The Commanders is based on two years of reporting and intensive interviewing within the Bush administration and the Pentagon and provides a behind-the-scenes account of the administration's war and peace policies. Bob Woodward shows how the United States' most crucial decisions are debated, fought over and finally put into action by a handful of strong, ambitious and politically sophisticated men. These commanders include the Commander-in-Chief himself, Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Colin Powell as well as National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, Secretary of State James Baker and Generals Maxwell Thurman, commander in Panama and H. Norman Schwarzkopf, commander of Desert Storm. The Commanders provides details of what happens when these men sit down to determine defense policy. It follows the inner-council debates and National Security Council meetings as the action moves from the Pentagon to the White House, to the fields of Panama and the Gulf. As Bob Woodward unveils the struggle for power and influence among these men, he shows Bush at the helm, fully - even emotionally - involved in every judgement and every detail. The Commanders shows who America's leaders really are.
In the last 36 years, Woodward has authored or coauthored 15 books, all of which have been national non-fiction bestsellers. Eleven have been #1 national bestsellers -- more than any contemporary non-fiction author.
Photos, a Q&A, and additional materials are available at Woodward's website, www.bobwoodward.com
His most recent book, Obama's Wars, is being published by Simon & Schuster on September 27, 2010.
Since 1971 Bob Woodward has worked for The Washington Post, where he is currently an associate editor. He and Carl Bernstein were the main reporters on the Watergate scandal for which the Post won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Woodward was the lead reporter for the Post's articles on the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks that won the National Affairs Pulitzer Prize in 2002.
In 2004, Bob Schieffer of CBS News said, "Woodward has established himself as the best reporter of our time. He may be the best reporter of all time."
In a lengthy 2008 book review, Jill Abramson, the managing editor of The New York Times, said that Woodward's four books on President Bush "may be the best record we will ever get of the events they cover . . . . They stand as the fullest story yet of the Bush presidency and the war that is likely to be its most important legacy."
Woodward was born March 26, 1943 in Illinois. He graduated from Yale University in 1965 and served five years as a communications officer in the United States Navy before beginning his journalism career at the Montgomery County (Maryland) Sentinel, where he was a reporter for one year before joining the Post.
