The Cold War

A brilliantly arresting historical work, John Lewis Gaddis's The Cold War takes us as never before to the time when the world stood on the brink of destruction. In 1945 war came to an end. But a whole new terror was only just beginning... Here is the truth behind every spy thriller you've read: why America and the Soviet Union became locked in a deadly stalemate; how close we came to nuclear catastrophe; what was really going on in the minds of leaders from Stalin to Mao Zedong, Ronald Reagan to Mikhail Gorbachev, how secret agents plotted and East German holidaymakers helped the Berlin Wall fall. It is a story of crisis talks and subterfuge, tyrants and power struggles - and of ordinary people changing the course of history. 'Gripping' Len Deighton 'Superb ... brimful of racy incident' Independent on Sunday 'A lively and readable history' The Times 'Force 9 on the Richter scale' Spectator John Lewis Gaddis is the Robert A. Lovett Professor of History at Yale University, and 'the dean of cold war historians' (The New York Times). He is the author of numerous books, including Security and the American Experience, the book recently pressed on his cabinet and senior security staff by President Bush.

A brilliantly arresting historical work, John Lewis Gaddis's The Cold War takes us as never before to the time when the world stood on the brink of destruction. In 1945 war came to an end. But a whole new terror was only just beginning... Here is the truth behind every spy thriller you've read: why America and the Soviet Union became locked in a deadly stalemate; how close we came to nuclear catastrophe; what was really going on in the minds of leaders from Stalin to Mao Zedong, Ronald Reagan to Mikhail Gorbachev, how secret agents plotted and East German holidaymakers helped the Berlin Wall fall. It is a story of crisis talks and subterfuge, tyrants and power struggles - and of ordinary people changing the course of history. 'Gripping' Len Deighton 'Superb ... brimful of racy incident' Independent on Sunday 'A lively and readable history' The Times 'Force 9 on the Richter scale' Spectator John Lewis Gaddis is the Robert A. Lovett Professor of History at Yale University, and 'the dean of cold war historians' (The New York Times). He is the author of numerous books, including Security and the American Experience , the book recently pressed on his cabinet and senior security staff by President Bush.

"Outstanding . . . The most accessible distillation of that conflict yet written." -- The Boston Globe "Energetically written and lucid, it makes an ideal introduction to the subject." -- The New York Times The "dean of Cold War historians" ( The New York Times ) now presents the definitive account of the global confrontation that dominated the last half of the twentieth century. Drawing on newly opened archives and the reminiscences of the major players, John Lewis Gaddis explains not just what happened but why --from the months in 1945 when the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. went from alliance to antagonism to the barely averted holocaust of the Cuban Missile Crisis to the maneuvers of Nixon and Mao, Reagan and Gorbachev. Brilliant, accessible, almost Shakespearean in its drama, The Cold War stands as a triumphant summation of the era that, more than any other, shaped our own. Gaddis is also the author of On Grand Strategy.

"Outstanding . . . The most accessible distillation of that conflict yet written." -- The Boston Globe "Energetically written and lucid, it makes an ideal introduction to the subject." -- The New York Times The "dean of Cold War historians" ( The New York Times ) now presents the definitive account of the global confrontation that dominated the last half of the twentieth century. Drawing on newly opened archives and the reminiscences of the major players, John Lewis Gaddis explains not just what happened but why --from the months in 1945 when the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. went from alliance to antagonism to the barely averted holocaust of the Cuban Missile Crisis to the maneuvers of Nixon and Mao, Reagan and Gorbachev. Brilliant, accessible, almost Shakespearean in its drama, The Cold War stands as a triumphant summation of the era that, more than any other, shaped our own. Gaddis is also the author of On Grand Strategy.

'Masterly ... a book of resounding importance for appraising our global future as well as understanding our past' Richard Davenport-Hines, The Times Literary Supplement , Books of the Year 'A masterful survey that will set the standard for Cold War scholarship for years to come' Jonathan Steele, London Review of Books As Germany and then Japan surrendered in 1945 there was a tremendous hope that a new and much better world could be created from the moral and physical ruins of the conflict. Instead, the combination of the huge power of the USA and USSR and the near-total collapse of most of their rivals created a unique, grim new environment: the Cold War. For over forty years the demands of the Cold War shaped the life of almost all of us. There was no part of the world where East and West did not, ultimately, demand a blind and absolute allegiance, and nowhere into which the West and East did not reach. Countries as remote from each other as Korea, Angola and Cuba were defined by their allegiances. Almost all civil wars became proxy conflicts for the superpowers. Europe was seemingly split in two indefinitely. Arne Westad's remarkable new book is the first to have the distance from these events and the ambition to create a convincing, powerful narrative of the Cold War. The book is genuinely global in its reach and captures the dramas and agonies of a period always overshadowed by the horror of nuclear war and which, for millions of people, was not 'cold' at all: a time of relentless violence, squandered opportunities and moral failure.

'Masterly ... a book of resounding importance for appraising our global future as well as understanding our past' Richard Davenport-Hines, The Times Literary Supplement , Books of the Year 'A masterful survey that will set the standard for Cold War scholarship for years to come' Jonathan Steele, London Review of Books As Germany and then Japan surrendered in 1945 there was a tremendous hope that a new and much better world could be created from the moral and physical ruins of the conflict. Instead, the combination of the huge power of the USA and USSR and the near-total collapse of most of their rivals created a unique, grim new environment: the Cold War. For over forty years the demands of the Cold War shaped the life of almost all of us. There was no part of the world where East and West did not, ultimately, demand a blind and absolute allegiance, and nowhere into which the West and East did not reach. Countries as remote from each other as Korea, Angola and Cuba were defined by their allegiances. Almost all civil wars became proxy conflicts for the superpowers. Europe was seemingly split in two indefinitely. Arne Westad's remarkable new book is the first to have the distance from these events and the ambition to create a convincing, powerful narrative of the Cold War. The book is genuinely global in its reach and captures the dramas and agonies of a period always overshadowed by the horror of nuclear war and which, for millions of people, was not 'cold' at all: a time of relentless violence, squandered opportunities and moral failure.