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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Will Moderates Save The Day?, May 14, 2009
Two prominent political figures profoundly influenced U.S. foreign policy since the late 1700s to early 1800s: Alexander Hamilton, George Washington's treasury secretary, and Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the U.S. For two centuries since these two, U.S. foreign policy has shifted back and forth like a pendulum between the Hamiltonian ideology of conservatives/neoconservatives, and the Jeffersonian liberal followers. Mr. Hamilton viewed a strong national economy and military as a necessity to protect U.S. interests, while Mr. Jefferson advocated promoting the American ideals of freedom and democracy abroad (p. 45 of hardcover).
According to Mr. Gelb, the power to lead derives from the power to solve problems, and for 50 years, no U.S. administration has correctly used this indispensible power that is currently on the decline. If this downward trend continues, the U.S. will be nothing more than just another great power; essentially where China is now. Mr. Gelb views this prospect as a travesty for all countries, because in such a scenario the world would be "without a leader to sustain world order and help solve international problems." (p. 278)
Mr. Gelb has an optimistic view of reversing America's diminishing power stemming from the misunderstanding and misuse of U.S. power in foreign affairs, as well as the weakening of domestic fundamentals such as the economy, infrastructure, public schools and political system. The saving grace, according to Mr. Gelb is the rise of moderates to positions of power to counter the destructive influence of "demons" on the far right and left. These moderates, of whom Mr. Gelb is a member of, have failed to strut their stuff for the past 50 years. What would compel them to fight as hard as the extremists on either ends of the political spectrum to get their voices heard? Mind you, they'd have to stay in power consistently for decades to clean up the mess Mr. Gelb asserts the "demons" have created. In a "Meet the Press" interview with the late Tim Russert, Karl Rove correctly asserted the fight for power has always been between conservatives and liberals. Everyone else just goes along for the ride. Mr. Gelb even admits that extremists drown out the voice of moderates, and fight with uncanny resolve. The reason why Muslim extremists were backed by Pakistan in Afghanistan is precisely because they fought harder than moderate Afghani commanders such as Ahmad Shah Massoud. Pakistan needed these extremists to fight their proxy war in India.
So how is Mr. Gelb's optimistic view of a moderate takeover reconciled with a history that doesn't support it? What chance does the U.S. have for retaining its long run indispensable superiority in the face of these bleak prospects? The massive government debt alone may be enough to knock us out of contention as the world leader.
Mr. Gelb correctly postulates that if the U.S. dominant power is to be restored and retained, extremists have to be marginalized. Just how this can be accomplished and the likelihood of its success remains to be seen.
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19 of 26 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Was the Iraq War a war of choice? , April 7, 2009
Leslie Gelb's new book "Power Rules" is a modern update to Niccolo Machiavelli's 15th century classic book written to the new ruler of the City-State of Florence, Italy. Only Gelb's book is specifically written for new U.S. President Barack Obama about the present U.S. situation in Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran and elsewhere. Machiavelli once wrote:
"There are three kinds of intelligence: one kind understands things for itself, the other appreciates what others can understand, the third understands neither for itself nor through others. This first kind is excellent, the second good, and the third kind useless."
Whether *Power Rules* falls into the first or the second of Machiavelli's three types of intelligence is the question to be answered in this book review.
Gelb relates what he understands for himself as a political moderate about U.S. foreign policy based on decades of working for Presidents on both sides of the political spectrum.
Using Gelb's favorite concept about U.S. foreign policy, - *mutual indispensability,* (i.e., "we swim together, or we hang apart") this book is "indispendable" and should get a wide reading across the political spectrum. Gelb disabuses just about every camp of foreign policy -- hard-dumb, soft-smart, and globalist-economic -- of their preconceived notions about foreign affairs. Instead he opts for what he calls a common sense approach. But unlike Machiavelli who wrote that "men never do anything well except through necessity," Gelb's approach is based on non-necessity or non-imperatives (i.e., choice). Contrary to Machiavelli, Gelb says war is rarely necessary, as necessity is prone to being invented. Gelb is thus a postmodernist Machiavellian, however otherwise realistic and commensensical he is. It is interesting to note that the Afghan War was initially seen as the common sense *war of necessity* and the Iraq War a *war of choice.* Now the Afghan War is seen by many as a war of choice that we should retreat from. What is seen as common sense is changeable.
Despite that I couldn't put this well-written book down I am sorry to say that it is a disappointment not by what he wrote but what he didn't. For in singling out the invasion of Iraq by President George W. Bush II as a war of choice Gelb never answers the elusive question of our time: if Bush's invasion of Iraq and his policy of pre-emptive warfare was such an obvious failure why did Machiavelli write "There is no avoiding war; it can only be postponed to the advantage of others"? Gelb loves to invoke Machiavelli to legitimate his book but unfortunately for us only selectively so. He sidestepped this issue.
Of course the Iraq War was a war of choice by President Bush, as pointed out in Lawrence Freedman's book *A Choice of Enemies.* Although al Qaeda has always been highly suspected of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, as Freedman points out in his book the Saudis and Pakistan are the most suspicious sponsors. Faced with the ambiguous situation of who attacked the U.S. after 9/11, Bush had to "choose" an enemy. Bush apparently picked the *low hanging fruit* of Iraq and Afghanistan instead of provoking war with the Saudis (oil), Pakis (nukes), or Iran (Islam). Thus, Bush "chose" indirect warfare as that was the only option which preserved "mutual indispensability" (Gelb's term) with the Saudis (oil), Pakis (nukes) and Iran (Islam). But the American public never has understood that these wars are indirect wars, and thus has perceived them as *manufactured.*
Gelb offers six excellent chapters of rules for exercising power. However, while Gelb is certainly aware in his book of how foreign states (Saudi, Pakistan, Iran) harbor, fund, and arm shadow terrorist networks both within and outside their countries, he frustratingly doesn't offer any guidelines of how to deal with them. Gelb puts so much emphasis on abandoning "unilateralism" for cooperation with other allies or even rival nations that he fails to answer what we do when such nations are also our ally-enemies or are *mutually indispenable* to our national interests? Using Gelb's terminology, what kind of "leverage doors" can you open with nations that hold their own greater leverage over us: Saudis (oil), Pakis (nukes & Islam) and Iran (Islam and soon nukes). What kind of leverage can you exert over friendly Arab states that continue to want to back stab us and keep us bogged down fighting their wars?
Gelb isn't a naive liberal. He just fails to address such paradoxes although he criticizes conservative foreign policy thinkers as simplistic and unable to handle complexity. Oddly, Machiavelli is mostly embraced by conservatives, not liberals.
Machiavelli wrote in Book II, Chapter 9 of his Discourses the following: "this method of starting war has always been common among the powerful and among those who still have respect for both their own word and that of others. For if I wish to wage war upon a prince with whom I have long-respected treaties, I can attack one of his friends with more justification and excuse than I can attack the prince, knowing for a certainty that if I attack his friend he will either resent it (and I shall fulfill my intention of waging war upon him) or not resent it, in which case he will reveal his weakness or lack of faith by not defending one of his dependents. Either one of these two alternatives suffices to lessen his reputation and to facilitate my plans."
In other words, is the Iraq and Afghan Wars indirect wars waged to gain leverage against both neighboring Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Iran? Gelb doesn't say. But if it is an indirect war then the reasons why Bush failed at devising a convincing public justification for the war become more apparent (e.g., WMD's, removing a tyrant, democracy building, etc). Gelb's approach may be commensensical, non-ideological, and aversive of what he calls "demons," but perhaps it misses the mark.
I got the feeling from reading the book that Gelb is ingratiating himself with the new Obama Presidential administration, not for a job (like Machiavelli did with the Lorenzo de Medici), but to disabuse the Obama team of their notions of soft power and that all you have to do in foreign policy is negotiate. If so, Gelb has his own double Machiavellian motivation to slip some medicine into the dog food while playing doctor and criticizing his last patient (Bush) for not taking his medicine (i.e., Bush negotiated behind the scenes and through clandestine intermediaries rather than publicly in order not to legitimate enemy regimes).
It is plausible that a faction within Saudi Arabia wanted the U.S. to fight their war for them against Iraq? We have known for a long time that the Saudis were implicated in 9/11 and that the Pakis are the Taliban and thus an accomplice in Afghanistan. If this was the case, Gelb offers no understanding of how the U.S. should deal or gain leverage over such a situation. Should it have negotiated, gone to war with Saudi Arabia and cut its economic lifeline of oil risking an economic depression, risked an all out war with Pakistan thus risking nuclear retaliation or an all-out war with Islam, or what? We don't know because Gelb is stuck on answers that are obvious and full of common sense rather than asking those questions that everyone seems to want to avoid like some sort of dark family secret.
The book jacket is filled with endorsements mainly by liberal foreign policy critics who have embraced Gelb's book as some sort of vindication of their criticisms of Bush's actions and policies by the dean of foreign policy. Gelb, however, is above the fray, but almost to a fault. Unfortunately, Gelb leaves some of the most tantalizing and prescient propositions of Machiavelli about the Iraq War unanswered. Instead he has opted to write a book that casts a pox on everyone's houses -- which is greatly needed.
In the end, however, I am afraid that I have to put Gelb's book in the second category of Machiavelli's as that which "appreciates what others can understand" more than it casts light or depth on what we don't understand. Nonetheless, don't miss reading this excellent book. It is a *necessity,* even if it is your choice.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Power Rules, May 15, 2009
Power Rules by Leslie H. Gelb; by far is one of the most interesting and informative books on the United States foriegn policy that I have ever read, even when I was in college. This book should be mandatory reading for any one interested in how the United States is percieved in world by all nations. It explains in great detail how we previously gained our reputation and the tools at our disposal to change our over all image in the world. It also points out the pit falls and the rewards the United States earns when formulating an administrations foriegn policy step by step. Very good and easy to comprehend. Highly recommended.
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by Robert J. Art
