THE MARCH OF FOLLY : FROM TROY TO VIETNAM PB – BARBARA W. TUCHMAN

"From the distinguished American historian whose work has been acclaimed around the world, a major new book that penetrates one of the most bizarre and fascinating paradoxes in history: the persistent pursuit by governments of policies contrary to their own intersts. Across the march of thirty centuries, Tuchman brings to life the dramatic events which constitute folly s hallmark in government; the fall of Troy, symbolic prototype of freely chosen disaster; the Protestant secession, provoked by six decades of spectacularly corrupt papcy; the British forfeiture of the American colonies; and America s catastrophic thirty year involvement with vietnam. The March of Folly, a work of profound and poignant relevance today, is breathtaking in its scope, originality and vision, and represents the writing of Barbara Tuchman at it s finest."