Brilliant, Compelling, Practical, Essential and Unnerving,
December 10, 2001
John G. Heidenrich
The author of this book not only completed graduate work with a direct focus on genocide, but spent over a year supporting the Office of War Crimes at the Department of State, each day creating an open source intelligence report on genocide-at the time he was engaged in this activity, there were eighteen (18) such active genocidal movements going on around the world.This is a brilliant and compelling book that is also practical and essential for anyone who desires to understand the complete inadequacy of the diplomats, the policymakers, the media, and the intelligence communities. It is unnerving in its calm and reasoned detailing of how genocide can take place, its survey of the millions upon millions of post-WWII holocausts taking place today–as the media and policymakers ignore these realities.
Citizen-voters, in my view, will benefit considerably from this book because it will help them understand that there are three worlds out there, and we as a nation are not dealing well with two of the three–the most dangerous two. There is the world of well-fed diplomats and businessman, traveling and negotiating in their warm safe buffer zones. There is the real world as experienced by normal people, many of whom are oppressed and poor and feel helpless in the face of dictatorial regimes and local warlords who may do as they wish absent the rule of law. And then there is the world of genocide, an underworld of such horrific pervasive violence and inhuman brutality that one can only wonder if we are all guilty of mass insanity for turning our backs on this murder of millions.
The author is a world-class scholar and ardent champion for informing the public and achieving informed policy in this vital area, and I can only hope that serious people put some money behind his thinking.
