Description: This book explores a crucial feature of U.S. foreign policy: the extent to which many of America's greatest triumphs resulted from diplomats disobeying orders.
Brief description: Seth Jacobs is Professor of History at Boston College and the author of The Universe Unraveling: American Foreign Policy in Cold War Laos (2012), Cold War Mandarin: Ngo Dinh Diem and the Origins of America's War in Vietnam, 1950-1963 (2006), and America's Miracle Man in Vietnam: Ngo Dinh Diem, Religion, Race and U.S. Intervention in Southeast Asia, 1950-1957 (2004).
Review Quotes: 'Is there a distinctive American way of diplomacy? In this hugely readable book, Seth Jacobs shows that there most certainly is, but perhaps not as we might assume. Unlike their counterparts from other countries, American diplomats, many of them amateurs, have a long history of disobedient freelancing. Jacobs shows why this is a peculiarly American tradition, and why it matters.' Andrew Preston, author of American Foreign Relations: A Very Short Introduction