Presidents of War

Presidents of War
Author: Michael Beschloss
Publisher: Crown
Total Pages: 754
Release: 2019-10-22
Genre: History
ISBN: 0307409619

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From a preeminent presidential historian comes a “superb and important” (The New York Times Book Review) saga of America’s wartime chief executives “Fascinating and heartbreaking . . . timely . . . Beschloss’s broad scope lets you draw important crosscutting lessons about presidential leadership.”—Bill Gates Widely acclaimed and ten years in the making, Michael Beschloss’s Presidents of War is an intimate and irresistibly readable chronicle of the Chief Executives who took the United States into conflict and mobilized it for victory. From the War of 1812 to Vietnam, we see these leaders considering the difficult decision to send hundreds of thousands of Americans to their deaths; struggling with Congress, the courts, the press, and antiwar protesters; seeking comfort from their spouses and friends; and dropping to their knees in prayer. Through Beschloss’s interviews with surviving participants and findings in original letters and once-classified national security documents, we come to understand how these Presidents were able to withstand the pressures of war—or were broken by them. Presidents of War combines this sense of immediacy with the overarching context of two centuries of American history, traveling from the time of our Founders, who tried to constrain presidential power, to our modern day, when a single leader has the potential to launch nuclear weapons that can destroy much of the human race. Praise for Presidents of War "A marvelous narrative. . . . As Beschloss explains, the greatest wartime presidents successfully leaven military action with moral concerns. . . . Beschloss’s writing is clean and concise, and he admirably draws upon new documents. Some of the more titillating tidbits in the book are in the footnotes. . . . There are fascinating nuggets on virtually every page of Presidents of War. It is a superb and important book, superbly rendered.”—Jay Winik, The New York Times Book Review "Sparkle and bite. . . . Valuable and engrossing study of how our chief executives have discharged the most significant of all their duties. . . . Excellent. . . . A fluent narrative that covers two centuries of national conflict.” —Richard Snow, The Wall Street Journal

The Road to War

The Road to War
Author: Marvin L. Kalb
Publisher: Brookings Institution Press
Total Pages: 303
Release: 2013
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0815724934

The Road to War examines how presidential commitments can lead to the use of American military force, and to war. Marvin Kalb notes that since World War II, "presidents have relied more on commitments, public and private, than they have on declarations of war, even though the U.S. Constitution declares rather unambiguously that Congress has the responsibility to "declare" war.

Presidential War Power

Presidential War Power
Author: Louis Fisher
Publisher:
Total Pages: 344
Release: 2004
Genre: Law
ISBN:

For this new edition, Louis Fisher has updated his arguments to include critiques of the Clinton & Bush presidencies, particularly the Use of Force Act, the Iraq Resolution of 2002, the 'preemption doctrine' of the current U.S. administration, & the order authorizing military tribunals.

The Presidents' War

The Presidents' War
Author: Chris DeRose
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 405
Release: 2014-06-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 1493010875

For the first time, readers will experience America’s gravest crisis through the eyes of the five former presidents who lived it. Author and historian Chris DeRose chronicles history’s most epic Presidential Royal Rumble, which culminated in a multi-front effort against Lincoln’s reelection bid, but not before: * John Tyler engaged in shuttle diplomacy between President Buchanan and the new Confederate Government. He chaired the Peace Convention of 1861, the last great hope for a political resolution to the crisis. When it failed, Tyler joined the Virginia Secession Convention, voted to leave the Union, and won election to the Confederate Congress. * Van Buren, who had schemed to deny Lincoln the presidency, supported him in his efforts after Fort Sumter, and thwarted Franklin Pierce's attempt at a meeting of the ex-Presidents to undermine Lincoln. * Millard Fillmore hosted Lincoln and Mary Todd on their way to Washington, initially supported the war effort, offered critical advice to keep Britain at bay, but turned on Lincoln over emancipation. * Franklin Pierce, talked about as a Democratic candidate in 1860 and ’64, was openly hostile to Lincoln and supportive of the South, an outspoken critic of Lincoln especially on civil liberties. After Vicksburg, when Jefferson Davis’s home was raided, a secret correspondence between Pierce and the Confederate President was revealed. * James Buchanan, who had left office as seven states had broken away from the Union, engaged in a frantic attempt to vindicate his administration, in part by tying himself to Lincoln and supporting the war, arguing that his successor had simply followed his policies. How Abraham Lincoln battled against his predecessors to preserve the Union and later to put an end to slavery is a thrilling tale of war waged at the top level of power.

War and the American Presidency

War and the American Presidency
Author: Arthur Meier Schlesinger
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages: 205
Release: 2005-10-17
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0393346358

"Historical reflections that deftly challenge the political and ideological foundations of President Bush's foreign policy."--Charles A. Kupchan, New York Times In a book that brings a magisterial command of history to the most urgent of contemporary questions, two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., explores the war in Iraq, the presidency, and the future of democracy. Describing unilateralism as "the oldest doctrine in American history," Schlesinger nevertheless warns of the dangers posed by the fatal turn in U.S. policy from deterrence and containment to preventive war. He writes powerfully about George W. Bush's expansion of presidential power, reminding us nevertheless of our country's distinguished legacy of patriotism through dissent in wartime. And in a new chapter written especially for the paperback edition, he examines the historical role of religion in American politics as a background for an assessment of Bush's faith-based presidency.

War Powers

War Powers
Author: Peter Irons
Publisher: Macmillan
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2006-05-02
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9780805080179

This book examines a fundamental question in the development of the American empire: What constraints does the Constitution place on our territorial expansion, military intervention, occupation of foreign countries, and on the power the president may exercise over American foreign policy? Worried about the dangers of unchecked executive power, the Founding Fathers deliberately assigned Congress the sole authority to make war. But the last time Congress declared war was on December 8, 1941, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Since then, every president from Harry Truman to George W. Bush has used military force in pursuit of imperial objectives, while Congress and the Supreme Court have virtually abdicated their responsibilities to check presidential power. Legal historian Irons recounts this story of subversion from above, tracing presidents' increasing willingness to ignore congressional authority and even suspend civil liberties.--From publisher description.

The Politics of War Powers

The Politics of War Powers
Author: Sarah Burns
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2019-11-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0700628738

The Constitution of the United States divides war powers between the executive and legislative branches to guard against ill-advised or unnecessary military action. This division of powers compels both branches to hold each other accountable and work in tandem. And yet, since the Cold War, congressional ambition has waned on this front. Even when Congress does provide initial authorization for larger operations, they do not provide strict parameters or clear end dates. As a result, one president after another has initiated and carried out poorly developed and poorly executed military policy. The Politics of War Powers offers a measured, deeply informed look at how the American constitutional system broke down, how it impacts decision-making today, and how we might find our way out of this unhealthy power division. Sarah Burns starts with a nuanced account of the theoretical and historical development of war powers in the United States. Where discussions of presidential power often lean on the concept of the Lockean Prerogative, Burns locates a more constructive source in Montesquieu. Unlike Locke, Montesquieu combines universal normative prescriptions with an emphasis on tailoring the structure to the unique needs of a society. In doing so, the separation of powers can be customized while maintaining the moderation needed to create a healthy institutional balance. He demonstrates the importance of forcing the branches into dialogue, putting them, as he says, “in a position to resist” each other. Burns’s conclusion—after tracing changes through Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s administration, the Cold War, and the War on Terror—is that presidents now command a dangerous degree of unilateral power. Burns’s work ranges across Montesquieu’s theory, the debate over the creation of the Constitution, historical precedent, and the current crisis. Through her analysis, both a fuller picture of the alterations to the constitutional system and ideas on how to address the resulting imbalance of power emerge.

Presidents and Their Generals

Presidents and Their Generals
Author: Matthew Moten
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 456
Release: 2014-11-05
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0674058143

Moten traces a sweeping history of the evolving roles of civilian and military leaders in conducting war. In doing so he demonstrates how war strategy and national security policy shifted as political and military institutions developed, and how they were shaped by leader's personalities.

The General vs. the President

The General vs. the President
Author: H. W. Brands
Publisher: Anchor
Total Pages: 482
Release: 2017-10-03
Genre: History
ISBN: 1101912170

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist, bestselling historian, and author of Our First Civil War comes the riveting story of how President Harry Truman and General Douglas MacArthur squared off to decide America's future in the aftermath of World War II. "A highly readable take on the clash of two titanic figures in a period of hair-trigger nuclear tensions.... History offers few antagonists with such dramatic contrasts, and Brands brings these two to life." —Los Angeles Times At the height of the Korean War, President Harry S. Truman committed a gaffe that sent shock waves around the world, when he suggested that General Douglas MacArthur, the willful, fearless, and highly decorated commander of the American and U.N. forces, had his finger on the nuclear trigger. At a time when the Soviets, too, had the bomb, the specter of a catastrophic third World War lurked menacingly close on the horizon. A correction quickly followed, but the damage was done; two visions for America’s path forward were clearly in opposition, and one man would have to make way. The contest of wills between these two titanic characters unfolds against the turbulent backdrop of a faraway war and terrors conjured at home by Joseph McCarthy. From the drama of Stalin’s blockade of West Berlin to the daring landing of MacArthur’s forces at Inchon to the shocking entrance of China into the war, The General and the President vividly evokes the making of a new American era.