GENERAL POST-WORLD WAR II

The Cold War

H - L

 

Hennessy, Peter. The Secret State: Whitehall and the Cold War. London: Allen Lane/Penguin, 2002.

Addison, History Today 52.7, comments that "[n]o one writes with greater authority on Whitehall than Hennessy, and he tells the story with a sparkling combination of wit and infectious enthusiasm."

According to Peake, Studies 48.1, the author reviews the mechanism and functions of the Joint Intelligence Council (JIC) "during various periods of the Cold War in considerable detail based on newly declassified cabinet documents."

Herken, G.F. The Winning Weapon: The Atomic Bomb in the Cold War, 1945-1950. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988.

Cold War Connection, "Top Books on the Cold War," http://www.cmu.edu/coldwar/annot.htm, finds that the author ""describes the powerful, often-perverse influence the atomic bomb played in international relations between the end of World War II and the Korean War." Herken "is especially good in interpreting the debate over the internationalization of the atom and the domestic context in which that debate was conducted."

Hoffman, David E. "Reagan Approved Plan to Sabotage Soviets: Book Recounts Cold War Program That Made Technology Go Haywire." Washington Post, 27 Feb. 2004, A1. [http://www.washingtonpost.com]

In his new book At the Abyss: An Insider's History of the Cold War, Thomas C. Reed, a former Air Force secretary who served in the National Security Council from January 1982 to June 1983, says that President Reagan approved a CIA plan in January 1982 "to sabotage the economy of the Soviet Union through covert transfers of technology that contained hidden malfunctions." This included "software that later triggered a huge explosion in a Siberian natural gas pipeline."

See also Gus W. Weiss, "The Farewell Dossier: Duping the Soviets," Studies in Intelligence 35, no. 9 (1996): 121-128; and "The Farewell Dossier: Strategic Deception in the Cold War." Intelligencer 11, no. 2 (Winter 2000): 23-28.

Hyland, William. The Cold War: Fifty Years of Conflict. New York: New York Times, 1991.

"William G. Hyland, 79, former deputy national security adviser to President Gerald R. Ford and former editor of Foreign Affairs magazine, died" on 25 March 2008. Patricia Sullivan, "William G. Hyland; Editor, Advised Ford On Security," Washington Post, 28 Mar. 2008, B7.

Israelyan, Victor L. On the Battlefields of the Cold War: A Soviet Ambassador's Confession. University Park, PA: Penn State University Press, 2003.

Legvold, FA, Jan.-Feb. 2004, notes that the author "served in key second-level positions in the Soviet Foreign Ministry from 1968 to 1987.... This is intriguing material for the general reader and valuable material for future historians."

Jackson, Ian. The Economic Cold War: America, Britain and East-West Trade, 1948-63. New York: Palgrave, 2001.

Jenssen, Lars Christian, and Olav Riste, eds. Intelligence in the Cold War. Oslo: Hegland Trykkeri, 2001.

Jessup, John E. A Chronology of Conflict and Resolution, 1945-85. New York: Greenwood, 1989.

Johnson, Loch K. "Spymasters and the Cold War." Foreign Policy 105 (Winter 1996-1997): 179-192.

La Joie, Roland [MAJGEN/USA (Ret.)] "The Last Casualty of the Cold War: Lt. Col. Arthur D. Nicholson and the U.S. Military Liaison Mission." Intelligencer 13, no. 1 (Spring/Summer 2002): 60-65.

Thr former commander of the USMLM and Associate Deputy Director for Operations/Military Affairs, CIA, uses Nicholson's death in 1985 while performing his duties with the USMLM to highlight the function of the Mission from 1947 until the Berlin Wall came down.

LaFeber, Walter. America, Russia, and the Cold War, 1945-1971. 2d ed. New York: Wiley, 1972.

Laville, Helen. Cold War Women. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 2002.

Lazar, Marc. "The Cold War Culture of the French and Italian Communist Parties." Intelligence and National Security 18, no. 2 (Summer 2003): 213-224.

"[T]he Cold War had a considerable impact in France and Italy, being relayed domestically by two powerful communist parties and amplifying already-existing conflicts in each of these societies. In France, as in Italy, the confrontation was violent, and developed into a kind of 'war culture'.... It permitted polemical and political passions to be unleased against ... 'the enemy'.... Yet, despite its intensity and continual stoking, this confrontation was always mastered and controlled by communists and non-communists alike."

Leebaert, Derek. The Fifty-Year Wound: The True Price of America's Cold War Victory. New York: Little, Brown, 2002.

Zelikow, FA 81.3, finds that this book "is often slapdash in its treatment of particular episodes, and it suffers from critical omissions.... But Leebaert is often perceptive and well informed. His arguments are intriguing and provocative even when they are wrong."

Leffler, Melvyn P.

1. "The American Conception of National Security and the Beginning of the Cold War, 1945-1948." American Historical Review 89, no. 2 (Apr. 1984): 346-381.

John Lewis Gaddis, "Comments," American Historical Review 89.2 (Apr. 1984): 382-385, argues that Leffler has given too much importance to the influence of George Kennan and the Policy Planning Staff in this timeframe.

The author's response is at Leffler, "Reply," American Historical Review 89.2 (Apr. 1984): 391-400.

2. "Inside Enemy Archives: The Cold War Reopened." Foreign Affairs 75, no. 4 (Jul./Aug. 1996): 120-135.

Materials coming out of the former Soviet Union, its former Warsaw Pact allies, and even China "reveal a Soviet system as revolting as its worst critics charged long ago. Some scholars go further, asserting that the archives confirm not only the genocidal actions and fundamental brutality of the regime but also its ideological underpinnings and hegemonic aspirations." It is with the latter interpretations that Leffler takes issue, arguing that Soviet policy was grounded in "realpolitik" in its dealings with the West and China.

3. A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1992. [pb] 1993.

Surveillant 2.2 notes that "[m]any previously classified documents support this work."

A reviewer in APSR 87.1 says that this work "will be of immense value to scholars interested in the Grand Strategy of the Truman administration.... [It] clarifies the crucial role of global economic objectives in U.S. grand strategy.... [T]he key theoretical concepts Leffler uses are not up to the subtlety of the story he tells.... The conclusion is ... direct, clear, and effective."

4. The Specter of Communism: The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1917-1953. New York: Hill and Wang, 1994.

5. For the Soul of Mankind: The United States, the Soviet Union, and the Cold War. New York: Hill and Wang, 2007.

Ikenberry, FA 86.6 (Nov.-Dec. 2007), calls this "a masterful account of the Cold War.... Leffler focuses on critical turning points ... [and] draws vivid portraits of U.S. and Soviet leaders." His interpretation "moves beyond the old revisionist and traditionalist debates.... This important work will enlighten and sophisticate the debate on the ColdWar."

Levering, Ralph B. The Cold War: A Post-Cold War History. Arlington Heights, IL: Harlan Davidson, 1994.

Cold War Connection, "Top Books on the Cold War," http://www.cmu.edu/coldwar/annot.htm, says that "this compact, highly readable book provides a balanced diplomatic history of the Cold War."

Lucas, W. Scott. Freedom's War: The US Crusade against the Soviet Union, 1945-56. New York: New York University Press, 1999. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 2000.

According to Shaw, Journal of Cold War Studies 3.3 (Fall 2001), the author "disagrees with historians like [John Lewis] Gaddis who maintain that the [Truman] Doctrine was devised merely as a reaction to the domestic political situation. Instead Lucas ... stresses Harry Truman's ideological vision.... [T]he Truman administration forged links with a network of private individuals in the media, business, public relations, the trade unions, and the financial world to promote U.S. ideology at home and overseas.... Lucas might have taken greater care ... to distinguish between the individuals and groups who actively ... cooperated with the U.S. government and those who were engaged in activities that happened to coincide with official views."

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