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The New York Times Book Review |
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Read “In the War Room: An insider’s history of the National Security Council” a review by Evan Thomas of “Running the World” for The New York Times Book Review (The New York Times, June 26, 2005).
EXCERPTS:
“David J. Rothkopf has written an enlightening insider’s history of what he calls ‘the committee in charge of running the world.’”
“Rothkopf enlivens (the book) with an appreciation of human foibles...His insider status also serves him well; he seems to know everyone in the foreign policy world and has interviewed most of the former national security advisors as well as various other heavyweights.”
“(Condoleezza) Rice was unusually reflective with Rothkopf...Rice candidly predicted to Rothkopf that it would take 30 or 40 years before we know whether the initiatives of this Bush administration were ‘really creative responses’ to 9/11 or ‘disastrous’ ones.”
ADDITIONAL REVIEWS:
Read “Two degrees of domination” a review by Dan Dunsky of “Running the World” for the Toronto Globe and Mail (Globe and Mail, June 25, 2005)
“…a comprehensive narrative history of the so-called ‘committee that runs the world’.
The historical narrative is like catnip for conspiracy theorists. If you think a small group of people really runs the world, then this is the book for you. The National Security Council (NSC) is the ultimate Washington insiders club, a who’s who of those with the power to shape history. In the 58 years since it was created by the Truman Administration, Rothkopf argues, this incredibly small and exclusive group has become the Alpha and Omega of U.S. foreign and security policy.
Membership is pretty much restricted to the most senior relevant officials of the executive branch: the president and vice-president, the secretaries of state and defence, the national security advisor, the director of central intelligence, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, the president’s chief of staff, plus their top deputies.
The group is further refined in that members of the NSC emerge ‘from a remarkable concentrated list of elite academic institutions and similar career paths.’ Consequently, since the NSC came into its own during the Nixon Administration, virtually all its members have known or worked with one another, both in and out of government.
To illustrate this remarkable concentration, Rothkopf plays ‘Two Degrees of Henry Kissinger’ with a list that shows how every one of the 13 national security advisors who followed Kissinger’s stint in that post are, at most, only two degrees removed from him, either by having worked with him or for him or for his staff.
Paradoxically, Harry Truman established the NSC partly to change the concentration of power FDR had amassed. Famous for holding his cards close to his chest, Roosevelt loved to keep opponents and allies off balance and, according to historian Arthur Schlesinger, ‘deliberately organized—or disorganized—his system of command to ensure that important decisions were passed on to the top.’ In the three months he was FDR’s vice-president, Truman met Roosevelt only three times and the two never discussed the atomic bomb, the details of the Yalta Summit or the secret agreements Roosevelt had made with other nations. Small wonder that upon becoming president, Truman famously declared, ‘I felt like the moon, the stars and all the planets had fallen on me.’
Still, using examples from the Nixon, Carter and, especially, the George H.W. Bush administrations, Rothkopf argues convincingly that small can sometimes be very effective when it comes to managing international affairs.
Rothkopf, we should note is no outsider himself. He’s a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, served as deputy under-secretary of commerce during the Clinton Administration and as managing director of Kissinger Associates, the global consulting firm chaired by Henry Kissinger (there’s his two degrees). His establishment credentials certainly helped in writing Running the World, for which he interviewed nearly everyone who has had a prominent role in developing or enacting U.S. international policy over the past 35 years. Befitting his insider status Rothkopf has produced a fair and balanced history of the NSC since 1947.” |
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Introducing David Rothkopf’s “Running the World,” hailed as “invaluable” and “the definitive history of the NSC.” |
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“If you are looking for just one book that will take you into the inner-sanctums of American foreign policy – past, present, and even the future – this is the one. Deeply researched, extraordinarily well written, and filled with colorful anecdotes and the kind of insider information that comes only with extensive interviewing, David Rothkopf’s book is both an essential read and a highly entertaining one. Once you are done, you’ll never look at America’s foreign policy – or its role in the world -- quite the same way as you did before.” --Jeffrey E. Garten, Dean, Yale School of Management, former official in four U.S. presidential administrations
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