American Rasputin

"This is a wonderful book. I came across it because I read a review and it became clear to me that Walter Rostow, the subject of the book, was a singular personality in the panoply of foreign policy militarisation. It’s a very good read. I believe it’s David Milne’s first book, and he just knocks it out of the park. He opens with this amazing anecdote about Robert McNamara. It was his last day in office as secretary of defence – he was going on to the World Bank, and he was already broken down emotionally because he realised that his legacy was going to be as dubious as it is. There was Walter Rostow, giving a briefing on how the US should intensify and accelerate the bombing runs in North Vietnam, and finally McNamara just stands up and says, “You’ve been telling us this for the last three years, and it hasn’t done a thing.” He uses all sorts of blue language and he finally collapses and begins to weep in the Oval Office, with the most powerful men in the world all assembled. It’s just a searing image, and he does a great job in crafting it and making it come to life. Very much so. He ends up, indirectly, being responsible for the murders of hundreds of thousands of people. Milne does a great job of sketching out how an incredibly bright man can be such a dullard when it comes to the consequences of waging war without listening to people on the ground. For example, there’s one bit when he goes with General Westmoreland on a fact-finding tour to Vietnam. By the time they get to Honolulu, they had already decided to intensify the bombing. Before they got to Saigon, they had already rendered their verdict."