Running the World: The Inside Story of the National Security Council and the Architects of American Power

David Rothkopf

PublicAffairs, Apr 28, 2009 - History - 304 pages

Never before in the history of mankind have so few people had so much power over so many. The people at the top of the American national security establishment, the President and his principal advisors, the core team at the helm of the National Security Council, are without question the most powerful committee in the history of the world.Yet, in many respects, they are among the least understood.

A former senior official in the Clinton Administration himself, David Rothkopf served with and knows personally many of the NSC's key players of the past twenty-five years. In Running the World he pulls back the curtain on this shadowy world to explore its inner workings, its people, their relationships, their contributions and the occasions when they have gone wrong. He traces the group's evolution from the final days of the Second World War to the post-Cold War realities of global terror—exploring its triumphs, its human dramas and most recently, what many consider to be its breakdown at a time when we needed it most.

Drawing on an extraordinary series of insider interviews with policy makers including Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, Henry Kissinger, senior officials of the Bush Administration, and over 130 others, the book offers unprecedented insights into what must change if America is to maintain its unprecedented worldwide leadership in the decades ahead.

What people are saying

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - chellinsky - LibraryThing

I was disappointed with the overall effect of the book. The first half makes an excellent argument about the importance of the structure of the NSC and its ability to craft the U.S.'s involvement in ...

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - ClownishAtBest - LibraryThing

The author's bias really comes out in his flawed interpretation of the Nixon through Reagan period. Prior to that, it's a useful and engaging read.

Contents

• The Committee in Charge of Running the World: 3
• Washingtons Choice: 22
• Greatness Thrust Upon Them: 33
• Gulliver Embarks Leaders Leadership and the Difference Between the Two: 61
• Bound in Lilliput: 80
• America in Decline the NSC Ascendant: 108
• A Superpower in Search of Itself: 157
• Morning in America Twilight at the NSC: 210
• Across a Bright Line in History: 260
• The New Improved PostCold War InformationAge Indispensable Nation: 303
• The Beginning of the End of the End of History: 344
• A Thumb on the Scales Tipping the Balance in the Battle Between the Traditionalists and the Transformationalists: 389
• U S Foreign Policy in the Age of Ambiguity: 448
• A Guide to Abbreviations and Acronyms: 471
• acknowledgments: 475
• notes: 479
• bibliography: 519
• index: 533

Popular passages

Page 62 - And he gave it for his opinion, that whoever could make two ears of corn, or two blades of grass, to grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew before, would deserve better of mankind, and do more essential service to his country, than the whole race of politicians put together.‎

Page 41 - I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures. I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.‎

Page 260 - I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past...‎

Page 260 - Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective - a new world order - can emerge: a new era- freer from the threat of terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice, and more secure in the quest for peace, an era in which the nations of the world, East and West, North and South, can prosper and live in harmony.‎

Page 27 - Observe good faith and justice towards all Nations. Cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free> enlightened, and, at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a People always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence.‎

Page 41 - At the present moment in world history nearly every nation must choose between alternative ways of life. The choice is too often not a free one.‎

Page 41 - It is logical that the United States should do whatever it is able to do to assist in the return of normal economic health in the world, without which there can be no political stability and no assured peace.‎

Page 5 - Council is to advise the President with respect to the integration of domestic, foreign, and military policies relating to the national security...‎

Page 5 - Council" ) . The President of the United States shall preside over meetings of the Council: Provided, That in his absence he may designate a member of the Council to preside in his place.‎

Page 123 - Should a President, in the event of a nuclear attack, be left with the single option of ordering the mass destruction of enemy civilians, in the face of the certainty that it would be followed by the mass slaughter of Americans?‎

About the author

David J. Rothkopf, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, served as deputy under secretary of commerce during the Clinton Administration, as Chairman and CEO of Intellibridge Corporation, a provider of international analysis to the national security community, and as managing director of Kissinger Associates. A well-known commentator for leading newspapers and magazines, he has taught international relations at Columbia University; written, co-authored or edited five other books on international and information age themes; and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the President's Advisory Council of the U.S. Institute of Peace. He lives in Washington DC.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Running the World: The Inside Story of the National Security Council and the Architects of American Power
• Author: David Rothkopf
• Edition: reprint
• Publisher: PublicAffairs, 2009
• ISBN: 0786736003, 9780786736003
• Length: 304 pages
• Subjects: History / World