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This is one of the great American political biographies of recent years, an extraordinary work that captures the mercurial American diplomat at his inspiring best and appalling worst. Internationally, only Andrew Roberts’s magnificent...
USSC lecturer in American Studies Aaron Nyerges reviews Adina Hoffman's biography of Ben Hecht, one of the most accomplished and prolific American screenwriters. The review was published by The Australian Book Review.
Anonymous is a coward. It was a singular act to take to the op-ed pages of The New York Times in September 2018. (‘‘I am part of the resistance inside the Trump Administration...
Senior Fellow Dr Charles Edel surveys four recent works examining the role, ambitions and trajectory of modern China. He finds that although Elizabeth Economy, Nadège Rolland, Sulmaan Wasif Khan, and Ma Jian all apply...
In the introduction to Working, his monumental 1972 collection of oral histories on how Americans think about work, the great journalist Studs Terkel wrote that work ‘‘is, by its very nature, about...
Is Donald Trump going to destroy himself? Will Jared and Ivanka eventually complete their takeover of the White House and rule the world? Will Steve Bannon – the Trump whisperer and chief political...
Don Winslow first established himself as a writer of uncommon insight and persuasive power with his 2006 thriller, The Winter of Frankie Machine. Its impact alone brought New York-born, California-based Winslow to...
Senior Fellow Charles Edel and Hal Brands write in The American Interest on the lessons to be drawn from the Versailles settlement a century ago. They examine why the world's democracies were so...
Doris Kearns Goodwin is a first-class American presidential historian. Her new book, Leadership: Lessons from the Presidents for Turbulent Times, could not be better timed. American voters went to the polls this...
In the terminal phase of Richard Nixon’s presidency, in the American summer of 1974, defence secretary James Schlesinger worried that Nixon’s mental decline would lead to a nuclear incident. By this point, secretary...
After Donald Trump was inaugurated, Washington speculated: Might we see from Bob Woodward, given the volcanic eruption of power and chaos that engulfed Trump from the moment he took the oath of office...
Stephen Loosley reviews Pulitzer prize-winning historian Jon Meacham's new book, The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels.
USSC lecturer in American studies Dr Rodney Taveira authored the chapter The Divine Violence of Underworld USA in the book The Big Somewhere: Essays on James Ellroy's Noir World.
James Ellroy's identity as...
Arizona Republican John McCain is among the most powerful people to have occupied a US Senate seat. An undoubted war hero (despite the trashing of his reputation by Donald Trump) who suffered mightily...
On the evening of the first day of the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862, the Union forces at Pittsburgh Landing reflected the partial rout that had been suffered. As reinforcements were ferried...
Earlier this year, I reviewed Michael Wolff’s sensational, lacerating book on the Trump administration, Fire and Fury. Some claimed the book would bring down Donald Trump. It did not, of course. It has...
USSC visiting fellow Stephen Loosley reviews Michael Wolff's book Fire and Fury for The Australian. Loosley writes that Wolff's account of the first year of the presidency is lightweight but engaging.
In the latest edition of the Security Challenges journal, USSC research fellow Dougal Robinson describes how relations between the United States and Australia have stabilised after the infamous Trump-Turnbull phone call in January...
The state institutions portrayed in the HBO crime procedural True Detective are innately and structurally corrupt. Local mayors’, state governors’, and district attorneys’ offices, city and county police, and sheriff’s departments commit and...
Jeremi Suri’s The Impossible Presidency grounds contemporary debates about the presidency in a historical understanding of the office — and shows why its recent occupants don’t measure up.
