Rating: 
Summary: American foreign policy - a critique
Review: What Uncle Sam Really Wants by Noam Chomsky reveals America and her rather brutal approach towards foreign policy. I took a foreign policy class my junior year of high school, and it was a real eye-opener, perhaps the best class I have ever taken in my life. When I read this book, I felt like I was there all over again. Up until the Cold War ended, the United States' government was almost obsessed with fighting Communism, and from McCarthyism, to verbal qualms with the USSR, and it became a global witchhunt to fight the 'evils' of Communism. To my surprise, there were also many coups and military actions against other countries that werealmost entirely covered up by the United States government, some happening during an administration which was thought to be run by 'one of the most honest presidents we've ever had,' Jimmy Carter. The crucifixation of El Salvador was a really disturbing part to read, since Chomsky gets into detail how many citizens were slaughtered by the military of their country (it makes the Holocaust look tame, not to downplay the terrible situation the Jews endured in the concentration camps). The US sent funds to aid their countries but somehow most of those funds made it into the pockets of the terrorists who were altering a country's respective government. This book also shows how a Third World Country has little hope of advancement, since the US arguably intimidates them or ignores them. According to Chomsky, the US has very little popular support for its goals in the Third World. They also try to avoid negotiations so the needs of the Third World are left on the back burner and any hopes of getting help remain halted. Whenever an uprising starts though, the US is always there to flex their muscle as a superpower, since one of the main goals of foreign policy is to protect all of Her borders, and all of Her enemy's borders. I cannot view an overall opinion on Chomsky's work since this is the only book I have read by him to date. The title of this book is suggestive, but the text itself is backed up w/ valid information and contains references to other texts dealing w/ such issues on American foreign policy. There seems to be no prejudice towards the liberal side of the spectrum or the conservative side (in this book, he questions both of those groups), and he doesn't flat out insult America or any politicians, something other writers related to Chomsky (Ann Coulter,Michael Moore) are knwon for doing.
Rating:
Summary: Eye Opening
Review: When I read this short book I didn't know what to think. I was torn between, "I guess our government really is an imperialist, terrorist, expoloitative superpower." and "This guy is full of ....." Right now, I'm leaning toward the former. While discussing what Chomsky believes are the real motivations for US foreign policy, the famous linguist manages to call the largest terrorist organization in the world, paints the CIA as an ex-SS officer hiring agency, and indict every American president since Kennedy with serious war crimes. I seriously doubt that the Soviet propoganda office every issued a more scathing rebuke of US foreign policy. But regardless of whether I agree with Chomsky completely, many of the man's ideas are extremely original - except to Americans -and thought provoking.
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