The Fifty-Year Wound: The True Price of America's Cold War Victory

by Derek Leebaert

Book Overview

The Fifty-Year Wound is the first cohesively integrated history of the Cold War, one replete with important lessons for today. Drawing upon literature, strategy, biography, and economics -- plus an... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316518476
• ISBN13: 9780316518475
• Release Date: March 2002
• Publisher: Little Brown and Company
• Length: 750 Pages
• Weight: 2.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.6" x 6.7" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

A Breath of Sanity--Hard Look at Cost of Cold War

This is an extraordinary book, in part because it forces us to confront the "hangover" effects of the Cold War as we begin an uncertain path into the post 9-11 future. It begins by emphasizing that the Cold War glorified certain types of institutions, personalities, and attitudes, and ends by pointing out that we paid a very heavy cost--much as General and President Eisenhower tried to warn us--in permitting our society to be bound by weaponry, ideology, and secrecy.Two quotes, one from the beginning, one from the end, capture all that lies in between, well-documented and I would add--contrary to some opinions--coherent and understandable."For the United States, the price of victory goes far beyond the dollars spend on warheads, foreign aid, soldiers, propaganda, and intelligence. It includes, for instance, time wasted, talent misdirected, secrecy imposed, and confidence impaired. Particular costs were imposed on industry, science, and the universities. Trade was distorted and growth impeded." (page xi)"CIA world-order men whose intrigues more often than not started at the incompetent and went down from there, White House claims of 'national security' to conceal deceit, and the creation of huge special interests in archaic spending all too easily occurred because most Americans were not preoccupied with the struggle." (page 643)Although the author did not consult the most recent intelligence reform books (e.g. Berkowitz, Johnson, Treverton, inter alia), he is consistently detailed and scathing in his review of intelligence blunders and the costs of secrecy--in this he appears to very ably collaborate the findings of Daniel Ellsberg's more narrowly focused book on "SECRETS: A Memoire of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers." He points out, among many many examples, that despite Andropov's having been head of the KGB for fifteen years, at the end of it CIA still did not know if Andropov has a wife or spoke English. He also has a lovely contrast between how little was learned using very expensive national technical means (secret satellites) and open sources: "So much failure could have been avoided if CIA has done more careful homework during the 1950s in the run-up to Sputnik; during the 1960s, when Sovieet marshals were openly publishing their thoughts on nuclear strategy; or during the 1970s and 1980s, when stagnation could be chronicled in the unclassified gray pages of Soviet print. Most expensively, the CIA hardly ever learned anything from its mistakes, largely because it would not admit them." (pages 567-568).The author's biographic information does not include any reference to military service, but footnote 110 suggests that he was at least in Officer Candidate School with the U.S. Marine Corps during the Vietnam era. The biography, limited to the inside back jacket flap, also avoids discussing the author's considerable experience with information technology. Given the importance of this critique of all that most Republicans and most 50

Views of a Fighter Pilot

Derek Leebaert's book, The Fifty-Year Wound is the finest work of historical analysis that I have ever read and studied. His work is complete and definitive. With his insight into the dynamics of world events he has transformed the mosaic of the complex events and personalities of the 50 years of Cold War into a seamless story. Many know the history of events, but few can reveal why they were what they were. His perspectives are priceless; his words dense with meaning. He has a unique ability to capture and interpret significant events in a single sentence. He reveals the good and the bad, and separates facts from fiction. Telling the truth took great courage. His style is fascinating. With the moment of the subject and his outstanding ability to write, this will be one of the outstanding books on national events and international relations of this decade. I give it an unqualified recommendation for all who wish to learn from history.

This is the book we've been waiting for

America has been waiting for this book since 1991. Leebaert has given us a rich and detailed account of what the Cold War cost the United States in resources, people, and money. No one is sacred; no one is exempt from Leebaert's cold scrutiny. The myths of Kennedy and Kissinger are shattered, and Reagan is finally put in perspective.Leebaert's writing is often complex; one can easily get lost in his grammar. But don't let that deter you from picking up this book; his research and analysis are top-notch.You should know that this book, although proceeding in a chronological way, is not a history of the Cold War. It is an analysis of what it cost the U.S. If you don't have a good understanding of the outline of the Cold War, watch CNN's documentary before you tackle this book.

What Price Victory? This Book Trashes Conventional Wisdom!

More than ten years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the time has come for a thorough, dispassionate, non-ideological review of the Cold War and its consequences. In this book, Derek Leebaert, professor of government at Georgetown University, attempts such a review. It is a daunting task to explore fifty years of history in one volume but Leebaert largely succeeds in creating a cogent, analysis of American actions during this period and their consequences.This book is the first I have ever read about the Cold War that is not filtered through the author's ideology of either the right or the left. Radical leftists will blame the Cold War on American capitalist imperialism. Establishment liberals have tended to view this titanic struggle as between forces equally malevolent or at least equally compromised. The right, of course, has a tendency to forgive each and every American excess as a necessary component in a struggle against a force of pure evil. Leebaert subscribes to none of these views. As Leebaert demonstrates, the truth is much more nuanced.Leebaert begins by setting forth the danger posed by Stalin's Soviet Union during the late forties. He reveals the cold hand of Stalin behind North Korean aggression The first figure scorned by Leebaert is George Kennan, architect of the containment policy who, after the crowning achievement of his life, spent the next forty years undermining it. Leebaert has high regard for President Truman, George Marshall and, surprisingly, British foreign secretary Ernest Bevin. He sees these men as helping stabilize the fluid post-war situation. I, myself am not high on Bevin, an old school anti-semite, who was virulently anti-zionist and reneged on his Labour party's pledge to support Jewish immigration to Palestine but that is a story for another book. Leebaert also notes the excesses of the McCarthyist persecutions which prevented a sober examination of the unusually extensive communist penetration of the American government. He views the Eisenhower years as the period when bad intelligence and hasty policy decisions started to undermine the ability of the U.S. to properly respond to Soviet challenges.Leebaert's discussion and criticism of the Kennedy and Johnson years focuses on both the tragic descent into the Vietnam morass and the growth of American "adventurism." The Kennedy brothers and their "best and brightest" advisors are regarded as reckless in their failure to properly assess all options as well as the consequences of their actions. Kennedy era policy makers essentially turned U.S. policy away from direct confrontation with Moscow and towards covert adventurism. Particularly singled out for scorn are McGeorge Bundy, national security advisor and Robert McNamara, secretary of defense. Leebaert simply rejects out of hand the later arguments by Kennedy sycophants like Arthur Schlesinger Jr., that Kennedy, by the end of his life, had already decided to write off Vietnam. Leeb

A Book Well Worth Reading, Thinking About and Arguing About!

Derek Leebaert has written a remarkable work on the 50 Year Cold War that was the hinge of the history of the 20th Century. The term "magisterial," all too often a cliche appended to long rather than worthwhile books, is apt. Intrepidly crossing various academic disciplines, Mr. Leebaert explores many aspects of the all-encompassing US-USSR conflict. The book is at once balanced and provocative--sure to stir controversy in the best sense, spurring thought, argument, reflection and perspective. At the same time, it is accessible and beautifully written, manifestly informed by a lifetime of curiosity, learning and action. Among the themes is a declaration of the importance of leadership and the significance of individual action even in a time marked by unprecedented institutional and bureaucratic power and authority. The book concludes with interesting perspectives on our current situation and the world scene. In a sense, Leebaert is helping fill the void created by the startling absence of a transcendent presidential message by Presidents George H.W. Bush or Bill Clinton, marking the end of the Cold War, offering perpective on its meaning, updating our national vision, and preparing Americans for the changes that the victory of our values is unleashing not only on the world abroad but also on ourselves.