The publisher should send a free copy to every politician who spends our tax dollars. Fitzgerald is an engineer and cost expert in the Pentagon. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

In the late 1950s, Washington was driven by its fear of communist subversion: it saw the hand of Kremlin behind developments at home and across the globe. The FBI was obsessed with the threat posed by American communist party--yet party membership had sunk so low, writes H.W. Brands, that it could have fit "inside a high-school gymnasium," and it was so heavily infiltrated that J. Edgar Hoover actually contemplated using his informers as a voting bloc to take over the party. Abroad, the preoccupation with communism drove the White House to help overthrow democratically elected governments in Guatemala and Iran, and replace them with dictatorships. But by then the Cold War had long since blinded Americans to the ironies of their battle against communism. In The Devil We Knew, Brands provides a witty, perceptive history of the American experience of the Cold War, from Truman's creation of the CIA to Ronald Reagan's creation of SDI. Brands has written a number of highly regarded works on America in the twentieth century; here he puts his experience to work in a volume of impeccable scholarship and exceptional verve. He turns a critical eye to the strategic conceptions (and misconceptions) that led a once-isolationist nation to pursue the war against communism to the most remote places on Earth. By the time Eisenhower left office, the United States was fighting communism by backing dictators from Iran to South Vietnam, from Latin America to the Middle East--while engaging in covert operations the world over. Brands offers no apologies for communist behavior, but he deftly illustrates the strained thinking that led Washington to commit gravely disproportionate resources (including tens of thousands of lives in Korea and Vietnam) to questionable causes. He keenly analyzes the changing policies of each administration, from Nixon's juggling (SALT talks with Moscow, new relations with Ccmmunist China, and bombing North Vietnam) to Carter's confusion to Reagan's laserrattling. Equally important is his incisive, often amusing look at how the anti-Soviet struggle was exploited by politicians, industrialists, and government agencies. He weaves in deft sketches of figures like Barry Goldwater and Henry Jackson (who won a Senate seat with the promise, "Many plants will be converting from peace time to all-out defense production"). We see John F. Kennedy deliver an eloquent speech in 1957 defending the rising forces of nationalism in Algeria and Vietnam; we also see him in the White House a few years later, ordering a massive increase in America's troop commitment to Saigon. The book ranges through the economics and psychology of the Cold War, demonstrating how the confrontation created its own constituencies in private industry and public life. In the end, Americans claimed victory in the Cold War, but Brands's account gives us reason to tone down the celebrations. "Most perversely," he writes, "the call to arms against communism caused American leaders to subvert the principles that constituted their country's best argument against communism." This far-reaching history makes clear that the Cold War was simultaneously far more, and far less, than we ever imagined at the time.

This eye-opening expose, the result of fifteen years of investigative work, uncovers the CIA's systematic efforts over several decades to suppress and censor information. Angus Mackenzie, an award-winning yournalist, filed and won a lawsuit against the CIA under the Freedom of Information Act, and in the process became an expert on government censorship and domestic spying. Mackenzie lays bare a complex narrative of intrigue among federal agencies and their senior staff, including the Department of Defense, the executive branch, and the CIA. From cover-ups and secrecy oaths, to scandals over leaks and exposure, to the government's often insidious attempts to monitor and control public access to information, Mackenzie tracks the evolution of a policy of suppression, repression, spying, and harassment.

Controlling Technology Ethics and the Responsible Engineer Second Edition This valuable guide provides an in-depth treatment of what constitutes ethical behavior on the part of engineers. It carefully examines the various conflicts faced by engineers and offers practical, proven advice on what to do in such situations. This revised and considerably expanded Second Edition examines the causes and consequences of technological disasters such as Bhopal, Chernobyl, Challenger, and the precursor of them all, the Titanic. It also describes such highly successful projects as the Panama Canal and the Shinkansen. All the major areas of engineering are covered with interesting case histories describing exemplary behavior of engineers placed in difficult situations. The way in which such ethical engineers can be supported by their professional societies and by the law is explored in depth. Controlling Technology: Ethics and the Responsible Engineer, Second Edition presents a practical and fascinating examination of the moral obligations, responsibilities, and challenges faced by engineers as they perform their professional duties. This invaluable guide is must reading for all engineers, graduate engineering students, and others interested in technology and society issues.

While many associate the concept commonly referred to as the “military-industrial complex” with President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s 1961 farewell address, the roots of it existed two hundred years earlier. This concept, as Benjamin Franklin Cooling writes, was “part of historical lore” as a burgeoning American nation discovered the inextricable relationship between arms and the State. In Arming America through the Centuries, Cooling examines the origins and development of the military-industrial complex (MIC) over the course of American history. He argues that the evolution of America’s military-industrial-business-political experience is the basis for a contemporary American Sparta. Cooling explores the influence of industry on security, the increasing prevalence of outsourcing, ever-present economic and political influence, and the evolving nature of modern warfare. He connects the budding military-industrial relations of the colonial era and Industrial Revolution to their formal interdependence during the Cold War down to the present-day resurrection of Great Power competition. Across eight chronological chapters, Cooling weaves together threads of industry, finance, privatization, appropriations, and technology to create a rich historical tapestry of US national defense in one comprehensive volume. Integrating information from both recent works as well as canonical, older sources, Cooling’s ambitious single-volume synthesis is a uniquely accessible and illuminating survey not only for scholars and policymakers but for students and general readers as well.