Duel of Eagles: The Mexican and U.S. Fight for the Alamo

Rating:
Summary: BIASED BUT BRILLIANT
Review: To be precise, DUEL OF EAGLES is the story of the Texas War of Independence not just the fight for the Alamo. While Jeff Long styles his book as the "Mexican and US fight", the US government stayed at arms length the whole time. Texas independence from Mexico was won by immigrants into Texas and Texas colonists and not US troops. Jeff Long examines the motives of major players on both sides of this conflict from Santa Anna to Sam Houston as well as the economic and historical background of the time. He portrays the Texas side as greedy speculators and land-grabbers, con artists and frauds. The Mexican side gets off better in his view, being more civilized and the largely innocent victims of the struggle. This reader could not help but see a bias against the Anglo-Saxon side on the part of Mr. Long. While I don't doubt his conclusions are true that many Texians, among them Texas historic icons, were crooks, cheats, murderers and losers, his occasionally non-nuetral language betrays his agenda. The last chapter is almost fully devoted to the depradations of the victorious Texians against Mexicans living in Texas and the beginnings of a violent racism against the Mexican race by the Anglos. This all may unfortunately be true but seems beyond the bounds of a military history and occurs after the war ended. But this gratuitous rambling helps to cement Mr. Long's indictment of the Anglos. This is my only complaint. Otherwise, DUEL OF EAGLES is chock full of information with lots of backend notes and brilliantly tells the story of a fascinating chapter of US history.