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War on Peace: The End of Diplomacy and the Decline of American Influence Hardcover – April 24, 2018

by Ronan Farrow (Author)

4.5 1,282 ratings

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A harrowing exploration of the collapse of American diplomacy and the abdication of global leadership, by the winner of the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in Public Service.

US foreign policy is undergoing a dire transformation, forever changing America’s place in the world. Institutions of diplomacy and development are bleeding out after deep budget cuts; the diplomats who make America’s deals and protect its citizens around the world are walking out in droves. Offices across the State Department sit empty, while abroad the military-industrial complex has assumed the work once undertaken by peacemakers. We’re becoming a nation that shoots first and asks questions later.

In an astonishing journey from the corridors of power in Washington, DC, to some of the most remote and dangerous places on earth―Afghanistan, Somalia, and North Korea among them―acclaimed investigative journalist Ronan Farrow illuminates one of the most consequential and poorly understood changes in American history. His firsthand experience as a former State Department official affords a personal look at some of the last standard bearers of traditional statecraft, including Richard Holbrooke, who made peace in Bosnia and died while trying to do so in Afghanistan.

Drawing on newly unearthed documents, and richly informed by rare interviews with warlords, whistle-blowers, and policymakers―including every living former secretary of state from Henry Kissinger to Hillary Clinton to Rex Tillerson―War on Peace makes a powerful case for an endangered profession. Diplomacy, Farrow argues, has declined after decades of political cowardice, shortsightedness, and outright malice―but it may just offer America a way out of a world at war.

Print length

432 pages
Language

English
Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company
Publication date

April 24, 2018
Dimensions

9.6 x 6 x 1.5 inches
ISBN-10

0393652106
ISBN-13

978-0393652109
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Farrow draws on both government experience and fresh reporting to offer a lament for the plight of America’s diplomats―and an argument for why it matters. ‘Classic, old-school diplomacy,’ he observes, is ‘frustrating’ and involves ‘a lot of jet lag.’ Yet his wry voice and storytelling take work that is often grueling and dull and make it seem…vividly human."
― Daniel Kurtz-Phelan, The New York Times

"Offers lively writing, astute commentary, and plenty of great stories, laced through with passion and outrage....Farrow is a natural storyteller, and his empathy and imagination breathe life even into the endless, awkward Thanksgiving dinner that constitutes diplomacy."
― Rosa Brooks, Washington Post

"Dogged research and persuasive argument....Farrow brings to his book astonishing access....[he is] an indefatigable and imaginative reporter."
― David Shribman, The Globe and Mail

"A masterpiece….The writing sparkles."
― Dan Simpson, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

"A compelling mixture of political analysis and personal anecdote."
― Andrew Anthony, The Guardian

"Has the United States turned its back on diplomacy, and on its diplomats? And if so, at what cost? Farrow makes a good case that we have, and that the cost will be high....He captures extraordinarily well what the work of diplomacy means."
― Barbara K. Bodine, San Francisco Chronicle

"With astonishing reporting and gripping prose, Ronan Farrow tells the powerful story of the gutting of American diplomacy…War on Peace is an indispensable and fascinating revelation of what diplomats actually do for our country and why undermining them is so dangerous. Farrow is a riveting storyteller with a great eye for colorful characters. This is one of the most important books of our time."
― Walter Isaacson, author of Steve Jobs and professor of history, Tulane

"Ronan Farrow has scooped us all (again). And it is no wonder. A gifted writer with a powerful intellect and a passion for truth, Farrow has become one of this generation’s finest journalists and War on Peace a book that will be required reading for generations to come. It is perhaps the most riveting and relatable book on foreign policy and diplomacy I have ever read. I have covered these same corridors of diplomatic power, these same bloody war zones, yet on every page of War on Peace I was astonished by what I learned."
― Martha Raddatz, ABC News chief global affairs correspondent and author of The Long Road Home

"US diplomacy has failed to keep up with the times. Part insider account and part sober analysis, War on Peace traces the fall of American diplomacy and pulls no punches. Only someone as incisive and unflinching as Farrow could have written this book―and we should all be thankful that he did. A must-read."
― Ian Bremmer, editor-at-large, Time magazine, and president, Eurasia group

"It's hard to imagine there is a single important diplomat Ronan Farrow didn't speak to in the course of reporting this remarkable account of American diplomacy in decline. This is no surprise: who better than a diplomat-turned-investigative-reporter to bring this deeply reported, acutely observed, and morally righteous chronicle of a nation that has all but abandoned diplomacy in favor of high-tech, high-ticket military action at just the perilous moment when steely and patient diplomacy is needed more than ever. This scoop-laden book is essential reading for those of us who yearn for peace and American moral leadership on a fractious planet."
― Lydia Polgreen, former editorial director, New York Times Global, and editor-in-chief, HuffPost

About the Author

Ronan Farrow is an investigative journalist who writes for The New Yorker and makes documentaries for HBO. He has been an anchor and reporter at MSNBC and NBC News, and his writing has appeared in publications including The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. He is a winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the George Polk Award, and the National Magazine Award, among other commendations, and has been named one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential People. He is also an attorney and former State Department official. He lives in New York City.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company; First Edition (April 24, 2018)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 432 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0393652106
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393652109
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.54 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 9.6 x 6 x 1.5 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #357,604 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #106 in War & Peace (Books)
- #469 in United States Executive Government
- #1,173 in History & Theory of Politics

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4.5 1,282 ratings

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Ronan Farrow

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Ronan Farrow is an investigative journalist who writes for The New Yorker and makes documentaries for HBO. He has been an anchor and reporter at MSNBC and NBC News, and his writing has appeared in publications including The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. A series of stories he wrote in 2017 exposed the first allegations of sexual assault against the movie producer Harvey Weinstein. Prior to his work as a journalist, he served as a State Department official in Afghanistan and Pakistan and reported to the Secretary of State as a senior official focused on youth uprisings. He is a Yale Law School-educated attorney and studied at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. He is a winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, the George Polk Award, and the National Magazine Award, among other commendations, and has been named one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People (and also one of People’s Sexiest Men Alive, which doesn’t have anything to do with his career, but he still brings it up a lot).

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AAR

Interesting, Insightful, Inspirational

Reviewed in the United States on April 28, 2018

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I never expected to pick up a non-fiction book on this topic and have it read like a novel. Farrow's writing is nuanced, fluid and full of first person anecdotes that bring color and immediacy to all the situations he describes.

Combining careful research and analysis with first person interviews, Farrow illustrates the direction the United States government has taken over the past few decades in valuing militarism, devaluing diplomacy, and the disappointing and dire consequences for having done so.

His accounts of where diplomacy has worked are realistic, not overly rosy. He portrays diplomacy as a messy, difficult, process, carried out by flawed human beings, and fraught with compromises that often do not leave the parties involved fully satisfied. And yet, the alternative--force--is clearly worse and, in the long run, does not seem to work to make either the US or any other place in the world safer. In fact, the opposite is mostly true.

From reading this book, I got the impression that diplomats are often forced into positions of having to tolerate and even condone a certain amount of militarism. Farrow can't help but wonder if Democrats and Republicans valued diplomatic efforts more than these Pyrrhic proxy wars (and if the State Department and USAID were fully funded so as to be staffed with experienced and dedicated career diplomats, with a deep knowledge of the part of the world they were addressing, combined with their having sophisticated negotiating skills), if conditions here and abroad would not be so much better. Instead, over the years, and especially now, the State Department and USAID are being gutted of skilled, career professionals in favor of militarism and "might makes right."

According to Farrow, this gutting of State, while seeming to reach its apex with Trump, was moving in that direction under other heads of state, such as Clinton, Bush and Obama. Farrow implies that Obama somewhat redeemed himself during his second four years with the Paris Accord, Iran Deal, and rapprochement with Cuba, all of which might be reversed under Trump. Farrow quotes Secretary John Kerry, who worked tirelessly on the Iran deal, as saying about Trump's threat to kill it, "If that's the art of the deal, you can see why this guy went belly up seven times."

A quote by Cicero in the Epilogue sums up this thoughtful read: There are two types of military dispute, the one settled by negotiation and the other by force. Since the first is characteristic of human beings and the second of beasts, we must have recourse to the second only if we cannot exploit the first.

Farrow's tone is measured but left me wishing that my country could move away from the direction of beasts.

114 people found this helpful

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Randolph Eck

The end of diplomacy?

Reviewed in the United States on June 25, 2018

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A trend seems to have been in effect, gathering steam since September 11, 2001. Farrow notes that “Around the world, uniformed officers increasingly handled the negotiation, economic reconstruction, and infrastructure development for which we once had a devoted body of trained specialists.” Today it seems that America has changed who it brings to the table. The author notes that the foreign ministers are still there, but the militaries and militias have the better seats. It seems that the State Department has ceded a lot of authority to the Defense Department since that fateful event in 2001. We are witnessing the destruction of the diplomatic institutions and giving little thought to engineering modern replacements. This is important as it makes the world less safe and prosperous. Farrow, in this book, gives as an account of the crisis unfolding. He describes it as “a life-saving discipline torn apart by political cowardice.” We have here the story of the transformation of the role of the U.S. and its public servants “inside creaking institutions desperately striving to keep an alternative alive.”

The story begins with an important diplomat Richard Holbrooke. This story describes the disintegration of his last mission concerning Pakistan and Afghanistan, and provides a window into “what was lost when we turned away from a profession that once saved us.” This was a long time coming as the Pentagon and CIA often bypassed the civilian foreign policy system and did business with various country’s military and intelligence leaders directly. The ensuing chapters provide an interesting and intriguing narrative of what transpired in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

In part three of the book, Farrow discusses diplomacy, or lack thereof, in Syria (2016), Afghanistan (2002), Horn of Africa (2006), Egypt (2013), and Colombia (2006). This lessoning of dependence on diplomacy was put on steroids since the 2016 election. For example, in Iraq and Syria more decisions on troop deployment were given to the military. In Yemen and Somalia, field commanders could engage in raids without White House approval. In Afghanistan, Trump granted secretary Mattis sweeping authority to set troop levels. “Diplomats were no longer losing the argument on Afghanistan: they weren’t in it.” In addition, the White House ended the practice of “detailing” State Department officers to the National Security Council, meaning fewer diplomatic voices in the policy process. In many cases, we see military and intelligence solutions win out, and we see the U.S. actively sabotage opportunities for diplomacy, sometimes resulting in an actual increase in terrorist groups and terrorist activity. For example, the CIA’s relationship with the warlords of Somalia actually destabilized the region and enflamed Islamist sentiment. We see the rise of al-Shabaab from a fringe element with limited influence to one with ambitions beyond Somalia’s borders. Its bloody message would resonate with recruits around the world.

In the Middle East, “American administrations had chosen to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Middle East’s autocratic strongmen for decades.” When those regimes crumbled and the alliances became a liability, the U.S. was slow to adapt. “Military-to-military deals had eclipsed diplomacy for so long, we barely knew how to do anything else.” In Afghanistan, we see warlords ruling with the imprimatur of a government backed by the U.S. In Columbia, we see paramilitary death squads gain support of the United States. It is a slippery slope we have been following, now only compounded by the current Trump administration.

6 people found this helpful

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shiraz f aziz

insight into how american govt. foreign policy functions

Reviewed in Canada on January 31, 2021

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the book is based on facts, it shows how there are power struggles within the government to formulate foreign policy. these struggles are competitive rather then co-operative. for reaching a particular goal.

One person found this helpful

Interest Variety

A must read in present times

Reviewed in India on August 5, 2022

Verified Purchase

Firstly, this version in the blue paperback is good. The print is fine and legible. Secondly, this is the "updated" version from 2021. I was first confused on how different is it from the 2018 edition. Well it does talk about the Biden administration so it does go past the Trump era. It would have been better if they had contrasted the cover a bit more from the older edition.

It gives a good glimpse on how it all unfolded to where it is now. Might write another review once I am done and digested it completely.

shima

米国務省の実情を描いた良書

Reviewed in Japan on June 3, 2018

Verified Purchase

最近、#MeTooムーヴメント関係でメディアから引っ張りだこのRonan Farrow氏だが、元からジャーナリストだったわけではなく、オバマ政権下ではRichard Holbrookの配下で外交チームに属していたこともあり、実務経験があるとも言える。
本書はトランプ批判が目的ではない。
米国務省の弱体化と米国政府の軍主導の外交は、今に始まった話ではなく、数十年前から始まっている。トランプ政権になって、その傾向が加速したのは事実だが。
本書は、このような傾向について、Ronan Farrow氏自身の経験、過去の国務長官たちや国務省に在籍した外交スペシャリストたちへのインタビューを通して、米国務省で何が起きているのかを描いている。
米国の外交がどこに向かっているのかを知る上で、その実情がよく分かる作品である。

なお、後半の1/3はフットノートやインデックスなので、実際のページ数は2/3程度。

4 people found this helpful

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Jennifer Coutu

Bonne qualité de livres l usagé

Reviewed in Canada on October 7, 2021

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Le livre est arrivé rapidement et en bonne qualité.

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PPR

Great book