History and Foreign Affairs Roundtable Discussion &Book Club

A searing exploration of authoritarianism in the Middle East through the legacy of Gamal Abdel Nasser’s years in power in Cold War–era Egypt. We Are Your Soldiers examines seven countries—Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Yemen, and Libya—and Nasser’s impact on each of them.

The larger-than-life Egyptian president ruled for eighteen years between the coup d’état he led in 1952 and his death in 1970, during which he wrested control of the Suez Canal from the British and French empires.

The war against Japan was fought over a vast area that included the Pacific Ocean and islands, the SW Pacific, SE Asia, and China/ Burma/ India and culminated in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. How did Japan view their goals at the beginning of the war and how did they assess their enemy and their chances of winning throughout the war?

A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • A stunning history of the first national anti-terrorist campaign waged on American soil—when Ulysses S. Grant wielded the power of the federal government to dismantle the KKK, while testing the extent of states' rights.

The Ku Klux Klan was at its peak in the early 1870s and their mission was to obliterate the political power of newly emancipated Black Americans and their white allies. To repel the virulent tidal wave of violence, President Grant waged a two-term battle against the Klan.

Award-winning history writer and journalist Clay Risen tells the story of McCarthyism and the Red Scare—the anti-Communist witch hunt that gripped America in political hysteria during the decade following WW II. McCarthyism arose amid the conflict between social conservatives and New Deal progressives, and the onset of the Cold War.

An urgent, accessible, and important history, Red Scare reveals an all-too-familiar pattern of illiberal conspiracy-mongering and political and cultural backlash that speaks directly to the antagonism and divisiveness of our contemporary moment.