Confront and Conceal : Obama's Secret Wars and Surprising Use of American Power

**FROM INSIDE OBAMA'S SITUATION ROOM . . . THE CRITICAL MOMENTS IN THE COVERT WAR AGAINST IRAN, THE STRUGGLES TO DEAL WITH A RECALCITRANT PAKISTAN AND ITS FAST-GROWING NUCLEAR ARSENAL, THE TENSIONS WITH THE AMERICAN MILITARY OVER AFGANISTAN AND WITH ALLIES SWEPT UP IN THE CHAOS OF THE ARAB SPRING** Three and a half years ago, David Sanger's book __The Inheritance: The World Obama Confronts and the Challenges to American Power__ described how a new American president came to office with the world on fire. Now, just as the 2012 presidential election battle begins, Sanger follows up with an eye-opening, news-packed account of how Obama has dealt with those challenges, relying on innovative weapons and reconfigured tools of American power to try to manage a series of new threats. Sanger describes how Obama's early idealism about fighting "a war of necessity" in Afghanistan quickly turned to fatigue and frustration, how the early hopes that the Arab Spring would bring... Inside the White House Situation Room, the newly elected Barack Obama immerses himself in the details of a remarkable new American capability to launch cyberwar against Iran--and escalates covert operations to delay the day when the mullahs could obtain a nuclear weapon. Over the next three years Obama accelerates drone attacks as an alternative to putting troops on the ground in Pakistan, and becomes increasingly reliant on the Special Forces, whose hunting of al-Qaeda illuminates the path out of an unwinnable war in Afghanistan. Confront and Conceal provides readers with a picture of an administration that came to office with the world on fire. It takes them into the Situation Room debate over how to undermine Iran's program while simultaneously trying to prevent Israel from taking military action that could plunge the region into another war. It dissects how the bin Laden raid worsened the dysfunctional relationship with Pakistan. And it traces how Obama's early idealism about fighting "a war of necessity" in Afghanistan quickly turned to fatigue and frustration. One of the most trusted and acclaimed national security correspondents in the country, David Sanger of the New York Times takes readers deep inside the Obama administration's most perilous decisions: The president dispatches an emergency search team to the Gulf when the White House briefly fears the Taliban may have obtained the Bomb, but he rejects a plan in late 2011 to send in Special Forces to recover a stealth drone that went down in Iran. Obama overrules his advisers and takes the riskiest path in killing Osama bin Laden, and ignores their advice when he helps oust Hosni Mubarak from the presidency of Egypt. "The surprise is his aggressiveness," a key ambassador who works closely with Obama reports. Yet the president has also pivoted American foreign policy away from the attritional wars of the past decade, attempting to preserve America's influence with a lighter, defter touch--all while focusing on a new era of diplomacy in Asia and reconfiguring America's role during a time of economic turmoil and austerity. As the world seeks to understand whether there is an Obama Doctrine, Confront and Conceal is a fascinating, unflinching account of these complex years, in which the president and his administration have found themselves struggling to stay ahead in a world where power is diffuse and America's ability to exert control grows ever more elusive. Examines Obama's aggressive use of innovative weapons and new tools of American power to manage a rapidly shifting world of global threats and challenges. FROM INSIDE OBAMA’S SITUATION ROOM . . . THE CRITICAL MOMENTS IN THE COVERT WAR AGAINST IRAN, THE STRUGGLES TO DEAL WITH A RECALCITRANT PAKISTAN AND ITS FAST-GROWING NUCLEAR ARSENAL, THE TENSIONS WITH THE AMERICAN MILITARY OVER AFGHANISTAN AND WITH ALLIES SWEPT UP IN THE CHAOS OF THE ARAB SPRING Three and a half years ago, David Sanger’s book The Inheritance: The World Obama Confronts and the Challenges to American Power described how a new American president came to office with the world on fire. Now, just as the 2012 presidential election battle begins, Sanger follows up with an eye-opening, news-packed account of how Obama has dealt with those challenges, relying on innovative weapons and reconfigured tools of American power to try to manage a series of new threats. Sanger describes how Obama’s early idealism about fighting “a war of necessity” in Afghanistan quickly turned to fatigue and frustration, how the early hopes that the Arab Spring would bring about a democratic awakening slipped away, and how an effort to re-establish American power in the Pacific set the stage for a new era of tensions with the world’s great rising power, China. As the world seeks to understand the contours of the Obama Doctrine, Confront and Conceal is a fascinating, unflinching account of these complex years, in which the president and his administration have found themselves struggling to stay ahead in a world where power is diffuse and America’s ability to exert control grows ever more elusive. "President Obama's administration came to office with the world on fire. Confront and Conceal is the story of how, in his first term, Obama secretly used the most innovative weapons and tools of American power, including our most sophisticated -and still unacknowledged - arsenal of cyberweapons, aimed at Iran's nuclear program. Washington and the world were rocked by Confront and Conceal, which goes deep into the Situation Room as Obama questions whether this new weapon can slow Iran and avoid a war - or whether it will create blowback, as the Iranians and others retaliate with cyberattacks on the United States. It describes how the bin Laden raid worsened the dysfunctional relationship with Pakistan, and how Obama's early idealism about fighting a "war of necessity" in Afghanistan quickly turned to fatigue, frustration, and now withdrawal. As the world seeks to understand how Obama will cope with nationalistic leaders in Beijing, a North Korea bent on developing a nuclear weapon that can reach American shores, and an Arab world where promising revolutions turned to chaos, Confront and Conceal - with an updated epilogue for this paperback edition - provides an unflinching account of these complex years of presidential struggle, in which America's ability to exert control grows ever more elusive."-- Publisher's website Part I: Afghanistan and Pakistan : the curse of unfinished business. Blowing smoke ; "Afghan good enough" ; The bomb scare ; Getting bin Laden, losing Pakistan ; The long game : getting out, without really leaving Part II: Iran : the zone of immunity. The secret war chapter ; "Cut off the head of the snake" ; Olympic games ; "The land of lousy options" Part III: Drones and cyber : the remote-control war. The dark side of the light footprint Part IV: Arab spring : the revolts, and the rise of the brotherhood. "You sold out the revolution" ; Searching for the "right side of history" ; The riddle of the brotherhood ; What works once doesn't always work twice Part V: China and North Korea : the rebalancing. Restraining the tiger, containing the Kims Epilogue. Presents An Assessment Of Obama's Foreign-policy Challenges And Achievements Addressing Questions From The Outcomes Of Radically Different Approaches To American National Security To The Ways In Which Fiscal Constraints Have Affected American Power. Prologue -- Afghanistan And Pakistan: The Curse Of Unfinished Business -- Iran: The Zone Of Immunity -- Drones And Cyber: The Remote-control War -- Arab Spring: The Revolts, And The Rise Of The Brotherhood -- China And North Korea: The Rebalancing -- Epilogue. David E. Sanger. Originally Published In Hardcover In Slightly Different Form In The United States By Crown Publishers ... New York, In 2012--page Vi. Includes Bibliographical References (pages 445-471) And Index.