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Select a book:
"A fascinating and alarming examination of one of the least explored
trends in American policy: the militarization of foreign aid. As
Hodge powerfully illustrates with a storyteller's eye for detail, time
and again in recent years the American military has been called to a
task it is ill-equipped to perform - nation-building - with disastrous
consequences. In the process, the work of 'bona-fide' civilian
foreign assistance workers has become infinitely more suspect,
complicated and perilous. An indispensable guide for anyone who wises
to understand the terrible price being paid for the outsourcing of
American foreign policy."
-- Scott Anderson, author of The Man Who Tried to Save the World
"Equal parts inspiring and frustrating, this is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand U.S. foreign policy."
-- Colleen Mondor, Booklist
Kirkus Reviews:
"In his fast-moving, well-argued assessment, he warns about a military stretched too thin, distracted from its primary mission of fighting and winning wars; about a U.S. treasury strained to the breaking point; and about the huge and clumsy footprint often left by the new class of soldier/diplomats. For a civilian readership increasingly alienated from the culture of its military, Hodge provides an important guide to what the reformers have wrought."
Publishers Weekly (10/25):
"Hodge (coauthor of A Nuclear Family Vacation), a journalist specializing in defense and national security issues, takes a critical look at the post-9/11 shift in U.S. foreign policy toward nation building in a timely and balanced account. Drawing upon firsthand reporting from Iraq and Afghanistan and extensive interviews with key figures behind the shift, the author traces how the initial failure to secure Afghanistan and Iraq led to the "military's embrace of counterinsurgency"--a shift to "armed social work" that blended force and humanitarianism and became the new face of American foreign policy. Hodge locates the origins of the new paradigm in the work of defense intellectuals like Thomas Barnett (The Pentagon's New Map) and the support of a cadre of military officers, led by Gen. David Petraeus, who embedded the doctrine in the military's counterinsurgency manual and oversaw its adoption during the 2007 surge. While acknowledging some tentative successes, the author argues that nation building detracts from the military's primary mission and is best left to development and diplomatic agencies. Hodge calls for a national conversation on the issue of nation building, and his carefully reported and sprightly written critique is a good place to begin."
"One of the top young reporters out there, Nathan Hodge wrestles with the key foreign policy question of our times: How did American foreign policy get so out of balance and where do we head to next? Perceptive and informative, Armed Humanitarians weaves strong analysis with lively stories from the field. If you want to understand the dilemmas that our soldiers and diplomats face today trying to build stability in forlorn places that range from Haiti to Afghanistan, read this book."
--P.W. Singer, author of Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century
"Go down the rabbit hole with Nathan Hodge as he takes you through the military's shiny new world of kinder, gentler warfare. Fascinating, painfully honest, always interesting and most importantly a milestone guide to the future of war."
-- Robert Young Pelton, author, The World's Most Dangerous Places
"A fascinating and important first-hand account of the new American way of war."
--Sean Naylor, author, Not a Good Day To Die: The Untold Story of Operation Anaconda
"Drawing on a decade of reporting from nearly every hotspot and hellhole on the globe, one of America’s savviest defense writers reveals how the Global War on Terror led to a military transformation George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld never envisioned in pursuit of a policy they rejected. Armed Humanitarians takes the reader from Baghdad to Bagram and Tbilisi to Timbuktu, delivering a boots-eye view of our new nation-building military -- and an eye-opening look at the heavy costs in blood and treasure that go with it."
--Richard Whittle, former Dallas Morning News Pentagon correspondent and author of The Dream Machine: The Untold History of the Notorious V-22 Osprey
"Hodge deftly and convincingly shows how American 'nation building' became a mission of 'armed social work.' Essential reading to understand what went wrong in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the perils that lie ahead"
--Ken Silverstein, author of The Radioactive Boy Scout: The True Story of a Boy and His Backyard Nuclear Reactor
"An important, timely book: Nathan Hodge, one of the nation’s best defense reporters, tells a compelling story about U.S. soft power, showing how military force and humanitarian aid has coalesced during missions abroad. A must read."
--Tara McKelvey, author of Monstering: Inside America's Policy of Secret Interrogations and Torture in the Terror War
-- Scott Anderson, author of The Man Who Tried to Save the World
"Equal parts inspiring and frustrating, this is a must-read for anyone seeking to understand U.S. foreign policy."
-- Colleen Mondor, Booklist
Kirkus Reviews:
"In his fast-moving, well-argued assessment, he warns about a military stretched too thin, distracted from its primary mission of fighting and winning wars; about a U.S. treasury strained to the breaking point; and about the huge and clumsy footprint often left by the new class of soldier/diplomats. For a civilian readership increasingly alienated from the culture of its military, Hodge provides an important guide to what the reformers have wrought."
Publishers Weekly (10/25):
"Hodge (coauthor of A Nuclear Family Vacation), a journalist specializing in defense and national security issues, takes a critical look at the post-9/11 shift in U.S. foreign policy toward nation building in a timely and balanced account. Drawing upon firsthand reporting from Iraq and Afghanistan and extensive interviews with key figures behind the shift, the author traces how the initial failure to secure Afghanistan and Iraq led to the "military's embrace of counterinsurgency"--a shift to "armed social work" that blended force and humanitarianism and became the new face of American foreign policy. Hodge locates the origins of the new paradigm in the work of defense intellectuals like Thomas Barnett (The Pentagon's New Map) and the support of a cadre of military officers, led by Gen. David Petraeus, who embedded the doctrine in the military's counterinsurgency manual and oversaw its adoption during the 2007 surge. While acknowledging some tentative successes, the author argues that nation building detracts from the military's primary mission and is best left to development and diplomatic agencies. Hodge calls for a national conversation on the issue of nation building, and his carefully reported and sprightly written critique is a good place to begin."
"One of the top young reporters out there, Nathan Hodge wrestles with the key foreign policy question of our times: How did American foreign policy get so out of balance and where do we head to next? Perceptive and informative, Armed Humanitarians weaves strong analysis with lively stories from the field. If you want to understand the dilemmas that our soldiers and diplomats face today trying to build stability in forlorn places that range from Haiti to Afghanistan, read this book."
--P.W. Singer, author of Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the 21st Century
"Go down the rabbit hole with Nathan Hodge as he takes you through the military's shiny new world of kinder, gentler warfare. Fascinating, painfully honest, always interesting and most importantly a milestone guide to the future of war."
-- Robert Young Pelton, author, The World's Most Dangerous Places
"A fascinating and important first-hand account of the new American way of war."
--Sean Naylor, author, Not a Good Day To Die: The Untold Story of Operation Anaconda
"Drawing on a decade of reporting from nearly every hotspot and hellhole on the globe, one of America’s savviest defense writers reveals how the Global War on Terror led to a military transformation George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld never envisioned in pursuit of a policy they rejected. Armed Humanitarians takes the reader from Baghdad to Bagram and Tbilisi to Timbuktu, delivering a boots-eye view of our new nation-building military -- and an eye-opening look at the heavy costs in blood and treasure that go with it."
--Richard Whittle, former Dallas Morning News Pentagon correspondent and author of The Dream Machine: The Untold History of the Notorious V-22 Osprey
"Hodge deftly and convincingly shows how American 'nation building' became a mission of 'armed social work.' Essential reading to understand what went wrong in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the perils that lie ahead"
--Ken Silverstein, author of The Radioactive Boy Scout: The True Story of a Boy and His Backyard Nuclear Reactor
"An important, timely book: Nathan Hodge, one of the nation’s best defense reporters, tells a compelling story about U.S. soft power, showing how military force and humanitarian aid has coalesced during missions abroad. A must read."
--Tara McKelvey, author of Monstering: Inside America's Policy of Secret Interrogations and Torture in the Terror War
"Highly entertaining and deeply worrying. The mad world of Mutually
Assured Destruction lives on."
--Financial Times (Top Science Books of 2008)
"Required deck-chair reading for one man: Barack Obama."
--New Statesman
"A vacation for some, a nightmare for others. Either way, well worth reading."
--Kirkus
"Exhibiting dark humor, defense journalists Hodge and Weinberger take a tour of America’s nuclear-weapons infrastructure, visiting labs, plants, bunkers, missile silos, and ground zeros of nuclear explosions."
--Booklist
"In this adventure in 'nuclear tourism,' the husband-and-wife authors … convey an acute sense of the incoherence of latter-day nuclear strategizing."
--Publishers Weekly
"The enlightening A Nuclear Family Vacation … is a trawl around the many nuclear missile launch sites, weapons laboratories and test bases that still litter the planet… It is solid and informed, but the format, partly travel, adds a lighter side. The idea of package tours to former top-secret nuclear test sites is bizarre in itself and the writers revel in the oddness of what they are doing."
--South China Morning Post
"A Nuclear Family Vacation is an eye-opening read for anyone who thinks that nuclear weapons are a thing of the past."
--Nerve
--Financial Times (Top Science Books of 2008)
"Required deck-chair reading for one man: Barack Obama."
--New Statesman
"A vacation for some, a nightmare for others. Either way, well worth reading."
--Kirkus
"Exhibiting dark humor, defense journalists Hodge and Weinberger take a tour of America’s nuclear-weapons infrastructure, visiting labs, plants, bunkers, missile silos, and ground zeros of nuclear explosions."
--Booklist
"In this adventure in 'nuclear tourism,' the husband-and-wife authors … convey an acute sense of the incoherence of latter-day nuclear strategizing."
--Publishers Weekly
"The enlightening A Nuclear Family Vacation … is a trawl around the many nuclear missile launch sites, weapons laboratories and test bases that still litter the planet… It is solid and informed, but the format, partly travel, adds a lighter side. The idea of package tours to former top-secret nuclear test sites is bizarre in itself and the writers revel in the oddness of what they are doing."
--South China Morning Post
"A Nuclear Family Vacation is an eye-opening read for anyone who thinks that nuclear weapons are a thing of the past."
--Nerve
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