To read a comprehensive history of the technical, military and political aspects of the Cold War, based on documents from the two super-powers, written by a scholar who is free of bias, is something I never thought I would be able to do. But in The Fifty-Year War I can. . . . For the men and women who are going to lead the world in the first generation of the Twenty-First Century, this account of how the Cold War was fought and won is indispensable. For those of us who lived through it. . . . Friedman's account is enthralling. Having spent much of my life reading about, studying, worrying about, participating in the Cold War, I thought there was nothing new for me to learn about it. Boy was I wrong. Read The Fifty-Year War and see why. - Stephen Ambrose