Evan Thomas – författare

With a new introduction by the authors, this is the classic account of the American statesmen who rebuilt the world after the catastrophe of World War II.A captivating blend of personal biography and public drama, The Wise Men introduces six close friends who shaped the role their country would play in the dangerous years following World War II. They were the original best and brightest, whose towering intellects, outsize personalities, and dramatic actions would bring order to the postwar chaos and leave a legacy that dominates American policy to this day. The Wise Men shares the stories of Averell Harriman, the freewheeling diplomat and Roosevelt’s special envoy to Churchill and Stalin; Dean Acheson, the secretary of state who was more responsible for the Truman Doctrine than Truman and for the Marshall Plan than General Marshall; George Kennan, self-cast outsider and intellectual darling of the Washington elite; Robert Lovett, assistant secretary of war, undersecretary of state, and secretary of defense throughout the formative years of the Cold War; John McCloy, one of the nation’s most influential private citizens; and Charles Bohlen, adroit diplomat and ambassador to the Soviet Union.

On February 15, 1898, the USS Maine exploded in the Havana Harbor. Although there was no evidence that the Spanish were responsible, newspapers such as Hearst's New York Journal whipped up a frenzy, claiming that Spain had destroyed the ship. Soon after, the easily influenced President McKinley declared war, sending troops to both Cuba and the Philippines In this rip-roaring history Thomas reveals that the hunger for war had begun years earlier. Depressed by the 'closing' of the Western frontier and embracing theories of social Darwinism, a group of warmongers including a young Teddy Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge agitated incessantly that the US exert its influence across the seas. US foreign policy was transformed and when Roosevelt became president there began a war without reason, concocted within the White House - a bloody conflict that would come at huge cost. Thrillingly written and brilliantly researched, THE WAR LOVERS is the story of 6 men at the center of history: Roosevelt, Lodge, Hearst, McKinley, William James and Thomas Reed and confirms once more than Evan Thomas is a popular historian of the first rank.

On February 15th, 1898, the American ship USS Maine mysteriously exploded in the Havana Harbor. News of the blast quickly reached U.S. shores, where it was met by some not with alarm but great enthusiasm. A powerful group of war lovers agitated that the United States exert its muscle across the seas. Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge were influential politicians dismayed by the "closing" of the Western frontier. William Randolph Hearst''s New York Journal falsely heralded that Spain''s "secret infernal machine" had destroyed the battleship as Hearst himself saw great potential in whipping Americans into a frenzy. The Maine would provide the excuse they''d been waiting for. On the other side were Roosevelt''s former teacher, philosopher William James, and his friend and political ally, Thomas Reed, the powerful Speaker of the House. Both foresaw a disaster. At stake was not only sending troops to Cuba and the Philippines, Spain''s sprawling colony on the other side of the world-but the friendships between these men.Now, bestselling historian Evan Thomas brings us the full story of this monumental turning point in American history. Epic in scope and revelatory in detail, The War Lovers takes us from Boston mansions to the halls of Congress to the beaches of Cuba and the jungles of the Philippines. It is landmark work with an unforgettable cast of characters-and provocative relevance to today.

Upon assuming the presidency in 1953, Dwight Eisenhower came to be seen by many as a doddering lightweight. Yet behind the bland smile and apparent simplemindedness was a brilliant, intellectual tactician. As Evan Thomas reveals in his provocative examination of Ike's White House years, Eisenhower was a master of calculated duplicity. As with his bridge and poker games he was eventually forced to stop playing after leaving too many fellow army officers insolvent, Ike could be patient and ruthless in the con and generous and expedient in his partnerships. Facing the Soviet Union, China, and his own generals, some of whom believed a first strike was the only means of survival, Eisenhower would make his boldest and riskiest bet yet, one of such enormity that there could be but two outcomes: the survival of the world, or its end. This is the story of how he won.

The intimate, inspiring, and authoritative biography of Sandra Day O’Connor, America’s first female Supreme Court justice, drawing on exclusive interviews and first-time access to Justice O’Connor’s archives—by the New York Times bestselling author Evan Thomas.“She’s a hero for our time, and this is the biography for our time.”—Walter Isaacson She was born in 1930 in El Paso and grew up on a cattle ranch in Arizona. At a time when women were expected to be homemakers, she set her sights on Stanford University. When she graduated near the top of her law school class in 1952, no firm would even interview her. But Sandra Day O’Connor’s story is that of a woman who repeatedly shattered glass ceilings—doing so with a blend of grace, wisdom, humor, understatement, and cowgirl toughness. She became the first ever female majority leader of a state senate. As a judge on the Arizona State Court of Appeals, she stood up to corrupt lawyers and humanized the law. When she arrived at the United States Supreme Court, appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1981, she began a quarter-century tenure on the Court, hearing cases that ultimately shaped American law. Diagnosed with cancer at fifty-eight, and caring for a husband with Alzheimer’s, O’Connor endured every difficulty with grit and poise. Women and men who want to be leaders and be first in their own lives—who want to learn when to walk away and when to stand their ground—will be inspired by O’Connor’s example. This is a remarkably vivid and personal portrait of a woman who loved her family, who believed in serving her country, and who, when she became the most powerful woman in America, built a bridge forward for all women.Advance praise for First“A great storyteller has found his greatest subject in trailblazer Sandra Day O’Connor. Evan Thomas has written one of the most insightful and thoroughly captivating biographies I have ever read: A clear and compelling illumination of Sandra Day O’Connor’s unique voice and place in American history is told through her remarkable life’s journey from a rancher’s daughter to the first woman appointed to the highest court in the land.”—Doris Kearns Goodwin, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Leadership: In Turbulent Times    “A vivid, humane, and inspiring portrait of an extraordinary woman and how she both reflected and shaped an era.”—Drew Faust, president emerita, Harvard University

A riveting, in-the-room account of the pivotal six months in 1941 that turned the tide of World War II, as Churchill and Roosevelt forged a crucial alliance and Hitler squandered his early advantage—from the New York Times bestselling author of Road to SurrenderIn the summer of 1941, Winston Churchill was desperate—for two years, Britain had stood alone against Germany, heavily battered by the Blitz as another season of grinding war loomed. Franklin D. Roosevelt, the ally Churchill needed most, was coyly evading any commitment to join the war; Americans, FDR knew, weren't worried enough about the Axis to risk sending their sons overseas. Meanwhile for an arrogant Adolf Hitler, whose war machine had already swept across Europe and now looked poised any day to take Moscow, the continent seemed all but won.By late December, though, Churchill would be lighting the White House Christmas tree with Roosevelt as an open ally, while in Berlin, basic supplies would be running out in an omen of the years to come. In the course of a few months, the war's direction was critically, permanently reversed—a result of crucial strategic calls made by the Allies, and of equally vital missteps by the Axis. Hitler's early advantage, once fumbled, would never be regained.To bring these heart-pounding decisions to life, historian Evan Thomas vividly takes us into the war rooms of Roosevelt, Churchill, and Hitler. Placing us inside the span of a few months that would redefine the course of the war—as Churchill implores Roosevelt at a secret meeting in the Atlantic, as Hitler tries to parse German intelligence reports from D.C.—The Hour Strikes grants us intimate access to the men who would redefine a world.

Two of America’s most perceptive political reporters join forces for an unprecedented behind-the-scenes look at the race for the White House in POLITICO’s Playbook 2012, a series of four instant digital books on the 2012 presidential election. The first edition, The Right Fights Back, follows the campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.   The battle for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination promises to be one of the most hotly contested and closely fought in recent memory, as establishment Republicans, Tea Party favorites, and dark horse insurgents vie to take on President Obama in the November election. In The Right Fights Back, Mike Allen, chief White House correspondent for POLITICO, and Evan Thomas, the award-winning journalist and author of Robert F. Kennedy and The War Lovers, chronicle the dramatic events of this historic campaign as it unfolds.   With exclusive real-time reporting from the campaign trail, The Right Fights Back provides detail, color, and in-depth analysis that take readers beyond the hourly headlines and commentary. From the role of Super PACS and conservative interest groups to the clashes of personality and policy that will define the race to capture the GOP nomination, this is a history-as-it-happens account of the resurgent American right at the crossroads.

Sea of Thunder is a taut, fast-paced, suspenseful narrative of the Pacific War that culminates in the battle of Leyte Gulf, the greatest naval battle ever fought.Told from both the American and Japanese sides, through the eyes of commanders and sailors of both navies, Thomas''s history adds an important new dimension to our understanding of World War II. Drawing on oral histories, diaries, correspondence, postwar testimony from both American and Japanese participants, and interviews with survivors, Thomas provides an account not only of the great sea battle and Pacific naval war, but of the contrasting cultures pitted against each other.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY TIME AND ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY RICHMOND TIMES-DISPATCH • “What was it really like to be Richard Nixon? Evan Thomas tackles this fascinating question by peeling back the layers of a man driven by a poignant mix of optimism and fear.”—Walter Isaacson, author of Steve JobsEvan Thomas delivers the best single-volume biography of Richard Nixon to date, a radical, unique portrait of a complicated figure who was both determinedly optimistic and tragically flawed. The New York Times bestselling author of Ike’s Bluff and Sea of Thunder, Thomas brings new life to one of American history’s most infamous, paradoxical, and enigmatic politicians, dispensing with myths to achieve an intimate and nuanced look at the actual man. What drove a painfully shy outcast in elite Washington society—a man so self-conscious he refused to make eye contact during meetings—to pursue power and public office? How did a president so attuned to the American political id that he won reelection in a historic landslide lack the self-awareness to recognize the gaping character flaws that would drive him from office and forever taint his legacy? In Being Nixon, Evan Thomas peels away the layers of the complex, confounding figure who became America’s thirty-seventh president. The son of devout Quakers, Richard Nixon (not unlike his rival John F. Kennedy) grew up in the shadow of an older, favored brother and thrived on conflict and opposition. Through high school and college, in the navy and in politics, he was constantly leading crusades and fighting off enemies real and imagined. As maudlin as he was Machiavellian, Nixon possessed the plainspoken eloquence to reduce American television audiences to tears with his career-saving “Checkers” speech; meanwhile, his darker half hatched schemes designed to take down his political foes, earning him the notorious nickname “Tricky Dick.” Drawing on a wide range of historical accounts, Thomas reveals the contradictions of a leader whose vision and foresight led him to achieve détente with the Soviet Union and reestablish relations with communist China, but whose underhanded political tactics tainted his reputation long before the Watergate scandal. One of the principal architects of the modern Republican Party and its “silent majority” of disaffected whites and conservative ex-Dixiecrats, Nixon was also deemed a liberal in some quarters for his efforts to desegregate Southern schools, create the Environmental Protection Agency, and end the draft. A deeply insightful character study as well as a brilliant political biography, Being Nixon offers a surprising look at a man capable of great bravery and extraordinary deviousness—a balanced portrait of a president too often reduced to caricature. Praise for Being Nixon“A biography of eloquence and breadth . . . No single volume about Nixon’s long and interesting life could be so comprehensive.”—Chicago Tribune “Terrifically engaging . . . a fair, insightful and highly entertaining portrait.”—The Wall Street Journal “Thomas has a fine eye for the telling quote and the funny vignette, and his style is eminently readable.”—The New York Times Book Review “Thomas proves an amiable and fair-minded tour guide.”—The Boston Globe “A measured, concise, and important American biography.”—Michael Beschloss, author of Presidential CourageFrom the Hardcover edition.

With a new introduction by the authors, this is the classic account of the American statesmen who rebuilt the world after the catastrophe of World War II.A captivating blend of personal biography and public drama, The Wise Men introduces six close friends who shaped the role their country would play in the dangerous years following World War II. They were the original best and brightest, whose towering intellects, outsize personalities, and dramatic actions would bring order to the postwar chaos and leave a legacy that dominates American policy to this day. The Wise Men shares the stories of Averell Harriman, the freewheeling diplomat and Roosevelt’s special envoy to Churchill and Stalin; Dean Acheson, the secretary of state who was more responsible for the Truman Doctrine than Truman and for the Marshall Plan than General Marshall; George Kennan, self-cast outsider and intellectual darling of the Washington elite; Robert Lovett, assistant secretary of war, undersecretary of state, and secretary of defense throughout the formative years of the Cold War; John McCloy, one of the nation’s most influential private citizens; and Charles Bohlen, adroit diplomat and ambassador to the Soviet Union.

The Very Best Men is the story of the CIA''s early days as told through the careers of four glamorous, daring, and idealistic men who ran covert operations for the government from the end of World War II to Vietnam. Evan Thomas re-creates the personal dramas and sometimes tragic lives of Frank Wisner, Richard Bissell, Tracy Barnes, and Desmond FitzGerald, who risked everything to contain the Soviet threat.Within the inner circles of Washington, they were regarded as the best and the brightest. They planned and acted to keep the country out of war—by stealth and “political action” and to do by cunning and sleight of hand what great armies could not, must not be allowed to do. In the end, they were too idealistic and too honorable, and were unsuited for the dark, duplicitous life of spying. Their hubris and naïveté led them astray, producing both sensational coups and spectacular blunders like the Bay of Pigs and the failed assassination attempts on foreign leaders in the early 1960s. Thomas draws on the CIA''s own secret histories, to which he has had exclusive access, as well as extensive interviews, to bring to life a crucial piece of American history.

This bestselling biography of legendary trial lawyer Edward Bennett Williams is "a skillful and lively portrait of a larger-than-life lawyer" (Kirkus Reviews).Legendary attorney Edward Bennet Williams was arguably the best trial lawyer ever to practice. Now, for the first time, bestselling author Evan Thomas takes us into the courtrooms of Williams''s greatest performances as he defends "Godfather" Frank Costello, Jimmy Hoffa, Frank Sinatra, The Washington Post, and others, as well as behind the scenes where the witnesses are coached, the traps set, and the deals cut. In addition to being a lawyer of unprecedented influence, Williams was also an important Washington insider, privy to the secrets of America''s most powerful men. Thomas tells the truth behind the stories that made Williams one of the most talked about public figures of his time, including Williams''s role in the publication of the Pentagon Papers and the possibility that Williams may have been Watergate''s Deep Throat. Based on Thomas''s exclusive access to Williams''s papers, The Man to See is an unprecedented look at the strategies and influence of this exceptional man.

The New York Times bestseller from master biographer Evan Thomas brings to life the tumultuous story of the father of the American Navy.John Paul Jones, at sea and in the heat of the battle, was the great American hero of the Age of Sail. He was to history what Patrick O’Brian’s Jack Aubrey and C.S. Forester’s Horatio Hornblower are to fiction. Ruthless, indomitable, clever; he vowed to sail, as he put it, “in harm’s way.” Evan Thomas’s minute-by-minute re-creation of the bloodbath between Jones’s Bonhomme Richard and the British man-of-war Serapis off the coast of England on an autumn night in 1779 is as gripping a sea battle as can be found in any novel. Drawing on Jones’s correspondence with some of the most significant figures of the American Revolution—John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson—Thomas’s biography teaches us that it took fighters as well as thinkers, men driven by dreams of personal glory as well as high-minded principle, to break free of the past and start a new world. Jones’s spirit was classically American.

This book reviews the monitoring approaches used in the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) period, and its chapters highlight the significant gap between ""improved"" water and sanitation and impacts on health.

He was "Good Bobby," who, as his brother Ted eulogized him, "saw wrong and tried to right it . . . saw suffering and tried to heal it." And "Bad Bobby," the ruthless and manipulative bully of countless conspiracy theories. Thomas''s unvarnished but sympathetic and fair-minded portrayal is packed with new details about Kennedy''s early life and his behind-the-scenes machinations, including new revelations about the 1960 and 1968 presidential campaigns, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and his long struggles with J. Edgar Hoover and Lyndon Johnson.

‘A true page-turner.’ All About History, ☆☆☆☆☆‘Urgent, compulsively readable and powerfully resonant’ Sinclair McKay You know Oppenheimer, the man who created the atomic bomb…Now meet the men who detonated it, and the extraordinary weight of their decisions…  Road to Surrender by New York Times bestselling author Evan Thomas is a riveting, immersive account of the agonizing decision to use nuclear weapons against Japan – a crucial turning point in World War II and geopolitical history. At 9:20 a.m. on the morning of May 30, General Groves receives a message to report to the office of the secretary of war “at once.” Stimson is waiting for him. He wants to know: has Groves selected the targets yet?So begins this suspenseful, impeccably researched history that draws on new access to diaries to tell the story of three men who were intimately involved with America’s decision to drop the atomic bomb—and Japan’s decision to surrender. They are Henry Stimson, the American Secretary of War, who had overall responsibility for decisions about the atom bomb; Gen. Carl “Tooey” Spaatz, head of strategic bombing in the Pacific, who supervised the planes that dropped the bombs; and Japanese Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo, the only one in Emperor Hirohito’s Supreme War Council who believed even before the bombs were dropped that Japan should surrender.Henry Stimson had served in the administrations of five presidents, but as the U.S. nuclear program progressed, he found himself tasked with the unimaginable decision of determining whether to deploy the bomb. The new president, Harry S. Truman, thus far a peripheral figure in the momentous decision, accepted Stimson’s recommendation to drop the bomb. Army Air Force Commander Gen. Spaatz ordered the planes to take off. Like Stimson, Spaatz agonized over the command even as he recognized it would end the war. After the bombs were dropped, Foreign Minister Togo was finally able to convince the emperor to surrender.To bring these critical events to vivid life, bestselling author Evan Thomas draws on the diaries of Stimson, Togo and Spaatz, contemplating the immense weight of their historic decision. In Road to Surrender, an immersive, surprising, moving account, Thomas lays out the behind-the-scenes thoughts, feelings, motivations, and decision-making of three people who changed history.‘This dramatic, you-are-there masterpiece provides a convincing explanation of one of the great moral questions of 20th century history: was America right to drop the atom bomb on Japan at the end of World War II? … This is an indispensable book for those who want to understand the moral issues surrounding the use of great power.’ Walter Isaacson‘In this meticulously crafted and vivid account, Evan Thomas tells the gripping and terrifying story of the last days of the Second World War in the Pacific. Writing with insight and understanding, he recreates for us those critical moments when, for better or worse, the decisions, from the dropping of the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the Japanese surrender, were made.’ Margaret MacMillan

At 9:20 a.m. on the morning of May 30, General Groves receives a message to report to the office of the secretary of war '';at once.'' Stimson is waiting for him. He wants to know: has Groves selected the targets yet? So begins this suspenseful, impeccably researched history that draws on new access to diaries to tell the story of three men who were intimately involved with America''s decision to drop the atomic bomband Japan''s decision to surrender. They areHenry Stimson, the American Secretary of War, who had overall responsibility for decisions about the atom bomb;Gen. Carl '';Tooey'' Spaatz, head of strategic bombing in the Pacific, who supervised the planes that dropped the bombs; andJapanese Foreign MinisterShigenori Togo, the only one in Emperor Hirohito''s Supreme War Council who believed even before the bombs were dropped that Japan should surrender. Henry Stimson had served in the administrations of five presidents, but as the U.S. nuclear program progressed, he found himself tasked with the unimaginable decision of determining whether to deploy the bomb. The new president, Harry S. Truman, thus far a peripheral figure in the momentous decision, accepted Stimson''s recommendation to drop the bomb. Army Air Force Commander Gen. Spaatz ordered the planes to take off. Like Stimson, Spaatz agonized over the command even as he recognized it would end the war. After the bombs were dropped, Foreign Minister Togo was finally able to convince the emperor to surrender.To bring these critical events to vivid life, bestselling author Evan Thomas draws on the diaries of Stimson, Togo and Spaatz, contemplating the immense weight of their historic decision. InRoad to Surrender,an immersive, surprising, moving account, Thomas lays out the behind-the-scenes thoughts, feelings, motivations, and decision-making of three people who changed history.