Instruments of Statecraft: U.S. Guerilla Warfare, Counterinsurgency, and Counterterrorism, 1940-1990

"Instruments of Statecraft: U.S. Guerilla Warfare, Counterinsurgency, and Counterterrorism, 1940-1990 was published in 1992 by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc."

"Informed by recently declassified and previously unpublished documents, Instruments of Statecraft is an authoritative study of American covert, unconventional warfare waged against ideological adversaries, from the Truman administration up to the recent war in the Persian Gulf."

"Since World War II, assassination, sabotage, kidnaping, torture, the overthrow of foreign governments, and other terroristic activities have been intrinsic to our national defense policy. These have been justified time and again as necessary to combat communist insurgency and, more recently, terrorism-as the only effective response to the barbarism ascribed to, or projected onto, our enemies- be they Sandinistas or the PLO."

"So it is that America has maintained forces -including the OSS, the CIA, the Green Berets, and the Delta Force-that have specialized in dirty warfare with impunity, in Nicaragua, Lebanon, Laos, Vietnam, the Philippines, Afghanistan, Guatemala, Africa, Cuba, Central America, and Greece, among other places."

"Michael McClintock gives a fascinating and alarming expose of the dark side of American foreign policy, while examining its tactical roots-from the pronouncements of Clausewitz and Raymond Aron, to its ideological basis in the Monroe Doctrine, Theodore Roosevelt's "Big Stick" foreign policy, and Woodrow Wilson's post-colonialist crusade."

This is a very extensive look into our Cold War past. Even a brief read will show that the events of today, really aren't all that out of character for the U.S. government. It shows that such secret, clandestine activities are not the recent invention of the current administration, neither are they confined just to "Conservative Hawks", as many Liberals seem to believe, or at least behave. These activities have become a bureaucratic institution that transcends party-lines.

Only by understanding our place in world history, can we even begin to comprehend why there are those that actually hate America. Believing as our current President would have us believe, that "they hate us because of our freedoms", or of some other American ideology, is to judge history through a clouded and broken lense.

While it must be aknowledged that we've benefitted many in the world, a number of times it came at the expense of others. Others caught in the crossfire. Too many times, in an effort to achieve the "Greater Good", we've made ememies out of previously neutral or friendly populations that would, from time to time, come and bite us in the ass, then we'd be subjected to some cover-story put out by our own government that would mask our own complicity in causing their anger in the first place.

If however, you prefer to live in the fairytale land that our government has dutifully provided for us through the years, then you'll definitely want to avoid the link in this post. And indeed, avoid this whole blog as well, because as well all know, it's fashionable today to brand as unAmerican, anything and anyone that doesn't blindly parrot the "official" line, and only speak of the country we love, in the best possible light, pretending and insisting that there are no shadows.