How should the United States act in the world? Americans cannot decide. Sometimes we burn with righteous anger, launching foreign wars and deposing governments. Then we retreat―until the cycle begins again. No matter how often we debate this question, none of what we say is original. Every argument is a pale shadow of the first and greatest debate, which erupted more than a century ago. Its themes resurface every time Americans argue whether to...

From the bestselling author of "Sea of Thunder" comes a riveting narrative about America's ferocious drive towards empire during the Gilded Age, and the uncanny resemblance of the Spanish-American War to the Iraq War of today.-- Publisher