The Untold History of the United States [Hardcover]

Oliver Stone (Author), Peter Kuznick (Author)

Book Description

Release date: October 30, 2012

The companion to the Showtime documentary series, director Oliver Stone and historian Peter Kuznick challenge the prevailing orthodoxies of traditional history books in this thoroughly researched and rigorously analyzed look at the dark side of American history.

“At last the world knows America as the savior of the world!”—Woodrow Wilson

The notion of American exceptionalism, dating back to John Winthrop’s 1630 sermon aboard the Arbella, still warps Americans’ understanding of their nation’s role in the world. Most are loathe to admit that the United States has any imperial pretensions. But history tells a different story as filmmaker Oliver Stone and historian Peter Kuznick reveal in this riveting account of the rise and decline of the American empire.

Aided by the latest archival findings and recently declassified documents and building on the research of the world’s best scholars, Stone and Kuznick construct an often shocking but meticulously documented “People’s History of the American Empire” that offers startling context to the Bush-Cheney policies that put us at war in two Muslim countries and show us why the Obama administration has had such a difficult time cleaving a new path.

Stone and Kuznick will introduce readers to a pantheon of heroes and villains as they show not only how far the United States has drifted from its democratic traditions, but the powerful forces that have struggled to get us back on track.

The authors reveal that:

· The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were militarily unnecessary and morally indefensible.

· The United States, not the Soviet Union, bore the lion’s share of responsibility for perpetuating the Cold War.

· The U.S. love affair with right-wing dictators has gone as far as overthrowing elected leaders, arming and training murderous military officers, and forcing millions of people into poverty.

· U.S.-funded Islamist fundamentalists, who fought against the Soviets in Afghanistan, have blown back to threaten the interests of the U.S. and its allies.

· U.S. presidents, especially in wartime, have frequently trampled on the constitution and international law.

· The United States has brandished nuclear threats repeatedly and come terrifyingly close to nuclear war.

American leaders often believe they are unbound by history, yet Stone and Kuznick argue that we must face our troubling history honestly and forthrightly in order to set a new course for the twenty-first century. Their conclusions will challenge even experts, but there is one question only readers can answer: Is it too late for America to change?

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick have done what many would consider impossible. They have written a political history of the United States in the 20th Century that tells us exactly how the United States became an empire through conscious decisions, and how the struggle to maintain that empire will go on despite which political party holds office. It is a brilliant survey of the untold story." (Lloyd C. Gardner, author of The Road to Tahrir Square)

“Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick provide a critical overview of US foreign policy during the past few decades. There is much here to reflect upon. Such a perspective is indispensable…At stake is whether the United States will choose to be the policeman of a “Pax Americana,” which is a recipe for disaster, or partner with other nations on the way to a safer, more just and sustainable future.” (President Mikhail Gorbachev)

“A brave revisionist study which shatters many foreign policy myths… the Stone-Kuznick team grapples with the unsavory legacy of American militarism. . . . Make room on your book shelf for this compelling leftist primer.” (Douglas Brinkley, New York Times bestselling author of The Great Deluge)

"Howard [Zinn] would have loved this ‘people’s history’ of the American Empire. It's compulsive reading: brilliant, a masterpiece!” (Daniel Ellsberg, author of Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers)

“Finally, a book with the guts to challenge the accepted narrative of recent American history… This is the 'Washington didn't really chop down the cherry tree' book for our last hundred years." (Bill Maher)

“Kuznick and Stones’ Untold History is the most important historical narrative of this century.” (Martin Sherwin, Pulitzer Prize-winning co-author of American Prometheus)

"By casting a spotlight on the shadier aspects of America's past, as well as the humane alternatives, Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick provide a thought-provoking rebuttal to the nationalist myths that are far too often served up as history. They remind us that, until Americans have the courage to confront reality, they will remain trapped by their illusions." (Lawrence Wittner, author of One World or None: A History of the World Nuclear Disarmament Movement Through 1953)

"Stone and Kuznick provide a boldly critical view of the most painful aspects of American history. Their perspective on nuclear danger is especially illuminating. They make clear how close we have come to the ultimate human absurdity of annihilating ourselves as a species with our own technology. One thinks of the Enlightenment motto, "Dare to know!" The knowledge we gain can be a source of powerful wisdom." (Robert Jay Lifton, author of Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism)

"We won't be able to manage America's future if we don't know its past. In their Untold Story, Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick peel away layers of misleading myth about America in the 20th century. Some will be surprised, others angry. Most will understand their nation much better, especially the young. Then perhaps we can move forward in the new century." (Jeff Madrick, author of Taking America)

It’s time for serious people to confront rather than avoid or attempt to denigrate the profound challenges raised by Stone and Kuznick. They are asking (and answering!) all the right questions. (Gar Alperovitz, author of The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb)

About the Author

Oliver Stone has won numerous Academy Awards for his work on such iconic films as Platoon, Wall Street, JFK, Born on the Fourth of July, Natural Born Killers, Salvador, and W. 

Peter Kuznick is a professor of history and director of the award-winning Nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is currently serving his third term as distinguished lecturer with the Organization of American Historians. He has written extensively about science and politics, nuclear history, and Cold War culture.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 784 pages
• Publisher: Gallery Books; First Edition edition (October 30, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1451613512
• ISBN-13: 978-1451613513
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 2.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (223 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,501 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #25 in Books > History > Historical Study & Educational Resources > Social History
  • #29 in Books > History > Modern (16th-21st Centuries) > 21st Century
  • #76 in Books > History > Modern (16th-21st Centuries) > 20th Century

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

87 of 102 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars What they never taught in school December 20, 2012

By John Somerville

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

This book is criticized in the mass media for its bias. It is biased. Biased, however, is not the same as inaccurate and I have not read any accusations on that score. You'll know far more than you did, after reading what has not been told before..

240 of 301 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars U.S. HISTORY TOLD THE RIGHT WAY... FOR ONCE November 2, 2012

By Michael P. Naughton

Format:Hardcover

"History has many cunning passages, contrived corridors and issues." T.S. Eliot

Those of you who have read Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States: 1492-Present (Perennial Classics) or Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, Revised and Updated Edition will devour Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick's The Untold History of the United States. These two intellects bring fresh insight to a benighted past. Minor footnotes and characters, like Henry Wallace, in our history's drama are bought to the forefront for once. The reader becomes Dante to Oliver Stone and Professor Kusnick's Virgil, taking us through the gates of Hell in our personal history. In these pages the real Truman, Eisenhower, Reagan are exposed, not extolled or lionized. It is inscrutable and unconscionable what Truman did in Hiroshima. The truth behind who really defeated Germany. Terror bombing in WWII to terrorism in present day. As Historian Henry Steele Commager once pointed out, "From the beginning of our history, we've been rather casual about our crimes."

Although the book is a companion to the documentary series on Showtime, which is highly recommended, the book stands alone and independent; it covers, in 14 chapters, the most important moments where we got history wrong. Cognitive dissonance will kick in. A certain sciolism exists in our culture as we whistle in the dark.

This book reads like a modern day version of Thucydides, the Greek historian, The History of the Peloponnesian War and the corruption of language.

As a culture inculcated by an embellished history, remember this:

If we do not choose our leaders carefully and become more engaged, and stop viewing history in hindsight, then we risk our nation becoming either a kakistocracy or catastrophe - you decide. You have more power then you think.
Think independently. "Question everything" as Marx once said.

Read this book.

Tell it right for once.

Warning: This book will keep you up all night... save it for a weekend read.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Things that make you go Hmmm... January 29, 2013

By Eric C. Petersen

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I purchased this book with some trepidation as Stone is pretty well known as having a certain "bias" about US foreign policy and I feared the book might be a rant. Instead the book turned out to be a well-ordered and very-well footnoted history of roughly the last century of mainly, but not exclusively, American foreign policy, one that all too often has been shortsighted, foolish, and with the advent of the atomic bomb, terrifying. I'm a faily old dude going on 71 and the more history books I read the more apparent it is that there is no such thing as "the truth" or "reality." Stone looks at the past using a different set of facts that the American Exceptionalist crowd would omit from their histories. From these two different viewpoints two different conclusions could be drawn; however, as long as the facts presented are correct, so is each different view. It's up to the reader to decide where the weight of the evidence falls.

There were a number of times when I felt certain issues were dealt with too briefly - the Balfour Declaration being one - but given the scope of the book this brevity is understandable, and for those who might want a more thorough exegesis than a few sentences on something like Balfour whole books have been written. Guess my point is history, even very recent history, is comprised of many elements lurking in the shadows and a fuller understanding of events can only be achieved by looking at those the political class would rather have swept under the rug - permanently.

This book is probably a must-read for those of us concerned with the fact this country spends nearly half the planet's military budget and has less-than-nothing to show for it, a stupendous misallocaton of resources (at least in my book) that's gone on for now over half a century. Defenders of this policy would site "national security." Stone pretty well destroys this argument; Pogo was right. How we got stuck in this Tar Baby is a fascinating, if depressing, story that begins with the Truman administration, and continued to march on down the decades through various presidencies until here we are. If you have read David McCullough's "Truman" a rather positive image was revealed; not in this book. Many sides to any story and this one is definitely worth reading to better understand how we got from there to here.