Shadow Warfare
The History of America's Undeclared Wars
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- €10.99
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- €10.99
Publisher Description
Contrary to its contemporary image, deniable covert operations are not something new. Such activities have been ordered by every president and every administration since the Second World War. In many instances covert operations have relied on surrogates, with American personnel involved only at a distance, insulated by layers of deniability.
Shadow Warfare traces the evolution of these covert operations, detailing the tactics and tools used from the Truman era through those of the contemporary Obama Administrations. It also explores the personalities and careers of many of the most noted shadow warriors of the past sixty years, tracing the decade–long relationship between the CIA and the military.
Shadow Warfare presents a balanced, non–polemic exploration of American secret warfare, detailing its patterns, consequences and collateral damage and presenting its successes as well as failures. Shadow Wars explores why every president from Franklin Roosevelt on, felt compelled to turn to secret, deniable military action. It also delves into the political dynamic of the president's relationship with Congress and the fact that despite decades of combat, the U.S. Congress has chosen not to exercise its responsibility to declare a single state of war – even for extended and highly visible combat.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Hancock and Wexler (co-authors of The Awful Grace of God) present a comprehensive, well-researched, and up-to-date analysis of U.S. shadow warfare: the covert and clandestine operations that began with the Cold War and extend into the current War on Terror. Covert warfare's objective is "to obtain results without visible American military involvement in the actual fighting." Its legality has been disputed, but it has been authorized by "a succession of presidents over some seven decades." The Communist conquest of China was countered by involvement with Nationalist exile forces in Burma; by two decades of covert operations in Tibet; and by a final throwdown in Indochina all unsuccessful. Long-term covert warfare against Castro's Cuba also proved a total failure, though in the Congo, American efforts were more successful. Yet throughout the 1970s, covert warfare increasingly came "under the legislative microscope," and its "dark side" manifested in actions conducted through the 1980s against revolutionary movements in Latin America. Simultaneously, in Afghanistan, support for anti-Soviet insurgents midwifed a generation of Islamic terrorists. Fighting these new adversaries has produced a merging of the "covert and conventional," emphasizing nation-building on one hand and individual targeting on the other, but, as the authors note, the success and prospects of both remain limited.
