Despite more than two centuries of academic discourse, historians of the Civil War are still adding fresh works to the historiography.  Since the conclusion of the war, historians have sought a better understanding of the battles and generals.  Numerous historians have written on the Shenandoah Valley Campaign, including William Allan, Gary L. Ecelbarger, Robert K. Krick, and Robert G. Tanner.  The works of both Allan and Tanner, however, exhibit strong Confederate bias and thus give unfair assessments of the Union during the campaign.  Both Ecelbarger and Krick focused on battles and not the entire campaign.  In Shenandoah 1862, Cozzens adds balance to the debate and offers a sweeping reexamination of the campaign while avoiding bias by using both Confederate and Union primary sources (p. 2).  Central to Cozzens’ argument that Confederate General Thomas J. Jackson was not without imperfections, nor were the Union generals inept as often depicted in previous works.

Written in a narrative style, Shenandoah 1862 offers substantial insight into Jackson.  Throughout the work, Cozzens gives background information to provide a better understanding of Jackson’s thought processes.  In chapter one, when addressing Jackson’s religious views, Cozzens notes that Jackson’s strong faith allowed him to act comely in the heat of battle.  In doing so repeatedly, however, Cozzens drowns his arguments in a sea of narrative.

In his introduction, Cozzens argues that the significance of Jackson’s victories during the Shenandoah Valley Campaign “demonstrated that the Union armies and their commanders not only were not invincible, but also could be made to appear foolish through deft and daring maneuver” (p. 5).  The issue with this statement is that the Confederate victory at the battle of First Manassas in 1861 demonstrated the vulnerabilities of Union forces.  Consequently, the 1862 Shenandoah Valley Campaign can only reinforce what was already made evident a year earlier at Manassas.  Additionally, Cozzens undervalues the significance of First Manassas when stating that until Shenandoah, it had been a while since a Confederate victory.  While the victories during the Shenandoah Valley Campaign reinvigorated a Confederacy beset with recent defeats in the Western Theater, many Confederates remembered the triumph at Manassas a year earlier.

Several topics are of consequence to Cozzens’ work, most significantly the actions of Jackson and the failures of the opposing Union generals.  Regarding Jackson, Cozzens argues that the general’s strengths included a keen understanding of topography and the rapid movement of his forces to exploit enemy’s weaknesses.  Cozzens’ maintains, however, the Jackson’s quick troop marches left his men too drained to be useful during the latter stages of the campaign (p. 509-10).   Moreover, Jackson never shared his plans with his officers, thus leaving them bewildered in battle.

As for the Union, while previous historians contend that Abraham Lincoln’s generals were incompetent, Cozzens argues that the Federal command structure hindered their ability to meet the changing realities of a campaign.  Cozzens maintains that Lincoln’s discontent with events in Virginia lead to the president interfering in both the Shenandoah and Peninsular campaigns.  Concerns over the defense of Washington, resulted in Lincoln’s shuffling of troops from operations against Richmond to the hopeful destruction of Jackson’s forces in the Shenandoah Valley.   Cozzens notes that despite Federal meddling, Union generals conducted themselves well in the Shenandoah Valley.

Another issue with Cozzens’ work is that of citations.  Cozzens builds his work on a large primary and secondary source base.  While that is certainly a strength, the lack of citations for every quote is problematic.  For example, when quoting Jackson in the first paragraph on page 7, Cozzens does not provide any footnotes.  Further complicating the issue is that Cozzens uses many works on Jackson, thus it is impossible to match the uncited quotes with any particular source.  Another instance appears in the last paragraph on page 177, where Cozzens uses multiple quotations to relay a discussion of tactics between Colonel Nathan Kimball and Major General Harry G. Armstrong.  Again, it becomes difficult to attribute the quotations to a single source.

In sum, Cozzens offers a fair assessment of Jackson’s Shenandoah Valley Campaign.  While previous publications expresses strong Confederate bias, Cozzens addresses the shortcomings of all commanders, regardless of their affiliations.  Moreover, Cozzens provides substantial insight into how Jackson’s personal beliefs and military fortitude affected his leadership.  Despite some weaknesses, Cozzens demonstrates that fresh analysis of the Civil War are possible and indeed, valuable.

The motivations of Confederate soldiers have long been debated by scholars.  Before Kenneth W. Noe’s Reluctant Rebels, historians concentrated on the young men who joined the army shortly after the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter.  Motivations for joining the war, argues war correspondent William Howard Russell, did not include ideological reasons such as politics and liberty.  In agreement, Gerald Linderman notes that men wanted, and were expected, to demonstrate their courage through battle.  Conversely, James McPherson contends that after Fort Sumter, men enlisted because they believed in the political ideology of the Confederacy.  These men saw the war as an extension of the American Revolution and were more than willing to fight for slavery and liberty.  Agreeing with McPherson, Randall Jimerson added that Confederates linked the protection of slavery with fighting for the defense of their homes and for liberty.  All of these scholars, however, based their findings on the men who joined the war in 1861.  Moreover, with scant evidence, scholars suggested that men joining the cause later on held different ideological views and were inferior soldiers.  Therefore, Noe seeks a nuanced understanding of the motivations, and abilities, of those who joined the army in 1862 and beyond.

Noe divides his work in three parts.  In part one, Noe addresses the ideological contention that men enlisted to defend their rights.  Noe argues that late enlisters wrote little of nationalism and were not worried about duty and honor.  Slavery, however, played a more significant role in that noticeably more post-1861 enlisters were son’s of slave holders.  Part two centers on the oversimplified assertion that Confederates only joined the army to protect their homes.  Here, Noe argues that young late enlisters were fueled by romanticism, while older men were concerned with defending their loved ones.  Part three examines the factors that caused men to enlist and what empowered them during the time in the army.  In this portion of his work, Noe concludes that the home maintained a strong presence in the lives of the soldiers.  Religion played a key role in connecting men with their homes and motivations to keep fighting, yet prevented larger group camaraderie.

To gain a nuanced understanding of the men who enlisted after 1861, Noe assembles a group of 320 men.  Through the use of census data, diaries, letters, and service records, Noe constructs a compelling rebuttal.  From these sources, Noe uncovers that these men were angered by the North’s hard hand of war and dwelt on the local ramifications of the conflict.  Moreover, these men were older and, generally, had backgrounds related to manual labor.  Noe’s statistical data suggests a clear connection between slavery and soldier motivations.  In his research, Noe finds that between thirty and forty percent of his sample were from slaveholding families.  Consequently, Noe demonstrates that these men had a stronger connection to slavery than the men who joined the army in 1861.  Additionally, Noe’s correlation between slavery and soldier motivations reflects a wider trend already suggested by Joseph Glatthaar in General Lee’s Army.  Nevertheless, Noe’s sample is far from perfect.  Not wanting to write “yet another study of white Southern elites,” Noe included those who where, and where not, literate.  Yet, as Noe acknowledges, this means his sample is “only suggestive at best for the entire population” (p. 13).  Futhermore, Noe excludes officers on the grounds that are more prosperous than enlisted men for fear that they would skew his data set (p. 16).  Consequently, Noe’s sample ignores men that could hinder his argument that men joining after 1861 were less ideologically motivated.

Contrary to earlier assessments that post-1861 soldiers were more likely to dessert and flee in battle, Noe uses his evidence base to argue that ultimately these late enlisters still “marched, fought, killed, and died for the Confederacy on dozens of battlefields” (p. 209).  Moreover, Noe adds that these men “were not cowards. Called upon to engage in combat, most seemingly fought to the best of their abilities” (p. 209).  Instead, Noe argues that these men were older and tired from hard work, thus combat exhausted them rather quickly.

Reluctant Rebels demonstrates the value of statistical evidence.  Despite issues over how Noe assembled his sample, his work remains valuable to the debate over Confederate soldier motivations.  Noe successful nuances preexisting arguments by explaining what many earlier works simply assumed, that being the traits of the enlisted solders after 1861.  It is Noe’s evidence that suggests that late enlisters where different from the men who joined the army in 1861, but they were certainly not inferior soldiers.

The rifle musket was once conceived as the reason for a prolonged and bloody Civil War. In The Rifle Musket in Civil War Combat, Earl J. Hess endeavors to rewrite the history of the war’s most infamous firearm.  Historians and soldiers alike assumed the assertions of “pre-Civil War rifle enthusiasts with little alteration or questioning”  by accepting range of the rifle musket to be “anywhere from 250 to 1,000 yards” (p. 2-3).  Since the rifle musket’s range was claimed as superior to that of the smoothbore musket, scholars like James M. McPherson argue that despite the new rifle, soldiers continued to fight with outmoded tactics.  In addition to McPherson, Hess challenges the works of John Mahon in “Civil War Infantry Assault Tactics (Military Affairs, Summer 1961), and Grady McWhiney and Perry Jamieson in Attack and Die. These scholars advocated the “rifle revolution” theory, where the rifle musket’s longer killing range directly contributed to enormous causalities, the use of trenches, ineffective artillery and calvary attacks, and ultimately a protracted Civil War.  Citing Paddy Griffith’s Battle Tactics of the Civil War as the impetuous for his own work, Hess notes that Griffith found that most battles of 1863 and 1864 occurred between 127 and 141 yards.  Accordingly, Mark Grimsley and Brent Nosworthy reached similar numbers when examining the firing distances of the rifle musket (p. 7).  Adding to the debate, Hess argues that a combination of the rifle musket’s parabolic trajectory and combat within 100 yards on hilly terrain meant that the rifle musket was only slightly more lethal than its smoothbore predecessor.

Essentially, Hess seeks the termination of the “rifle revolution” theory.  To do so, Hess builds his work with the data compiled by other scholars as well as his own examination of archival documents, such as service records.  From this research, Hess argues that an increased effective range does not mean more casualties.  Rather, Hess notes that skirmishes typically occurred at a distance of 94.4 yards, which is an effective range for both rifle and smoothbore muskets.  Despite the potential of the rifle musket, soldiers were not trained to fire the weapon at longer distances.  Moreover, soldier’s were not well versed in trajectories of the rifle musket’s minie ball projectile.  Hess writes that when fired, the minie ball followed an arc-like trajectory, whereby the bullet passed through two killing areas.   Since soldiers did not consider the trajectory of the rifle musket, they did not adjust their aim when firing.  Thus all too often soldiers fired over the heads of the advancing enemy.

The rifle musket, asserts Hess, did alter Civil War tactics.  Since both Confederate and Union armies continued to fight with Napoleonic troop formations, Hess asserts that the impact of the rifle musket was restricted to skirmishing and sniping.  Nevertheless, Hess states that the rifle musket’s heightened effectives in “skirmishing was never a substitute for good fighting by the battle line” (p. 174).  Furthermore, Hess perceives the increased sniping range as having only a marginal affect on military operations (p. 196).

Along with the discussion of the combat effectiveness of the rifle musket, Hess address how soldiers came about acquiring weapons.  In his analysis of general orders, Hess finds that the Army of Tennessee lost 4,000 rifles simply from retreating soldiers (p. 46-7).  Although some troops simply abandon their rifles while in a hasty retreat, Hess uses the recollections of soldiers to suggest that some troops had the legitimate need to discard damaged firearms.  Additionally, Hess concludes that riflemen discarded their weapons in exchange for undamaged ones on the battlefield, with some did so when ammunition for their current rifle ran out (p. 48).

While Hess’s work deals serious damage to the “rifle revolution” thesis, The Rifle Musket in Civil War Combat is not perfect.  The majority of Hess’s evidence stems from the use of the rifle musket in the Western Theater.  Consequently, Hess’s data is perhaps more indicative of western battles than those of the Eastern Theater.  Another point of contention is that while Hess’s argues that soldiers were not trained to estimate distances accurately, the author accepts the purported firing ranges of soldiers without hesitation.  One should acknowledge the serious implications of soldier observations during the heat of battle.

Aside from the weakness in Hess’s work, the author has produced a noteworthy rebuttal to the works of previous historians.  Far from simply a study of the rifle musket, Hess’s examination demonstrates that technology alone does not win wars.  Therefore, Hess’s work ought to receive a warm reception from history buffs and Civil War scholars.

In Allies and Adversaries: The Joint Chiefs of Staff, The Grand Alliance, and U.S. Strategy in World War II, Mark A. Stoler emphasizes the role of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in constructing American foreign policy during the Second World War.  In thirteen chapters, Stoler addresses the shift in U.S. civil-military relations that, as argued by the author, received limited discussion in the historiographical debate (xi).  The book begins with the prewar issues that preceded the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, then covers the strategic debates of 1942 and 1943, and finally addresses the planning of the war’s endgame and Cold War policies.  Stoler maintains that despite the momentous shift in political power made possible by the 1947 National Security Act, the historiography has yet to explain how and why the JCS became a significant and permanent fixture in U.S. foreign policy.  For Stoler, the objective of Allies and Adversaries is to address these shortcomings.

According to Stoler, the political and geographic complexities of the Second World War necessitated the involvement of the JCS in diplomatic matters.  The author contends that President Franklin D. Roosevelt did not have much faith in the State Department.  Thus, the military presented itself as a logical replacement in foreign affairs.  Moreover, FDR favored his own policies and preferred an active role in wartime decisions, which resulted in the Chiefs reporting directly to the president.  Stoler notes that earlier on, the JCS cemented an influential relationship with the president and maintained it throughout Roosevelt’s presidency.

Stoler’s analysis of America’s “Europe First” decision sheds substantial light on difficult civil-military dilemmas confronting the JCS.  As noted by the author, the JCS had to deal with both American and British authorities when formulating wartime strategies.  The author argues that JCS smartly understood British interests to be shortsighted and self-serving (imperial preservation) and not useful in winning the war.¹  Instead, Stoler contends that the JCS focused on invading mainland Europe and confronting the expansive Japanese empire in the Pacific.  Yet U.S. military strategist argued over whether invading German occupied Europe was more imperative than a war in the Pacific.  Some argued that focusing on the Japanese threat would prevent Japan from attacking the USSR.  Nevertheless, the Germans were ultimately seen as the more direct and active threat against the Soviet Union.  As quoted by Stoler, Roosevelt stated that “the whole question of whether we win or lose the war depends on the Russians,” thus after eliminating the Germans, “we can defeat the Japanese in six weeks” (85). Essentially, the author emphasizes that an Allied victory rested on keeping the Russians in the war.  Despite his assertion that a major objective of American strategy centered on keeping the Soviets in the war, Stoler does not thoroughly address the delay in the invasion of occupied France (123).

To support his arguments, Stoler uses a wide range of diplomatic and military records, as well as the personal papers of influential members of the U.S. government and armed services.  The author’s emphasis on the importance of keeping the USSR in the war should force all subsequent historiographical debates on the Second World War to reexamine America’s wartime partnership with the Russians.  Ultimately, all readers will appreciate Stoler’s effort and will acquire a deepened understanding of the rise of the JCS as a dominate force in U.S. postwar foreign policy.

In War Without Mercy, John W. Dower examines the confluence of racism and war making that empowered the ideologies of both the United States and Japan during the Pacific War.  Before Dowers work, most studies of racism and hatred during the Second World War focus on the Holocaust.  Additionally, the major works on the war between the U.S. and Japan, such as Ronald Spector’s Eagle against the Sun: The American War with Japan (1984), gave little attention to topics of race and ideology.  Therefore, Dower’s groundbreaking book challenges the ways in which scholars analyze wars between the Western world and Asia.  Dower identifies what he sees as the prevailing trends – widespread racism and abhorrence of the enemy, – driving American and Japanese fighting during the Pacific War.  For Dower, then, it is necessary to explain how “abstractions” like “war words and graphic images” became tangible through poor military intelligence, acts of barbarism, and the implementation of “exterminations policies” (x).  Moreover, the author is concerned with the ramifications of such brutal warfare.  Rather, after years of deep seeded hostility, how did the United States and Japan make amends so easily?  Dower concludes that while racism drove both nations during the Second World War, Cold War politics, especially Soviet Communism, hastened the reconciliation process and cemented the current partnership between the U.S. and Japan (310).

Racism, argues Dower, took on different forms for the Americans and Japanese.  For the U.S., the emergence of a powerful Japanese empire challenged long-standing beliefs of white supremacy (5-6).  Regarding the Japanese, the author contends that Japan took its racial superiority for granted (5). Despite claims from the Japanese government that the island nation was fighting for colonized Asians, this Pan-Asian unity was a myth.  The Japanese were just as, or even more, aggressive than Westerners towards other Asians (7).  In terms of viewing one another, Dower argues that both the U.S. and Japan allowed prejudice and racial stereotypes to permeate their understanding of each other’s military capabilities.  Moreover such misconceptions allowed for “Race hate fed atrocities, and atrocities in turn fanned the fires of race hate” (11).  Furthermore, the dehumanization of the enemy at both the command and frontline levels resulted in emotional and mental distancing that allowed soldiers to kill repeatedly.  Combined with the deeply embedded racial hatred, the desensitization of troops made the Pacific War more savage than Europe.

Much of Dower’s work rests on the examination of propaganda, particularly cartoons, films, novels, and official government publications.  Through these sources, both the U.S. and Japan sought to establish the other as subhuman.  The Americans used such propaganda to portray the Japanese as barbarous racists bent on the destruction of civilization.  Often, the Japanese were depicted as animals, usually monkeys, insects, and reptiles.  Conversely, according to the author, the Japanese presented the Allies as corrupt demonic beings that threatened Japanese purity.  Yet despite Dower’s masterful use of propaganda, much of his work is American-centric in that discussions of Japan are noticeably shorter than those of America.  Moreover, the absence of oral histories is troubling.  If the race hate between the two enemies was as ferocious as Dower maintains, than the memories of both American and Japanese soldiers, sailors, and airmen would reinforce the author’s central thesis.

War Without Mercy challenges the historiography to address issues of race, not only in the Pacific War, but also in all wars.  The conclusions of Dower, while pertinent to America’s war with Japan, are exceedingly applicable to the Vietnam War.  In sum, Dower offers a valuable work on the racial and ideological aspects of war making.

Besides the study of battles and the conduct of the war, recent Civil War historiography emphasizes the lives of contemporary women.  In Gender and the Sectional Conflict, Nina Silber dedicates three short chapters in which she argues that the role of gender is integral to understanding Civil War ideology and memory.  While building on Drew Gilpen Faust’s Mothers of Invention, Silber synthesis directly connects the arguments put forth in her previous work, The Romance of Reunion, with the studies of LeeAnn Whites and David Blight.  According to Silber, Whites argues in her 1992 essay that scholars should strive to understand the Civil War as a gender struggle (xii).  This argument caused Silber to reexamine her previous research by including men and women, which in turn allows the author to analyze the ideology of both northerners and southerners.  Furthermore, Blight’s Race and Reunion emphasizes the postwar connection between race and America’s quickness to forget issues of slavery and emancipation.  Adding to Blight’s work, Silber contends that gender allowed the nation to concentrate on the home and ignore links to issues of race (xix).  In essence, Silber focuses on how women from both the Union and Confederacy shaped the rational behind waging the Civil War as well as their involvement during the war, and after, the conflict.

The ideological arguments provided by Southerners and Northerners for going to war is central to Silber’s first chapter.  Sibler contends that Confederates fused the need to defend their nation with the more crucial duty of protecting their families.  As noted by Silber, for Confederate men, “while the nation may have been a cause worth fighting for, it meant nothing in the absence of homes and families” (xiv).  In contrast, Silber argues that Unionists understood the need to secure a positive future for their family as more vital than their current well being (xv).   Put another way, Silber states “If Confederate soldiers fought for ‘home,’ Union men very clearly—and more self-consciously—fought for ‘country’” (13).

Mid-war patriotism of women provides the focal point of Silber’s second chapter.  Silber finds that Union and Confederate women differed in how they shaped the nations ideological rational for going to war.  During the war, Silber contends that southern women upheld contemporary ideals of gender.  To support the Confederacy, southern women gave aid to soldiers because these men were defending the institutions of the home and womanhood.  Northern women, however, found themselves at the center of the Union debate over issues of class and antiwar sentiment.  In the North, many writers used women to question whether the working class bled more than the elites for the Union.  Silber argues that to silence critics,  northern women were more inclined to associate support for the war as loyalty to the Union and thus were open to developing political opinions not entirely inline with those of northern men.

The discussion of the Civil War’s legacy dominates chapter three.  In this chapter, Silber address the role women played in shaping postwar memory.  The burial of war dead affected how northern and southern women participated in the shaping of memory.  Since the federal government handled the interment of Union dead, northern women were invisible to the public.  Silber does note, however, that northern women concerned themselves with helping needy veterans.  In contrast, southern women were heavily involved in the burying of Confederate dead, which many women used to demonstrate their allegiance to the family, and more significantly, the defense of the Confederacy.  Consequently, southern women became an indispensable component of the romanticizing of the Lost Cause.  Silber maintains that northerners concluded that defending the Republic “was ultimately men’s business, not women’s, and it was a business that lacked the sentimental and feminine influences that surrounded the Lost Cause” (88).  Using both primary and secondary sources, Silber develops a valuable synthesis on the study of gender during the Civil War.  Although most of Silber’s sources emerge from recent scholarship, her work is certainly not any less significant.  Additionally, despite the brevity of Gender and the Sectional Conflict, Silber successfully combines the arguments of Whites and Blight with her own research, thus providing a holistic understanding of the current historiography.   Ultimately, Silber’s work forces historians to reexamine Civil War constructions of gender in terms of patriotism and memory.

Traditionally, historians portrary both the First and Second Vietnam Wars as American lead wars against communism.  In The First Vietnam War, editors Mark Atwood Lawrence and Fredrik Logevall provide a collection of articles to argue the origins of the Vietnam Wars lay in the Viet Minh’s fight against French colonial rule.  The collection reminds academia that the Vietnam War was more a product of anti-colonialism, rather than the spread of Soviet communism.  Moreover, the collection illustrates that the conflicts in Vietnam were not domestic, but rather events with international ramifications.  Chapters by Lawrence and John Prados are paramount in addressing how a French problem in Indochina became an American war.

Mark Atwood Lawrence raises one of the more significant arguments in chapter six, where he examines the role Great Britain in encouraging American support for France during the First Vietnam War.  Lawrence argues that Britain and France shared a common interest in preventing the disintegration of their colonial empires, thus both were willing crush colonial uprisings.  Britain did not want the war in Vietnam to encourage rebellion in places like India and Malaya, thus Britain saw a French victory in Indochina as a triumph for all colonial powers.  Since the Second World War had left both Britain and France militarily weak, the US was seen as an invaluable partner in the defense of European colonial empires.  Recognizing America’s dislike for European colonialism, Lawrence maintains that Britain helped recast the war in Vietnam as struggle against the spread of communism.  Lawrence notes that while the British government pressed the US to carry the financial burden of funding the French war, Britain offered meager monetary and military assistance.  Lawrence’s work demonstrates that even after the Second World War, Britain continued its tradition of using other nations to achieve foreign interests.  Ironically, once Britain granted independence to India and other colonies, England lost interest in supporting the war in Vietnam.

In chapter eleven, orthodox scholar John Prados emphasizes Frances reliance on the US for the war in Indochina.  Focusing on Dien Bien Phu, Prados argues that the French changed the reason for being in Vietnam from a war of colonial preservation to a fight against communism.  At the time of Dien Bien Phu, French public support for the war was waning. Conversely, the US became increasingly more involved in Indochina.  For President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the war in Vietnam had indeed become a struggle against international communism.  With the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu, the Eisenhower administration had proof that communism could spread across Southeast Asia.  Moreover, the Eisenhower administration understood that America could not rely on other nations to win the war against communist expansion.  Consequently, Prados argues that with Eisenhower’s “Domino Theory,” America was enamored in the Cold War ideology of fighting communism.

In sum, The First Vietnam War emphasizes the colonial origins of the Vietnam War.  With so much attention placed on how Vietnam became a Cold War battleground, historians failed to adequately discuss place Vietnam in a colonial context.  Consequently, The First Vietnam War is a valuable addition to the discourse on both the Vietnam War and post-Second World War world.

All too often scholars present the Vietnam War as a product of the Cold War, whereby ignoring the conflict’s colonial origins.  In Imaging Vietnam and America, orthodox historian Mark Philip Bradley examines how the Viet Minh and Americans perceived one another.  For the Viet Minh, America’s Founding Fathers expressed an ideology that supported Vietnamese independence.  As a result, Bradley maintains that Viet Minh conceptions of the United States were dominated by the rhetoric of the American Revolution.  Conversely, racial stereotypes shaped America’s opinion of Vietnam.  Noting the link between postcolonial Vietnam and America’s colonial past, Bradley acknowledges a shared desire for liberty.  Additionally, Bradley contends that because of common ideology, war between the two civilizations would seem impossible.  Throughout his work, however, Bradley argues that a common appreciation for self-determinism was insufficient in cementing an alliance between Viet Minh and the U.S..

Most of the historiography contends, that although America backed the Viet Minh during the Japanese occupation of Indochina, over time the U.S. lost interest in the relationship.  Bradley argues that the historiography suggests that America chose to support French claims to Vietnam out of respect, and Cold War interests in Europe, rather than recognize a free Vietnam.  Challenging these arguments, the author addresses the relationship between Vietnam and the U.S. as one founded on misconceptions and suspicions.

Bradley makes use of his strong background in Vietnam studies by demonstrating the relationship between Vietnam and America through Vietnamese primary sources.  Bradley’s mastery of Vietnamese literature allows him to access the underlying attitudes of the Vietnamese, French, and Americans.  For Bradley, the Vietnamese understanding of Americans was rather limited.  In part to isolation and limited media outlets, most Vietnamese understood American purely in the context of men like Thomas Jefferson and George Washington.  Bradley notes that Ho Chi Minh connected with America’s Founding Fathers and used their words to invoke Vietnamese independence.  Moreover, to fuse with American ideology, Ho Chi Minh used portions of America’s Declaration of Independence in his proclamation of a free Vietnamese state.

While most diplomatic histories are topdown studies, Bradley centers on the intangible popular political sentiments.  Consequently, Bradley demonstrates that Orientalism dominated American perceptions of the Vietnamese.  For example, although the CIA noted the determination of the Viet Minh to achieve self rule, in reports, agents emphasized the inferiorities of Asian peoples.  Bradley contends America doubted the ability of Ho Chi Minh to rule without Soviet assistance.  Combined with such stereotypes and the intensification of the Cold War, US policy makers ultimately questioned the Viet Minh’s nationalist ideology.

In sum, Bradley offers a fresh analysis of the relationship between postcolonial Vietnam and America.  In doing so, Bradley advocates that both nations developed faulty perceptions of one another.  Despite some commonalities, ideological and racial stereotypes distorted the mindsets of both the Viet Minh and American policy makers.

When one thinks about America and imperialism, all too often the name Theodore Roosevelt comes to mind. In Theodore Roosevelt’s Caribbean: The Panama Canal, the Monroe Doctrine, and the Latin American Context, Richard H. Collin argues against the popularized image of Theodore Roosevelt as a staunch imperialist. Collin asserts that this belief, long advocated by Latin American writers, loses sight of Roosevelt’s main stance against European interference in Latin American affairs. Rather than being an imperialist, Roosevelt stood for the exclusion of Europe, not the subjection of Latin America (ix). While Latin Americans altered the legacy of Roosevelt and late 19th-Century U..S foreign policy, Collin’s accuses the historiography as focusing on over simplistic arguments, such as Frederick Marks III’s assertion in Velvet to Iron: The Diplomacy of Theodore Roosevelt that Roosevelt was a virtuous man. For Collin, Caribbean contexts outweigh arguments centered on Roosevelt (xv). Thus Collin’s work is an examination of how nations, such as Columbia and Venezuela, exhibited agency in their dealings with the major contemporary European powers and the United States.

Central to Collin’s work is the argument that modernism, not the U.S., was the enemy of Latin America (9). Rather, a negative portrayal of the U.S. was a convenient means for Latin Americans to place the blame over Latin America’s struggles on the Americans. Additionally, issues with entering the industrialized world spurred dynamic changes for Latin America. An example used by Collin is that of sugar. With the advent of new technologies, the production of sugar was no longer limited to the Caribbean (34). Supporting that overarching argument is the assertion that Roosevelt opposed the expansion of one nation at the expense of another. Collin states that Roosevelt strongly believed in the concepts of independence and civilization, and thus the mixing of different cultural groups would sully those ideals (52). Consequently, instead of supporting imperialist actions, Roosevelt looked down on the “sleazy” dealings of American entrepreneurs in Central and South America (11).

Latin American agency in international affairs resonates throughout Collin’s work. Demonstrating an active Latin America is the case of Venezuela and Great Britain. Collin argues that Venezuela and Britain wrangled over the avoidance of each others taxes, with the South American nation arresting British nationals that were suspected of circumventing trade laws. The dispute escalated when France used military force to free jailed citizens in Venezuela, with Britain taking note of the effectiveness of such actions. Together with Germany, Britain assembled a naval armada to force Venezuela to the negotiating table. Fearful of a joint British and German invasion of South America, the U.S. stationed a large fleet off Puerto Rico. The American show of force helped pressure the Europeans to accept arbitration and allow the disintegrating German and British alliance to save face (106-107).

Another example of Latin American agency persists in America’s relationship with Columbia. Collin argues that during Columbia’s civil war, conservative Columbian leader Jose Manuel Marroquin manipulated the United States. Marroquin promised the U.S. rights to build a canal through Panama, granted that the American’s helped end his nations civil war. The Columbian leader used U.S. intervention to undermine the power of his liberal opponents in Panama. With the war leaving Columbia destitute, the U.S. dumped much capital into the nation in hopes that Marroquin would finally sanction the construction of a canal in Panama. Despite America’s ability to diplomatically end the conflict, Marroquin reneged on his end of the deal. Thus, Collin contends that Columbia forced America’s hand and thus the U.S. ultimately supported Panamanian independence (267-277).

In Theodore Roosevelt’s Caribbean: The Panama Canal, the Monroe Doctrine, and the Latin American Context readers will be exposed to two significant arguments. Under the leadership of Theodore Roosevelt, the US stood with Latin America against European imperialism and various Latin American nations were active participants in late 19th-Century internal affairs. Collin’s arguments are supported by a deep pool of primary and secondary sources. Readers will appreciate the author’s extensive use of archival sources from the U.S. and Latin America. Ultimately, Collin adds an invaluable component to the historiography of U.S. foreign relations.

Now nearly twenty-five years later America finds itself in another, yet far more serious, air campaign against Gaddafi. It seems that pent-up anger from the Lockerbie bombing and other acts of terror provide the fuel that powers many Western nations in the current fight against Gaddafi. Will the campaign of 2011 end differently than El Dorado Canyon?