This powerful study makes a compelling case about the key U.S. role in state terrorism in Latin America during the Cold War. Long hidden from public view, Operation Condor was a military network created in the 1970s to eliminate political opponents of Latin American regimes. Its key members were the anticommunist dictatorships of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Bolivia, Paraguay, and Brazil, later joined by Peru and Ecuador, with covert support from the U.S. government. Drawing on a wealth of testimonies, declassified files, and Latin American primary sources, J. Patrice McSherry examines Operation Condor from numerous vantage points: its secret structures, intelligence networks, covert operations against dissidents, political assassinations worldwide, commanders and operatives, links to the Pentagon and the CIA, and extension to Central America in the 1980s. The author convincingly shows how, using extralegal and terrorist methods, Operation Condor hunted down, seized, and executed political opponents across borders. McSherry argues that Condor functioned within, or parallel to, the structures of the larger inter-American military system led by the United States, and that declassified U.S. documents make clear that U.S. security officers saw Condor as a legitimate and useful 'counterterror' organization. Revealing new details of Condor operations and fresh evidence of links to the U.S. security establishment, this controversial work offers an original analysis of the use of secret, parallel armies in Western counterinsurgency strategies. It will be a clarion call to all readers to consider the long-term consequences of clandestine operations in the name of 'democracy.'

No foreign policy decision in recent history has had greater repercussions than President George W. Bush's decision to invade and occupy Iraq. It launched a new doctrine of preemptive war, mired the American military in an intractable armed conflict, disrupted world petroleum supplies, cost the United States hundreds of billions of dollars, and damaged or ended the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans and Iraqis. Its impact on international politics and America's standing in the world remains incalculable.
The Iraq Papers offers a compelling documentary narrative and interpretation of this momentous conflict. With keen editing and incisive commentary, the book weaves together original documents that range from presidential addresses to redacted memos, carrying us from the ideology behind the invasion to negotiations for withdrawal. These papers trace the rise of the neoconservatives and reveal the role of strategic thinking about oil supplies. In moving to the planning for the war itself, the authors not only provide Congressional resolutions and speeches by President Bush, but internal security papers, Pentagon planning documents, the report of the Future of Iraq Project, and eloquent opposition statements by Senator Robert Byrd, other world governments, the Non-Aligned Movement, and the World Council of Churches. This collection addresses every aspect of the conflict, from the military's evolving counterinsurgency strategy to declarations by Iraqi resisters and political figures-from Coalition Provisional Authority orders to Donald Rumsfeld's dismissal of the insurgents as "dead-enders" and Iraqi discussions of state- and nationbuilding under the shadow of occupation. The economics of petroleum, the legal and ethical questions surrounding terrorism and torture, international agreements, the theory of the "unitary presidency," and the Bush administration's use of presidential signing statements all receive in-depth coverage.
The Iraq War has reshaped the domestic and international landscape. The Iraq Papers offers the authoritative one-volume source for understanding the conflict and its many repercussions.

No foreign policy decision in recent history has had greater repercussions than President George W. Bush's decision to invade and occupy Iraq. It launched a new doctrine of preemptive war, mired the American military in an intractable armed conflict, disrupted world petroleum supplies, cost the United States hundreds of billions of dollars, and damaged or ended the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans and Iraqis. Its impact on international politics and America's standing in the world remains incalculable.
The Iraq Papers offers a compelling documentary narrative and interpretation of this momentous conflict. With keen editing and incisive commentary, the book weaves together original documents that range from presidential addresses to redacted memos, carrying us from the ideology behind the invasion to negotiations for withdrawal. These papers trace the rise of the neoconservatives and reveal the role of strategic thinking about oil supplies. In moving to the planning for the war itself, the authors not only provide Congressional resolutions and speeches by President Bush, but internal security papers, Pentagon planning documents, the report of the Future of Iraq Project, and eloquent opposition statements by Senator Robert Byrd, other world governments, the Non-Aligned Movement, and the World Council of Churches. This collection addresses every aspect of the conflict, from the military's evolving counterinsurgency strategy to declarations by Iraqi resisters and political figures-from Coalition Provisional Authority orders to Donald Rumsfeld's dismissal of the insurgents as "dead-enders" and Iraqi discussions of state- and nationbuilding under the shadow of occupation. The economics of petroleum, the legal and ethical questions surrounding terrorism and torture, international agreements, the theory of the "unitary presidency," and the Bush administration's use of presidential signing statements all receive in-depth coverage.
The Iraq War has reshaped the domestic and international landscape. The Iraq Papers offers the authoritative one-volume source for understanding the conflict and its many repercussions.

Chilean New Song (la Nueva Cancion chilena) entranced and uplifted a country that struggled for social change during the turbulent 1960s and early 1970s, until the 1973 coup that overthrew democratic socialist president Salvador Allende. This powerful musical style-with its poetic lyrics and haunting blend of traditional indigenous wind and stringed instruments-was born of and expressed the aspirations of rising classes. It promised a socially just future as it forged social bonding. In Chilean New Song, J. Patrice McSherry deftly combines a political-historical view of Chile with a narrative of its cultural development. She examines the democratizing power of this music and, through interviews with key protagonists, the social roles of politically committed artists who participated in a movement for change. McSherry explores the impact of Chilean New Song and the way this artistic/cultural phenomenon related to contemporary politics to capture the passion, pain, and hope of millions of Chileans.

During the Cold War, a series of coups in Latin America resulted in a new form of military rule-the national security state-in which the armed forces ruled as an institution and drastically transformed state and society to conform to a messianic vision of national security. This book examines the lasting impact of institutionalized military power on Argentine state and society and the structural legacies of the national security state. Despite important steps toward democracy in the 1980s, security and intelligence forces acted to block democratizing measures and shape the emerging political system.

Latin America is one of the most violent regions in the world. It has suffered waves of repressive authoritarian rule, organized armed insurgency and civil war, violent protest, and ballooning rates of criminal violence. But is violence hard-wired into Latin America? This is a critical reassessment of the ways in which violence in Latin America is addressed and understood. Previous approaches have relied on structural perspectives, attributing the problem of violence to Latin America's colonial past or its conflictual contemporary politics. Bringing together scholars and practitioners, this volume argues that violence is often rooted more in contingent outcomes than in deeply embedded structures. Addressing topics ranging from the root sources of violence in Haiti to kidnapping in Colombia, from the role of property rights in patterns of violence to the challenges of peacebuilding, The Politics of Violence in Latin America is an essential step towards understanding the causes and contexts of violence-and changing the mechanisms that produce it.