State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III - Hardcover

Woodward, Bob

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0743272234 ISBN 13: 9780743272230

Publisher: Simon & Schuster, 2006

Synopsis

"Insurgents and terrorists retain the resources and capabilities to sustain and even increase current level of violence through the next year.'' This was the secret Pentagon assessment sent to the White House in May 2006. The forecast of a more violent 2007 in Iraq contradicted the repeated optimistic statements of President Bush, including one, two days earlier, when he said we were at a ''turning point" that history would mark as the time "the forces of terror began their long retreat." State of Denial examines how the Bush administration avoided telling the truth about Iraq to the public, to Congress, and often to themselves. Two days after the May report, the Pentagon told Congress, in a report required by law, that the "appeal and motivation for continued violent action will begin to wane in early 2007." In this detailed inside story of a war-torn White House, Bob Woodward reveals how White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, with the indirect support of other high officials, tried for 18 months to get Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld replaced. The president and Vice President Cheney refused. At the beginning of Bush's second term, Stephen Hadley, who replaced Condoleezza Rice as national security adviser, gave the administration a 'D minus' on implementing its policies. A secret report to the new Secretary of State Rice from her counselor stated that, nearly two years after the invasion, Iraq was a "failed state." The book reveals that at the urging of Cheney and Rumsfeld, the most frequent outside visitor and Iraq adviser to President Bush is former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who, haunted still by the loss in Vietnam, emerges as a hidden and potent voice. Woodward reveals that the secretary of defense himself believes that the system of coordination among departments and agencies is broken, and in a secret May 1, 2006 memo Rumsfeld stated, that "the current system of government makes competence next to impossible." State of Denial answers the core questions: What happened after the invasion of Iraq? Why? How does Bush make decisions and manage a war that he chose to define his presidency? And is there an achievable plan for victory?

About this title

Review:

"State of Denial feels all the more outraged for its measured, nonpartisan tones and relentless reporting. It is nothing less than a watershed.... The full story of the Iraq War will be told by historians....This book...will be at the top of their shelves as they proceed to the altar of judgment."

-- Ted Widmer, The Washington Post Book World

"Serious, densely, even exhaustively reported, and a real contribution to history in that it gives history what it most requires, first-person testimony....This is a primer on how the executive branch of the United States works, or rather doesn't work, in the early years of the 21st century."

-- Peggy Noonan, The Wall Street Journal

"Never-before-reported nuggets in every chapter....It offers the most revealing in-the-room glimpse of the Bush administration that we have so far."

-- Walter Shapiro, Salon.com

"State of Denial is brimming with vivid details about White House meetings, critical phone calls, intelligence reports, and military affairs....Impressively detailed and eye-opening revelations about the Bush administration's handling of the Iraq war and its aftermath."

-- Chuck Leddy, The Boston Globe

"Woodward's book is packed with details about the gulf between the information the administration had and the picture it presented."

-- USA Today

"Woodward's trilogy on the Bush administration at war is essential, and compelling, reading."

-- Foreign Affairs

About the Author:

Bob Woodward is an assistant managing editor of The Washington Post.

About this edition

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 0743272234
• ISBN 13: 9780743272230
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 560