Turmoil and Triumph

Fülszöveg

1 was tired after six and one-half tumultu-ous years, and I felt that memoirs could easily be self-serving. Turn over the documents to the historians, I thought. Soon my energy returned and, as I looked into my records, I felt a renewed sense ofexcitement about whathad happened on my watch, and a desire to set out the flow ofevents as they appeared from my own point ofview. Much had been accomplished during those crucial years. Theprocess was at times exhilarating, at times fractious, in an administration often at odds with itself. I wanted topresent the reality as I experienced it, warts and ail: a foray into how things happened in Washington during years that were on the hinge of history. When I started as secretary of state, the world was in turmoil, and when I left office, the cold war was over and, after a struggle lasting over four décodés, the idea of free and open political and economic systems had triumphed. —from the Foreword
George P. Shultz has written a towering... Tovább

Fülszöveg

1 was tired after six and one-half tumultu-ous years, and I felt that memoirs could easily be self-serving. Turn over the documents to the historians, I thought. Soon my energy returned and, as I looked into my records, I felt a renewed sense ofexcitement about whathad happened on my watch, and a desire to set out the flow ofevents as they appeared from my own point ofview. Much had been accomplished during those crucial years. Theprocess was at times exhilarating, at times fractious, in an administration often at odds with itself. I wanted topresent the reality as I experienced it, warts and ail: a foray into how things happened in Washington during years that were on the hinge of history. When I started as secretary of state, the world was in turmoil, and when I left office, the cold war was over and, after a struggle lasting over four décodés, the idea of free and open political and economic systems had triumphed. —from the Foreword
George P. Shultz has written a towering book, a brilliant personal account of his years (1982-1989) as secretary of state under Président Ronald Reagan. Not since Dean Acheson or Henry Kissinger has a former secretary of state written so deftly and articulately about the forging of a new, stronger foreign policy for America. When Secretary Shultz joined the Reagan cabinet, war raged in Lebanon, the Soviets were escalating the arms race, terrorism was at fever pitch. Yet his relentless détermination—his use of strength in tandem with diplomacy—led to bold initiatives in the Middle East, new stratégies for peace with the Soviets that transformed the superpower relationship, a strengthening of our hand in Asia and in Central and South America, and the forward march of democracy.
There are behind-the-scenes talks with the Palestinians and Israelis, critical meetings with the Soviets, and frank discussions with the Japanese and Chinese. There is also a surprisingly close-up look at the power (Continued on bock flap)
(Continuéei from front flap)
struggle of the State Department with the staffs of the National Security Council and the White House and with the CIA, climaxing in the Iran-Contra affair. The events of Iran-Contra set out here can only be described as astounding. It is the first complété assem-bling of the facts from Secretary Shultz's vantage point and is destined to provoke a reassessment of this period in our history.
George Shultz paints vivid portraits of the major players during his term in office. On the world scene-. Mikhail Gorbachev, Margaret Thatcher, Helmut Kohi, Yasuhiro Nakasone, Deng Xiaoping, Yitzhak Shamir, Yitzhak Rabin, King Hussein, and Hosni Mubarak. And on the domestic scene: Cap Weinberger, Bill Casey, George Bush, Don Regan, Ed Meese, and Jim Baker. His most stunning portrayal, though, is of Ronald Reagan. Secretary Shultz's assessment of Reagan is as revealing as it is startling.
In Turmoil and Triumph, George Shultz documents it ail—the hows and the whys, the personalities at play—so that it reads like high drama and "living history." Certainly no other book by a member of the Reagan administration has this depth of purpose, this scope, this degree of révélation, or makes a contribution of this significance.
George P. Shultz has served in four cabinet posts: secretary of state, secretary of labor, director of the OMB, and secretary of the treasury. His cabinet service spanned over twelve years. A Princeton graduate with a Ph.D. in économies from MIT, he is Distinguished Fellow at the Hoover Institution on War, Révolution and Peace at Stanford University. Mr. Shultz is coauthor of Economie Policy Beyond the Headlines, among other books. He lives in Stanford, California. Vissza