Ivan Eland: 7 books

In War and the Rogue Presidency, Ivan Eland shows that almost immediately after the nation's founding, starting with the first presidency of George Washington, the executive's role in defense and foreign policy began expanding past what the framers of the Constitution had envisioned. The Constitution...

Presidents who claimed to limit government often actually did the opposite. History often looks unfavorably on presidents who may have actually contributed smart and important policies. Were Harding and Coolidge really as ineffective as their reputations maintain? Did Hoover not do enough to end the...

Evaluating presidents on the merits of whether their policies promoted peace, prosperity, and liberty, this ranking system takes a distinctly new approach. Historians and scholars have long tended to give higher rankings to presidents who served during wartime, were well spoken, or exceeded in expanding...

Debunking numerous myths that have emerged about the world’s resources of oil, this book argues that the use of U.S. military power to secure oil is not only needless and costly—in both lives and money—but also counterproductive to U.S. security. Intended to make government, the media, and citizens...

Delving into the concept of the United States as an empire, this investigation examines U.S. interventions around the world—from the Spanish-American War to the invasion of Iraq—demonstrating how they not only contradict the principles of both liberals and conservatives but also make a mockery...

This book examines the implications of counterinsurgency warfare for U.S. defense policy and makes the compelling argument that the United States' default position on counterinsurgency wars should be to avoid them. • Examines a wider breadth of historical cases than other books on counterinsurgency,...

Combining a history of Iraq and its dominant sects with an acute awareness of the political machinations fomenting worldwide, this keen military analysis offers a practical exit strategy for U.S. armed forces in Iraq—partitioning, a unique strategy that has been successful in other chaotic political situations.