First published 2019
Richard Holbrooke commanded rooms and negotiated peace deals with equal intensity. He brokered the Dayton Accords that stopped the killing in Bosnia, America's most successful diplomatic triumph after the Cold War ended. His career spanned from Vietnam as a young adviser to Afghanistan as his final mission. Holbrooke believed completely in himself and in America's duty to lead the world through strength and generosity. His razor intelligence and relentless energy made him both admired and despised in Washington's corridors of power. Yet his aggressive tactics and constant self-promotion blocked his path to the top positions he craved. George Packer draws from Holbrooke's personal diaries and private papers to reveal how one man's ambitions mirrored America's own contradictions during its moment of global dominance. The biography captures both the possibilities and the perils of American power through the life of a brilliant, flawed diplomat who embodied his country's strengths and weaknesses.
Genres: biography, history, 20th-century, american, political-science, non-fiction, 21st-century, american-history
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: ambition, power-dynamics
Setting: Afghanistan, America, Bosnia, Vietnam
Period: Cold War, Vietnam War
608 pages · Paperback · Jonathan Cape