The Age of Terror: America and the World After September 11

Rating:
Summary: Survey of Great Thinkers on the Post Cold War Environment
Review: The Age of Terror compiles the thoughts of various academics about the roots of terrorism and possible directions for national security. The majority of the all-star cast of authors is currently teaching at Yale. Most are historians, while a law professor, a management professor and a scientist round out the crew. Many of the authors also have some political experience, whether within the beltway or overseas. Their thoughts and ideas are well articulated and diverse.

My one criticism of the book lies in the lack of any attempt to synthesize some of the ideas into a coherent set of policy choices. Given the political experience of Strobe Talbott and Charles Hill, among others, this team could have taken the time to combine some of their thoughts into policy options that our current leaders could consider. Instead, the editors succumbed to the publisher's pressure to rush to market before the window of opportunity created by 9/11 passed.

Other than the above criticism, I found the majority of the essays insightful and informative, even though I have stayed very current on these issues since my profession requires a firm understanding of the national security environment. I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in surveying the opinions of many of the foremost historians and other professionals in our society today.

Rating:
Summary: Good outline of terror-related issues despite rush to print
Review: The Age Of Terror should be a disaster. Eight academicians and career bureaucrats, thrown together in the immediate aftermath of September 11th, ruminate on issues related to that momentous event. Against all odds, though, this hurried collaboration produced some solid work.

Some topics are inspired (how to foster cooperation between the private sector and the military establishment) and others are predictable (foreign policy, civil liberties, and radical Islam). For the most part the authors showed great prescience in their outline of the issues that would confront the United States. The weakest chapter, ironically, covers the most obvious problem: the tension between national security and civil liberties. Conversely, the best essay is the most complex: how to harness American ingenuity to devise new technologies to confront terrorists. Proximity to the attacks did not really effect the quality of the work; those essays that are good would have been so regardless of when written, and the few that fall short would not have improved with time for reflection. The authors all are experts in their respective fields, and if anything this book shows that America's elites were not as caught off guard as it seemed in the first days after the Pentagon and World Trade Center were attacked.

This book is a good overview of terror-related policy issues and at times provides a surprising degree of depth. That it worked at all, let alone holds up, is a pleasant surprise and a tribute to the editors and contributors.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: This book is a good example of a growing trend in public discourse: everyone seems to have something to say, regardless of whether they know much about the topic. If you are a well-informed reader, the commentaries and conclusions of "The Age of Terror" will not shed any new light on the topic; they tend to platitudes and generalizations. For excellent and illuminating content, I recommend "How Did This Happen? Terrorism and the New War" by Gideon Rose (Editor), James F. Hoge Jr. (Editor). The contributors have expertise in their respective fields and it shows.

Rating:
Summary: Very uneven and, at some points, very poor
Review: This book of essays was published as a reaction to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Having gotten into print within just a few weeks of the attacks, the essays are as much a reaction to the events as they are dispassionate analyses. Some of the essays are very insightful and standing by themselves would merit a five star rating. Others, however, deserve no more than one star.

The first essay, by John Louis Gaddis is only worth one star because he does not clinically try to understand what made the terrorists tick. Instead, he seems to actually justify their feelings. This kind of analysis of terrorism is never acceptable. In blaming the United States for mistakes it made, Gaddis has the temerity to state, "in the Middle East, we tolerated the continuing Israeli dispossession and repossession of Palestinians even as we were seeking to secure the rights of Palestinians..." First, he is absolutely wrong in his accusations against both the United States and Israel. Second, he gives comfort to terrorism by going beyond a clinical analysis of their alleged grievances.

Equally fatuous is Abbas Amanat who states, "The defiance of Jewish settlers, the arrogance of the Israeli politicians, the tanks, helicopter gunships, and jet fighters roaring overhead, the night raids, the detentions and frequent breaches of basic human rights --- all these provoke intense sentiments of anger and frustration." This type of foolishness makes, what might have otherwise been a fairly good post 9/11/01 book, a piece of garbage. Never, ever concede any understanding of terrorism which might be construed as a justification. Certainly, never concede potential justification when the alleged grounds for such justification are wrong.

There were several good essays but the bad apples spoiled the batch, or in this case, the book.

Rating:
Summary: Provocative, informative, entertaining book on 9/11
Review: This collection of essays--written, compiled, and published within just a few weeks of 9/11-- easily could have fallen into the trap of being just another slap-dash, knee-jerk, sloppily-put-together "instant book." And, as with any collection of essays by different authors, The Age of Terror: America and the World After September 11 could have ended up being wildly uneven in terms of quality, theme, and style. Fortunately, none of this happened. Instead, the book's two editors - former Clinton Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott and Nayan Chanda-have assembled a fine collection of essays by leading experts in various fields (history, law, political science, molecular biology, diplomacy) into a top-notch, thought provoking, fascinating look at the world after 9/11. As explained on the book's jacket, the premise here is that "the unforgivable is not necessarily incomprehensible or inexplicable." After reading this book, the events of 9/11 should be both more comprehensible and more explicable to just about any reader.

Among the more provocative essays in The Age of Terror" is the one by Charles Hill, a former aide to Secretaries of State Kissinger, Haig, and Shultz. Hill's chapter, entitled "A Herculean Task: The Myth and Reality of Arab Terrorism," demolishes what Hill considers to be a series of "deceptive and dangerous myths" that have sprung up following 9/11: that "America faces an entirely new kind of challenge;" that "we brought this on ourselves;" that there are "legitimate grievances about poverty and oppression" that "leave those afflicted with no choice but to take up terrorism;" and that "nothing we do can be effective against such a threat." Even more provocatively, Hill blasts "the miserable state of politics and governance" in the Arab world, plus the tendency of Arabs to blame all their problems on warped conspiracy theories (i.e, the Mossad was behind 9/11) and bluntly states: "Every regime of the Arab-Islamic world has proved a failure. Not one has proved able to provide its people with realistic hope for a free and prosperous future." On the contrary, Hill argues that Arab regimes have intentionally served up a "combination of internal oppression and propaganda to generate rage against external enemies." In this soil, according to Hill, " religiously inflamed terrorists take root" and thrive. Hill then concludes his fascinating, thought-provoking essay with a classic literary analogy, comparing the current fight against terrorism to the "twelve labors of Hercules." And just as Hercules required "intelligence," "patience," "fortitude" "the willingness and ability to undertake diverse and difficult tasks," "methods other than direct, main force" at times; the assistance of allies, and continued respect for "properly constituted laws and procedures of justice" to successfully complete his labors, so shall we in our current struggle. Hill leaves us with fighting words fit for Hercules: "those who commit acts of war will be warred upon until they surrender or die."

[....]

Paul Kennedy's essay, "Maintaining American Power: From Injury to Recovery," to this reviewer's mind is somewhat repetitive of earlier arguments he has made, particularly in his best-known book, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers. Kennedy stumbles early on when he states unequivocally that 9/11 has led "not just to short-term, military responses...but also to a re-examination of many aspects of the American way of life, of America's attitude toward other countries." Huh? It has? Where? Not in the Bush Administration, that's for sure! After that, Kennedy hits his stride, arguing forcefully (as he has in the past) that the U.S. needs to utilize and strengthen all of the elements of its power: military/industrial, economic, and diplomatic. Kennedy sharply criticizes the Bush Administration's strong tendency towards unilateralism and apparent disrespect for international organizations and alliances, while arguing for an essentially realpolitik "smart diplomacy." Finally, Kennedy warns of the "danger of overreaction and overextension" to the "dreadful and unjustified shock" of 9/11, and prophecizes that the U.S. may find that the 21st century is "even more tricky to navigate, and even more turbulent, than...the century just gone."

Aside from the Hill, Ferguson, and Kennedy essays, other chapters in The Age of Terror ably cover such topics as: the role of science (and strengthening America's scientific base) in the post-9/11 world (Maxine Singer); flaws in U.S. foreign policy--inconsistency, insensitivity, unilateralism once again--that need fixing if we are to fight the asymmetric threat of terrorism (John Lewis Gaddis); the rise of Islamic extremism and fundamentalism--"salafiyyah," Wahhabism-- in the Arab world and "its roots in the history of the Muslim sense of decline and its unhappy encounter with the dominant West;" (Abbas Amanat); the need to maintain our "most fundamental values," such as civil liberties and open debate of issues, while fighting terror (Harold Hongju Koh); and the need for improved intelligence and homeland security while learning as a society how to "live with terrorism" (Paul Bracken). In sum, if you want to understand why 9/11 happened and where we might go from here, I strongly recommend that you read this excellent, well-written, thought-provoking book.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting contemporary essays on a timely subject.
Review: This collection of writings provides contemporary thinkers who consider the new issues raised by the events of September 11th. A range of views and ideas on terrorism's roots and how to combat it mark eight essays which consider such diverse topics as Islamic beliefs and violence, new ideas on security and freedoms, and new challenges for science and medicine to respond to terrorist activities.

Rating:
Summary: Decent collection of essays but a little dated.
Review: This is basically a bunch of essays by academics (mostly from Yale) that consists of describing certain elements as related to terrorism and US policy. The academics who composed these essays range from professors of history, law, political science, and there's one molecular biologist. I found most of these essays relevant and interesting from the point of view of examining globalism and also the political roots of fundamentalist Islam. Some of these commentators take the viewpoint that America needs to protect its dominant position and assume an imperalist attitude to do so. I found a little fault with that. I believe cooperation and tolerance is the key. Other commentators illustrate the point that we must be aggressive in combating terrorism and also learn productive measures to combat a potential bioterrorist attack. Most of this is common sense but each writer puts their own spin on it relating to the field they teach about. A little bit of the book was rough because it seemed to be put together rather hastily without proper editing. Also, there were two essays that got pretty dry and read more like reading some kind of intelligence memo. I found myself having to fight boredom a couple of times. Lastly, there were many comparisons drawn in the book between 9-11 and Pearl Harbor or even Britain's position as the dominant power 100 yrs earlier. This was somewhat tedious because we've heard these comparisons over and over. They are true to an extent but there has never been anything quite like 9-11 happen before. I don't know that we'll find any fool-proof answers to the problems of terror that we all face in a changing world in this book. However, it's good that books like this one open up the discussion so that we may dare to think about such matters before we are caught off guard. If you want something to pass the time that concerns political matters and is relatively accessible you should read this book. It's not spectacular but it's okay.

Rating:
Summary: Often insightful
Review: This is in some ways an instant book--produced within a month or so of September 11. But the people who contributed have long been thinking about the issues raised by those horrifying events. The contributions are uneven, as one would expect from a proejct like this, but the whole is much better than one might expect. It helps the reader put the events in the context of Middle Eastern and world history and provides some ideas to chew on. I always find John Lewis Gaddis and Paul Kennedy stimulating. The essays by Niall Ferguson (provocatively advocating imperialism!) and Maxine Singer (on the role science might be given) were particularly thought provoking.