Updated: 10 hours ago
"Unquestionably the interest of the United States was that of civilization."
-Lord Charnwood, 'Theodore Roosevelt' (1923)
The United States has had 46 American Presidents, and there are extensive biographies and books written about them. Some U.S. Presidents were a very big deal. When studying a President, I want to know what historians and readers think are the legit best biographies to dig into before investing my time in a large volume, as I would on any major historical figure.
Not saying I know for sure that Lord Charnwood's biography on 'Abraham Lincoln' is the #1 book on President Lincoln, but to me it probably is.
I find Charnwood well researched, honest, and he wrote unique insights on America that I already knew to be true from other sources. I loved Lord Charnwood's biography on Abraham Lincoln so much that I went to town on his biography about Theodore Roosevelt (our 26th President). And again in this biography, I found unique insights that convinced me Lord Charnwood understood what America was (in his day), and Roosevelt's role in it.
In Lord Charnwood's 'Theodore Roosevelt' (1923), is a chapter called 'The Inherited Foreign Policy'. This is about how the United States fought Spain, at the time a brutal slave empire in the Spanish American War (1898), quickly won, and annexed Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines, anchoring USA to Asia for the last 120 years.
With Taiwan in the news, and China in a tizzy, we should be examining America's century old role in Asia, how we got there, and why we should be ready to fight militarily to maintain our status quo.