Bush at War

Bush at War reveals in stunning detail how an untested president with a sweeping vision for remaking the world and war cabinet members often at odds with each other responded to the September 11 terrorist attacks and prepared to confront Iraq. Woodward's virtual wiretap into the White House Situation Room is the first history of the war on terrorism.

Adopting a largely uncritical and almost gossipy tone, Washington Post editor Woodward offers a "behind-the-scenes" narrative of the beginnings of George W. Bush's war making in Afghanistan and elsewhere. Woodward does appear to have been granted unprecedented access to what many consider to be the most secretive administration in American history, but that might leave one wondering how much the author was being managed by his subjects, Bush, Cheney, Powell, Rumsfeld, Rice, and Tenet. Annotation (c)2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Publishers Weekly

Quoting liberally from transcripts of National Security Council meetings and hundreds of interviews with those in the presidential inner circle, including four hours of interviews with Bush himself, the Washington Post assistant managing editor, best-selling author and Watergate muckraker manages to provide a nonpartisan account of the first 100 days of the post September 11 war on terror. While Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, President Bush and CIA Director George Tenet are impressive, Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz come off as hawkish and reactionary, repeatedly calling for a strike against Iraq in the first days of the conflict while pushing for a more widespread, global war. Woodward does an excellent job of exposing the seat-of-their-pants planning sessions conducted at the highest levels of power and the hectic diplomacy practiced by Powell and Bush in trying to get the air war against Afghanistan off the ground. He also brings to light the divisions among the planners concerning the bombing in Afghanistan, which made little impact until late in the game, when the Taliban lines were finally hit. In addition to recounting the heated arguments about when and how to retaliate against Al Qaeda, Woodward also follows Special Ops agents flown into Afghanistan with millions in payoff money weeks in advance of any other American presence. Living in harsh conditions with little to no support, these "110 CIA officers and 316 Special Forces personnel," in this account, ran the show, and effectively won the war with their intelligence gathering operations. While at times relying a bit too heavily on transcribed conversations, Woodward nonetheless offers one of the first truly insightful and informative accounts of the decision making process in the war on terror. 16 pages of b&w photos. ( Nov.) Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.

A rookie reporter at The Washington Post when he got the call about a break-in at the Watergate in 1972, Bob Woodward has become synonymous with the term "investigative reporter."