Stephen Kinzer

Biography of Alan and John Foster Dulles, head of the CIA/State Department during a big chunk of the post-WWII period. They were terrible human beings convinced of their Christian, pro-American big business righteousness—when not in government, they represented major businesses with interests overseas, including in places whose governments they later helped overthrow on the grounds that they weren’t pro-capitalist enough. Foster Dulles (1) thought that Gurkhas were Pakistani (they are not), (2) when informed that they were not, said, well, they’re Muslim (they are not), and (3) as a result of his beliefs, insisted that Pakistan be included in a regional compact in a region of which it was not part, which contributed to the dissolution of that compact, though I suppose that might be a good thing given how awful his aims generally were. So much of the world has reason to despise America, and the Dulles brothers oversaw a big chunk of that—more, possibly, than the Koch brothers. That said, it’s not clear that much would have differed without them; as the author emphasizes, they were products of their (white, Christian, male, wealthy) environment and the other people around them, especially the Republicans and especially Eisenhower, thought similarly.… (more)