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Nick Turse

The Changing Face of Empire: Special Ops, Drones, Spies, Proxy Fighters, Secret Bases, and Cyberwarfare (Dispatch Books) Paperback – November 20, 2012

by Nick Turse (Author)

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Following the failures of the Iraq and Afghan wars, as well as “military lite” methods and counterinsurgency, the Pentagon is pioneering a new brand of global warfare predicated on special ops, drones, spy games, civilian soldiers, and cyberwarfare. It may sound like a safer, saner war-fighting. In reality, it will prove anything but, as Turse's pathbreaking reportage makes clear.

Print length

107 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Haymarket Books
Publication date

November 20, 2012
Dimensions

5.25 x 0.25 x 8 inches
ISBN-10

1608463109
ISBN-13

978-1608463107
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Nick Turse, an award-winning journalist and historian, is the author/editor of several books including The Complex: How the Military Invades Our Everyday Lives, the managing editor of TomDispatch.com, and a fellow at the Nation Institute.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Haymarket Books (November 20, 2012)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 107 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1608463109
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1608463107
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 5.3 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.25 x 0.25 x 8 inches

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David Bliven

Great chronicaling of 21st Century U.S. Imperialism

Reviewed in the United States on February 15, 2017

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I think it's absolutely essential that we know what our government is up to. If we don't, then how/why would we have a basis to protest it? This book's conclusion is worth quoting at length: "After more than a decade of war, it has failed to eliminate a minority, rag-tag Afghan insurgency with limited popular support. It trained an indigenous Afghan force that was long known for its poor performance, before it became better known for killing its American trainers. It has spent years and untold tens of millions of tax dollars chasing down assorted firebrand clerics, various terrorist “lieutenants,” and a host of no-name militants belonging to al-Qaeda, mostly in the backlands of the planet. Instead of wiping out the organization and its wannabes, however, it seems mainly to have facilitated its franchising around the world. . . . It’s thrown millions of dollars in personnel, equipment, aid, and recently even troops into the task of eradicating low-level drug runners (as well as the major drug cartels), without putting a dent in the northward flow of narcotics to America’s cities and suburbs. It spends billions on intelligence only to routinely find itself in the dark. It destroyed the regime of an Iraqi dictator and occupied his country, only to be fought to a standstill by ill-armed, ill-organized insurgencies, then out-maneuvered by the allies it had helped to put in power, and unceremoniously bounced from the country. It spends untold millions of dollars to train and equip elite Navy SEALs to take on poor, untrained, lightly-armed adversaries, like gun-toting Somali pirates."

One person found this helpful

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wsmrer

The Underling Theme

Reviewed in the United States on May 19, 2013

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An interesting book it is a laundry list of what America's continuing militarization is generating with advancing technology and the need to intervene in all area of the world where our National Interest might be perceived to be threatened.

The underlying theme Turse pursues well is simply how mindless this process has become.

Turse is not afraid to list all post WW II American military actions, save Granada and Panama, as defeats given their intended aim. But he clearly does not see the current moves found in his subtitle as wise re-directions. And he sees the current push to use Special Ops, proxy armies and robot technology, the new American way of war, holding great potential for unforeseen entanglements and serial blow-back.

One startling finding of his is that, quoting Admiral Olson, the outgoing chief of Special Operations Command, "Black operations like the bin Laden mission are now exceptionally common. A dozen or so are conducted every night."

Right now, Olson emphasized, U.S. Special Operations forces were approximately as large as Canada's entire active duty military.
Our secret war is not well publicized and this book is defiantly an opening on it.

A criticism of his work would be, as noted by one or more reviewers, what else can be done in this dangerous world we inhabit?

His answer is look to the past where small incursions have blossomed into major (misdirected) engagements; actions have consequences, expect them. He does not use the term `Cost- Benefit Analysis' but does call up the process as a necessity for policy makers.

Some portion of the book deals with the hypocrisy of our politicians, but none of that will come as a surprise to most readers. Perhaps more interesting time could have been spent on the question of what if anything is implied by the term National Interest that is presumably driving our military policy.

Turse's title, The Changing Face of Empire, hits on the concept that America is behaving like an empire and that is an unconformable notion perhaps for some. The Imperial Age was a period when some European nations carved up the world for their own national interest, Britain being the outstanding example. Historical studies have shown that the gains did not match the costs for the country's population as a whole but clearly did for some parties -- the ruling elite. Today American is under some threat, real or imagined, that is driving our Imperial reach. It would be useful if authors as well informed as Nick Turse were to try to unravel the real meaning of National Interest in a way of directing rational policy or asking what in the world do we really think we are doing and who is benefiting?*

*Jeremy Scahill, Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield published in 2013 is an excellent continuation on this topic.
And this: According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, the CIA has conducted 378 strikes in the program's 10-year history. Of those, 326 are classified as "Obama strikes." The total number of people killed by drones is estimated at 2,528 to 3,648. Civilian casualties are estimated at 416 to 948, with 168 to 200 of those being children. As many as another 1,545 are estimated to have been injured in those strikes.

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culdee

Solid Read

Reviewed in the United States on April 15, 2015

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I was diappointed how thin this book was until I read it. There is noting wasted this is all prime rib and no fat. I liked it so much I bought my son in law a copy. His major is military intelligence.

3 people found this helpful

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Dr. Danny

Revealing and insightful

Reviewed in the United States on January 18, 2017

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Well written and excellent investigative journalism. Not footnoted, and a little dated given the state of the world these days, but a compelling short read.

Reviewed in the United States on June 8, 2015

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As in all of his work Dr. Turse goes where no other investigative Journalist does. Shining a light where the military prefers we are kept in the Dark.
Great Read!

2 people found this helpful

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Rev. Dean

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on January 21, 2015

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Excellent book and I highly recommend it to anyone thinking about joining the armed forces, as a MUST READ.

2 people found this helpful

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JC Warren

Blackwater on Steroids

Reviewed in the United States on June 30, 2013

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Nick Turse has performed an invaluable service to freedom loving people everywhere by detailing just how extensive the militarization of America is. I always make it a point to read his posts on TomDispatch.com. He does insightful and courageous investigations and doesn't pull any punches. I'd also recommend his book "Kill Anything That Moves" to help you get a sense of how the rest of the world views America's military interventions.

6 people found this helpful

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Mark Warren

A must read.

Reviewed in the United States on September 25, 2015

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Fascinating read.

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William Podmore

Useful study of the USA's current mode of warfare

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 18, 2014

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Journalist and author Nick Turse explores the six elements of the USA’s current way of warfare: special operations, drones, spies, proxy fighters, secret bases and cyber-warfare. “Garrisoning the planet is just part of it. The Pentagon and U.S. intelligence services are also running covert special forces and spy operations, launching drone attacks, building bases and secret prisons, training, arming, and funding local security forces, and engaging in a host of other militarized activities right up to full-scale war.”

He writes of the US cyber-warfare against Iran, “As with other facets of the new way of war, these efforts were begun under the Bush administration but significantly accelerated under President Obama, who became the first American commander-in-chief to order sustained cyberattacks designed to cripple another country’s infrastructure.”

US Special Operations Forces are active in more than 75 countries. There are 60,000 troops in the Joint Special Operations Command, who track and kill suspected terrorists. Turse calls them the ‘the chief executive’s private assassination squad’. 85 per cent of them are deployed in the greater Middle East: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Yemen, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

The USA has 60 drone bases across the world, mostly in Africa and the Middle East. It has 450 military bases in Afghanistan. It has 8,000 military personnel in Africa, in bases in Djibouti, Uganda, Kenya, the Central African Republic, South Sudan, Ethiopia, the Seychelles islands off Africa, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Bush used to talk of the ‘arc of instability’, which covered all the countries in the area from North Africa to the border with China, also known as the Greater Middle East, but sometimes was said to stretch from Latin America to Southeast Asia.

Turse concludes, “In addition to waging more wars in ‘arc’ nations, Obama has overseen the deployment of greater numbers of special operations forces to the region, has transferred or brokered the sale of substantial quantities of weapons there, while continuing to build and expand military bases at a torrid rate, as well as training and supplying large numbers of indigenous forces. Pentagon documents and open source information indicate that there is not a single country in that arc in which U.S. military and intelligence agencies are not now active. This raises questions about just how crucial the American role has been in the region’s increasing volatility and destabilization.”

When we see the wreckage left by the US wars against Korea, Vietnam, Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, we can see that the USA certainly does not do nation-building, but nation-busting. The USA provides not stability and security for the world, but destruction.

4 people found this helpful

D.C. Johnson

Very factual,in contrast to the bland mainstream media

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 12, 2013

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The book appears to tell the truth and support its points by very precise and beleivable relevations of what really hhappened

One person found this helpful

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