopped Hitler before he plunged the world into war and holocaust, but lacked the will to do so, does not survive serious scrutiny. Appeasement proved to be a horribly misguided policy aga...
Jeffrey Record: Weinberger-Powell Doctrine Doesn't Cut It
Vincent Ferraro presents the article "Weinberger-Powell Doctrine Doesn't Cut It." The article was written by Jeffrey Record and originally appeared in the October 2000 issue of "Proceedings," a publication of the U.S. Naval Institute. The article is a criticism of the Weinberger-Powell Doctrine, which states that the vital interests of the United States must be at stake before the United States fights a war. The doctrine also asserts that the country should only fight wars that it intends to win.
The Wrong War
Was the U.S. military prevented from achieving victory in Vietnam by poor decisions made by civilian leaders, a hostile media, and the antiwar movement, or was it doomed to failure from the start? Twenty-five years after the last U.S. troops left Vietnam, the most divisive U.S. armed conflict since the War of 1812 remains an open wound not only because 58,000 Americans were killed and billions of dollars wasted, but also because it was an ignominious, unprecedented defeat. In this iconoclastic new study, Vietnam veteran and scholar Jeffrey Record looks past the consensual myths of responsibility to offer the most trenchant, balanced, and compelling analysis ever published of the causes for A...
Sizing Up the Soviet Army
Record har blandt andet på grundlag af russiske kilder studeret den russiske hærs størrelse og organisation og draget konklusioner med hensyn til Kremls hensigter. Alt peger på at russerne forbereder en kort, intensiv konflikt karakteriseret ved deres egen massive offensiv til overrumpling af fjenden.
Wanting War
A complete explanation of the U.S. decision to go to war in 2003.
Ends, Means, Ideology, and Pride
Why did the Axis Powers lose World War II, and what can we learn from its defeat? The Axis seemed on top of the world until 1941, when it added to its list of enemies the United States and the Soviet Union. The entry of Russia and America into the war decisively tipped the balance against Germany, Italy, and Japan. Resource-rich Russia and the United States were prepared for protracted conflict, whereas the Axis was not. From Pearl Harbor onward, it is difficult to imagine how the Axis could have avoided the fate that befell it, short of Stalin's defection from the Allied side. Material weakness should have imposed strategic discipline on Axis territorial ambitions, but none of the three maj...
Appeasement Reconsidered
U.S. use of force since 1945 has been significantly influenced by the perceived consequences of appeasing Hitler in the 1930s, and from the mid-1970s to 2001 by the chilling effect of the Vietnam War. As the United States approached its second war with Iraq, proponents cited the Munich analogy to justify the war, whereas opponents argued that the United States was risking another Vietnam. Though reasoning by historical analogies is inherently dangerous, an examination of the threat parallels between Hitler and Saddam Hussein, and between the Vietnam War and the situation the United States has confronted in post-Baathist Iraq, reveals that the Munich analogy was misused as an argument for war, whereas the American dilemma in Iraq bears some important analogies to the Vietnam conflict, especially with respect to the challenges of state-building and sustaining domestic public support for an unpopular protracted war.
Iraq and Vietnam
None
Beating Goliath
Beating Goliath examines the phenomenon of victories by the weak over the strong--more specifically, insurgencies that succeeded against great powers. Jeffrey Record reviews eleven insurgent wars from 1775 to the present and determines why the seemingly weaker side won. He concludes that external assistance correlates more consistently with insurgent success than any other explanation. He does not disparage the critical importance of will, strategy, and strong-side regime type or suggest that external assistance guarantees success. Indeed, in all cases, some combination of these factors is usually present. But Record finds few if any cases of unassisted insurgent victories except against the...
