Book description
> In this extraordinarily insightful, illuminating book, Rajiv
Chandrasekaran focuses on southern Afghanistan in the year of Obama's
surge.
Little America
is a story of this long arc of American involvement, and of the campaign
to salvage a victory in southern Afghanistan on Obama's watch., and
reveals the epic tug of war that occurred between the president and a
military that, once on the ground, increasingly went its own way. This
political battle's profound ramifications for the region and the world
are laid bare through a cast of fascinating characters -disillusioned
and inept diplomats, frustrated soldiers, headstrong officers - who
played a part in the process of pumping millions of dollars of American
money and soldiers into Afghan nation-building. He addresses the British
involvement around Kandahar prior to the arrival of the US Marines, and
reveals the uneasy - and, at times, openly hostile - relationship
between the United States and Britain as they began in 2009 to share
responsibility for Helmand.
What emerges is a detailed picture of unsavoury compromise - warlords
who were to be marginalised were suddenly embraced, the Karzai family
transformed from foe to friend, fighting corruption no longer a top
priority - and a venture that has become unsustainable in every way:
politically, financially, and strategically. As in his Samuel Johnson
Prize-winning Imperial Life in the Emerald City
, by bringing to life a corner of a conflict and Chandrasekaran reveals
the bigger story of the war. Has the war in Afghanistan been worth the
money spent and bloodshed? Through vivid, on-the-ground storytelling,
Little America
takes readers toward an answer in a way no other book on Afghanistan
has.> > In this extraordinarily insightful, illuminating book,
Rajiv Chandrasekaran focuses on southern Afghanistan in the year of
Obama's surge. Little America
is a story of this long arc of American involvement, and of the campaign
to salvage a victory in southern Afghanistan on Obama's watch., and
reveals the epic tug of war that occurred between the president and a
military that, once on the ground, increasingly went its own way. This
political battle's profound ramifications for the region and the world
are laid bare through a cast of fascinating characters -disillusioned
and inept diplomats, frustrated soldiers, headstrong officers - who
played a part in the process of pumping millions of dollars of American
money and soldiers into Afghan nation-building. He addresses the British
involvement around Kandahar prior to the arrival of the US Marines, and
reveals the uneasy - and, at times, openly hostile - relationship
between the United States and Britain as they began in 2009 to share
responsibility for Helmand.
What emerges is a detailed picture of unsavoury compromise - warlords
who were to be marginalised were suddenly embraced, the Karzai family
transformed from foe to friend, fighting corruption no longer a top
priority - and a venture that has become unsustainable in every way:
politically, financially, and strategically. As in his Samuel Johnson
Prize-winning Imperial Life in the Emerald City
, by bringing to life a corner of a conflict and Chandrasekaran reveals
the bigger story of the war. Has the war in Afghanistan been worth the
money spent and bloodshed? Through vivid, on-the-ground storytelling,
Little America
takes readers toward an answer in a way no other book on Afghanistan
has.>
