The United States of War

"David Vine's book is a brilliant tour de force, a sweeping introspection, dissection, and condemnation of U.S. war-making and the myriad ways that U.S. military bases splayed around the world grease the wheels of the war machine. Exposing the intimate connections between these bases and war, he exhorts us to disentangle the web so that the United States of Peace can emerge. Read it and act."--Medea Benjamin, Codirector, CODEPINK "David Vine's previous book, Base Nation, provided a clear look at rampant U.S. imperialism as exhibited by U.S. overseas basing at some 750 locations across the globe. In a similar vein, The United States of War is an agonizing read even if the myth of U.S. exceptionalism is already badly tattered. In short, 'exceptionalism' only applies if one means unique brutality, violence, ruthlessness, unparalleled pursuit of self-interest, and imperialism of the most blatant and degrading sort--an exceptionalism that has meant the deaths of millions, the maiming of millions more, and the wandering from state to state of even more millions displaced by war. It is not a book to read curled up by a warm winter fire; rather, it's a book to stir your soul--if you have one left--to action."--Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, USA (Ret), former chief of staff, U.S. Department of State, and Professor of Government and Public Policy, the College of William and Mary "David Vine's The United States of War puts a much needed pin to the balloon of American exceptionalism. An invaluable guide to a country that, long before Orwell came along, said war was peace-and interventionism was the highest form of anti-colonialism. The United States of War is especially important now, as we try to make sense of a presidential administration that, in the name of so-called isolationism, has left a trail of global destruction in its wake."--Greg Grandin, Professor of History, Yale University, and author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America"Vine's newest book connects Fort Lauderdale to Okinawa. It makes me realize I can't make adequate sense of U.S. militarism today if I don't take seriously Native Americans' history. The book will make us all globally smarter and a lot more curious."--Cynthia Enloe, author of The Big Push: Exposing and Challenging the Persistence of Patriarchy "Along with this book being a model of excellent scholarship, Vine is a gifted writer. Reading the text is akin to reading the very best of essay writing and will make the text accessible to academic and non-academic readers, as well as to high school, undergraduate, and graduate students."--Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author of An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States "A brisk, sweeping, and utterly persuasive account of the relationship between foreign bases and the U.S. propensity for war. The case that Vine makes is irrefutable: the former spawn the latter."--Andrew Bacevich, author of The Age of Illusions: How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory