RaveThe New York Times Book Review... in his engrossing procedural of a war crimes trial, Paradis offers a more troubling history than some triumphalist American chronicles of the Doolittle raid ... Paradis, himself a Pentagon lawyer who defends detainees held by the American military at Guantánamo Bay, has a keen sense of the injustices, vagaries and ironies of war crimes trials. His book’s authority is the result of substantial archival research. He gives a chilling account of Japan’s scramble to find legal grounds for executing the American prisoners ... a richly researched book ... While Paradis avoids lazy moral equivalences, his book, like any true war story, has something to disquiet nationalists of all stripes.
Larry Diamond
PositiveThe New York Times Book ReviewIn his impassioned book Ill Winds, [Diamond] proves a stalwart, persuasive champion for democracy ... Diamond proposes some sensible policy fixes ... he properly highlights how the United States contributed to democratization in numerous countries. Yet Ill Winds does not dwell on how the United States has blighted its democratic credibility, gliding past a darker history that could reappear during future contests against China or Russia: how the Cold War drove Washington’s support for vicious anti-Communist governments in Indonesia, Pakistan, South Africa, Argentina, Iran and elsewhere.