Breaking Ranks

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

The 10 men whose stories are told here once held powerful jobs in or connected with the American military complexthe CIA; nuclear weapons labs and factories; the army; the foreign service. But each man began questioning the morality of the industry he served, broke ranks and chose instead to work as peace activists. Their stories range from the dramatic (Bill Perry's tension-filled stint as director of public relations for the Livermore Lab) to the contemplative (physicist Tom Grissom's realization, after 15 years at a major weapons design lab, that he could no longer reconcile his ethics with his work). Everett ( Bearing Witness, Building Bridges: Interviews with North Americans Living and Working in Nicaragua ) ably profiles them, but the men also speak cogently for themselves, weighing whether personal gain or collective happiness matters more. (Feb.)

Library Journal

These books are about dissenters: People who feel strongly that our society or government has treated them or others unjustly. Breaking Ranks focuses on ten men--former cold warriors, military and civilian--who became disillusioned with their original stances on nuclear deterrence and American interventionist policies in the Third World. Some of them have become pacifists while others speak out against U.S. government military defense policy. The Courage of Their Convictions contains vignettes of 16 men and women who fought for their civil rights all the way to the Supreme Court. The cases were heard between 1940 and 1986 and dealt with race, religion, civil protest, and privacy. Both books allow their subjects to state their views on why they decided to take a stand and fight for their particular cause. While all of these individuals faced moral dilemmas, the accounts in Breaking Ranks are especially vivid. Both books are highly recommended.-- Gary D. Barber, SUNY at Fredonia Lib.