Book Notes

• Published date: 01 March 1974
• DOI: 10.1177/106591297402700124
• Date: 01 March 1974
• Subject Matter: Articles

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BOOK NOTES
Tsars, Mandarins and Commissars: A History of Chinese-Russian Relations. By
.
HARRY SCHWARTZ. (New York: Doubleday, 1973. Pp. xiv, 300. paperback,
$2.50.)
On the basis of mostly secondary Western sources, the author presents a brief,
superficial historical survey of Sino-Russian relations since the mid-seventeenth
century. But, actually, nine of the eleven chapters in the book are devoted to the
analysis of events and controversies between the two neighbors in the past century.
The major change in this revised edition is the addition of a new last chapter to
summarize the Sino-Soviet conflict in 1964-72. The central theme throughout the
book is to demonstrate that overall Sino-Russian relations have been basically deter-
mined by the conflict of national interests and the manifestation of national power.
The book is principally a sensational, journalistic approach rather than an objec-
tive scholarly inquiry and an oversimplification of the complex subject rather than
a penetration of sophisticated intricacy. Its chief merit, however, lies in the analy-
sis of the complicated Russo-Chinese entanglement in view of the American-Rus-
sian-Chinese triangle.
EDWARD Su
The Roots of War. By RICHARD J. BARNET. (Baltimore: Penguin Books, Inc., 1972.
Pp. 350. $1.65.)
A profoundly realistic study of basic factors and forces, in the United States,
which have effectuated a generation of Washington war-making and which may
seem to promise a continuation of that war-making, when &dquo;Today, Pentagon files
are stuffed with contingency plans for future wars.... &dquo; Barnet finds three of these
&dquo;roots’&dquo; of our war-making: (1) our concentration of decision-making in a &dquo;na-
tional security bureaucracy&dquo;; (2) &dquo;our capitalist economy (ever more state capital)
and the business creed that sustains it&dquo; ; and (3) the susceptibility of our people &dquo;to
manipulation on ’national security’ issues.&dquo; Decrying this &dquo;national security&dquo; war-
making by &dquo;an elite preserve ... for the benefit of that elite,&dquo; Barnet offers con-
structive proposals for building &dquo;a society rooted in the politics of...