War and Politics Books

An intriguing book that adopts a new slant on the development of Islam in the Sudan. Author Johnson shows us, step by step how the rise of states in this region and their relations with neighbors and the West resulted in a different form of religious expression. The Dervishes that fought the British at the end of the 19th century were imbued with a fervor, according to Johnson that reflected a long-developed process of assimilation and adaptation to both the Northern Arab, the Southern African and he West in general - the colonial experience. It is a fine addition to Francis Deng's great book, WAR OF VISIONS. I found THE ROOT CAUSES OF SUDAN'S CIVIL WARS a very enlightening read. As the author of a new book on the Sudan, JIHAD: THE MAHDI REBELLION IN THE SUDAN, I must include this volume into any meaningful understanding of historical forces in this region. TOP RATED!!!

After reading this book, you will laugh at newspaper reports that describe the conflict in Sudan as between "the Muslim north and Christian and animist south". Johnson not only has extensive academic publications in Sudanese ethnography and historiography, but also worked in the aid field in the country. He is also, in a well-sourced, calm and clearly presented manner, outraged at how thoroughly misunderstood the situation in Sudan is. The detail in this book is amazing. I consider myself fairly knowledgeable in an armchair kind of way about southern Sudan, and was consistently being presented with either facts of which I was unaware or, better yet, syntheses tying together various fields in a historical perspective. The offensives, famines, factionalism within southern groups, agricultural schemes, external mediators, forced displacement patterns, and competing aid agencies are all here, and presented so one can see the linkages. This is one of the rare books in which, for example, the connection between the timing of government offensives to seasonal rainfall is convincingly fit within framework of underdevelopment as a political strategy.

There are a couple points that made me consider moving this down to four stars. One is that Johnson is clearly partisan to the south. He is not fatally so in my opinion, describing some very unflattering characteristics and actions of Garang's faction, and making his bias clear from the beginning. By the end of the book, he also makes a strong case that "neutrality" has been misused or abused in the context of the Sudanese wars, and led me to muse that his outrage seems to spring from his knowledge, versus some writers about southern Sudan whose outrage impedes their learning. I also occasionally found the division of the book in its latter section into thematic sections confusing, especially in cases where the text would refer to later chapters for more information about a mentioned event or process. Fortunately, the appendix includes both a detailed chronology from 1972 through 2001 and a pretty good topical index for when I needed a bit of help orienting myself. The extensive annotated bibliography would be quite useful for some people. There is also the rather obvious issue that the book was written prior to the finalization of the peace agreement and death of Garang, which makes me anxious for an update.

Bottom line: If you want to know about the conflicts in Sudan between 1983 and 2001, then this is the book. If you've read other works on Sudan, you'll be astonished at how thoroughly Johnson annihilates the common wisdom. And whoever you are, you may come to share some of Johnson's outrage.

"Searching for Peace: the Road to TRANSCEND" is an indispensable guide for "peaceworkers". It combines theory (e.g. "on the psychology of the TRANSCEND Approach") with concrete examples of 40 conflicts from around the world, based on 40 years of practical experience in helping conflict parties find nonviolent solutions. Instead of seeking to bring the conflict parties to the negotiating table from the beginning, which can often result in a stream of mutual accusations that exacerbates the conflict, this approach first holds extensive dialogues separately with each conflict party, to gain their trust and understand their grievances and fears, needs and desires. By presenting the parties with a richer repertoire of possible approaches, and by showing them how similar conflicts have been successfully solved elsewhere, this often helps them see a way out of a seemingly intractable situation in which they feel themselves trapped. Johan Galtung, who founded the academic discipline of peace research, and has always applied his insights to help people suffering from conflict, like a good doctor, has joined forces with Carl Jacobsen, Finn Tschudi and Kai Frithjof Brand-Jacobsen to share with us his rich experience. This book ought to be required reading for all international relations scholars, practitioners, policy-makers and peace activists.

"Searching for Peace: the Road to TRANSCEND" is an indispensable guide for "peaceworkers". It combines theory (e.g. "on the psychology of the TRANSCEND Approach") with concrete examples of 40 conflicts from around the world, based on 40 years of practical experience in helping conflict parties find nonviolent solutions. Instead of seeking to bring the conflict parties to the negotiating table from the beginning, which can often result in a stream of mutual accusations that exacerbates the conflict, this approach first holds extensive dialogues separately with each conflict party, to gain their trust and understand their grievances and fears, needs and desires. By presenting the parties with a richer repertoire of possible approaches, and by showing them how similar conflicts have been successfully solved elsewhere, this often helps them see a way out of a seemingly intractable situation in which they feel themselves trapped. Johan Galtung, who founded the academic discipline of peace research, and has always applied his insights to help people suffering from conflict, like a good doctor, has joined forces with Carl Jacobsen, Finn Tschudi and Kai Frithjof Brand-Jacobsen to share with us his rich experience. This book ought to be required reading for all international relations scholars, practitioners, policy-makers and peace activists.

What makes a German professor get interested in writting a tremendous book about the Mexican Revolution and get to be a book about international politics around the first war world? It beats me. The fact is: This book is an outstanding piece of historical war literature that can be compared with the best in the field. It is thoroughly documented and researched. Obviously the author has made a very exact analysis going through an enormous work of investigation that has taken a good deal of time. So if you are wondering why Mexico had a revolution that started around 1910 and lasted around 11 years, here is the place to look. It will also explain you in detail the many faces of this revolution that touched so many aspects of the life of people from all social and economical ranges. The outburst of the revolution was like a chain reaction originated mainly by the unjust and unfair situation which most people were having that exploded at the same time in most states in Mexico, each one of them with different leaders, armies and political affiliations. So the whole thing was quite complicated. That is why this book is amazing. It manages to tell the story in a most pleasurable way and it is very exciting reading indeed. All the main historical characters are very well described, in both their relationship and motivation with the revolution. Madero who started it all, Victoriano Huerta the villain and putschmaker, Emiliano Zapata the revolutonaty peasent who fought for land and liberty, Pancho Villa, once the chief of Northern Armies, but who was him? was he good or bad?, Carranza the non elected president, and at the end Obregon and Calles the first leaders and many others. But that is not all, here is described in all detail how and why England, Germany, Japan, France, Spain, and the United States got involved and which part each one of them played in this part of history which had dramatic results for the future, mostly because of the outcome both of the world war that started in 1914 and of the mexican revolution in 1910. It is worth mentioning the exactitude with which every aspect of this history is told, the author has not spared anything to accomplish a documentation which is well based in historical evidence and at the same time has made an exciting history book that can almost be read as a novel. Highly recommended.

Prior to the publication of Friedrich Katz's monograph on the Mexican Revolution, historians of Mexico and the Mexican Revolution customarily overlooked the significance, influence, and totality of Europe, the United States, and World War I. Unfortunately, the Mexican Revolution, unlike the Russian, Chinese, French, and American Revolutions, did not enjoy the same academic attention prior to the Cuban and Vietnamese Revolutions, which provided an intellectual impetus for social historians of that era. For the most part, the Mexican Revolution was perceived as an "isolated affair"...one of a nationalist nature lead by and for the Mexican peasant and Indian alike. Of course, the one-party system that eventually monopolized the political structure of Mexico readily utilized and claimed a revolutionary legitimacy that perpetuated the triumph of "the untouchables." As a result, many of the ideas and aspirations of the revolution do not become implemented until the presidency of Lázaro Cárdenas (1934-1940)...aspirations that continue to seek redress.

What Friedrich Katz accomplishes in this very important book-among many other things-is to incorporate the importance of Mexico into the diplomatic history of the First World War. More than simply a narrative of the Mexican Revolution, the author traces the roots of European and North American diplomacy in the early twentieth century and unearths the multifarious machinations of both countries, including those of the various sectors of the Mexican bourgeoisie. According to one reviewer, "Katz explains mechanisms of foreign policy and foreign relations convincingly and in concrete terms as processes of interaction among the respective economic, commercial, domestic, and social policies of all the nations involved, relating them as much to their governments as to the interest groups within their societies."

Divided into five parts and researched in ten countries, Katz displaces many of the myths surrounding the historiography of the Mexican Revolution in addition to explaining the importance of the Mexican-U.S. border and its impact for the northern revolutionaries. Utilizing a comparative approach, the author carefully illustrates the differences and advantages of Mexico's Northern states in order to explain its eventual victory of the revolution. In this regard, the Northern frontier plays a crucial role during the Porfiriato and acts as a social laboratory for further U.S. involvement in Latin America and around the world, specifically future U.S. involvement in Third World countries. Mexico, then, becomes "a case study not only of how local rifts can be exploited for global ends, but of how global rifts can be exploited for local ends." This "new strategy of exploiting social conflicts...was not adopted by the European powers until WWI...when each side tried to aid revolutionary movements that were directed at its rivals." Indeed, John M. Hart is correct in saying that U.S. policy throughout the globe is first "tested" and "tried" in Mexico. Thus, the term "secret war" takes on new meanings as it refers to new strategies of "alliances and understandings that the great powers and the business interests linked to them develop early in the twentieth century as a response to the wave of revolutions that swept some of what are now called the developing countries."

In what is perhaps Katz's most interesting theory of the Mexican Revolution, his idea of the "the Transformation of the Northern Frontier into the Border," is for me, the central component that tipped the scales in favor of this area. Aside from illustrating a broad diplomatic history of the Mexican Revolution, Europe, the United States, and WWI, the author also describes in detail the historical background of the northern frontier and its unique economic, social, and political development. In other words, what conditions and historical background provided the fertile ground for revolutionary activity, which eventually lead the North to the seat of power in Mexico City? One key to understanding the various conditions of this area are to be found in the huge influx of U.S. capital pouring over into Mexico's northern frontier. Simultaneously, the Díaz regime begins to break the caudillo strangle hold that developed throughout the peripheries following the Independence Wars by employing his infamous "pan o palo" technique. Katz argues that this early attempt at centralization adds tension to an area experiencing land displacement and political usurpation.

The influx of North American capital during the late nineteenth century engenders a variety of implications, most of which take place following the U.S.-Mexican War (1846-1848). During this period Latin America was "pulled increasingly into the frenetic development of world capitalism." By 1914, foreign capital totaling some 7,567,000,000 overwhelmed the Latin American economies and provided the economic muscle for Mexico's northern frontier.

Katz states that in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Mexico underwent a radical transformation due to the "unprecedented amounts of foreign, especially American, capital into...the country's frontier." Although not mentioned by the author, on the other side of the border, the newly established North American southwest also experiences much of the same inflow of intensive capital development, which in some cases occurs simultaneously on both sides of the Río Bravo/Río Grande. In response to North America's corresponding growth of the capitalist economic system, Porfirio Díaz, attempted to offset U.S. influence by giving concessions to other European powers: Germany, France, and especially Great Britain. Here, the diplomatic puzzle begins to come together with Katz's accessibility to German, British, and Mexican archives.

By favoring European companies at times over U.S. corporations, the Díaz regime laid the foundations for further U.S. antagonism against the Mexican government. North American corporations, upset with the Díaz regime's favorable treatment of European capital, anxiously invited the opportunity to work with a president who was sensitive to their interests. Due to this and other reasons, the exiled presidential candidate, Francisco I. Madero, was able to obtain the assistance of bankers and capitalists in Texas. The Northern Frontier States provided Madero's movement with armed troops and military leadership, due in large part to their historical background as military colonists. Once the revolution took on a life of its own, Díaz left the country prophetically stating: "Madero has unleashed a tiger, lets see now if he can control it."

Once in power, however, Katz argues that Madero alienated various sectors of the Mexican population, his early supporters, the United States, and Germany. Considered by some earlier historians as naïve, Katz believes that naïveté does not take you as far as the presidency; on the contrary, Madero simply miscalculated and underestimated the volatile nature of the revolution. While the U.S. perceived Madero as unreliable and unable to control the frequent revolts erupting throughout the country, Germany concluded that Madero went too far with his minute social reforms. On the other hand, local leaders like Emiliano Zapata and the Flores Magón brothers complained that Madero did not go far enough, particularly on the issue of land reform.

According to one German diplomat, Paul von Hintze, Madero was a too idealistic in his approach and lacked the will power of a Porfirio Díaz: "the cardinal error lies in his...belief that he can rule the Mexican people as one would rule one of the more advanced Germanic nations. This raw people of half-savages without religion, with its small ruling stratum of superficially civilized Mestízos can live with no regime other than enlightened despotism." And although Félix Díaz, nephew of Porfirio Díaz, deserved some consideration, the only individual that could bring back order to Mexico, according to both the Germans and North Americans, was another military dictator: Victoriano Huerta (1913-1914). Once the U.S. gave the green light for the overthrow of Madero via Henry Lane Wilson, the other European powers had to go along with the "victory." Germany "had hoped for a coup d' etat where a strong-man would come to power with domestic policies fundamentally different from Madero's, but whose foreign policy would strengthen Mexico's orientation toward Europe." In the end, Huerta took control, at least for a while.

By WWII, much of the same activity-diplomatic mudslinging-is taking place in Germany, the United States, Great Britain, and Mexico are at center stage, specifically in John Hart's latest effort. Here, Mexico's diplomatic upper hand is demonstrated time and again when the Cárdenas regime nationalizes several private sectors of the economy and brings them under government control. How is Mexico able to do this and then continue on this nationalist path in the face of so much North American protest? The answer lies in WWII and the importance of securing a hemispheric solidarity capable of stability in the face of growing German and Japanese "aggression."

John Hart's latest effort describes growing Mexican nationalism and its effects on American investors and pre-revolutionary landowners. Mexico is able to maintain economic and political control despite North America's "move toward global hegemony that gained momentum after December 1941." Due to US need to maintain the veneer of hemispheric solidarity, the Cárdenas and Avila Camacho regimes are able to maneuver and manipulate political and economic conditions to their own advantage, conditions that years earlier would have been questioned. Central to this nationalization of various areas of the Mexican economy is the Mexican government's continued appropriation of land, especially with the case of the Laguna region and its oil reserves. As Hart states: "The consolidated companies complained once again that the Mexican government wanted the hardwoods and chicle industries for itself without mentioning [the] oil." By 1940, however, the companies "were politically overmatched in their confrontation with the Mexican and Campeche governments. Cárdenas' timing was perfect. The American government was concerned with the war in Europe and the crisis with Japan, not with the protection of chicle and lumber companies in Mexico."

The same sort of dilemma also meets numerous U.S. corporations throughout Latin America in the early twentieth century. Prior to the Great Depression (1929), U.S. companies "launched vast investment projects with little regard for the concerns of the host society or the policies of their own government." The result, as O'Brien points out, is continued resentment in the face of the economic collapse that Latin America undergoes during this period. Latin Americans, able to identify the causes of their misery and economic downfall, developed a stronger nationalism that encompassed aspects of anti-Americanism. The nationalization projects that Cárdenas develops for Mexico during his tenure (1934-1940) are part of not only the mistrust of U.S. corporations in Mexico as a result of the Great Depression, but also his own diplomatic aptitude toward the global situation transpiring with WWII. Mexico's historical relationship with the United States, as Katz, Hart, and O'Brien point out, is nothing less than offensive.

Katz's notion of "the Secret War"-although true to the extent that it was the first time that European powers utilized such an approach with Mexico-is not an idea exclusively monopolized during that period. Indeed, as Hart and O'Brien point out, "secret wars" with Mexico and Latin America take place throughout the twentieth century and continue even as I write this final paragraph. The contradictions that are involved in such a thwarted relationship are beyond the scope of this essay; however, the complicated affair between the U.S. and Latin America is further complicated with Latin American corporations currently vying for U.S. consumers, especially along the Mexico-US Border region. The end result is something reminiscent of Gloria Anzaldúa's idea that the border is an area where the "Third World grates against the First World and bleeds." Contemporary perspectives, though, offer an additional interpretation as the Border area develops into something of a hybrid society where two cultures meet and where current tensions continue to bring both nations to the diplomatic drawing board. The lines become blurred as the elites of both societies in the US and Latin America agrees to continue exploiting the local population vis-à-vis the future welfare of the country. Perhaps Virgil Elizondo was correct when describing the border region he predicted that the Future is Mestízo. I would only add: In more ways than one.

"Censorship" is a truly ugly idea, repellant to anyone who values First Amendment rights. And yet, few would argue that in wartime is unnecessary. _Secrets of Victory: The Office of Censorship and The American Press and Radio In World War II_ (University of North Carolina) by Michael S. Sweeney tells a previously untold story. Sweeney has assembled what is surprisingly an inspiring tale on what could have been a dismal subject. The censors did their patriotic duty, and in almost every case, did it well, staying to a middle course that got the job done but was not unduly repressive.

There's a hero in this often dramatic book, a hero who helped win the war not with firepower but with persuasion, common sense, and patriotism. Byron Price was a newsman nominated by Roosevelt to be director of the Office of Censorship shortly after Pearl Harbor. Price had huge amounts of authority and responsibility, but the miracle is that Price got all that power and chose to run a voluntary system whereby the nation's journalists would become their own censors. All Americans wanted to do their part in winning the war, and journalists were no different; Price enlisted them in a cooperative effort. He issued a code of voluntary censorship, and enlisted the help from newspapers and radio stations in following it. Essentially, the code spelled out details of a rule of thumb: "Is this information I would like to have if I were the enemy?" Violations, and there were hundreds of them, got confidential letters from Price's office, detailing the mistakes and asking for more circumspection. There were few serious complaints about the self-censorship program. Sensible rules included that opinions could not be censored, nor could stories that had been publicized in other countries. Even the ACLU approved of the way the censors had done their job.

Sweeney's description of how censorship was applied is fascinating. Even descriptions of sporting events had to contain no mention of the weather, and "lost dog" ads and requests for a certain song dedication were curtailed, for they could contain coded information. There are wonderful details on censoring (or failing to censor) such things as the Manhattan Project, General Patton's slapping of combat stress victims, and the threat of incendiary balloons floated over from Japan. It goes into detail on censoring the movement of the President, who sometimes unfairly hit the road so that political dialogue would be stilled by his silence. This is a fascinating book about an aspect of the war not generally appreciated, but which turned out to be well waged at home. The admirable Price was quite eager to be put out of a job, hounding President Truman before the surrender papers were officially signed to end all censorship. He had an admirable distaste for a job he had executed in an exemplary fashion; he wrote, "It should be understood that no one who does not dislike censorship should ever be permitted to exercise censorship."

"Censorship" is a truly ugly idea, repellant to anyone who values First Amendment rights. And yet, few would argue that in wartime is unnecessary. _Secrets of Victory: The Office of Censorship and The American Press and Radio In World War II_ (University of North Carolina) by Michael S. Sweeney tells a previously untold story. Sweeney has assembled what is surprisingly an inspiring tale on what could have been a dismal subject. The censors did their patriotic duty, and in almost every case, did it well, staying to a middle course that got the job done but was not unduly repressive.

There's a hero in this often dramatic book, a hero who helped win the war not with firepower but with persuasion, common sense, and patriotism. Byron Price was a newsman nominated by Roosevelt to be director of the Office of Censorship shortly after Pearl Harbor. Price had huge amounts of authority and responsibility, but the miracle is that Price got all that power and chose to run a voluntary system whereby the nation's journalists would become their own censors. All Americans wanted to do their part in winning the war, and journalists were no different; Price enlisted them in a cooperative effort. He issued a code of voluntary censorship, and enlisted the help from newspapers and radio stations in following it. Essentially, the code spelled out details of a rule of thumb: "Is this information I would like to have if I were the enemy?" Violations, and there were hundreds of them, got confidential letters from Price's office, detailing the mistakes and asking for more circumspection. There were few serious complaints about the self-censorship program. Sensible rules included that opinions could not be censored, nor could stories that had been publicized in other countries. Even the ACLU approved of the way the censors had done their job.

Sweeney's description of how censorship was applied is fascinating. Even descriptions of sporting events had to contain no mention of the weather, and "lost dog" ads and requests for a certain song dedication were curtailed, for they could contain coded information. There are wonderful details on censoring (or failing to censor) such things as the Manhattan Project, General Patton's slapping of combat stress victims, and the threat of incendiary balloons floated over from Japan. It goes into detail on censoring the movement of the President, who sometimes unfairly hit the road so that political dialogue would be stilled by his silence. This is a fascinating book about an aspect of the war not generally appreciated, but which turned out to be well waged at home. The admirable Price was quite eager to be put out of a job, hounding President Truman before the surrender papers were officially signed to end all censorship. He had an admirable distaste for a job he had executed in an exemplary fashion; he wrote, "It should be understood that no one who does not dislike censorship should ever be permitted to exercise censorship."

Tony Vaux took a job that landed him in Kosovo, Ethiopia, Sudan, Mozambique, Afghanistan, Somalia, Bosnia, Azerbaijan and Rwanda. He worked for Oxfam, one of the world's premier development and relief organizations. In his work, he helped some of the poorest and hungriest people on this planet. He believed his work vital, but he observed and raised questions. He saw that what needed to be done frequently did not get done. Vaux and his associates, over stressed and under funded, decided sometimes who would live and who would not. Food and medical aid became entangled with politics and military action. Many of the people helped were less than innocent and sometimes guilty of horrific crimes. Helping the vulnerable, the most laudable of tasks, he found, can itself be corrupting.

What saves this book from becoming another "realist" tome about how awful and hopeless we humans are, is Vaux's willingness to probe his own psyche as well as others'. We're often able to make ourselves quite comfortable with the assessment that the human race is, as Vaux states, "a species of exceptional brutality and cruelty" (page iv). We object only when the accusation is made against ourselves. If our accuser presses on and places before us our own behavior, we may admit that, yes, sometimes we have, under certain circumstances, acted brutally. But, we hasten to explain: circumstances forced us to act so. We had our reasons. They made us do it. It's a cruel world. Vaux rejects this sophistry. He admits, "the possibility that I too could be a killer." (184) By "killer" he does not mean that he could serve in a UN peacekeeping force. He means he is fully capable of having been on the wrong side in Somalia, Bosnia or Rwanda.

From this non-privileged position, Vaux recounts debates among Oxfam staff about the identity of the organization: will it aim to promote development or be an emergency relief action? Should Oxfam deliver aid to a society that oppresses women to the point that women will not benefit from the aid - or should the organization try to save as many lives as possible, even if most of them will be male? Will accepting help from one side in a conflict - in this case trucks with armed soldiers to deliver food - compromise Oxfam's neutrality and its future effectiveness?

It is also from this position that he raises his most fundamental issue. Vaux points out that aid workers are in positions of power and that power corrupts. Aid organizations and workers develop interests, organizational and personal, in seeing that acts are done in a certain way and that they receive credit. "Saving lives," he writes, "can be intoxicating, especially when people are weak and vulnerable." (94) "The motive of pity so easily interacts with the motive for cruelty, and the desire to help so easily becomes the desire for power. .... Managers in the `disaster relief industry', like those in charge of homes for children or the elderly, have the opportunity to abuse power because they are dealing with vulnerable people." (95) Pity becomes contempt.

But, Vaux argues, "Self-knowledge is the prerequisite of humanity." (72) "(T)o be happy requires a(n) ... abandonment of self - an ability to rejoice in other's success and in the formation of their altruism." (180) As another person has pointed out, aid may be something done to people. Better is to do something for people. But the best is to do something with people. Only the worker who has abandoned "self" is able to work with people.

One of Vaux's clear intentions when constructing the questions throughout this work is achieving a personal catharsis. The motivations and decision making apparatus of himself and the aid community come under mercilessly objective evaluation. The graphic nature of the situations may tempt the reader to give in to the hoplessness that front line aid workers experience, though dwelling on the situations descibed in this book would be, in my opinion, missing the point. The point is understanding why we do the things that we do. Can an aid provider ( NGO ) overlook causality and bring aid to the person in need? Will attempts to affect causality do more harm than good? Do underlying motivations exist that influence the manner in which aid is provided? The answers to these questions are not simple or finite.

This book forced me to be introspective in ways that few others have. If you want a true lesson in disciplining your objectivity it's definitely worth the time.

Dr. Holden-Rhodes gives you the truth about the open border between the Unites States and Mexico. He is an operational expert on Intelligence and Drug Trafficking. He is a Professor at Highlands University and is known world wide on his Strategical Intelligence gathering abilities. Dr. Holden-Rhodes is a teacher of teachers.

EDIT of 22 Sep 08: The publisher has sucumbed to insane greed. This book should not be selling for more than $45.95. It cost a penny a page to produce and they have not spend a dime on marketing, so go figure....

It is always a shame when a really great book is badly marketed and consequently does not reach as many professionals and citizens as it should. This is such a book.

What the blurbs don't tell you, such as they are, is that the author was one of the true pioneers in the world of open source intelligence (creating useful actionable intelligence using only legal and ethical sources and methods). His brilliant efforts in the early 1990's were easily a decade ahead of where the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) is today--using a wide variety of Latin American newspapers and lots of brainpower, he was able to create tactical intelligence that contributed significantly to the success of operational missions by the U.S. Southern Command and the Drug Enforcement Administration, leading the destruction of cocaine laboratories, the interdiction of aircraft, and the arrest of key people in the transnational criminal structure.

This book is an essential reference for any agency or command library concerned with asymmetric warfare, unconventional threats, and non-traditional methods of providing intelligence support to those responsible for dealing with anything other than traditional war. The sources and methods that the author discusses are especially pertinent to the study of terrorism, proliferation, transnational crime, cross-national toxic dumping, and other sub-state and non-state threats.

This book covers South African covert operations from the 1960s to 1980s. It gives details of many undercover operations as far afield as Nigeria and includes many counter-insurgency operations and meddling in the affairs of South Africa's neighboors including raids on Maputo and Lesotho and Gabarone in Botswana. A very interesting, rip roaring account. Perhaps more interesting to those interested in the military than those interested in politics.

Seth J. Frantzman

This book is for people that now what it is like to go that bit further to achieve an objective. It is easy reading, i couldn't put the book down. You have to take a step back and appretiate what these men went through. There is only one thing that comes to mind, they are harder than a bag of hard things, without a dought!

"This is the most detailed study of the Socialist League so far published - or ever likely to be...Mr. Bor is to be congratulated on recovering an essential part of the Labour Left in such a comprehensive manner."

"...(The Socialist League in the 1930s) comprehensively covers the history of the Socialist League, and if you are interested in the politics of the 1930s it is well worth a read."

Foucault never wrote a monograph on power per se, the arguably most influential notion put forth by him. Yet this posthumous publication of his College de France lectures 1975-76 approximates one. Here one can find the most elaborate discussion of the distinction between power-as-law and power as a bunch of local techniques and force relations, and more important, the idiosyncratic conceptualization of political power based on the model of war. It is also in these lectures that Foucault gives a sustantial analysis of racism. Although these topics are already touched upon in The History of Sexuality vol. 1, unfortunately they have not been given extended space to develop thanks to Foucault's drastic modification of his writing plan. Two decades after his premature death, we are finally allowed to have a better understanding of Foucault's profound reflection upon these issues. The continual unveiling of Foucault's other lectures in print in years to come makes life worthy to live even in this depressive political atmosphere.

Capably and collaboratively edited by Mauro Bertani and Allesandro Fontana, "Society Must Be Defended" is a collection of French philosopher and historian Michel Foucault's eleven lectures given at the College de France from 1975 to 1976, and which are ably translated into English for an American readership by David Macey. Offering an unusually insightful perspective and wisdom on a wide variety of educational topics ranging from the origin of feudalism, to the functions and domains of racism, to Hobbes' ideas on war and sovereignty, and a great deal more, "Society Must Be Defended" is a very thought-provoking and instructive collection from a uniquely informed and informative point of view. As Michel Foucault writes about this compilation of his views: "The role of history will, then, be to show that laws deceive, that kings wear masks, that power creates illusions, and that historians tell lies. This will not, then, be a history of continuity, but a history of deciphering, the detection of the secret, the outwitting of the ruse, and the reappropriation of a knowledge that has been distorted or buried. It will decipher a truth that has been sealed".

Given the amount of aid Germany and Italy gave the Spanish Nationalists in the Spanish Civil War, it is somewhat surprising that Spain didn't enter the war on the Axis side. They didn't, and this book goes a long ways toward explaining why. The Spanish economy was devastated by the Spanish Civil War. It was dependent on the world economy for oil and food. Remnants of the Spanish Empire, such as the Canary Islands and Spanish Sahara were vulnerable to British attacks if Spain sided with Germany and Italy.

At the same time, the Spanish nationalists were tempted by potential spoils such as Gibraltar, and possibly French Morocco. If the Germans had tried hard enough in the immediate aftermath of the fall of France, the Spanish might have considered joining the Axis. The Germans weren't interested in Mediterranean adventures at that time though, and by the time they became interested the Spanish had had time for second thoughts.

This book does a good job of looking at Spanish foreign policy during World War II, but it also looks at the Spanish economy and Spanish society in some depth. A good read.

This book is a fascinating look at Spanish politics and culture during World War II. It covers all aspects of Spanish history, from Franco's meetings with Hitler to bullfighters losing their lives in the arena. I've always found European history interesting, but until a few years ago I had never read anything about Spain, and had no idea what an interesting part it played during this time

1939 was the year that World War II began. But in Spain, this was the year that war ended. The Spanish Civil War devastated the nation from 1936 to 1939, and thus while most of Europe was going to war, Spain was rebuilding from a war.

Wayne Bowen's new book, "Spain During World War II", describes how Spain attempted to rebuild itself under the dictatorship of Francisco Franco. Dissent on the "Left" was forbidden: communist, socialist, and democratic views were suppressed by the Franco regime. But plenty of dissent on the "Right" existed. This book narrates the history of some of the major dissenters and shows that their power was quite significant.

One example of successful dissent came from Cardinal Segura and Cardinal Goma, leaders of the Catholic Church in Spain. They supported Franco but condemned Nazi Germany - because, while they didn't mind dictatorship, the pagan elements in Nazism filled them with horror. These church leaders managed to prevent a "cultural exchange" accord that would have exposed Spanish youth to Nazi culture.

At the other extreme was Pilar Primo de Rivera. She was the leader of the Women's Section of the Falange, and was enthusiastically pro-Nazi. In May 1941, concerned that Franco was appointing too many monarchists and too few Falangists to his cabinet, she led a protest against Franco's policies. Her popularity was too great for Franco to eliminate her, and he backed down and appointed more Falangists to his cabinet. Pilar Primo de Rivera continued to lobby for Spain to enter the war on Hitler's side, and to promote the Nazi cause within Spain.

Meanwhile, the majority of Spaniards during this time were not concerned with politics: they were concerned with jobs, the economy, and sports. Soccer ("football" in Europe) and bullfighting - the two great Spanish sports - were promoted by the Franco regime as a safe alternative to politics. But even here, the regime found that the Spanish people could not be controlled, as regional rivalries led to violence between the fans at football matches.

This book is a fascinating look at how Spain managed to rebuild from its war - at the same time that the rest of Europe was being devasted by the greatest war in history.