The Free World Colossus: A Critique of American Foreign Policy in the Cold War

by David Horowitz

Book by Horowitz, David

Genres: History

451 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1965

About the author

David Joel Horowitz was an American conservative writer and activist. He was a founder and president of the David Horowitz Freedom Center (DHFC); editor of the Center's website FrontPage Magazine; and director of Discover the Networks, a website that tracks individuals and groups on the political left. Horowitz also founded the organization Students for Academic Freedom.
Horowitz wrote several books with author Peter Collier, including four on prominent 20th-century American families. He and Collier have collaborated on books about cultural criticism. Horowitz worked as a columnist for Salon.
From 1956 to 1975, Horowitz was an outspoken adherent of the New Left. He later rejected progressive ideas and became a defender of neoconservatism. Horowitz recounted his ideological journey in a series of retrospective books, culminating with his 1996 memoir Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey.

Reviews

[Julio The Fox · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ach, how wise David Horowitz was when he championed the Old Left instead of pimping for the New right. David has slimed me in print on numerous occasions, including a paid ad in THE NEW YORK TIMES, but I will not respond in kind to his calumny. This review is from a scholar examining another. "The free world colossus" is the monster that emerged from World War II after nuking Japan twice. The United States, now under the guise of the National Security State, assumed the role of global policeman against revolution, from the Mediterranean to Guatemala to the Sea of Japan. Truman and the Democrats proclaimed this global crusade. Communism was not the enemy. Change was the enemy. "Communism" was Truman's red herring for global intervention wherever the American empire felt threatened. In Greece the U.S. aligned itself with the remnants of the Nazi-collaborationist government in a civil war to crush the Greek Communist Party; a party Stalin had refused military aid. On the opposite side of the globe the American war in Korea foreshadowed other U.S. military adventures of the Cold War, disguising war as not war, Truman''s "police action", while dropping napalm on civilians. All this horror Horowitz dissects coldly, calmly and with mucho documentation from the American media. Thanks, David. you're the man!

[Court · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s incredible that a book this detailed and lucid and critical of Us foreign policy could come from the mind of someone who went on to become one of the founding fathers of neoconservatism.

[John Kaufmann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent critique of American foreign policy. Includes chapters on the origins of the Cold War, containment strategy, Greece and Turkey, the Korean War, overthrows in Iran and Guatemala in the fifties, Cuba, nuclear arms and negotiations, up to Vietnam.