United States in the World Arena

By W.W. Rostow

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• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671202545
• ISBN13: 9780671202545
• Release Date: May 1969
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 568 Pages

Customer Reviews

Superb Rendition of History - Political and Economic

Don't be put off this book by those who have sought to demonize Professor Rostow for his role in shaping policy toward South Vietnam as Policy Planning chief at the State Department during JFK's administration - and as National Security Advisor during LBJ's administration. Not only did Rostow have relatively little involvement during the JFK administration - but his greatest efforts under LBJ were in seeking some means of influencing North Vietnam to stop its involvement in South Vietnam - rather than in seeking to expand the war. Moreover, as National Security Advisor, Rostow exercised his abilities in a far greater range than Vietnam policy - at a time of the Pueblo taking by North Korea, the USSR's invasion of Czechoslovakia, Israel's Six Day War, and the building of a process for disarmament talks with the USSR. The truth is that Rostow is a fine penetrating thinker and writer. This book and its sequel, Diffusion of Power, are wonderful examinstions of American foreign policy - and the foreign elements that affected it - from the Second World War through the late 1950s. (Diffusion of Power covers the period from the late 1950s to 1973 - and serves also as a personal account from inside the White House of the LBJ administration's conduct of policy - however don't read Diffusion of Power for an account of the Nixon foreign policy -- it's rather light). Two of the book's aspects that were particularly striking were: A) The discussions of politics and economics in the third world during a period in which most of the world was gaining independence from colonial empires - and the American response to that challenge and opportunity. Rostow gives a convincing argument that the Eisenhower administration should have done more to "win" (my word) the new governments of the majority of people in the world to the causes of freedom and to prosperity through free enterprise. B) Rostow's interesting analysis of the American relationship with the western European states that had been occupied only recently - were in many cases devastated by the occupation - and now faced the loss of their colonies as well as a sense of purpose. This is a superb book on many levels - from its consistently superb dissection of domestic considerations in foreign policy(particularly Congress) to the simple role of human personality (e.g., Dean Acheson's vs. that of John Foster Dulles) in the relations of the world's statesmen. I had written a paper on Rostow's Stages of Growth when I was in college. Rostow is one of those rare academics who writes very well; one of those rare foreign policy mavens who is as interested in the underdeveloped world as in Europe; and one of those rare experts in 3rd World economics who is unapologetic about the necessity of sometimes using military force to prevent totalitarian groups from gaining sway over peoples. Rostow writes very VERY well - and this book is a fascinating and extensive study of the first act of the Cold War in