Descent into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia by Ahmed Rashid
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(Hardcover)
- Pub. Date: June 2008
- 544pp
- Sales Rank: 74,085
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Product Details
- Pub. Date: June 2008
- Publisher: Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
- Format: Hardcover, 544pp
- Sales Rank: 74,085
- ISBN-13: 9780670019700
- ISBN: 0670019704
Synopsis
Ahmed Rashid is the voice of reason amid the chaos of Central Asia today. His unique knowledge of this complex, war-torn region gives him a panoramic vision and grasp of nuance that no Western writer can emulate. In Descent Into Chaos, Rashid reviews the regional conditions since 9/11 and the catastrophic aftermath of America’s failed war on terror. The underlying theme is clear, devastating and deeply critical of current U.S. foreign policy. Iraq is essentially a sideshow. Pakistan and Afghanistan are where the war really began. Pakistan remains the crucial resource and key player, and Afghanistan is where the fight against Islamic insurgency is eventually going to be played out.
Rashid also brings into clear focus the regional issues of Central Asia that few in our country seem to understand and yet are having a crucial impact on our own security and conduct. Seven years after 9/11, despite the thousands of lives and billions of dollars that have been spent in the region, it is in chaos. Pakistan, unstable and armed with nuclear weapons, has become terrorism central. The Taliban is resurging and reconquering land, and al Qaeda is stronger than ever. And at the heart of these calamities is the United States’ refusal to accept its responsibility for statecraft and nation building and its utter failure to understand the region. Rashid’s blistering critique of American policy is also a warning and an impassioned call to correct our failed strategies. There is no more urgent global task.
Publishers Weekly
"Iraq may turn out to be a mere side show compared with what is at stake with Pakistan and Afghanistan," says Rashid in his critical, timely and expansive book (the introduction alone takes up almost an entire disc). Arthur Morey walks a thin line: his overall success conveying the information in this weighty tome without sounding like a monotone college professor is a credit to his talent. Morey's voice is calm, authoritative and confident. His diction is perfect and his mannered delivery never loses steam. Nevertheless, even with an important book such as this, it is difficult to convey this quantity of factual information in a way that doesn't eventually begin to drone on. Morey fights the good fight and comes out ahead, barely. A Viking hardcover (Reviews, Apr. 14). (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. More Reviews and RecommendationsBiography
Ahmed Rashid is a Pakistani journalist based in Lahore who writes for The Washington Post, Daily Telegraph (London), the International Herald Tribune, The New York Review of Books, BBC Online, and The Nation. His previous books include Jihad, Taliban, and The Resurgence of Central Asia. He appears regularly on NPR, CNN, and the BBC World Service.
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Fantastic Overview of Af-Pak Conflictby Anonymous
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May 13, 2009: Most thorough overview of the events leading up to the Af-Pak crises we are facing today. A must read for anyone interested in the region. Provides a rare perspective on the events in the region.
Insane warmongeringby Anonymous
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September 25, 2008: Pakistani journalist Ahmed Rashid is a friend and supporter of Afghanistan?s president Hamid Karzai. Rashid warns that Afghanistan is facing state collapse, Pakistan is in meltdown, and the five Central Asian states are dictatorships. He claims that the most important thing in the world is to rebuild these nations. He shows that President Karzai?s regime depends on warlords and drug barons, who are backed by the CIA. Britain?s forces there are supposed to be helping to cut opium production, but their policy of paying farmers to destroy their opium crops has been `disastrous?. Opium production soared from 4,000 tons in 2005 to 8,200 in 2007. Half of this was grown in British-occupied Helmand, where the rest of Afghanistan?s opium was sold. The USA is allied to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, which are al-Qaeda?s main sponsors. The USA has given more than $10 billion to Pakistan?s President Musharraf. Bush backed him even after he tore up the constitution, sacked the judges, imprisoned more than 12,000 people and muzzled the media. This `created immense hatred for the U.S. Army and America?. The USA?s torture of POWs has further increased this hatred. As Rashid writes, ?By following America?s lead in promoting or condoning disappearances, torture, and secret jails, these countries found their path to democracy and their struggle against Islamic extremism set back by decades. Western-led nation building had little credibility if it denied justice to the very people it was supposed to help. It could well be argued that over time Islamic extremists were emboldened rather than subdued by the travesty of justice the United States perpetrated. The people learned to hate America. ? The deterioration of human rights in each country became linked to that government?s proximity to the CIA.? So the USA?s wars have increased the al-Qaeda threat, particularly in Pakistan. Rashid also notes that US interventions have failed in Yugoslavia and East Timor and made a hell-hole of Iraq. And then - after all this - Rashid calls on the USA, not to get out of the region, but to get deeper in. More sanely, he also calls on the peoples of the region to take responsibility for moving their nations towards democracy.
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