A Nation Like All Others

These are the kinds of large questions about the modern world and the U.S. place therein that would appeal to general readers and help them see that history may be much more than 'just one damned thing after another.'

Library Journal:
A fast yet comprehensive read with wide appeal for those interested in how the country has evolved to its present uncomfortable condition

James Mann, scholar-in-residence, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies:
Cohen’s deep scholarship and incisive writing have combined to make him for decades the leading historian of American foreign policy and diplomacy. This book succeeds in taking the reader concisely through the full sweep of America’s relations with the rest of the world.

Walter LaFeber, Cornell University:
Cohen’s lucid writing and distinguished scholarship have settled key questions in the history of U.S.-Asian relations, and he does the same here in magnificently relating four hundred years of U.S. relations with the world. Gemlike portrayals of Ben Franklin through McKinley (the 1890s marked ‘the point of no return’ for Americans) to Obama will attract students and general readers alike.

Melvyn P. Leffler, Edward Stettinius Professor of American History, University of Virginia:
In this brief and illuminating account of U.S. foreign policy from Benjamin Franklin and the American Revolution to Donald Trump and ‘America first,’ Cohen displays the wisdom and insight that have made him one of the country’s most admired chroniclers of American diplomacy. Lamenting the nation’s loss of its moral compass, Cohen deftly probes the economic, strategic, and domestic political imperatives that make it so difficult to reconcile the exceptionalism he cherishes with the realism he admires.

Jeremi Suri, University of Texas at Austin:
A Nation Like All Others is a book like none other. Warren I. Cohen offers an authoritative but brief overview of American interactions with the wider world from the founding of the nation to our present day. He covers all the major events with acute observations about the sources of policy, compelling judgments of decision makers, and thoughtful ruminations about how things fit together (or not). This is an opinionated survey of American trials and tribulations, delivered as a single narrative with larger-than-life protagonists.

George Herring, University of Kentucky:
A lively, well-written history of America’s foreign policy and diplomacy from 1776 to the present. This is a superb synthesis, in places quite provocative in its arguments, and a signal accomplishment.