A discussion of how the modern nation-state can defend against external threats while preserving its legitimacy. ( )

Fundamentally, Bobbitt believes that in the soundness of the morality that underlay the strategy of the bourgeois Western alliance and that defeated fascism and communism in what he considers the “wars of the nation state” while preserving fundamental freedoms of speech and association, and he aspires to lay the groundwork for preserving core values during what he considers the “wars of the market state” (which many readers on the left will disupte).

In both cases, he believes that the key is “the interposition of law . . . but not law that is interposed to block the demands of strategy, but rather law that is integrated with strategy.”

However, Bobbitt neglects evidence of the Bush administration’s bad faith in hijacking the intelligence to accomplish neoconservative ends, ignoring evidence such as the Downing Street Memo and such elements as the Project for a New American Century, the role of oil and oil companies (Bobbitt rebuts this charge on pp. 492-93), the role of Israel and the Israel Lobby (briefly acknowledged on pp. 525-26), the complicity of corporate-owned media, and the facilitation of this through media concentration. (Perhaps this is because he does not wish to contribute to delegitimizing the state?) Also, Bobbitt’s “market state” concept implicitly legitimates a number of these influences—making their omission all the more striking. ( )

Bobbitt manages to say something to offend just about anyone, whether liberal, conservative, or middle of the road, but his book is filled with history, profound concepts, and challenging ideas for how the wars against terror should be fought. Your dictionary and Wikipedia are aids in reading that I found helpful. Quick, can you tell me about the two treaties comprising the Peace of Westphalia, and what they decided? ( )