How to Hide an Empire, Daniel Immerwahr
How to Hide an Empire, Daniel Immerwahr
6 Rating(s)
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How to Hide an Empire
A History of the Greater United States

Author: Daniel Immerwahr

Narrator: Luis Moreno

Unabridged: 17 hr 25 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 02/19/2019


Synopsis

A pathbreaking history of the United States' overseas possessions and the true meaning of its empire We are familiar with maps that outline all fifty states. And we are also familiar with the idea that the United States is an "empire," exercising power around the world. But what about the actual territories-the islands, atolls, and archipelagos-this country has governed and inhabited? In How to Hide an Empire, Daniel Immerwahr tells the fascinating story of the United States outside the United States. In crackling, fast-paced prose, he reveals forgotten episodes that cast American history in a new light. We travel to the Guano Islands, where prospectors collected one of the nineteenth century's most valuable commodities, and the Philippines, site of the most destructive event on U.S. soil. In Puerto Rico, Immerwahr shows how U.S. doctors conducted grisly experiments they would never have conducted on the mainland and charts the emergence of independence fighters who would shoot up the U.S. Congress. In the years after World War II, Immerwahr notes, the United States moved away from colonialism. Instead, it put innovations in electronics, transportation, and culture to use, devising a new sort of influence that did not require the control of colonies. Rich with absorbing vignettes, full of surprises, and driven by an original conception of what empire and globalization mean today, How to Hide an Empire is a major and compulsively readable work of history.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Sunny on November 23, 2024

Excellent. Endlessly gagged......more

Goodreads review by Callum on January 20, 2025

The United States consists of 50 states and 16 territories. It could have been larger. The Philippines was once a US colony, and the US occupied Japan, South Korea, and West Germany post-WWII. However, the Philippines was granted independence, and the latter nations were not annexed. Why? According......more

Goodreads review by Wick on November 23, 2021

The United States is in everyone's backyard. This is a sweeping and scholarly work which sticks to its guns to prove a very poignant fact about the United States: it was created as an empire and continues to operate as such today. In How to Hide an Empire, Immerwahr provides a jaw-dropping account of......more