A Force So Swift

Kevin Peraino's absorbing book covers that tipping-point year, 1949, when Mao Zedong's Chinese Communist Party came to power and things not only changed radically within China, but also for Chinese-American relations.... This so-called loss of China has echoed down through the decades so that today the United States still finds itself groping for how best to deal with an even more consequential China.... However, unlike the world of 1949, so dramatically described by Peraino in his timely book, our current globalized world renders separation not even thinkable. -The New York Times Book Review A useful guide...The intimate, blow-by-blow reconstruction of the story offers a vivid sense of what it must have been like for American policy makers as they grappled...with the rapidly deteriorating situation in China....What Mr. Peraino does well is to capture a critical moment in the founding of what is today the most important bilateral relationship in the world and to show the dynamics that so often complicate the policy maker's task at times of upheaval and revolution. -The Wall Street Journal China is likely to be the most significant force in the global life of the 21st century, a prospect that makes Kevin Peraino's lucid and compelling new book all the more relevant. By reconstructing the Truman reaction to the fall of Nationalist China and the rise of Mao, Peraino takes us back to the beginning of the journey. This book is excellent history that informs the headlines of today. -Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Destiny and Power Kevin Peraino has written a compelling narrative about the dramatic events of 1949, when Mao's armies defeated Chiang Kai-shek and Truman had to decide what to do about it. In this well-researched and well-crafted book, he tells us about Mao's calculations and about the arguments in Washington--events that would determine U.S. policy in Asia for the next thirty years. -Frances FitzGerald, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Fire in the Lake Just now, when Americans are again trying to make sense of China, a new look at the postwar roots of U.S.-Chinese relations could not be more timely. And a riveting look this is, filled with charismatic individuals, dramatic moments and fraught decisions that still shape our world today. -H.W. Brands, author of The General vs. the President As China looms ever larger as America's global rival, it is hard to remember--or even imagine--a time when America was said to have lost China. The time was 1949, and Kevin Peraino takes us there with vividness and immediacy, a sure hand and a clear eye. This is narrative history at its most compelling. -Evan Thomas, author of Being Nixon Nineteen forty-nine was a transformative year in world affairs, and Kevin Peraino splendidly captures its significance and the larger-than-life personalities that made things happen. An important book, and a great read. -George C. Herring, author of The American Century and Beyond