Best Defense
Thomas E. Ricks' daily take on national security.

David Sanger’s ‘Confront and Conceal’ made me wonder: Should Barack Obama be seen as our first Asian president?

Here is a link to my review in today’s New York Times of David Sanger’s new book on President Obama’s foreign policy. As I say in the review, the strongest part of the book is the stuff about the joint Israeli-American cybercampaign against the Iranian nuclear infrastructure. (Btw, the copyeditor for the book review told ...

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Here is a link to my review in today's New York Times of David Sanger's new book on President Obama's foreign policy. As I say in the review, the strongest part of the book is the stuff about the joint Israeli-American cybercampaign against the Iranian nuclear infrastructure. (Btw, the copyeditor for the book review told me while editing it that she had checked and this is the first time the Times has used the word "cybercampaign" to describe a series of cyberattacks, which surprised me.)

Here is a link to my review in today’s New York Times of David Sanger’s new book on President Obama’s foreign policy. As I say in the review, the strongest part of the book is the stuff about the joint Israeli-American cybercampaign against the Iranian nuclear infrastructure. (Btw, the copyeditor for the book review told me while editing it that she had checked and this is the first time the Times has used the word "cybercampaign" to describe a series of cyberattacks, which surprised me.)

An interesting side observation in the book is Sanger’s comment that Obama’s "legendary self-control .  . . makes him seem like a politician from a more buttoned-down, controlled Asian environment."

I wonder: Is Obama actually our first Asian president?

Thomas E. Ricks covered the U.S. military from 1991 to 2008 for the Wall Street Journal and then the Washington Post. He can be reached at ricksblogcomment@gmail.com. Twitter: @tomricks1

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