The American Way of Strategy

By Michael Lind

Book Overview

Americans are unlikely to lose their cherished rights because of a military coup or a foreign conquest, writes Michael Lind. The more plausible and frightening scenario is one in which foreign danger forces Americans themselves to jettison their way of life, sacrificing liberty to ensure security. To prevent this scenario from happening is the real purpose of American strategy.
In The American Way of Strategy, Lind argues that the goal of U.S. foreign policy has always been the preservation of the American way of life--embodied in civilian government, checks and balances, a commercial economy, and individual freedom. Lind describes how successive American statesmen--from George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Alexander Hamilton to Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, and Ronald Reagan--have pursued an American way of strategy that minimizes the dangers of empire and anarchy by two means: liberal internationalism and realism. At its best, the American way of strategy is a well-thought-out and practical guide designed to preserve a peaceful and demilitarized world by preventing an international system dominated by imperial and militarist states and its disruption by anarchy. When American leaders have followed this path, they have lead our nation from success to success, and when they have deviated from it, the results have been disastrous.
Framed in an engaging historical narrative, the book makes an important contribution to contemporary debates. The American Way of Strategy is certain to change the way that Americans understand U.S. foreign policy.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195308379
• ISBN13: 9780195308372
• Release Date: October 2006
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 9.3" x 6.1"

Customer Reviews

An excellent, quickly readable history of American security policy

I recommend Michael Lind's book for anyone, short on time, who wants to understand the general consistency of American security policy at least up through the end of the cold war. Beyond the cold war, this book describes history in the making which will certainly be subject to multiple interpretations as it solidifies over time. For anyone asking the question "Where is America going?" and Where should America be going?" The American Way of Strategy will give you much to think about. These questions are not suitable for sound bites and partisan politics should have no role here. These are serious, deep, but also practical issues. Mr. Lind's excellent history and creative analyses has provided me with an excellent framework with which to deal with them. You will enjoy his book!

Essential In Understanding American Security Policy

The first chapter alone justifies buying the book. Michael Lind's American Way of Strategy is essential to an understanding of long-term (200+ years) American security policy. The first chapter applies directly to America's true objectives in prosecuting the war on terror, particularly in regards to nuclear proliferation. I haven't been more enthralled with a book on this subject since Walter Russell Mead's Special Providence.