Surprise, Security, and the American Experience
| Published date | 01 March 2005 |
| Date | 01 March 2005 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070200506000131 |
| Author | Tony Smith |
| Subject Matter | Review |
Reviews
The
Canadian connection to Hezbollah, Algerian extremists, and al
Qaeda also fall within the scope
of
Cold
Terror.
But other groups, like
the Irish Republican Army, do not. Also missing isa more comprehen-
sive look at Canada's immigration policies, particularly its refugee
determination system. In places the book is a bit disjointed, and some
readers may not like its resemblance
to
a diary or journal, rather than
traditional academic scholarship. Still,
Cold
Terror
is a highly provoca-
tive
and
engaging book. Bell's
command
of
the material is beyond
reproach, and all Canadians interested in the security
of
their country
will find
Cold
Terror
deeply disturbing.
Arne Kislenko/Ryerson University
SURPRISE,
SECURITY,
ANDTHE
AMERICAN
EXPERIENCE
John LewisGaddis
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004. x, 150pp, us$18.95
cloth
(ISBN
0-674-01174-0)
john Lewis Gaddis's short
but
highly ambitious book aims to place
the "grand strategy"
of
the Bush
administration-most
notably
summed up with the national security strategy
of
the United States
(NSS)
of
September 2002
and
the decision to invade Iraq in March
2003-within
the context
of
nearly two centuries
of
American foreign
policy that supposedly laid the groundwork for decision-making in
Washington in 2002-2003.
The
first grand strategy was authored, we
are told, by John Quincy Adams (when he was secretary
of
state), and
was followed later in the 19th century by presidents James Polk
and
William McKinley.
It
combined "preemption"
and
"unilateralism"
with the goal
of
achieving continental and hemispheric "hegemony."
The
second grand strategy, one practiced in the
20th
century, was
authored
by Woodrow Wilson (although
much
more successfully
practiced by Franklin D. Roosevelt). In contrast
to
the first tradition,
the second combined relative "restraint" with "mulrilateralism" and the
decision to promote democratic governments for
others-but
like the
first, it aimed at achieving hegemony, this time with a global reach.
And if these two traditions themselves do
not
provide elements enough
to establish an authentically American policy for the early 21st centu-
ry,Gaddis throws in for good measure Thomas Jefferson's notion
of
the
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Wimer 2004-2005
309
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