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| Descent into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia | 
 enlarge | Author: Ahmed Rashid
Publisher: Viking Adult
Category: Book
List Price: $27.95
Buy New: $16.38
You Save: $11.57 (41%)
New (45) Used (17) Collectible (4) from $16.38
Avg. Customer Rating:  19 reviews
Sales Rank: 3949
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 544
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.9
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.7
ISBN: 0670019704
Dewey Decimal Number: 954.053
EAN: 9780670019700
ASIN: 0670019704
Publication Date: June 3, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 How could they get it so Wrong! July 4, 2008
5 out of 7 found this review helpful
A very good read on how the Bush, Cheney et al continue to support a two faced and corrupt Pakistani miiltary and government to the determent of America and its citizens. Read it and weep. Thank you Ahmed Rashid.
Great coverage of Historical events, but still a bit fragmented. August 22, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
I enjoyed this book from one of my favorite authors. The book covers a lot of historical events. The author has high credibility, and I couldn't put the book down. Some of the material is fragmented, but it was still very interesting.
I'd highly recommend this one.
sb
 Strong narrative, weak analysis October 18, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is a good read and is full of interesting and enlightening details. However, it suffers from some serioius conceptual flaws. For example:
1) The author does not properly define "neo-conservative." He ends up using it as a catch-all perjorative for all hawks that he doesn't like. As a consequence, it is not always clear how his own hawkish beliefs (he argues that we should have invaded Afghanistan before 9/11) differ from those whose policies have clearly failed.
2) He tends to describe "nation building" as though it were a branch of engineering, i.e. something that definitely can be accomplished if we devote enough resources and experts to the problem. At one point, in a momenty of clarity, he admits that, with the exception of the extraordinary examples of Japan and Germany, no nation-building has ever succeeded in producing a viable nation.
These and other conceptual flaws prevent his arguments from ever getting off the ground. Yet the book is still very much worth reading--a good source of information.
Author has excellent access...read this after Ghost Wars October 22, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I am headed over to Kabul in a couple weeks to work in NATO's security assistance force. I have been reading a ton about the region over the past several months. Ghost Wars stands alone as the best read out there, but its narrative ends abruptly on Sept 10, 2001. For me this book can serve as a worthy sequel since a great deal of it deals with events since 9/11. The author is extremely thorough and detailed, but he also manages to hold the reader's interest by addressing themes instead of providing a straight chronology, which would have been painful given everything he includes here. Be forewarned, the author is very critical of US policy in the region, and seems to frequently overstate the degree to which the US policymakers can drive reform around the world. But I will say he spreads his criticisms fairly to other quarters...such as Karzai's government, and ultimately his opinions are articulated well enough to actually add something to the book. A totally objective, unimpassioned text would have been very dry. The author is a Pakistani journalist with incredible access and sources in that part of the world, and his text includes extensive notation. It should also be said that the incoming commander of Central Command Gen David Patreaus is a fan of this book. He recently brought the author onto his 100-member strategy review team dealing with Central and South Asia. So if you want to quickly become 'well read' on the area, pick up this book. It's extremely relevant at this point and time. I'm going to bring this over with me because I'm expecting it to serve as an excelent reference for regional people and place names.
Descent into Chaos September 21, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Written with great understanding of the political and economic struggle in the region. The enigma of Islam in the mind of ordinary person in the west. The misleading factor that puzzles the 'Think tanks' in Washington DC
on how to win Bush's war against terrorism. Most experts probably read it just not to show their ignorance and
have no desire to learn from their continuing mistakes in the region.
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