America, War and Power Defining the State 1775 - 2005

This collection of essays addresses the role of armed force, and attitudes toward it, in shaping and defining the United States of America. The firstsix chapters, arranged in chronological order, reflect the perspectives of historians on this central question, focusing on the American Revolution and Early Republic; American antebellum adventurism, especially regarding Latin America; the American Civil War and its impact on US attitudes toward foreign entanglements, down to the Second World War; the convergence of military and domestic issues during Dwight D. Eisenhower's career as general and US president; the American experience of the Cold War; and the Vietnam War as "television war", with consideration of its impact on the Iraq War. The last three chapters offer views on the topic in light of global systems theory, US domestic opinion and governance, and soft power theory. The concluding essay is by historians Fred Anderson and Andrew Cayton, whose book The Dominion of War: Empire and Liberty in North America, 1500-2000 (2005) provided the common reading for the symposium which produced these essays.This book will be of much interest to students of US military history, US politics and military history and strategy in general.Sondhaus, Lawrence is the author of 'America, War and Power Defining the State 1775 - 2005', published 2007 under ISBN 9780415772143 and ISBN 0415772141.