Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire by Chalmers Johnson ISBN: 0-8050-6239-4 Publisher: Owl Books Pub. Date: April, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.9 (60 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: As ye sow, so shall ye reap
Comment: Chalmers Johnson defines blowback as the "unintended consequences of policies that were kept from the American people." He also puts it in a simpler phrase: "a nation reaps what it sows." A lot of it is retaliation for political interference and economic imperialism. One example is the Lockerbie bombing of 1988, which was in retaliation for Reagan's bombing of Libya in 1986. (Note: this book was published in 2000, so his passage that "the innocent of the twenty-first century are going to harvest unexpected blowback disasters from the imperialist escapades of recent decades" is tragically ironic and foreshadowing. But blowback has been experienced by other empires, so America's not the only one. Look at the Soviet Union, Britain, and Rome.
Johnson explains America's imperialist influence in Japan, in particular, the notorious rape case in Okinawa in 1995. That was the most publicized case. In fact assault and harassment of Okinawans is commonplace. There's a clause in the U.S. forces occupation treaty that gives the U.S. military accused of crimes the right not to hand over guilty soldiers to the local authorities. It's kind of like the diplomatic immunity ambassadors in foreign countries get. (Remember Lethal Weapon 2?)
Individual countries are covered in detail: Japan, both Koreas, and China, in particular. The words "American Empire" in the title are no mistake. True, it's not outright political annexation as was done in the Roman, Spanish, or British Empires, but an economic hegemony. Where the Soviet created an Eastern bloc with countries such as East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Poland, so did the U.S. No, not in Western Europe, but in East Asia, comprising of Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Taiwan, and before their fall to Communist regimes, the former French Indochina countries. In fact, what's the first thing a newly-elected Japanese prime minister does? He flies straight to Washington D.C. to report in to his new masters.
Another factor of American foreign policy is its support, defense and economic, of repressive anti-Communist regimes, such as South Korea and Indonesia. America hardly batted an eye when in 1980, a student demonstration protesting martial law was violently put down in what became known as the Kwangju uprising. The same is true for the Kopassus commando squads in Indonesia, who violently put down Suharto's opponents.
Then there's Indonesia, where Suharto, who had been put in power by the CIA in 1965, was ousted with the help of the DIA because the IMF was unable to help Indonesia's financial problems. Conclusion: Suharto was no longer useful so he was dumped. The collapse of the Asian rim economies is also touched on.
Another similar pattern is how former dictators are given immunity for their crimes. Ferdinand Marcos died in exile in the U.S., General Chun Doo Hwan was pardoned by South Korean President Kim Young Sam, and Suharto was deemed too ill to stand trial.
The ultimate message in this book is indeed, that a country reaps what it sows. Solution: less imperialism, less interference, more peace, in other words, an end to the hegemony. There's so much peaceful potential that the U.S. has--why not use that?
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent book if you have an open mind
Comment: This book held less surprises for me, as a European reader living in the USA, than it does for many Americans who traditionally have something of an limited knowledge of the world they live in. America is not the worlds benevolent Godfather, nor is it an evil Empire - unfortunately depending on which side of the border people live they tend to adopt one of these rather unrealistic viewpoints. This book is balanced, considered analysis of American foreign policy of the past 50 years and some of the adverse consequences. It should be required reading in colleges to at least start people thinking in a more global perspective.
Blowback is a timely book that hopefully helps to explain that people don't "hate" America for the ludicrous reasons that the media likes to throw out - freedom, capitalism, democracy etc. Unless people take the time to understand the policies - and impact of those policies - over the last 50 years, they will never understand the consequences and reprocussions of them.
Rating: 4
Summary: That Forbidden Word: Empire
Comment: For practical purposes the eastern Pacific is an American lake, yet how many readers understand the role an obscure island like Okinawa plays in keeping it so. I didn't. But I do now, thanks to Johnson's valuable little book. Yes, the work's title is misleading; it needs a qualifier like Blowback in East Asia to be more accurate. Nonetheless, the chapters on Japan, and Meltdown, respectively, are little gems. Everyone knows that Japan sells alot to the US, but buys little in return. It doesn't seem fair. Their workers are employed, while ours increasingly aren't, and those who are need food stamps to survive. So should we blame them for taking away good American jobs. Not if Johnson is correct. The primary locus lies in Washington and Wall Street, not in Tokyo, Seoul or Jakarta. Simply put, it's the economics of empire that's to blame, although the term "empire" is never used in polite discourse, nor for that matter does Johnson bother to define it. But, regardless of what the network is called, reality is reality, and problems of imperial maintenance do arise, even for the experienced managers of Washington DC.
The challenge lies in strong but dependent economies, like Japan's and South Korea's, who have evolved their own competing form of capitalism, yet still need markets to survive. Hence, to keep dependent Asian economies dependent and their subordinate polities subordinate, markets must be regulated and upstarts punished. The chief tools in this regard are trade policy and capital flows, topics about which the American electorate thankfully knows little. If using these for reasons of empire requires undercutting America's own manufacturing sector and the good wages that go with it, then that's the price of remaining Number One. How long the imperium can continue the juggling act, however, remains to be seen.
Not every chapter is the equal of Japan, or Meltdown. The chapter on North Korea is very helpful for understanding the current standoff. The two on China are informative, but have little to do with blowback or empire, while the one on stealth imperialism is sub-Noam Chomsky. Moreover, the final chapter, which should be strong in summation, has little substance beyond the mildly speculative. On the other hand, prologues are often little more than bland introductions. This one however isn't. Johnson's prologue outlines in brief but telling detail a personal journey from empire's unwitting spear-carrier to that of clear-eyed critic. In its own way, it's a rather inspiring odyssey. One can only hope that increasing numbers of Americans make the same journey, because, unfortunately, empires are neither peaceable nor democratic, and rarely if ever self-liquidate.
 |
Title: The Sorrows of Empire : Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic [The American Empire Project ] by Chalmers Johnson ISBN: 0805070044 Publisher: Metropolitan Books Pub. Date: 13 January, 2004 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
 |
Title: Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance (The American Empire Project) by Noam Chomsky ISBN: 0805074007 Publisher: Metropolitan Books Pub. Date: 04 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $22.00 |
 |
Title: American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush by Kevin Phillips ISBN: 0670032646 Publisher: Viking Press Pub. Date: 01 January, 2004 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
 |
Title: The Great Unraveling: Losing Our Way in the New Century by Paul Krugman ISBN: 0393058506 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: September, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
 |
Title: Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq by Sheldon Rampton, John Stauber ISBN: 1585422762 Publisher: J. P. Tarcher Pub. Date: July, 2003 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
