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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Central government
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Elusive Victories - The American Presidency at War (Hardcover)
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Elusive Victories - The American Presidency at War (Hardcover)
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On April 4, 1864, Abraham Lincoln made a shocking admission about
his presidency during the Civil War. "I claim not to have
controlled events," he wrote in a letter, "but confess plainly that
events have controlled me." Lincoln's words carry an invaluable
lesson for wartime presidents, writes Andrew J. Polsky in this
seminal book. As Polsky shows, when commanders-in-chief do try to
control wartime events, more often than not they fail utterly.
In Elusive Victories, Polsky provides a fascinating study of six
wartime presidents, drawing larger lessons about the limits of the
power of the White House during armed conflict. He examines, in
turn, Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lyndon
Johnson, Richard Nixon, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama, showing
how each gravely overestimated his power as commander-in-chief. In
each case, these presidents' resources did not match the key
challenges that recur from war to war. Both Lincoln and Johnson
intervened in military operations, giving orders to specific units;
yet both struggled with the rising unpopularity of their conflicts.
Both Wilson and Bush entered hostilities with idealistic agendas
for the aftermath, yet found themselves helpless to enact them.
With insight and clarity, Polsky identifies overarching issues that
will inform current and future policymakers. The single most
important dynamic, he writes, is the erosion of a president's
freedom of action. Each decision propels him down a path from which
he cannot turn back. When George W. Bush rejected the idea of
invading Iraq with 400,000 troops, he could not send such a force
two years later as the insurgency spread. In the final chapter,
Polsky examines Barack Obama's options in light of these
conclusions, and considers how the experiences of the past might
inform the world we face now.
Elusive Victories is the first book to provide a comprehensive
account of presidential leadership during wartime, highlighting the
key dangers that presidents have ignored at their peril.
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