Book Reviews : The Coming of the Whirlwind. By CONSTANTINE BROWN. (Chicago: Henry Reg nery Company, 1964. Pp. 381. $4.95.)
| DOI | 10.1177/106591296401700422 |
| Published date | 01 December 1964 |
| Author | Isaac A. Stone |
| Date | 01 December 1964 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
808
to
the
other
with
no
interruption
of
thought,
and
each
successive
theme
fits
well
in
his
general
scheme.
But
most
important,
unlike
most
North
American
writers,
he
has
captured
the
Mexican
mysticism
and
psychology
in
this
insightful
work.
In
so
doing,
he
has
written
a
superb
book
and
produced
an
invaluable
aid
to
the
student
interested
in
Latin
America.
Inasmuch
as
a
new
president
of
Mexico
was
recently
inaugurated,
his
book
is
both
timely
and
appropriate.
RODOLFO
MARTÍNEZ
University
of
Utah
The
Coming
of
the
Whirlwind.
By
CONSTANTINE
BROWN.
(Chicago:
Henry
Reg-
nery
Company,
1964.
Pp. 381.
$4.95.)
Constantine
Brown
was
diverted
from
teaching
political
science
to
political
journalism
by
the
combined
circumstances
of
lack
of
immediate
employment
and
finding
himself
in
Europe
at
the
outbreak
of
World
War
I.
His
areas
of
reporting
included
fringes
of
the
Eastern
front
and
the
Balkans.
He
interviewed
Lenin
(date
unspecified),
confessing
that
he
found
him
unimpressive
and
did
not
expect
the
Soviet
regime
to
last.
He
witnessed
the
Greek-Turkish
war
and
was
impressed
by
Kemal
and
our
Admiral
Mark
Bristol.
After
the
war
he
served
the
Chicago
Daily
News
in
Paris,
London,
and
Washington.
Dismissed
brusquely
by
Frank
Knox,
the
paper’s
new
owner,
for
failure
to
&dquo;clear&dquo;
his
news
stories
with
the
White
House
under
Hoover,
he
became
a
foreign
news
commentator
for
the
Washington
Evening
Star
and
subsequently
a
syndicated
columnist.
His
column,
especially
during
World
War
II
and
since,
has
dwelt
on
a
uniform
theme:
Russian
perfidy.
His
main
&dquo;pipelines&dquo;
prior
to
and
during
the
last
war
included
Loy
Henderson
of
the
State
Department
and
Admiral
William
D.
Leahy.
Brown
also
admires
Hoover,
Secretary
Hull,
Gen-
eral
MacArthur;
he
dislikes
Roosevelt,
Harry
Hopkins,
Justice
Frankfurter
(whose
influence
he
inordinately
magnifies),
Sumner
Welles.
Serious
students
will
find
in
Brown’s
loosely
recorded
memoirs
some
interest,
little
of
historical
value,
and
a
fair
share
of
misinformation.
An
especially
serious
flaw
is
the
author’s
habit
of
relating
as
historical
facts
the
gossip
of
the
period
in
ques-
tion
without
reference
to
the
large
body
of
material
since
published
which
makes
nonsense
of
his
accounts.
He
writes
in
1963
as
if
the
State
and
War
Department
publications
and
much
of
the
memoir
literature
were
nonexistent.
Unsupported
statements
abound.
For
example,
what
is
the
source
for
the
statement
that
the
Soviets
had
obtained
from
the
Anglo-French
negotiating
team
in
Moscow
in
the
summer
of
1939
&dquo;every
smallest
detail
of
[their]
military,
naval
and
air
power&dquo;
which
they
promptly
passed
on
to
the
Germans?
In
regard
to
the
Soviet
efforts
to
buy
a
battle-
ship
in
1939
Brown
should
have
consulted
the
special
Foreign
Relations
volume
on
U.S.-Soviet
relations
instead
of
repeating
dated
gossip.
Leahy
is
described
as
chair-
man
of
the
Joint
and
Combined
Chiefs
of
Staffs
(!),
and
Roosevelt,
it
is
asserted,
was
obliged
-
but
perversely
refused
-
to
take
his
advice
on
diplomatic
issues.
It
is
highly
unlikely
that
Leahy
rebuked
Roosevelt
in
the
language quoted
directly
on
page
301.
The
volume
Conferences
at
Cairo
and
Tehran
furnishes
the
real
reason
for
Roosevelt’s
decision
to
make
his
headquarters
at
the
Soviet
Embassy
at
Tehran.
What
is
the
source
for
the
assertion
that
the
Soviets
dissolved
the
&dquo;Free
German&dquo;
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