Bacevich argues that from Reagan through Bush (and probably Obama though he was only a candidate when this was written), a consistent sense of American exceptionalism coupled with the belief that military power can solve all problems has disguised the real source of all of our international crises, which is that we are a shallow and profligate people, willing to accept the most venal lies as long as we have secure access to lots of cheap oil. I rate books more on the ideas they conjure up rather than whether or not I agree with them and in those terms I rate this highly. But use Kagan's Of Paradise and Power (or something similar) as a counter-weight.

Bacevich's book, which is dedicated to his soldier son killed in Iraq, argues that the U.S. is no longer a true republic, and that it is now governed by an “imperial presidency” and is “a de facto one-party state” in which a Congress marked by pervasive “corruption” is ruled by “an Incumbents’ Party” and politics is theater.

The “national security state,” Bacevich believes, is marked by failures: 1) to avert 9/11; 2) to bring to justice its architects; 3) to respond appropriately to Islamic extremism; 4) in the Iraq and Afghan wars.

Bacevich shows that George W. Bush did not break with past tradition, he has affirmed a long-standing ideology of national security informed by four convictions with deep roots in American history: 1) History has a purpose; 2) The U.S. embodies freedom; 3) American success is guaranteed by Providence; 4) Freedom must prevail everywhere for the American way of life to endure. This highly elastic ideology, now “hardwired into the American psyche,” serves chiefly to legitimate action of the American executive. The ideology serves the “self-selecting, self-perpetuating camarilla” [i.e. cabal]—a power élite of “hawks” in control of national security policy since WWII.

The gargantuan national security state shrouds itself in secrecy and lies. It has done “more harm than good.” The Bay of Pigs fiasco led Kennedy to realize that the system was out of control and he changed leadership, revamped institutions (McNamara, Bundy) and worked around the apparatus (e.g. did not use the NSC in the Cuban missile crisis, instead devising a small extra-constitutional group, an approach often replicated since). The actual institutions of the national security state undergo perpetual reform while those who hold power regard them as “not partners but competitors” and “the American people remain in the dark,” the apparatus remaining in place because it provides legitimacy for “political arrangements that are a source of status, influence, and considerable wealth.”

We should learn 1) “[T]he ideology of national security, American exceptionalism in its most baleful form, poses an insurmountable obstacle to sound policy”; 2) “Americans can no longer afford to underwrite a government that does not work”; 3) “To attend any longer to this elite would be madness . . . today’s Wise Men . . . have forfeited any further claim to trust." ( )

I read this book based on its title, and wish that I had not taken the time. The book is actually a collection of impressions that combine into an anti-war diatribe. Its subtitle the End of American Exceptionalism is also misleading. In Bacevich’s view, that exceptionalism was described by Reagan’s “City on a Hill” and if it existed it has vanished along with America’s status as a superpower.

He grabs pieces of history, some of Niebuhr’s views, and his own anti-war bitterness into an attack of the national security apparatus. Years ago, Eisenhower’s farewell warning about the military-industrial complex was a much shorter and more coherent statement of the same position.

My half-star rating is simply because there is no lower value. Unless you love attacks on America, avoid the book. ( )

Bacevich is clearly angry. He's angry that the lives of young patriotic men like Pat Tilman and his own son have been wasted on poorly-thought-out wars that don't further American interests. Unlike most political scientists, he himself is a veteran (Vietnam and Iraq) who reached the rank of colonel, so he is not intimidated by the prospect of engaging with the arguments of military and defense department officials, and these are the most successful and convincing parts of the book. He shows that without compulsory national service (a draft) the U.S. cannot sustain long wars, but without talented leadership, the military is not capable of waging small, smart wars (he treats Tommy Franks as almost beneath contempt, and most of the other generals don't fare much better). This unfortunately leaves him regretting that to save the nation, we have to stop waging war, especially so-called "preventive war." The book covers a lot of bases, starting with a criticism of American consumerism (which, due to its unthinking reliance on oil, holds our foreign policy hostage to our greed) and our culture ("vulgar and soft") and then moving on to the imperial presidency and finally to an excoriation of the American military and political leadership, which he feels has been in a downward spiral since Forrestal. Not heavily academic, the book is written for the educated lay reader, and the prose is readable and quotable--although its "bold" tone is clearly thought by some to detract from the work. ( )

This is an odd, quirky book with several interesting points that is ultimately disappointing with a lack of support and credibility. As a part of the American Empire Project (www.americanempireproject.com) he is uniquely qualified as an exponent of a particularly relevant perspective, in addition to his military experience, but the book is weakly argued. He dismisses the largely successful military strategy of General Petraeus in only two paragraphs in the book (p. 151) and he only refers to him briefly in one other note. The counter-insurgency re-writing of American military doctrine as a result received short shrift.

Also, Obama is analyzed correctly as a wanna-be American leader with "sketchy foreign policy credentials" who "unhesitatingly ripped a page out of the Clinton playbook" (p. 79) only to deliver a comforting American electoral narrative as have all American presidents since WW II. Written previous to the disastrous beginning of Obama' presidency, Bacevich correctly points out that no one is about to fundamentally change Washington and it is business as usual (p. 170 ff). The American people do not seek out engagement and citizen participation which would focus our nation on what we can and can not accomplish given the limits of our power.

Bacevich also idiosyncratically and inconsistently invokes Protestant theologian Reinhold Niebuhr as relevant to his argument. His grasp of Niebuhr though is sketchy at best and nowhere does he convincingly quote him to support his points.

Bacevich seems to have published an interesting first draft that has not argued persuasively and comprehensibly enough to be convincing. He is more like a guerilla writer who bobs and weaves, makes a point, and then frustratingly runs away from convincing readers of his salient points.