Rating: 
Summary: Why they hate us!
Review: Chalmers Johnson has written an important book which will most unfortunately be little read. The last three books I have read are Blowback, Taliban by Ahmad Rashed, and Terror in the mind of God by Jeurgensmeyer. But for long years before this I have read books like The Otherside of the River and Red Star over China by Edgar Snow, A History of Vietnam by ???, Fire in the Lake, Dispatches, plus The Pentagon Papers and dozens of other informative and prescient works. Perhaps one of the best was The Poisonwood Bible. But Johnson's work brings together many of the loose ends that large numbers of Americans must have been dimmly aware of for the past 50 plus years. Like Johnson, I was in the navy on an LST for almost three years of the four years I was in, just a little later than Johnson's tour, Jan 1955 to Jan, 1959. And like Johnson, I was devoutly patriotic for all of those years, and I believed that our government was perhaps the most altruistic intitution ever concieved by man. (Indeed, I believe that it could still be were it not for the inattention and civic laziness of most of our citizens.) It was not until I read The Pentagon Papers in about 1974 or '75 that I realized that I could not depend solely on the daily newspaper and TV's accessment and reporting of the days events to inform me of what I should be aware of as an American citizen, responsible for the actions and inactions of my government. I pray that Johnson's book gets the readership it deserves, however, I am not terribly optimistic that this will be the case. (...)(I just read this for the first time since I submitted it. Unfortunately, the "editors" of this feature have seen fit to remove the meat of my comments about the book from this review, pretty much gutting it. I appologize to those of you who thought you were going to get a review of the book when you read this. 6/24/02 wfh)
Rating:
Summary: UPSETTING
Review: I find this book most upsetting and fell every American should read it for an understanding of what is happening in the United States today.
What is most upsetting is that I believe there is no turning back to our path we have taken.
Rating:
Summary: Read the book
Review: "Instead of demobilizing after the Cold War, the
United States imprudently committed itself to
maintaining a global empire." With this opening
remark Chalmers Johnson introduces his prediction
written in 1999 that the global interventionist
policy of the U.S. Government inevitably would
provoke justifiable resentment."Ja, and dot's dah vorst kind, too." Yes, it is the worst kind. For if the "justified"
part is true, then we are embarked now on yet another
venture that will sink us deeper into the morass. So, who is this Johnson, anyway? An officier of the
U.S. Navy stationed in Japan in the 1950s, graduate
of the ROTC program at Berkeley, he learned Japanese
and began what evidently became a lifelong study
of Asia. Seeking to dismiss Johnson's thesis as conspiracy
theory, some have used the ad hominem approach,
attacking the author rather than the issue.
Not a good sign. While Johnson may not have it all
right, indications are he may not have it all wrong.
Some unfortunate New Yorkers might still be alive
if we had paid him some mind when the opportunity
first presented itself. Johnson's message is simple. The best way to be
rid of the Osama bin Ladens of the world is to
stop creating them. This isn't rocket science.
Who's creating Osamas? We are. Osama bin Laden
was trained by the CIA. And that's the least
damaging part of the story. You needn't take my
word for it. Read the book.
Rating:
Summary: Timely and Insightful
Review: Chalmers Johnson, a US Navy veteran, makes an excellent argument for the US to pull back from overextended military committments, particularly in Asia.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant, courageous, visionary, scholarly, necessary
Review: I read Blowback through my tears in the days following the WTC attack. Dr. Johnson's measured arguments offered me not only a clear (and unfortunately, prophetic) explanation for the attack, but also a persuasive and thoughtful prescription for preventing future terrorist attacks. A wide reading and discussion of this brilliant analysis of "why the world hates America and what we can do about it" by American policymakers, students, and other concerned citizens could contribute greatly to the shaping of a new, safer, and wiser US foreign policy based solidly upon American values and ideals. Chapter 1 is so rich in ideas and information that I had to read it slowly and closely. Chapters 2 to the end, which expand and support the theses previewed in Chapter 1, read like a thriller--the pace and arguments build--I could hardly wait to finish it. Dr. Johnson is finally writing for a broad general audience; however, the arguments in Blowback are reliably (but unobtrusively) documented. A fascinating annotated bibliogaphy is also included. This is a potentially world-changing, breakthrough book, the kind that should win global awards, that could change the whole political conversation and the course of history. We leave it on a dusty shelf at our own peril. Dr. Johnson's thirteen previous distinguished and award-winning histories reflect his scholarly interest and expertise in Asian countries. In Blowback, however, Dr. Johnson's cumulative understanding of global history and politics clarifies crucial issues of US foreign policy for every region of the world. Blowback is Dr. Johnson's courageous (and, I think, patriotic) gift to the reading public of the visionary conclusions and insights resulting from a lifetime of objective, diligent, and brilliant inquiry into history and foreign policy. I highly recommend it and am deeply grateful for it.
Rating: 
Summary: Why is America In Permanent Crisis?
Review: In the film "Airplane" Robert Stack faces a plethora of unending beggars, panhandlers and religious fanatics while trying to enter the airport and save the runaway plane. The American government faces a seemingly unending series of real and manufactured crisis facing a host of seemy characters worldwide.
In this period of national mourning with the media leading the nation into WWIII on Afghanistan's plains, Americans should not go to nuclear holocaust so easily without asking the question--how did "we" get into this mess? Without seeing the current "crisis" as yet another in a long series of crisis, the American people, manipulated by the government, will always feel under attack. I began reading Chalmers Johnson's excellent book about two weeks before black September. As a history and political science major, I am deeply interested in foreign policy. Chalmers Johnson strips away the veneer and tells you what you need to know--how America gets into crisis and that every crisis can be traced back to some aspect of American foreign policy gone awry. In the book, he reviews the scenario of events in such diverse nations as South Korea, Okinowa, North and South Korea and China. Additionally, he reviews fundamental principles underlying each covert adventure which leads to one simple concept--every "crisis" begins with some CIA covert adventure going wrong, people's rights being violated,a nation's sovreignity being overrun in favor of some advantage for American foreign policy. Johnson's book rips off the thin veneer of legitimacy showing American foreign policy as the smoke and mirrors of the Wizard of Oz and the consequences of daring to question the great and powerful Oz. I recommend this work highly, particularly because of the current crisis with its screaming, sensational, jingoistic headlines.
Rating:
Summary: Understanding September 11
Review: Blowback (The Costs and Consequences of American Empire) was written at least a year before September 11 yet it clearly predicts and explains those terrible events. If we don't make an effort to understand why September 11 happened it will happen again and again. Reading Blowback is a beginning to achieving some measure of understanding.
Rating:
Summary: A great read
Review: I have to admit that I am not an avid reader of these types of books, but was given it as an assignment for a client to read and write a report. Most of the time, these assignments are dull, but I found this book really interesting. I could not put it down. After reading it, I started to see CNN, news events and the world around me in a different way. I think it is nothing new for someone born and raised outside of America. However, for an American, it is an educational eye-opener. Sometimes, it made James Bond seem based more on reality than fiction. The factual data was quite interesting and the book is well written. It is easy to read and straight to the point. What made it more interesting is that it was written by an American. The book is a little liberal for my tastes, but overall it was an exciting read for a non-fiction book. I think it was a good book and explains alot of things I see overseas. As an American, I did find it a little unpatriotic. So, that put me off a little when reading the book. However, I would highly recommend it for expats, international businessmen, politicians and American's who want to learn history beyond the confines of the scripted school lectures of the Civil War and WWII.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointed
Review: Had I read this book without knowing the identity of its author, Chalmers Johnson would have been down there at the bottom of my list of suspects. 'MITI and the Japanese Miracle' is - and will probably remain - one of the three best books I have ever read. With Blowback, he has now written one of the three worst. I found this work little more than a long-winded conspiracy theory. But shame on me that I did not see what was coming from Dr Johnson's prologue; apologizing for his initial disdain for the student protesters at Berkeley in the 1960s, he writes "I wish I had stood with the anti-war protest movement. For all its naiveté and unruliness, it was right and American policy wrong." Dr Johnson writes at length of the social backlash generated by the US military's undoubtedly intrusive presence in such places as Okinawa, and in parts of South Korea. He rationalizes this backlash, and basically apologizes for the policies which he claims caused it. He argues that this kind of backlash is inevitable, and we will see it elsewhere as a result of the US' attempts to sustain its "empire" in Asia even though the threat against which it was originally built as a buffer (the Soviet Union) has now vanished. He argues that the US is wrong to leave military forces in Asia on the pretext of preserving "stability", and that its globalization campaign - prosecuted on its behalf by what is portrayed as a dark and sinister proxy of the US Treasury (the IMF) - will entail even more "blowback", the consequences of which Americans (and others) will suffer in the years to come. Dr Johnson's conclusions may indeed be correct, or they may not be; it is difficult to tell, since they are based not so much on observations or established facts as on sweeping assertions, generalizations, intrigue and innuendo. There is very little in the way of verifiable evidence. ... Meanwhile, in Indonesia, the disappearance of several anti-Suharto activists in 1998 is later concluded by Indonesians to be the work of Kopassus, an elite commando unit of the Indonesian army. "Singled out for immediate responsibility was... Colonel Chairawan. Before his arrest, Chairawan told Nation magazine correspondent Allan Nairn that his primary contact at the US Embassy was Colonel Charles McFetridge, the DIA attaché." There can be little doubt about what Dr Johnson hopes we conclude from this. Yet diplomats and military attachés everywhere will testify that they are routinely required to maintain contact with local officials of their profession, and some of these can be unsavory characters to say the least; this does not necessarily mean that they support their activities, much less coordinate them. But there is more intrigue elsewhere: "South Korea was the first place in the postwar world where the Americans set up a dictatorial government... In order to keep South Korea firmly under its control, during the 1980s the Americans sent as successive ambassadors two senior officials of the CIA, James Lilley and Donald Gregg." Dr Johnson never explains exactly how these ambassadors' tenure in the CIA qualified them as the best candidates to "ensure" continuing American control over South Korea. He appears happy to leave this to the reader's imagination, so one thinks of Berkeley since the 1960s; the CIA is a dark, omnipotent, malevolent and manipulative demon for no other reason than that the students' placards say it is so. But the CIA does not escape so easily: "On August 22, 1997, the eve of the [peace-treaty and control of missile technology] talks [with North Korea], the North Korean ambassador to Egypt "defected" to the United States.... Then Newsweek revealed that the former ambassador in fact had long been on the CIA's payroll... Informed observers concluded that he had not so much defected as been called in from the cold at a time of the CIA's choosing and with an eye to scuttling the upcoming talks." Dr Johnson never names these "informed observers", nor cites any of the evidence on which they based their "conclusion". He does not see fit to mention any examples of high-profile spies who defected just as their countries' counter-intelligence services were closing in on them (Philby, Howard and others). But then, why should he? By this stage it is very clear to the reader that the Treasury, the Defense Department, the CIA and other US government institutional conspirators (very few individuals are named) are to be found guilty - of empire building, suppression of human rights and national sovereignty, and economic enslavement - if not by association, then by implication. It seems we should not need conclusive or reasoned evidence any more than the campus protesters of the 1960s did. ... But the saddest moment of all came at the end of the book, when Dr Johnson presents alternatives to empire. In seeking to reverse the imperialist economic policies which hollowed out much of US manufacturing industry, the US should "establish minimum wage-levels for the manufacture of goods that are to be exported to our market". Did I miss something, or is this not just the kind of expropriation of other countries' sovereignty against which Dr Johnson rails elsewhere in his book? One tragedy is that part of Dr Johnson's book does make a sympathetic and compelling case for greater assessment of personal accountability on the part of the Defense Department against the individuals it sends overseas; the rapists, the drunk-drivers, the uninsured motorists and others. It's too bad that this was not the case Dr Johnson assigned himself. Dr Johnson appears to have set out to prove institutional culpability on the part of the US for much of the social and economic disorder which has occurred in our "empire" over recent years. However, his failure to present rationally-derived, authoritative evidence in support thereof leaves the US government with little to answer for. He appears to have relied heavily on his readers being blessed with the same naiveté as his 1960s campus protesters, among whom I am sure this book will go down as a welcome and long-overdue vindication of their righteous rage. As for the rest of us? Speaking for myself, I am overwhelmed by reasonable doubt. And I feel very, very, sad.
Rating: 
Summary: Isolationism is not a Viable Option for the United States
Review: Chalmers Johnson's isolationist ideology hinders his ability to comprehend the unavoidable responsibilities thrust upon the United States. In a perfect universe super power nations should be able to embrace the concept that essentially the rest of the world can be ignored. Unfortunately, abstract speculations arguing that the troubles of other countries are not ours sound reasonable until the gun is pointed at our head. It is perhaps analogous to the hypothetical family living next door whose kids play in the backyard with real machine guns. The problem is not directly our own except for the irritating possibility that the spray bullets may pierce the walls of the house. Other peoples difficulties indeed shouldn't be laid at our doorstep. Alas, life is not always fair, and Johnson needs to accept this irritating fact. The quintessential historical example contradicting Johnson's central theme may very well be World War II. The "America First" isolationists which included Rev. Charles E. Coughlin and Charles Lindbergh staunchly contended that the United States shouldn't get involved in the troubles of Europe resulting from Hitler's saber rattling. A somewhat Pacifist mindset pervaded our politics and culture. The evidence is now overwhelming that Hitler's military threat could have likely been nipped in the bud. Chalmers seems to imply that Red China's leaders are basically decent and only the alleged belligerence of our nation's elected officials discourage them from becoming full fledged civil libertarians. There simply is no justification for such an opinion. Perceived weaknesses encourage those intent on harming us. The formulation of both carrot and stick policies is mandatory. Only hind sight allows perfect 20/20 vision, and therefore mistakes will occur. Chalmers is not incorrect to remind us of our past errors. After all, this is the best way to prevent making the same blunders in the future. Why, though, does he ignore our successes? I have many complaints about the previous Clinton administration. Nevertheless, Bill Clinton should be congratulated for many of his decisions pertaining to the crisis in the Balkans. Many lives were saved, and the horror did not expand into the rest of Western Europe and the former Soviet republics. An inadvertent "stop the world, I want to get off" attitude, is not in the least bit helpful. Isolationism may have been a legitimate alternative a few centuries ago. It took weeks to travel over the oceans, and much of the world had little impact whatsoever on the everyday life of America's citizens. Today our planet has been aptly described by the late Marshall McLuhan as increasingly evolving towards something akin to a small village. We can email someone in another country within seconds, and a airplane trip to remote areas of our globe is now a relatively minor event. I will not question the well meaning intentions of Pat Buchanan and Chalmers Johnson, but their isolationists views would be catastrophic if ever taken seriously.
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