This is a stunningly good book, covering American foreign policy from 1776 to 2008. I found myself agreeing with nearly all the judgments which the author makes, especially his view on George W. Bush and his disastrous foreign policies. And one cannot but be pleased to read about the years 1988 to 1991, when Gorbachev made things happen in the world for which we can all be grateful. ( )

A Fantastic Survey

Part of the Oxford History of the United States Series, this survey text of American foreign policy since the revolution is both comprehensive and in depth. This would be the perfect book for an undergraduate course on the history of American foreign policy.

George C. Herring's writing is fluid yet incredibly descriptive. At 1000+ pages, the book is a mammoth to get through, but for a college history class, is definitely manageable over a semester. I was really surprised at not only how accurate and nuanced the entire book was, but Herring was even able to include certain elements that I was even surprised with. Herring also includes some very detailed maps of all the major conflict zones, definitely helps in the spatial contextualization.

Overall, I can think of no finer text than "From Colony to Superpower" in educating oneself about the foreign policy of the most important country in the world today. Definitely recommend it for either a survey course, or even just as a reference book. ( )

Over the last couple of decades, Oxford University Press has been putting together a history of the United States from a variety of authors, slicing up the history of the Republic in numerous, detailed volumes.

An exception to that pattern, George Herrings FROM COLONY TO SUPERPOWER takes on the entire history of the United States. However, it takes on just one piece of that history, albeit a large one: foreign policy. Herring's volume looks at the U.S.'s relations with other powers from the Revolution straight through to the George W. Bush administration.

His thesis is that America has great ideals in the abstract which it has not always successfully brought in practice to its application of its foreign policy.

Herring brings a comprehensive, considered and balanced approach to the material. While he does have opinions, and certain subjects are clearly more favored than others, Herring takes pains to minimize his point of view.

When Herring does present a strong point of view, however, he infallibly provides in a footnote a source or volume that provides a different point of view. For example, Herring takes issue with the machinations that brought Panama independence from Colombia and gave the US the freedom to create the Panama Canal. And yet, even as he does this, he provides a competing source that exonerates Roosevelt.

Even those Presidents whom Herring seems to disagree politically with are critically evaluated for their contributions, positive and negative, to the narrative of US Foreign Policy. And those Presidents and figures that Herring admires are called out when they failed to live up to their ideals.

This careful balancing of viewpoints and pains to remain non partisan means that, given the breadth of the subject, the book is long. And if the reader is inclined to read more on one particular piece of American Foreign Policy history, there is a bibliographic essay (as opposed to a straight,dry, bibliography) where Herring discusses numerous other volumes for further reading.

The book took me several weeks to savor and digest, however these weeks were worth it. I learned an enormous amount about US Foreign Policy, as if I had taken a college course on the subject. If you have the time and inclination to learn about US Foreign Policy, Herring has created the definitive volume on the subject. ( )