Ebook: Prophets on the Right: Profiles of Conservative Critics of American Globalism

First published in 1975, Prophets on the Right examines the views of five "isolationist" or "conservative" critics of American foreign policy from the 1930s through the beginning of the Cold War - Charles A. Beard, Oswald Garrison Villard, Robert A. Taft, John T. Flynn, and Lawrence Dennis. Coming from very different backgrounds, these men were united in their opposition to the idea (or ideology) that America's domestic prosperity and well-being depend upon foreign expansion. Radosh describes, in a lively and scholarly manner, how their views were affected by American involvement in World War II and by the Cold War. As Radosh explains in the new introduction for this edition, when he wrote Prophets on the Right he was an ardent supporter of the Left, and hence sympathetic to the "anti-imperialism" of these "right-wing" thinkers. But now, Radosh says, he is "proudly a supporter of American interventionism," accepting the view that the United States "has a positive role to play in the spread of democracy and the creation of democratic regimes around the world." Although he rejects the arguments of his five "prophets," Radosh believes they raised serious questions about American foreign policy, which must be answered by anyone who, like his present self, thinks they were wrong.