A Choice of Enemies: America Confronts the Middle East Freedman, Sir Lawrence

Product Description The United States is locked into three prolonged conflicts without much hope of early resolution. Iran is pursuing a nuclear program; the aftermath of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein has seen unrelenting intercommunal violence; and the Taliban have got back into Afghanistan. George W. Bush will almost certainly leave office without solving any of these big foreign policy issues that have defined his presidency. Sir Lawrence Freedman, distinguished historian of 20th-century military and political strategy, teases out the roots of each engagement over the last thirty years and demonstrates with clarity and scholarship the influence of these conflicts upon each other. How is it that the US manages to find itself fighting on three different fronts?Freedman supplies a context to recent events and warns against easy assumptions: neo-conservatives, supporters of Israel and the hawks are not the sole reasons for the failure to develop a viable foreign policy in the Middle East. The story is infinitely more complex and is often marked by great drama. Unique in its focus, this book will offer new revelations about the history of the US in the region, and about America’s role in the wider world.A Choice of Enemies is essential reading for anyone concerned with the complex politics of the Middle East and with the future of American foreign policy.“Freedman is not just a good historian but a terse, readable writer.” Simon Jenkins, Sunday Times (UK) Review “A fast-paced introduction for lay-readers and a fresh analysis that will appeal to experts. . . . Gives an unrivalled sense of all the pressures and trade-offs facing American presidents.” —Financial Times“Provocative. . . . [Freedman] has assembled an impressive array of sources and presents them well. . . . Freedman has provided an expansive yet tightly written overview of a complex topic and made good sense of it.” —Foreign Affairs About the Author Sir Lawrence Freedman is professor of war studies at King’s College, London. In 2001 he was appointed head of the School of Social Sciences and Public Policy at King’s and then in 2003 vice principal for research. Before joining King’s he held research appointments at Nuffield College, Oxford, the International Institute for Strategic Studies, and the Royal Institute of International Affairs. He is the author of several books of history, including Kennedy’s Wars and The Official History of the Falklands Conflict. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Choosing EnemiesWhen war comes, choosing an enemy is normally the least of a government’s problems. The choice tends to be obvious. Speaking after the “unprovoked and dastardly” Japanese attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, “a date which will live in infamy,” President Franklin D. Roosevelt saw no need to elaborate on the meaning of these events: “The facts of yesterday speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our nation.” The next “unprovoked and dastardly” attack against American territory, on September 11, 2001, was naturally compared to Pearl Harbor. Yet in this case the facts did not speak so clearly. Four commercial aircraft had been hijacked. Two had been flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, a third into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., while a fourth, probably destined for the U.S. Capitol Building, crashed in Pennsylvania. The immediate cost in lives was higher: 3,021 (including nineteen hijackers) as against 2,382 in 1941. A measure of the traumatic impact, however, is that early estimates suggested that some 10,000 might have died as the two towers collapsed into dust and rubble. Moreover, the enemy had struck from within the United States, and a link with foreign organizations or states could only be assumed. There was no transparen