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.