The "dean of Cold War historians" ( The New York Times )now presents the definitive account of the global confrontationthat dominated the last half of the twentieth century. Drawing onnewly opened archives and the reminiscences of the major players,John Lewis Gaddis explains not just what happened but why —from the months in 1945 when the U.S. and the U.S.S.R.went from alliance to antagonism to the barely averted holocaust ofthe Cuban Missile Crisis to the maneuvers of Nixon and Mao, Reaganand Gorbachev. Brilliant, accessible, almost Shakespearean in itsdrama, The Cold War stands as a triumphant summation of theera that, more than any other, shaped our own.

Secret societies, assassination plots, cover-ups, and covert actions - these are the theories and shadows that influence politics, business, and even our daily lives. The truth is always out there, but what truth you believe depends on what you already know. Categorized into specific areas of interest, Conspiracy Encyclopedia is an essential guide to the many and varied theories that question the status quo and redefine the official version or events past. Presenting the case for and against a number of well-known theories - as well as more obscure and bizarre ones - this encyclopedia is dedicated to casting a skeptical eye on not only the world around us but the conspiracies as well. With detailed entries to help answer all the right questions, Conspiracy Encyclopedia also includes numerous alternate perspectives covering wars and state legislation, as well as biographies of the key figures of conspiracy theory.

In Deceit and Self Deception Robert Trivers, whose work has been acclaimed by figures such as Richard Dawkins and Steven Pinker, looks at how and why we so often deceive ourselves. We lie to ourselves every day: about how well we drive, how much we're enjoying ourselves - even how good looking we are. In this ground-breaking book, Robert Trivers examines not only how we self-deceive, but also why, taking fascinating examples from aviation disasters, con artists, sexual betrayals and conflicts within families. Revealing, provocative and witty, Deceit and Self-Deception is one of the most vital books written this century, and will make you rethink everything that you think you know. Robert Trivers is one of the leading figures pioneering the field of sociobiology. He received his bachelors and PhD from Harvard University. He has been on the faculty at Harvard, the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Rutgers University. 'A remarkable book, by a uniquely brilliant scient

Interweaving autobiography with history, introspection andpolitical commentary, Mary Antin recounts the process of"uprooting, transportation, replanting, acclimatization, anddevelopment that took place in my own soul", and reveals the impactof a new culture on her family.

In a collision with a steamship, City of Rome, on the night ofSeptember 25, 1925, the U.S. Navy Submarine S-51 sank in 132 feetof water, taking 33 sailors to the ocean floor. This is the storyof the men charged with doing the impossible-raising the thousandton sub from the bottom of the sea. Added to this modern classic oftrue adventure are a foreword and afterword giving specifics of theaccident and the aftermath, additional photographs, a publisher'spreface, and appendices.

In this distillation of frontline experiences and culturalinsights, Anita Pratap, one of the finest journalists India hasever produced, faithfully reports on the consequences of war,ethnic conflict, earthquakes, cyclones, prejudices, and themindless hatred and fear that has hurt so much of the world.Wherever there was a story to be told-from her native India toAfghanistan and Sri Lanka-Pratap braved the odds to send in reportsfrom the front, managing to track down elusive stories and makeheadlines. With determined diligence she exposed the terrors insidesuch frightening regimes as the Taliban, returning home each timewith a renewed determination to appreciate and celebrate theordinary.

In this the first book ever written about the CIA's Office of Technical Service, former director Robert Wallace (a real-life Q, straight out of the James Bond films) and internationally renowned intelligence historian H. Keith Melton offer an unprecedented look at the CIA's most secretive operations and the devices that made them possible. Against a backdrop of geopolitical tensions- including the Cold War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the current War on Terror-the authors show how the CIA carries out its missions employing amazingly inventive tools. Illustrated with images never before seen by the public-and featuring everything from micro cameras to wired kitties to exploding pancakes-Spycraft is both a fantastic encyclopedia of gadgetry and a revealing primer on the fundamentals of high-tech espionage.

Winston Churchill's six-volume history of the cataclysm thatswept the world remains the definitive history of the Second WorldWar. Lucid, dramatic, remarkable both for its breadth and sweep andfor its sense of personal involvement, it is universallyacknowledged as a magnificent reconstruction and is an enduring,compelling work that led to his being awarded the Nobel Prize forliterature. The Grand Alliance recounts the momentous events of1941 surrounding America's entry into the War and Hitler's march onRussia the continuing onslaught on British civilians during theBlitz, Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor and the alliance betweenBritain and America that shaped the outcome of the War.

From the authors of the bestselling "Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar" comes an uproarious new book on the meaning of death--and life, too. b w illustrations throughout. (Philosophy)

An account of the CIA's involvement in the covert wars inAfghanistan that fueled Islamic militancy and gave rise to binLaden's al Qaeda. For nearly the past quarter century, while mostAmericans were unaware, Afghanistan has been the playing field forintense covert operations by U.S. and foreign intelligenceagencies-invisible wars which sowed the seeds of the September 11attacks and which provide its context. From the Soviet invasion in1979 through the summer of 2001, the CIA, KGB, Pakistan's ISI, andSaudi Arabia's General Intelligence Department all operateddirectly and secretly in Afghanistan. They primed Afghan factionswith cash and weapons, secretly trained guerrilla forces, fundedpropaganda, and manipulated politics. In the midst of thesestruggles bin Laden conceived and then built his globalorganization. The author tells the secret history of the CIA's rolein Afghanistan, from its covert program against Soviet troops from1979 to 1989, to the rise of the Taliban and the emergence of binLaden, to th

Reinaldo Arenas was born in Cuba in 1943. In 1980, he was oneof 120,000 Cubans who arrived in the United States on the Marielboatlift. Arenas settled in New York where he lived until hisdeath from AIDS ten years later. Andrew Hurley is a translator of numerous works of literature,criticism, history, and memoir. He is professor emeritus at theUniversity of Puerto Rico. Thomas Colchie is an acclaimed translator, editor, and literaryagent for international authors. He is the editor of A HammockBeneath the Mangoes. He has written for the Village Voice and TheWashington Post. His translations include Manuel Puig's Kiss of theSpider Woman and (with Elizabeth Bishop, Gregory Rabassa, and MarkStrand) Carlos Drummond de Andrade's Travelling in the Family.

"In wartime," Winston Churchill wrote, "truth is so preciousthat she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies." ForBritain's counterintelligence operations, this meant finding theunlikeliest agent imaginable-a history professor named AlfredVicary, handpicked by Churchill himself to expose a highlydangerous, but unknown, traitor. The Nazis, however, have alsochosen an unlikely agent: Catherine Blake, a beautiful widow of awar hero, a hospital volunteer-and a Nazi spy under direct ordersfrom Hitler to uncover the Allied plans for D-Day...

Joseph Nye coined the phrase 'soft power' to describe anation's ability to attract and persuade. Whereas hard power - theability to coerce - grows out of a country's military or economicmight, soft power arises from the attractiveness of its culture,political ideals and policies. Hard power remains crucial in aworld of states trying to guard their independence and of non-stategroups willing to turn to violence. But as a new administration -whether Republican or Democrat - maps out its foreign policy, Nyeemphasizes the importance of husbanding our military power andnurturing our soft power. It is soft power that will help preventterrorists from recruiting supporters from among the moderatemajority. And it is soft power that will help the United Statesdeal with critical global issues that require multilateralcooperation.

The late 1990s saw a number of attacks against American military and governmental offices,most notably the U.S. Embassy bombings in Africa in 1998. On September 11,2001, however,the scale of this conflict changed dramatically,The hijacking of four commercial airliners on that sunny Tuesday morning led to the deaths of some 3,000 people. As in 1998, the terrorist group responsible for this devastating campaign was Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda, or "The Base," a loose network of extremists many of whom are willing to die for their cause, the promotion of a militant form of Islam and the destruction of the West. In Al-Qaeda, Jane Corbin, the award-winning senior BBC correspondent for Panorama the British equivalent of 60 Minutes -- crosses four continents in search of bin Laden's terror network. The result of four years research, reporting and travel throughout the Middle East, Africa, Europe and Aanerica, she has conducted hundreds of interviews with key eyewitnesses, investigators, and intelligence officers a

Winston Churchill's six-volume history of the cataclysm thatswept the world remains the definitive history of the Second WorldWar. Lucid, dramatic, remarkable both for its breadth and sweep andfor its sense of personal involvement, it is universallyacknowledged as a magnificent reconstruction and is an enduring,compelling work that led to his being awarded the Nobel Prize forliterature. Triumph and Tragedy recounts the dramatic months as theWar drew to a close the Normandy landings, the liberation ofWestern Europe, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and thesurrender of Germany and Japan.