A tired superpower?

October 22, 2024

ISLAMABAD – BOB Woodward writes the ultimate ‘insider’ accounts about American presidents, politics and foreign policy. He is one of the duo of journalists who exposed the Watergate scandal that led to president Richard Nixon’s downfall.

Woodward has long enjoyed unique access to America’s top political and military leaders. Which is why he is sometimes unflatteringly described as an ’“access journalist” who shows undue deference to his main, often anonymous sources.

His latest book, War, belongs to the same genre as earlier works and is based on scores of interviews offering insights into the highest levels of decision-making during Joe Biden’s presidency. What gives this book added significance is its publication on the eve of the American presidential election, as he draws comparisons between Donald Trump and Biden in how they dealt with international crises.

Woodward considers Trump as “the most reckless and impulsive president in American history”, who “is demonstrating the very same character as a presidential candidate in 2024”. He, therefore, deems Trump to be unfit for a second term in office. These views are no different from what Woodward previously wrote in his trilogy of books on the Trump presidency. The first two, titled Fear and Rage, were about the chaos in the Trump White House and depicted the former president as a self-obsessed, ill-informed and impetuous leader.

The principal focus of his new book is on how the Biden administration handled the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, although Woodward’s disclosures about Trump’s relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin — sending him Covid test kits when they were scarce at home — attracted greater pre-publication publicity for the book. War