The so-called Israel lobby has been widely denounced and demonized in the global media, but as Mitchell Bard reveals, its power pales in comparison to the decades-long corruption of American interests by Arab governments. Indeed, for more than seventy years, U.S. policy in the Middle East has been shaped not by the power of a nefarious “Israel lobby” but by a misguided emphasis on pleasing and placating the Arab states. This outlook has ensured that the United States pays disproportionate attention to their demands, assisting Arab countries—all of them dictatorial regimes with abysmal human rights records—that do not share our values and often work to subvert our interests. In this authoritative history, Bard provides a timely and valuable corrective to the unbalanced view of Middle East affairs that is so widely promoted today. Bard shows that the Arab Lobby’s goals include feeding America’s oil addiction, obtaining more sophisticated weaponry, and weakening our alliance with a democratic Israel. It also seeks to influence public opinion through a well-funded publicity campaign and by injecting distorted views of the Middle East into high school and college textbooks. Bard’s valuable book brings a much-needed balance to a debate fraught with ignorance and propaganda.

On November 10, 1975, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution declaring Zionism a form of racism. The move shocked millions, especially in the United States-- the country largely responsible for founding the UN. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the American Ambassador to the UN, denounced this attack on Israel as an anti-Semitic assault on democracy and stood up to the Soviet-backed alliance of Communist dictatorships and Third World autocracies that supported the resolution. His eloquent stand brought him celebrity in the U.S., but ultimately shortened his tenure at the UN by alienating American allies, adversaries, and much of the foreign policy establishment--including Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Nevertheless, Moynihan's moment was a turning point: a harbinger of a shift in American culture and politics that would culminate in the Reagan Revolution. Moynihan paved the way for a more muscular, idealistic, neoconservative foreign policy and for a new style of defiant "cowboy" diplomacy. In this book, Gil Troy argues that America's idea of itself--still torn, in the mid-'70s, between post-Vietnam and -Watergate defeatism and a growing sense of optimism--changed with Moynihan, altering both the left and the right in ways that continue to play out in the 21st century. Much of the rhetoric of this era survives in domestic foreign policy debates and the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine, suggesting that Moynihan's struggle has much to reveal about American politics and its position on the world stage--Publisher's summary.

With the end of the Cold War came not the end of history, but the end of America's sense of its strategic purpose in the world. Then, after a decade of drift, the US was violently dragged back into international conflict. Its armed forces responded magnificently but its leaders' objectives were substantially flawed. We fought the wrong war—twice—for reasons that were opaque, and few American citizens understood the cause for which their sons and daughters were fighting and dying. War is a poor substitute for strategic vision, and decisions made in the heat of imminent conflict are often limited by the emotions of the moment. In Don't Wait for the Next War , Wesley K. Clark, a retired four-star general of the US army and former Democratic candidate for president, presents a compelling argument for continued American global leadership and the basis on which it can succeed—a new American strategy. America needs both new power and deeper perspective. The platform for American leadership is to use America's energy resources to spark sustainable economic growth, building new strength to deal with pressing domestic issues like the deficit as well as the longer term challenges to US security—terrorism, cyber threats, the next financial crisis, China's rising power, and climate change. Such a strategy is not only achievable but essential, and it is urgently needed. This is the true test of American leadership for the next two decades, but it must start now, so America has the power and vision to deal with the acute crises that will inevitably come—in the Mideast, Europe, or Asia.

A personal and insightful call to action and a much-needed book about one of the most important bilateral relationships in the world—the relationship between Canada and the US—and why diplomacy matters now more than ever before. All over the world, diplomacy is under threat. Diplomats used to handle sensitive international negotiations, but increasingly, incendiary Tweets and bombastic public statements are posing a threat to foreign relations. In The Art of Diplomacy , the former US ambassador to Canada, Bruce Heyman, and his partner, Vicki Heyman, spell out why diplomacy and diplomats matter, especially in today’s turbulent times. This dynamic power couple arrived in Canada intent on representing American interests, but they quickly learned that to do so meant representing the shared interests of all citizens—no matter what side of the 49th parallel they happened to live on. Bruce and Vicki narrate their three years in Canada spent journeying across the country and meeting Canadians from all walks of life—including Supreme Court justices, prime ministers, fishermen, farmers, artists, and entrepreneurs. They tell the behind-the-scenes stories of how their team helped bring Obama to Canada and Trudeau to the US. They also reveal the importance of creating cultural and artistic exchange between Canada and the US, of promoting economic and trade interests, and overall, of making a lasting positive impact on one of the most important relationships in the free world today. This politically poignant and heartfelt memoir is a call to action, a reminder that only by working together to protect our shared values—the environment, social justice and human rights—can nations build a better world for all. As their long-time friend and colleague President Obama once said, “The world needs more Canada.” At this key moment in history, when opposing nationalist and populist agendas threaten to divide us, The Art of Diplomacy reminds us to keep calm, to work together and to carry on.

A major casualty of the assassin's bullet that struck down Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was a prospective peace accord between Syria and Israel. For the first time, a negotiator who had unique access to Rabin, as well as detailed knowledge of Syrian history and politics, tells the inside story of the failed negotiations. His account provides a key to understanding not only U.S. diplomacy in the Middle East but also the larger Arab-Israeli peace process. During the period from 1992 to 1996, Itamar Rabinovich was Israel's ambassador to Washington, and the chief negotiator with Syria. In this book, he looks back at the course of negotiations, terms of which were known to a surprisingly small group of American, Israeli, and Syrian officials. After Benjamin Netanyahu's election as Israel's prime minister in May 1996, a controversy developed. Even with Netanyahu's change of policy and harder line toward Damascus, Syria began claiming that both Rabin and his successor Peres had pledged full withdrawal from the Golan Heights. Rabinovich takes the reader through the maze of diplomatic subtleties to explain the differences between hypothetical discussion and actual commitment. "To the students of past history and contemporary politics," he writes, "nothing is more beguiling than the myriad threads that run across the invisible line which separates the two." The threads of this story include details of Rabin's negotiations and their impact through two subsequent Israeli administrations in less than a year, the American and Egyptian roles, and the ongoing debate between Syria and Israel on the factual and legal bases for resuming talks. The author portrays all sides and participants with remarkable flair and empathy, as only a privileged player in the events could do. In any assessment of future negotiations in the Middle East, Itamar Rabinovich's book will prove indispensable.

In the twenty-first century, globalization poses major challenges to the key players in U.S. domestic politics--challenges similar to many that Americans have faced from abroad since the nation's founding. But it is only in recent decades that links have been drawn between the study of American political development and international relations; even now, emphasis falls primarily on how domestic politics affects the world arena. This book redresses the imbalance. Ten leading scholars explore how, over the past two centuries, the changing positions of the United States in the world economy and in the international political order have shaped U.S. political institutions and domestic politics. Ira Katznelson, Aristide R. Zolberg, and Robert O. Keohane demonstrate the central role that efforts to contend with foreign military and economic competition played in forming the major institutions of U.S. government from the framing of the Constitution through the Civil War. Martin Shefter, Theda Skocpol (writing with Ziad Munson, Andrew Karch, and Bayliss Camp), Ronald Rogowski, and Judith Goldstein show how the nation's political institutions were transformed by problems of war and trade the U.S. subsequently faced. Aaron L. Friedberg, Bartholomew H. Sparrow, and Peter A. Gourevitch conclude the volume by analyzing how international conflicts during and after the Cold War influenced governmental institutions and domestic politics in the United States over the past fifty years. Shaped by War and Trade sets the agenda for further exploration of a topic whose discussion is long overdue.

A secular regime is toppled by Western intervention, but an Islamic backlash turns the liberators into occupiers. Caught between interventionists at home and fundamentalists abroad, a prime minister flounders as his ministers betray him, alliances fall apart, and a runaway general makes policy in the field. As the media accuse Western soldiers of barbarity and a region slides into chaos, the armies of God clash on an ancient river and an accidental empire arises. This is not the Middle East of the early twenty-first century. It is Africa in the late nineteenth century, when the river Nile became the setting for an extraordinary collision between Europeans, Arabs, and Africans. A human and religious drama, the conflict defined the modern relationship between the West and the Islamic world. The story is not only essential for understanding the modern clash of civilizations but is also a gripping, epic, tragic adventure. "Three Empires on the Nile" tells of the rise of the first modern Islamic state and its fateful encounter with the British Empire of Queen Victoria. Ever since the self-proclaimed Islamic messiah known as the Mahdi gathered an army in the Sudan and besieged and captured Khartoum under its British overlord Charles Gordon, the dream of a new caliphate has haunted modern Islamists. Today, Shiite insurgents call themselves the Mahdi Army, and Sudan remains one of the great fault lines of battle between Muslims and Christians, blacks and Arabs. The nineteenth-century origins of it all were even more dramatic and strange than today's headlines. In the hands of Dominic Green, the story of the Nile's three empires is an epic in the tradition of Kipling, the bard of empire, and Winston Churchill, who fought in the final destruction of the Mahdi's army. It is a sweeping and very modern tale of God and globalization, slavers and strategists, missionaries and messianists. A pro-Western regime collapses from its own corruption, a jihad threatens the global economy, a liberation movement degenerates into a tyrannical cult, military intervention goes wrong, and a temporary occupation lasts for decades. In the rise and fall of empires, we see a parable for our own times and a reminder that, while American military involvement in the Islamic world is the beginning of a new era for America, it is only the latest chapter in an older story for the people of the region.

The first comprehensive and systematic analysis of American and Soviet security cooperation since World War II, this volume expertly examines the pursuit of arms control, the search for stability, and the balance of power between the two countries. The twenty-one case studies, each commissioned from a highly qualified specialist on the subject in question, probe a wide range of global, regional, and bilateral situations and issues, including both successful and unsuccessful instances of cooperation. Developing a rigorous theoretical framework for analyzing and comparing these diverse cases, the contributors cast new light on the history of superpower relations.

"Theodore Draper is one of the two or three most cogent and thoughtful social historians in the United States today. Everything he writes merits close attention." -Irving Howe "Theodore Draper is a historian of today's world in a class by himself-formidably equipped with learning and experience, fearless in attacking the naivet of the left and the cruelty of the right." -Alfred Kazin Theodore Draper is one of America's most trenchant and informed critics. A Present of Things Past gathers together ten of his most recent and most powerful selected essays, in which Draper, with his customary acuity and wit, tackles a host of issues that define America's political culture. A Present of Things Past is concerned with a reexamination of the Second World War in both its military and its political aspects; the trajectory of American conservatism as it manifested itself during the Reagan years; the rise of Gorbachev and the history of "reform" in the Soviet Union; the revisionist debate over the origins and history of American communism; and the persistent mystery of a man named Max Eitingon, who was, depending on one's reading of the sources, either an important figure in the history of psychoanalysis or an agent of the Soviet secret police, or both. In "American Hubris," Draper illuminates the assumptions that have guided American foreign policy in the postwar period, and concludes that our costly misadventures-in Korea, Vietnam, Lebanon, and elsewhere-cannot be considered a string of aberrations. They were, he argues, a consequence of the Truman Doctrine. In "Reagan's Junta," Draper observes: "This is supposed to have been the era of the imperial presidency. It has turned out to be the era of presidencies that have tried to make themselves imperial-and failed." Throughout these compelling essays, Draper demonstrates the uses and abuses to which history has been put by ideologues of both the left and the right. He finds unacceptable, for example, the practice of many journalists of fictionalizing their sources. The New York Times has called Draper "one of the clearer-eyed observers of the issues that torment us." A Present of Things Past enhances that reputation. Theodore Draper is the author of numerous books, including Present History: On Nuclear War, Dtente & Other Controversies and American Communism. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and lives in Princeton, New Jersey. "Is especially recommended for students of political science, the Cold War era, and twentieth century American history as a powerful, thought-provoking view of the people and events that shaped nations, and through nations the world."-- Library Bookwatch

A profoundly moving biographical study of George Kennan by the fine historian John Lukacs A man of impressive mental powers, of extraordinary intellectual range, and--last but not least--of exceptional integrity, George Frost Kennan (1904-2005) was an adviser to presidents and secretaries of state, with a decisive role in the history of this country (and of the entire world) for a few crucial years in the 1940s, after which he was made to retire; but then he became a scholar who wrote seventeen books, scores of essays and articles, and a Pulitzer Prize-winning memoir. He also wrote remarkable public lectures and many thousands of incisive letters, laying down his pen only in the hundredth year of his life. Having risen within the American Foreign Service and been posted to various European capitals, and twice to Moscow, Kennan was called back to Washington in 1946, where he helped to inspire the Truman Doctrine and draft the Marshall Plan. Among other things, he wrote the "X" or "Containment" article for which he became, and still is, world famous (an article which he regarded as not very important and liable to misreading). John Lukacs describes the development and the essence of Kennan's thinking; the--perhaps unavoidable--misinterpretations of his advocacies; his self-imposed task as a leading realist critic during the Cold War; and the importance of his work as a historian during the second half of his long life.

The New York Times hailed John B. Judis's The Emerging Democratic Majority as "indispensable." Now this brilliant political writer compares the failure of American imperialism a century ago with the potential failure of the current administration's imperialistic policies. One hundred years ago, Theodore Roosevelt believed that the only way the United States could achieve peace, prosperity, and national greatness was by joining Europe in a struggle to add colonies. But Roosevelt became disillusioned with this imperialist strategy after a long war in the Philippines. Woodrow Wilson, shocked by nationalist backlash to American intervention in Mexico and by the outbreak of World War I, began to see imperialism not as an instrument of peace and democracy, but of war and tyranny. Wilson advocated that the United States lead the nations of the world in eliminating colonialism and by creating a "community of power" to replace the unstable "balance of power." Wilson's efforts were frustrated, but decades later they led to the creation of the United Nations, NATO, the IMF, and the World Bank. The prosperity and relative peace in the United States of the past fifty years confirmed the wisdom of Wilson's approach. Despite the proven success of Wilson's strategy, George W. Bush has repudiated it. He has revived the narrow nationalism of the Republicans who rejected the League of Nations in the 1920s. And at the urging of his neoconservative supporters, he has revived the old, discredited imperialist strategy of attempting to unilaterally overthrow regimes deemed unfriendly by his administration. Bush rejects the role of international institutions and agreements in curbing terrorists, slowing global pollution, and containing potential threats. In The Folly of Empire, John B. Judis convincingly pits Wilson's arguments against those of George W. Bush and the neoconservatives. Judis draws sharp contrasts between the Bush administration's policies, especially with regard to Iraq, and those of every administration from Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman through George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton. The result is a concise, thought-provoking look at America's position in the world -- then and now -- and how it has been formed, that will spark debate and controversy in Washington and beyond. The Folly of Empire raises crucial questions about why the Bush administration has embarked on a foreign policy that has been proven unsuccessful and presents damning evidence that its failure is already imminent. The final message is a sobering one: Leaders ignore history's lessons at their peril.

" Americans and Europeans are divided by more than an ocean when it comes to designing and carrying out policies toward countries that repress human rights, develop weapons of mass destruction, and/or support terrorism and subversion. Accounting for this divide are distinct interests, domestic politics, and above all profound disagreements between Americans and their counterparts in European capitals and Brussels over what tools of foreign policy--sanctions, engagement, military force--to empty to change the behavior of problem countries. The result is that Americans and Europeans often work at cross purposes--and that disagreements over policy toward problem countries threaten both to undermine efforts that promote desired change and transatlantic cooperation in other areas, be it within Europe or in building an open world trading system. This book examines the ""problem"" countries of Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, and Nigeria. The authors explain sources of American and European differences, consequences for policies designed to influence problem states, and prospects for bridging transatlantic policy rifts. A conclusion by Richard N. Haass places these differences in perspective and suggests what Europe and the United States need to do to ameliorate this tension--and what could transpire if they do not. "

"The United States and the Nazi Holocaust is an invaluable synthesis of United States policies and attitudes towards the Nazi persecution of European Jewry from 1933 right up to the modern day. The book, which includes 20 illustrations, weaves together a vast body of scholarly literature to bring students of the Holocaust a balanced, readable overview of this complex and often controversial topic. It demonstrates that the United States' response to the rise of Nazism, the refugee crisis it provoked, the Holocaust itself, and its aftermath were--and remain to this day--intricately linked to the ever-shifting racial, economic, and social status of American Jewry. Using a broad chronological framework, Barry Trachtenberg navigates us through the major themes and events of this period. He discusses the complicated history of the Roosevelt administration's response to the worsening situation of European Jewry in the context of the ambiguous racial status of Jews in Depression and World War II-era America. He examines the post-war decades in America, and discusses, over a series of chapters, how the Holocaust, like American Jewry itself, came to move from the margins to the very center of American awareness. The United States and the Nazi Holocaust considers the reception of Holocaust survivors, post-war trials, film, memoirs, memorials, and the growing field of Holocaust Studies. The reactions of the United States government, the general public, and the Jewish communities of America are all accounted for in this integrated, detailed survey"--

This volume provides new insights into the role of U.S. consuls in the Ottoman Middle East in the special context of the Holy Land. This volume provides new insights into the role of U.S. consuls in the Ottoman Middle East in the special context of the Holy Land. The motivations and functioning of the American consuls in Jerusalem, and of the consular agents in Jaffa and Haifa, are analyzed as part of the US diplomatic and consular activity throughout the world, and of Western involvement in the Ottoman Empire and in Palestine during the century preceding World War I. The processes of cultural, demographic, economic, environmental, and settlement change and the contribution of the US consuls and American settlers to development of and modernization of Palestine are discussed. Based on primary archival sources such facets as the role of consuls regarding the use of extraterritorial privileges, Western religious and cultural penetration, control of land and land purchase, non-Muslim settlement, judicial systems, and technological innovations are considered from American, Ottoman, and local viewpoints.

"Having observed earlier periods of determined, persistent, creative and wise American diplomacy on the Arab-Israeli conflict, we are left to ponder whether that kind of American leadership and diplomatic wisdom can be recaptured. We also are left to wonder whether the supportive domestic environment in which previous administrations operated will recur, or whether Congressional and public support for Israel has limited administration options and thus changed the very nature of the American role in the peace process. Our overall conclusions in this volume represent a mix of process, politics, and substantive lessons learned, offered in the hope that a better understanding of the past can inform future policy."-from The Peace Puzzle Each phase of Arab-Israeli peacemaking has been inordinately difficult in its own right, and every critical juncture and decision point in the long process has been shaped by U.S. politics and the U.S. leaders of the moment. The Peace Puzzle tracks the American determination to articulate policy, develop strategy and tactics, and see through negotiations to agreements on an issue that has been of singular importance to U.S. interests for more than forty years. In 2006, the authors of The Peace Puzzle formed the Study Group on Arab-Israeli Peacemaking, a project supported by the United States Institute of Peace, to develop a set of "best practices" for American diplomacy. The Study Group conducted in-depth interviews with more than 120 policymakers, diplomats, academics, and civil society figures and developed performance assessments of the various U.S. administrations of the post-Cold War period. This book, an objective account of the role of the United States in attempting to achieve a lasting Arab-Israeli peace, is informed by the authors' access to key individuals and official archives.

This compilation of essays, edited by a Palestinian writer and an Israeli journalist, constitutes a challenge to critically rethink the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Between the Lines presents a groundbreaking study that brings together insights from across the lines of conflict to put the latest chapter of Israeli apartheid and Palestinian resistance into context. Contributors include: Marwan Bargouti, Dr. Azmi Bishara, Dr. Sami Shalom Chetrit, Dr. Saleh Abdel Jawwad, Husam Khader, Eileen Kuttab, Dr. Yitzhak Laor, Dr. Adi Ophir, Dr. Ilan Pappe, Linda Tabar, Graham Usher and Dr. Jamal Zahalqa. "The destruction of a nation is not an everyday event in history. It is being carried out before our eyes, systematically and consciously, with cruelty and self-righteousness, and with the backing of the global superpower. These acute and informed essays develop a perspective on the background and unfolding of these events that is remote from anything likely to be heard in the West. They merit close attention and thoughtful consideration." --Noam Chomsky "This collection provides a lucid and critical analysis of the Israeli and American policies in the Middle East. The disastrous repercussions of this unholy alliance are presented in this collection through incisive and timely contributions. In the best tradition of [the journal] Between the Lines, readers will be rewarded by this collection that unmasks and exposes what the mainstream media refuses to report or admit." --Ilan Pappe, Israeli historian and author of A History of Modern Palestine Toufic Haddad is a Palestinian American activist who was formerly co-editor with Tikva Honig-Parnass of the Jerusalem-based magazine Between the Lines. Tikva Honig-Parnass is a Jewish Israeli active in radical anti-occupation movements.

Exploring Soviet and Russian history, politics, and foreign policy, The Uses of History brings together the classic essays of renowned scholar Alexander Dallin. The author provides insightful analysis and nuanced interpretations of such key-and controversial-issues as the domestic sources of Soviet foreign policy, Stalin's leadership in World War II, Russian-American relations in the Reagan era, the causes of the collapse of the USSR, and the disappointments of Russia's post-Soviet evolution. With his incisive assessment of the biases and blunders in American interpretations, Dallin rejects single-factor explanations for Soviet and Russian domestic and foreign policies, instead examining the complex interplay of internal and external conditions, institutions, mindsets, and the role of individual leaders. All readers interested in Soviet and post-Soviet history will find this collection a stimulating and deeply knowledgeable resource.

The great vogue of Eurocommunism came to an end with the return of the French and Italian Communist Parties to positions of opposition to authority in the late 1970's, and the electoral confirmation that Spain's Communist Party would remain small. As the vogue of communism with a human face passed. The question of American policy toward Communists became far less pressing; yet the question will almost certainly require attention in the future. This is particularly true with respect to the Italian Communist Party, which remains powerful in numbers and flexible in policy. Michael Ledeen examines Communist Party participation in Western European governments since World War II, and the ambivalent American foreign policy toward it. He concentrates on the Italian Communist Party: its history and its relations with the Soviet Union. Togliatti, Secchia, Gramsci, Nenni are identified as the major players in Italian communist and socialist politics. The author explores in depth why the United States has been reluctant to become involved in internal Italian affairs, and how this policy posture has strongly influenced in the development of communism in Western Europe. Ledeen shows that the strategies of contemporary West European Communist Parties are now roughly similar to those of the immediate post-war period. He argues that American intellectuals are as uncritical of Eurocommunism as they were after the first flush of Allied victory in World War II, that the Carter administration's foreign policy was incoherent, and that the United States needs a consistent, ideological approach to communism--one that includes the capacity for action as well as reaction. Michael Ledeen is a senior associate of the Center for Strategic and International Studies at Georgetown University, and formerly taught history at Washington University. He was the founding editor of The Washington Quarterly , and is the author of, among other works, Grave New World; The First Duce: D'Annunzio at Fiume; and editor of U.S. Defense and Foreign Policy.

America is the last remaining superpower. Yet what does this triumph mean when the challenges we face often defy military solutions? In Temptations of a Superpower , one of our most eloquent and incisive foreign policy analysts takes a hard look at this question, with all its implications for America's role in the post-Cold War world. Ronald Steel offers a devastating critique of a high-stakes game of foreign policy played by rules that no longer apply, and then proposes a more realistic--and pragmatic--view of the world and our place in it. The Cold War imposed a certain order on the world, giving us a secure sense of our enemies and allies, our interests and our mission. Steel paints a disturbing picture of the world now deprived of its ordering principle, where ethnic conflicts and national rivalries once held in check erupt in violence, where the shifting allegiances and fevered ambitions flout familiar strategies for keeping peace, conducting trade, and protecting human rights. He explores the history of our present predicament and explains the dangers of adapting outmoded but habitual policies to a new world whose shape is fast evolving. What, for instance, is the future of America's military, deeply embedded as it is in our culture and economy? If Wilsonian idealism, with its vision of converting the world to democracy, replaces anti-communism as the guiding principle behind foreign policy, how far should it take us? What distinctions should we make between our nearest neighbors and distant nations? How are we to balance economic needs and ethical imperatives? Analyzing the turmoil sweeping the world from China to Bosnia, Haiti to the Caucasus, Steel depicts the shattering dilemmas facing American policymakers. What concern should the United States have with many world quarrels? How can national interest be reconciled with strategic considerations and morality? When should domestic needs take precedence over foreign policy? The alternatives that Steel proposes to current policies defy much of the conventional wisdom and are certain to provoke controversy. He asks not only what America should do for the world, but what it must do for itself. Reminding us that foreign and domestic policy are inseparable, Steel argues that a renewed foreign policy must address not only changes in the world order, but the pressing, unmet needs within America itself.