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Across the full span of the nation's history, Donald Stoker challenges our understanding of the purposes and uses of American power. From the struggle for independence to the era of renewed competition with China and Russia, he reveals the grand strategies underpinning the nation's pursuit of sovereignty, security, expansion, and democracy abroad. He shows how successive administrations have projected diplomatic, military, and economic power, and mobilized ideas and information to preserve American freedoms at home and secure US aims abroad. He exposes the myth of American isolationism, the good and ill of America's quest for democracy overseas, and how too often its administrations have lacked clear political aims or a concrete vision for where they want to go. Understanding this history is vital if America is to relearn how to use its power to meet the challenges ahead and to think more clearly about political aims and grand strategy.
List of Figures
Abbreviations
Thinking about grand strategy in peace and war
Part I. From Backwater To Great Power:
1. The fight for sovereignty, 1775–1801
2. Expansion, sovereignty, and war, 1801–1817
3. Seeking a continent: expansion, Indian removal, and the Mexican War, 1817–1849
4. Schism, civil war, and reconstruction, 1849–1877
5. Conquering a continent: the Indian Wars, 1865–1897
6. American empire, 1897–1913
Part II. From Great Power to Superpower:
7. Stepping on the global stage, 1913–1921
8. The interwar interlude, 1921–1939
9. Moving astride the world: the Second World War, 1939–1945
10. The hot peace and the Korean War, 1945–1953
11. The hot peace: the Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson years, 1953–1969
12. The Vietnam War, 1961–1969
13. Détente and defeat: Nixon, Ford, and Vietnam, 1969–1977
14. For want of a vision: the Carter years, 1977–1981
15. Winning the hot peace: Reagan's great power competition, 1981–1990
Part III. The Post Cold War World:
16. The Gulf War, or First Iraq War, 1990–1991
17. The new world disorder: Bush and Clinton, 1991–2001
18. Wilsonian revolutionaries: Bush and war, 2001–2009
Part IV. Retreat and Defeat:
19. Retrenchment, engagement, and war: the Obama years, 2009–2017
20. Retrenchment, engagement, and weakness: Trump and Biden, 2017–2022
Conclusion
Acknowledgements
Notes
Index.
Description
Across the full span of the nation's history, Donald Stoker challenges our understanding of the purposes and uses of American power. From the struggle for independence to the era of renewed competition with China and Russia, he reveals the grand strategies underpinning the nation's pursuit of sovereignty, security, expansion, and democracy abroad. He shows how successive administrations have projected diplomatic, military, and economic power, and mobilized ideas and information to preserve American freedoms at home and secure US aims abroad. He exposes the myth of American isolationism, the good and ill of America's quest for democracy overseas, and how too often its administrations have lacked clear political aims or a concrete vision for where they want to go. Understanding this history is vital if America is to relearn how to use its power to meet the challenges ahead and to think more clearly about political aims and grand strategy.
