This paper offers a critical review of Thomas Barnett's 2003 book The Pentagon's New Map, in which Barnett argues that the United States military remained dangerously fixated on Cold War strategy well into the post-Soviet era. The review examines Barnett's central thesis that America must foster greater interconnectedness with functional states to combat threats emanating from dysfunctional ones, his proposal for a two-pronged military force capable of both rapid strike and nation-building operations, and the limitations of his framework. The paper also assesses the practicality of Barnett's reforms in light of U.S. actions in Iraq, inter-agency rivalry, and the political complexities of international coalition-building.
The paper demonstrates evaluative book reviewing — a technique that requires the writer to reconstruct an author's argument faithfully before subjecting each element to scrutiny. By first establishing Barnett's thesis and then probing its internal contradictions (e.g., the tension between advocating international cooperation while proposing unilateral U.S.-led military structures), the reviewer shows how critical analysis goes beyond summary.
The review opens by framing the problem Barnett addresses — post-Cold War strategic inertia — then moves through his central thesis, historical narrative, and reform proposals in roughly the order they appear in the book. The final sections pivot to critique, raising questions about feasibility, cultural barriers, and ideological contradictions, before closing with a verdict on the book's overall contribution. This mirrors the standard structure of an academic book review: context → argument reconstruction → critical evaluation → conclusion.
One of the greatest dangers — and most common military fallacies — of national leaders is to fight the last war rather than address the current and future strategic challenges facing the world. In his book The Pentagon's New Map, Tom Barnett argues that United States military leaders were not exempt from this mistake during the 1990s. At that time, America remained focused in its strategic design on fighting the Cold War of the past, rather than recognizing how the new world order would create a different series of geographic alliances between what Barnett calls functional and dysfunctional states.
Although Barnett is himself a product of the Pentagon and the American military education system, he argues that the containment of a bipolar power like the Soviet Union was an entirely different challenge from keeping America's borders safe from terrorism. "When the Cold War ended, our real challenge began" (1). The Soviet Union, though a tyranny, was a cohesive structure — unlike the nations of the Middle East, Latin America, Central America, and other dysfunctional regions that present a multitude of threats rather than a single, unified one. Barnett contends that America must deploy globalization effectively by ideologically unifying with other functional countries to create stronger security arrangements.
Despite the complexity of the global threat environment, Barnett argues that America can and must assume a leading world security role. A professor at the U.S. Naval War College, Barnett takes as his central theme the notion of "America sleeping" in the period leading up to 9/11. His thesis calls for greater interconnectedness with other nations, rather than the besieged, bunker mentality of independence that he believes still characterizes the thinking of many military and government officers. America must police rogue states, he contends, but must also clean up the political and economic mess left afterward — using a specially organized force operating under formal protocols, rather than an ad hoc "whatever works" strategy.
Interestingly, Barnett cites his "Midwestern optimism" and his identity as a child of the 1960s as being just as important to constructing his thesis as his military background. His argument centers on the need for greater international unity and strategic sharing of intelligence and data on security and terrorism between functional states, in opposition to dysfunctional ones. The distinction between these two categories of states forms the conceptual backbone of the entire book.
The book traces the shell-shocked strategic attitude that followed the Cold War's demise through the nationalism and ethnic conflicts that erupted in Eastern Europe during the 1990s. During this period, America was not "a global cop," as it had long considered itself, but rather "a global fireman" — putting out occasional fires without picking up the pieces, rebuilding torn political systems, or teaching the participants how to prevent future conflagrations (5). This reactive posture, Barnett argues, generated significant international ill will toward the United States and ultimately contributed to the conditions that produced the terrorist threat of today and beyond.
Barnett's proposal to create a dedicated nation-building force to operate after the fight is intriguing, and the establishment of specific protocols for such activity might well have been beneficial in Iraq. However, the author strikes an alarming note when offering his more controversial predictions, such as the possible annexation of neighboring nations by the United States fifty years into the future. Perhaps his most provocative assertion is that "the terrorist attacks of 9/11 simply revealed the yawning gap between the military we built to win the Cold War and the different" military system, strategy, and alliance structure "we need to build" to "secure globalization's ultimate goal" — the end of war as we know it (2). While greater "connectivity" is a worthy aspiration, this is not easily achieved. One must also ask whether the active pursuit of dysfunctional states might create more conflict in the short term, even if it promises less in the long term.
Despite his cry for an end to war, much of Barnett's argument — such as using the United States military aggressively against what he calls dysfunctional or renegade states — could be read as simply a resurrection of the idea of the United States as the world's policeman, with other nations in its service. Ultimately, The Pentagon's New Map provokes important questions but does not provide genuinely satisfying political or theoretical answers to the strategic problems of today.
Barnett, Thomas. The Pentagon's New Map. New York: Putnam, 2003.
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