This is one of the few books to find examples of from the hey-day of Christmas art. It's filled with works by Helen Sewell, Ray Greenleaf, Kate Greenway, Thomas Nast, Thomas Penfield, James Montgomery Flagg, and W.W. Denslow. Also wonderful photographs by Weegee, Underwood and Underwood, CIndy Sherman, and others. But the secret of this book is the Christmas literature: xmas Dream Songs by John Berryman, first editions of Thackery's xmas books, firsts of all of Dickens xmas books, and other amazing and unique examples of Christmas literature and children's books. A great book for the Christmas enthusiast.

In light the number of stars I have given this book, I feel I should start off be stating that there is tremendous merit in this work. The authors do a superb job of pointing out the root causes of warfare, and why it is naïve to expect that armed conflict has gone by the wayside. They then go on to point out the challenges to American global preeminence, and what needs to be done to assure it.

Specifically they look to precision-guided munitions as the key weapons of future combat, and space as its primary battleground. They make compelling arguments for each, particularly regarding the obsolescence of the primary weapons of today's Pax Americana: the tank, the strategic bomber, and the aircraft carrier. Furthermore, the completely debunk the myth of nuclear supremacy on the modern battlefield.

The problems with this book that I alluded to are twofold. First, the editing is appalling; there are numerous typos and misprints (for example, referring to a torpedo that can travel at 400 knots). While the knowledgeable reader can usually infer what the authors' intent is, editorial errors always make for a frustrating reading experience.

The second concern cuts to the heart of the book. While the authors do a superb job of defining the future battlefield, they offer very little in terms of how we get there from where we currently stand. The weapons systems they describe will almost certainly come to pass, but they neither make suggestions as to the allocation of R&D dollars, nor offer any sense of what research should receive priority. In the absence of such commentary, their bold assertions frequently seem more like dogma than scholarship. Moreover, they ignore potential doctrinal changes that might extend the service life of current weapons systems while increasing their effectiveness.

At its best, 'The Future of War' is a visionary look into the future of armed conflict. The authors correctly grasp the dawning senility of the weapons currently deployed, and paint a bold picture of what the future battlefield will look like. Unfortunately, while brilliantly describing the future, they completely ignore the near to middle term. As a result, 'The Future of War' while well worth reading, can only be treated as half of an equation. One must read the works of authors like Leonhard and MacGregor to truly appreciate the shape of the modern battlefield.

This book is more than the grocery store's blase` litany of new gizmos that has Tom Clancy's name slapped on it. So if you are intersted in a book that natters about specific weapons systems ad nauseum, you are better off shopping there or else watching the Discovery Channel. The Friedmans' book is useful because it sees technology as more than a collection of shiny and expensive toys that make loud noises; although utterly essential and often defining our ability to achieve our ends, technology is always a pillar within a grander scheme.

The value in this book is its capability to trace a concept historically, and provide us with a valuable and critical perspective of our strategic strength. Consequently we are able to analyze something transcending the, "Our ship is better than their ship," manner of thought.

So a framework of strategic thought, within which technological capability relative to others is essential for analysis, gives us insight into future needs. Whether their conclusions are valid are certainly open to debate; the approach, however, is certainly valuable.

Like, 'The Coming War With Japan,' this book is able to use multiple levels of understanding to present their arguments.......... the importance of the Friedmans' work is growing everyday. Worth the read.

This book directs one's attention to the discussion the way we have thought about war will no longer be as relevant in the future. The notion of "weapons reaching and obsolete status" points to a central thesis in the book--that America will remain the preponderant military and technical power of the 21st century. This of course may be a comforting piece of information for policy shapers and makers, and business peoples. But is it really ? Such dominance by one nation is bound to lead to the shifting of the balance of power among nations unless the movement toward internationalization proves to be successful. However, aspiring powers and emerging nations that wish to be freed from this American dominance may -- and there seems to be information to support this -- seek weapons of mass destruction to counter US global hegemony.

This book made a clearly argued case for American Dominance, but it does not help us to see the political/moral future. But within its parameters, its an "eye-opener."

The authors' central point is that the events leading to the war in the Pacific (1937-1945) are (contemporary to the early 90s) repeating themselves, and that another war between the U.S. and Japan is imminent. The proof of this is there, and incredibly accurate, but the authors' have failed to grasp the emotional and sociological reasons why that war will not come. As an analysis of the causes of WWII in the Pacific, and why Japan's economy suddenly fell apart in the late 90s, this book is as good as it gets -- just don't buy their predictions.

Even though this book is getting older, it's worth finding it at your library and giving it a read. The Friedmans see the world returning to more classic, zero-sum balance-of-power relationships in the post-Cold War context. This is even the case as regional, multilateral, and global international institutions develop. Since the nation-state system is still the most legitimate actor in these relationships, it seems that final equations of national interests will be the utlimate determinants of peace, war, and wealth in the coming decades.

This is an important consideration to understand if we are interested in looking at the world as a set of relationships that are more than public relations gestures [Kissinger's, 'Diplomacy' is also essential].

This 'Coming War With Japan,' identifies a set of mutually incompatible needs of both the United States and Japan that will ultimately define their relationship in the absence of the Soviet threat. China certainly understand this as well. These needs dwell in the economic and strategic spheres, much of it centering around energy needs.

The value of the Friedmans' approach -what makes their other book, 'The Future of War,' equally good- is to present these issues within a broad, historical context that gives us a perspective that isn't limited by the current context of our relationship. Even if you think that any differences between Japan and the United States can ultimately be resolved without was or economic conflict or else obscured by the growing prominence of China, this book still provides a useful perspective on the United States' relationship with Japan and its interests in the region.

The analysis of where post-Cold War politics is going is insightful and profound. Unfortunately, the alleged trigger for the coming war, European (non-) Union of 1992 has its roots in Cold War politics. Friedman used the dissipation of Cold War politics as the rationale for the coming impotence and disintegration of Cold War institutions (ie NATO). The EU is a child of Cold War politics; therefore the failing of successful integration should have been anticipated. Ergo, the "coming war" loses it's trigger. Still, the analysis is sound and I will be purchasing subsequent books from Friedman.

In this book, one can learn that: The internet started as a Defense Department project in the 80's p. 120 The proper way to search for pager manufacturing in internet web search engines is just to mention "pager", and not worry at all about other key words or symbols. p. 124 That, according to an intelligence project, pager repair could be a great business. p.139 I was lead to believe by a book review that this book would give me a great deal of information about passive intelligence gathering. It does not live up to its promise, and lacks credibility for so many factual (1,1969 2, +pager +manufacture + industry +trends ) and analytical (3 I threw my cell phone away, and got another for free)errors. What a shame.

I work as a professional performing due diligence for VC firms and client companies in Seattle and Silicon Valley. I have been using many of the techniques for several years that enable me to rapidly assess business opportunities and develop turnaround strategies. I am also a member of the Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals.

What this book did was enable me to enhance my business process and better articulate this extremely difficult line of work. For example, the business process outlined on page 58 is crucial in that it identifies several "Stop" or check points with clients. Key in this type of consulting, especially where steps you take as a consultant may directly add risk to your client, it is important to know where to draw the line and involve them for a decision. The authors clarify where the key decision points are when it comes to going from passive to semi-active, to active intelligence gathering. Critical, as time is money to you. But! to the client, information - or exposure thereof also means risk that could become your liability.

Consultants in this field are in the knowledge business, and one of the most difficult things to do is get the client to place a value on knowledge or intelligence. The authors, through wit and excellent real-world examples, spell out some of the keys to getting paid!! (pp 67). Naturally, this would go over the head of the casual reader who has never practiced and is looking for a "cook book" approach to due diligence of new business opportunities (i.e. see above commentary from Bogota).

This book is a "how to" book in that the authors have taken the time to clarify and rank several research tools and locations that one might not normally be aware of. This comparison alone is worth the money, as anyone who has used the web for performing research would agree.

The real brilliance in this book is subtle. By connecting the examples, you learn how to ask questions and iden! tify with what is important in doing intelligence research.! Again, for anyone who has gone in circles with clients who "don't know what they don't know", or worse yet, don't know how to value knowledge - this is critical to delivering fast, and minimizing your exposure.

Frankly, the Bogota guy didn't get it and has probably never performed true business intelligence. I agree that the coverage of the Internet web search engines, which used the example of finding information on pagers, is old news. The chapter's purpose was to show how more advanced tools outside of the Internet, such as Nexis, are preferred substitutes. That point was clearly made. However, this example was only used among 10 pages of chapter 5 (which was taken up with images of why the web doesn't work). The other 257 pp of this book are the meat.

My hats off to the authors for delivering a humorous text based on real-world wisdom that cuts through a very gray area that is as difficult to perform, as it is to explain.

As an investment banking anaylst, one of my primary jobs is build financial models of the companies we evaluate. One of the most underrated and (in my view) more important element of my work comes when we perform due diligence and understand the soundness of the assumptions we build into our models. Most analysts (in my experience) are too infatuated with their sophisticated spreadsheets and believe the sheer complexity of their models can compensate for a lack of understanding of the fundamental business they are set to evaluate.

The book does an outstanding job of articulating, at every step, the importance of challenging one's assumptions and systematically gathering, synthesizing, and =analyzing= information that helps to dig through the colored lenses of wishful thinking or purely numerical analysis. The occasional injection of humor is quite welcome - in a world of stuffy self-important books on business, here's a piece of work that was written by people who love what they do, and are adept at making you better at what you do as well.

I don't think it's something you'd want to read for its own sake unless you have a particular interest in the development of the novel in in the nineteenth century. The plot concerns the efforts of Sir Austin Feverel to prevent his son's marriage and then to break it up. There are ponderous attemps at humor. A tragic and melodramatic ending is tacked on. The story is often difficult to follow, with characters being assigned different names. Jane Austen had already shown how a a tight light novel could be constructed. Madame Bovary had been written (for the diffference between mediocrity and genius compare the descriptions of the food at the wedding breakasts in this and in Madame Bovary). This has the clumsy baggy long-winded structure of Dickens (who was writing Great Expectations at the sme time) but without the great characters and confrontations. This was popular literature in its time, and considered scandalous.

Excellent example of the style of the time.