The Next Decade: Where We’ve Been . . . and Where We’re Going
You can view this book's Amazon detail page here.
George Friedman, the author, was born in Hungary to Holocaust survivors. As a child he was in a camp for displaced persons in Austria before coming to the US, where he attended public schools in NYC. You can feel it all in this book, which is a raw look at America or, more appropriately what the American President should do over the next ten years.
The Cornerstone of Friedman’s thinking is that the US has gotten away from what it does well – creating power balances throughout the world to decrease the likelihood of the US having to go to war and to increase the likelihood that the US will have a keep any country from blocking what is best for America. Basically, Friedman promotes the manipulation of countries in order to keep balance power in our favor. He uses the example of how we have screwed up in Iraq. By removing Iraqi power in the region, we’ve let Iran become the big dog. Meaning that we either need to buddy up with Iran or remain in Iraq militarily if we’re going to keep balance there. It’s going to take Iraq too long to get back to equality with Iran for it to matter.
The book discusses each region in the world and the strengths and weaknesses, from the US perspective, of them over the next decade. Fascinating stuff, albeit a bit dry. A worthwhile read if just to stimulate some thinking about the problems that face the US. There is also some cold reality that puts the reports from MSNBC and Fox News in perspective – we hear so much distorted news these days. It’s nice to here some pragmatic (yes, it’s still opinionated) information.
Not a must read, but an intellectually stimulating one.
- Started reading:
- 13th February 2011
- Finished reading:
- 23rd February 2011