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Loading... While America Sleeps: Self-Delusion, Military Weakness, and the Threat to Peace Todayby Donald Kagan, Frederick W. Kagan (Author)
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InWhile England Slept Winston Churchill revealed in 1938 how the inadequacy of Britain's military forces to cope with worldwide responsibilities in a peaceful but tense era crippled its ability to deter or even adequately prepare for World War II. InWhile America Sleeps, historians Donald and Frederick W. Kagan retrace Britain's international and defense policies during the years after World War I leading up to World War II, showing how self-delusion and an unwillingness to face the inescapable responsibilities on which their security and the peace of the world depended cost the British dearly. The Kagans then turn their attention to America and argue that our nation finds itself in a position similar to that of Britain in the 1920s. For all its emergencyinterventions the U.S. has not yet accepted its unique responsibility to take the lead in preserving the peace. Years of military cutbacks--the "peace dividend" following the buildup and triumph over Communism of the Reagan years--have weakened our armed forces and left us with too few armed forces to cover too many possible threats. This has caused us to bank everything on high tech "smart" weapons--some of which have not yet been invented and others that we are not acquiring or deploying--as opposed to the long-term commitment of money, fighting men and women, and planning that the deterrence of a major war would require. This failure to shape a policy and to commit the resources needed to maintain peace has cost valuable time in shaping a peaceful world and has placed America's long-term security in danger. The policies of the Bush and Clinton administrations have left us in a position where we cannot avoid war and keep the peace in areas vital to our security. Neither have the post-Cold War policies sent clear signals to would-be aggressors that the U.S. can and will resist them. Tensions in the Middle East, instability in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, the nuclear confrontation between India and Pakistan, the development of nuclear weapons and missile by North Korea, and the menacing threats and actions of China, with its immense population, resentful sense of grievance and years of military buildup, all hint that the current peaceful era will not last forever. Can we make it last as long as possible? Are we prepared to face its collapse? While America Sleeps is a sobering work of history that poses a thoughtful challenge to policy-makers. No library descriptions found. |
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 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)355.033573Social sciences Public Administration, Military Science Military Science National Security National Security Military Policy and Grand Strategy North America United StatesLC ClassificationRatingAverage: (3.83)
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Wikipedia in English (1)
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Professor Kagan began as a liberal immigrant, and in early 2000s became a voice of neo-conservative concerns which saw a need for a strong military to defend against some as yet un-perceived "enemy". He compares the history of England's post-WWI policies summed up in the Unitarian widely-held delusion voiced by Prime Minister Neville Chamberlin -- "peace in our time" -- to America's post-WWII policies.
However, the professor's great expertise with the eternal wars of the Peloponnese (of Achea and Attica, in four volumes, and a 5th which summarizes them), fails him in finding false parallels between the post-war periods and the policies of the British and the Americans.
Professor Kagan fails to research, much less interview, the players -- Gorbachev, the USSR military, Ho Chi Minh, etc. -- and fails to identify the fact that the USSR collapsed from within, while Saudi-funded Wahhabi extremism began its ascendency. He fails to identify the role of the plutocracy, so critical in the Greek model. America was not "sleeping" -- it was deliberately kept distracted by domestic terrorists operating IRS 501c3 front organizations who attacked Our Government and weakened the democracy from within.
Worse, while calling for an even more robust military, he fails to identify what weapons-systems are needed. He fails to analyze the military situation under President Reagan -- the withdrawal from the middle east with the Beirut Bombing killing 300 Marines in barracks and resulting in the take-over and ascendancy of Islamic troops using terrorist tactics. The invasion of Granada -- in which our finest amphibious assault troops were pinned down on the beach by three Cuban machine gun nests. Reagan dramatically increased our military spending and the National Debt, with nothing to show for it. No facts show that the USSR collapsed as a result of any weapon the US produced. The USSR knew that the Bradley Fighting Vehicle could not fight, and the million-dollar-a-copy anti-missile missiles rarely knocked down even the most primitive Iraqi missiles in the first Bush War.
Far from identifying appropriate weapon-procurement systems, or suggesting how to defend against an actual "enemy", the author fails to assess the MIE (Military Industrial Establishment of which Eisenhower presciently-warned), fails to warn that it has bled us with an enormous, and practically worthless, war machine, and fails to assess or identify the "enemy". He fuels the industrial weaponized mind-set, leaving us with the fear which the plutocracy is trying to ignite.