Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I'm old enough to have live through the eventful 16-years (1929-1945)covered by Prof. David Kennedy's 2-volume history of that period of modern American history; for about half of that time, I was intellectually aware of what was happening; and I have read widely about the New Deal and WW-II. However, nothing I had been exposed to prior to reading "Freedom from Fear" gave me the context and an over-all understanding of the issues and obstacles that decision-makers faced during the Great Depression, the lead-up to WW-II, and the conduct of that war as have these wonderful two volumes. Even though I know full well how these matters played out, it was fascinating to learn how they came to be, and to realize that their outcomes were by no means foreordained nor inevitable. It is said about travel: "Getting there is half the fun;" in that sense, Kennedy is a marvelous tourguide to history.
One minor quibble: In true scholarly fashion, Kennedy
identifies sources for his many assertions and quotations in
footnotes; only a few footnotes contain additional explanatory
material that adds to the story. I would have preferred that the
many footnotes that merely give sources had been made into end
notes, available to those who want to check them but not
taking space on the pages of the narrative.
Click Here to see more reviews about: The American People in World War II: Freedom from Fear, Part Two (Oxford History of the United States) (Pt. 2)
Even as the New Deal was coping with the Depression, a new menace was developing abroad. Exploiting Germany's own economic burdens, Hitler reached out to the disaffected, turning their aimless discontent into loyal support for his Nazi Party. In Asia, Japan harbored imperial ambitions of its own. The same generation of Americans who battled the Depression eventually had to shoulder arms in another conflict that wreaked worldwide destruction, ushered in the nuclear age, and forever changed their way of life and their country's relationship to the rest of the world.The American People in World War II--the second installment of Kennedy's Pulitzer Prize-winning Freedom from Fear--explains how the nation agonized over its role in the conflict, how it fought the war, why the United States emerged victorious, and why the consequences of victory were sometimes sweet, sometimes ironic. In a compelling narrative, Kennedy analyzes the determinants of American strategy, the painful choices faced by commanders and statesmen, and the agonies inflicted on the millions of ordinary Americans who were compelled to swallow their fears and face battle as best they could. The American People in World War II is a gripping narrative and an invaluable analysis of the trials and victories through which modern America was formed.
