Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power by Robert D. Kaplan

Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power Reviews

• 
  Riku Sayuj

  
  Again, the high rating is for the scholarship and the presentation, not for the views or the conclusions. Full review might follow,
  but my essential view on Kaplan's world vision can be found here.
• 
  Max

  Most of the political economy books are very boring. 300 pages to prove a point that can be explained in 5 pages are the standard. I remember F.Zakaria's 'The Post-American World' was so boring I had to put it away after 50 pages. Hence, I took a gamble by picking up Monsoon, and it proved to be the black swan: 300 pages of entertaining and informative study of the geo-political situation in countries surrouding the Indian ocean.
  This book is a study that takes the reader on a journey through a thriving region, alive with desire for the future. We see Oman, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Birma, Indonesia and Zanzibar through the eyes of RK (who has visited all countries, something not all political commentators do), and understand their role in the Big Game for world power in which US and China are creeping ever closer. Complemented by historical background (those Portuguese were ruthless..) this book writes a full picture, which is not two dimensional, but at least 100 dimensional with local, historical, geopolitical and economic factors to take into consideration. Even though this book is not travel literature, RK perfectly shows what intellectual baggage a traveler in the Indian ocean requires in order to understand his surroundings. I love it. Every chapter increased my desire to book a ticket to one of those countries and go and explore myself.
  I was afraid for a disturbing American focus, but this is absolutely not the case. US and China are active in this region to secure their oil and gas supply. All countries are thus measured by their allegiance to China or US. This is understandable, because this Game for world power is what keeps geopolitical analysts busy - and it is the reason they pick up this book. The only thing I don't understand is that in other languages the subtitle is changed from '..the future of American power' to '..the future of World power'.
  Anyway, I'll be booking my ticket shortly.
• 
  AC

  This in intended to be a slightly more useful review than my first pass (below).
  
  Kaplan presents a survey of the Indian Ocean littoral – from Oman to Zanzibar - moving clockwise about the Sea in conscious imitation of the ancient periplous (
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periplous , which were descriptions of the Mediterranean, originally as seen from the side of a ship, moving clockwise around the Sea from the Straits of Gibraltar and back round again). Kaplan focuses on the geographical aspects, very much attuned to the relations between geography and history a-la-Braudel; on the historical background of the Indian Ocean littoral, from the Arabs, the Mughals, the Portugese – up to modern times; and the geopolitical aspects of this profoundly important region.
  
  Kaplan’s contention is that the Indian Ocean is about to replace the North Atlantic as the heart or center of the geopolitical realities of the 21st century. The reason for this is the rise of India, which is an Indian Ocean entity in large part; and the rise of China, whose energy needs, given that China is literally “walled-in” by the First Island Chain of U.S. Allies (Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Phillippines), will have to be satisfied by tankers that need to negotiate the Straits of Malacca (among other sea lanes). Moreover, just as the Indian Ocean of the 13th-17th centuries was a circle without a center (and without a geopolitical or power center), but a broadly diffused series of trading networks that produced, of necessity, a unique medieval cosmopolitanism – and notably, an Islamic medieval cosmopolitanism (!) – so, Kaplan thinks, the Indian Ocean of the coming years is set to play a similar role.
  
  His account of a non-arabic Islam, expressed by al-Jazeera at its best, is quite fascinating and persuasive.
  
  The key, of course, is that the U.S. play its role of elegant decline, and not teeter-off into the blood-drenched fantasies of the Neoconservatives (and their ilk) – and that China’s nationalists, of course, whom Mark Leonard calls the "neocomms", are also kept in check. (Kaplan supported the Bush War in Iraq, but has evolved, and frankly calls his earlier support a “mistake”.)
  
  The book also contains an important admixture of travelogue, thoroughly integrated with the larger themes, as Kaplan describes the actual tour that he took about the Indian Ocean – and it is beautifully written – almost hauntingly, in places… In addition to Oman, there is much on Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Burma, Indonesia, with a final chapter on Zanzibar. One of the most interesting chapters is number 15 on Chinese naval policy.
  
  A thoroughly impressive and important book – and a delight to read. I can’t recommend it highly enough. Consider this a six-star review.
  
  
  
  (This is a stunning book. Rich with travel, observation, geopolitical strategy, poetry... and vision both from above and from within.... Kaplan's tour of the Indian Ocean and the revival of the Muslim-Hindic trading world-emporium of the pre-Portugese and Western entry... symbolized by a rising China in the East... and an America that, one hopes, will sanely play its role of "elegant decline"... and by Al-Jazeera.... reading this book is to hear the tectonic plates of history moving in our times....)
• 
  Tariq Mahmood

  A Very engaging political travelogue about a number of countries around the Indian Ocean. I enjoyed the historical references juxtaposed with current issues affecting the various regions covered. The two biggest power players besides America are India and China, while the most modern Islamic country is Indonesia. Both Pakistan and Burma are frontier states which along with Bangladesh have been branded as failed states. The author predicts a gradual take over of the Indian Ocean by China slowly overtaking America as the main policeman of the sea. The change is inevitable and irreversible. Will it destabilize the region for the worst or the better? China does not seem to have as much hubris as the Americans so I expect the change to be for the better.
  
  The book is a great read for anyone interested in the politics of the region.
• 
  Everett Probasco

  A better title of this would be "Monsoon: The Histories and Geopolitics of the Indian Ocean". The "Future of the American Power" content is thin at best.
• 
  Mal Warwick

  Late in Barack Obama’s first term in the White House, his administration began to execute a foreign policy strategy known as the “pivot to Asia.”
  
  The new policy was tacitly grounded in the realization that the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the long-standing primacy of the Atlantic Alliance, had distracted the country from the new emerging world order. No longer could the United States reflexively command respect as the world’s sole superpower.
  
  The planet’s center of gravity was inexorably moving toward Asia, with the emergence of China, and secondarily of India, as regional powers—both of them candidates for future superpower status. And that is the reality the geopolitical theorist Robert D. Kaplan explores in his thought-provoking 2010 book, Monsoon, which anticipated Obama’s “pivot” by two years.
  
  South Asia holds the key to the planet’s future
  
  The themes that predominate in Monsoon, as in much of Kaplan’s other work, are the profound impact of geography, the enduring importance of history, and realpolitik. It’s unsurprising that he would be so popular in the defense establishment, which shares these preoccupations. In his view, Asia, and most particularly South Asia, holds the key to the future big-power alignments of the twenty-first century. That future, he believes, will play itself out along the shores of the Indian Ocean, which stretches from East Africa, the Middle East, and the Indian subcontinent to Southeast Asia and the Indonesian archipelago. It’s a future in which naval forces will be dominant.
  
  The success of the “pivot to Asia” will play out on the Indian Ocean
  
  Strategically, Kaplan sees the central question is whether China will truly succeed in building a two-ocean navy to match that of the United States. Writing before the pivot to Asia, he lacked confidence that the US Navy would command the resources to maintain its hegemony in the Indian Ocean as well as the western Pacific. (At the time, the Navy possessed fewer than 300 capital ships; currently, however, that number has grown to more than 490.) But he sees competition coming not just from China. India, too, is a naval power, and as its economy continues its rapid growth, Kaplan foresees its navy becoming formidable, also.
  
  An excellent guide to the geopolitics of the 21st century
  
  In Monsoon, Kaplan blends accounts of his extended travels throughout the littoral of the Indian Ocean with historical and geographic commentary, interviews with soldiers, political leaders, and activists, and fine-tuned geopolitical analysis. Along the way, he portrays some of the individuals, past and present, who have most deeply influenced the shape of the Indian Ocean world today. His portraits of the Sultan of Oman, the British imperialists Robert Clive and George Curzon, and now-Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi before he attained national office, are especially revealing.
  
  To understand the pivot to Asia, and grasp the stakes of the new grand game being played out in the waters of the Indian Ocean, Monsoon is an excellent guide.
  
  About the author
  
  Over the years, Robert D. Kaplan (1952-) has moved steadily in and out of the defense establishment. As a thinker, he has lately been most closely identified with the think tank the Center for a New American Security and the Defense Policy Board, a federal advisory committee to the Pentagon. He is, however, primarily a writer. His nineteen books to date encompass foreign affairs and travel, often between the same covers. His work has also frequently appeared in the nation’s leading newspapers and magazines.
• 
  laurel [the suspected bibliophile]

  Eh it was ok. Kaplan's views on imperialism feel dated and simplistic. Too tired to read a longer review.
  
  Fun fact: in the audiobook, the narrator over-pronounces things like quasi (quay-sai).
• 
  Adrian

  For anyone familiar with Robert D Kaplan's previous writings on the Indian Ocean in Foreign Affairs, or the changing nature of geopolitics, one would at first assume that this was merely an expansion of the aforementioned subjects. However, Kaplan's Monsoon is much more than such an impersonal academic treatise, it is both a journey through the history and the present of the Indian Ocean countries.
  The central premise of Monsoon is that the Indian Ocean, rather than the Pacific and Atlantic, will be the new theatre of power rivalry in the 21st century as a result of the rise of China and India, and the ever growing importance of commerce along this sea route. At its heart is the continuing importance of Persian Gulf commerce, coupled with the growth of the Hydrocarbon market in Central Asia, and the desire of all powers to reach the sea. Particular flash points Kaplan outlines are Burma, where India and China are competing for influence with the regime for access to gas reserves and expanded trade routes, and the strait of Malacca, essentially the gateway between the Indian and Pacific Oceans. In the 21st century world military power still counts, and this is indispensable when faced with piracy off the horn of Africa, and stability of commerce routes, but so does economic power and economic interconnectedness.
  While one would assume Monsoon to be a study of Globalization, it is in fact a historical study that reveals globalization is much older than commonly assumed. From the first chapter of the book, studying Oman's far reaching sea faring activity, to the final chapter exploring Zanzibar's microcosm of the global village, Monsoon reveals that Globalization has featured many different incarnations, whether it was the seafaring Omanis, the crusade minded Portuguese, the Dutch, and later the English, the Indian Ocean was paramount in the expansion of global power, and will indeed return to pre-eminence.
  Robert D Kaplan is by trade a travel writer and security analyst par excellence, and his travel writing expertise is evinced within Monsoon as one is not simply recounted data upon the countries in question, rather one is transported there in person through Kaplan's beautifully worded prose that fleshes out the various locations of his travels.
  Monsoon is not only a study of the changing face of geopolitics, it is both a beautifully worded travel memoir and historical journey that is both a pleasure to the senses, and a treat for the inquisitively minded.
• 
  Prash

  From time to time a book comes that dramatically transforms those who come into contact with it. I was 26 when I first discovered this book, and it utterly changed my life.
  
  Read this alongside Kaplan's luminous collection of essays, The Coming Anarchy, and it'll utterly change yours too.
  
  Monsoon deftly wove together together all the key themes of my life to reshape my outlook on international relations from the perspective of the Greater Indian Ocean, and now as I follow the trajectory of international affairs in my life and career, with the economic centre of the world economy slowly traveling eastward, I find myself thinking about it every day.
  
  My only regret? Not being able read this book again for the first time at the age of 26, when I was lost and trying to find a career path that would help me combine and reconcile my interests in history, international relations, travel, culture and literature. For those who haven't read Kaplan before, this is a treat. For those familiar with his work, this book is still as relevant today as it was when it was first published in 2010.
  
  Deftly weaving together history, political analysis, geography and literature together in crystalline prose to illuminate his travels through the littoral states lying athwart the Indian Ocean, Kaplan makes his case for why the Indian Ocean Region stretching from Aden to Malacca will be to the 21st century (and beyond) what the Mediterranean was to the world of Antiquity - a thriving thoroughfare of commerce, culture and conflict that unites Europe, Asia and Africa to become the centre of the world economy.
  
  I envy those who will read this book for the first time, because it'll make you realize (among other things) that you're looking at the world map all wrong - I now hang a copy of the world map in my room with Asia at its centre (not Europe), because that's the map my children will grow up seeing and taking for granted.
• 
  Bridget

  Another thorough and thought-provoking book from Kaplan. Monsoon had a very personal feel for me. Although it is only very peripherally about the UAE, it is also somehow ALL about the UAE. The nations of the Indian Ocean (Oman, Pakistan, Iran, India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Malaysia, and to a lesser extent, Burma) are all heavily present in the population of the UAE. They run this place. Ever since we moved here, I've thought that the UAE represented a kind of future where national boundaries don't matter that much, and language and ethnicities who might be political enemies back home mix together happily for the sake of trade and business. It turns out that this is not (only) the future, it's how it's been in this area in the past, too. Fascinating.
  
  This was close to a five-star read, but I thought Monsoon was ever-so-slightly less lyrical than Kaplan's other books. Maybe I just know his formula too well. Also, I personally was not so interested in the chapter about the Chinese navy. And sentences like this made my work-and-MA-beleaguered brain hurt:
  
  "Despite all the pageantry and stagy contrivances of Sukarno's leftist theater state, which developed a useful myth for the new Indonesian nation, and the Dutch- and Japanese-style post-colonialism of Suharto's right-wing military state, which fortified that myth with new institutions, geography has eventually overwhelmed both those attempts at extreme centralization."
  
  Four (or 4.5) stars it is, and required reading for anyone who wants to understand more about the people who make up UAE society.
  
  (PS - when we first moved here, I met a stunning, exotically beautiful woman who was half Yemeni, half Zanzibarian. I decided that was the craziest mix of parentage I'd ever heard of. Turns out, it's a totally logical marriage connection when you know more about the trade routes around here.)
• 
  James Murphy

  Monsoon is a book about the geography and geopolitics of the Indian Ocean region. It could be described as a travelogue, but Kaplan is deeply interested in the politics of South Asia as well. He travels from west to east, from Yemen to Indonesia, describing the histories, current political climates, and ambitions of the countries ringing this huge region. Kaplan doesn't say so but I think he must be one of those scholars who think the Indian Ocean will become the most important body of water in the world. Most of his focus is on the intensifying competition being created by trade and arms. China floats 85% of its oil and gas across its waters. Quickly-developing India juts into the ocean like a cowcatcher and thereby projects power over the trade routes. China's financing port facilities in Pakistan and Burma while India develops Himalayan defenses. It's anchored on its ends by a stable Oman and by an Islamic Indonesia tempered by Hindu and Buddhist influences, but the region is essentially unstable. Partly this is because the Cold War's understanding among great powers was a time of relative stability which is ending now as China, India, Indonesia, and Japan become more competitive but without the robust engagement of a now-declining America to balance their energetic rise and provide the example of moral order. This is a rich portrait of a region crowded with developing trade and increasing friction among rivals.
• 
  Christopher

  Kaplan's "Asian Pivot" doesn't quite pivot far enough.
  
  In an attempt to distance itself from the anti- terror policies in the Middle East of his predecessor, the Obama administration attempted an "Asian pivot" to focus more on the rising strategic threat of China. Kaplan, reading the tea leaves (pun probably intended), offers up Monsoon which tries to make the Indian Ocean and surrounding states the next major strategic focal point.
  
  It doesn't bear out. As with most Kaplan Lonely Plant-meets-Foreign Policy travel guides, each country he visits is given a quick little history, some interviews with some local bureaucrats or NGOs and maybe some kind words for whomever Kaplan sees as "the next big thing" in small scale authoritarianism.
  
  Kaplan's realism is very much of a "but he made the trains run on time" variety and it always leaves a bad taste in one's mouth as it hand waves real suppression of speech, free inquiry, and political freedom in exchange for some amorphous rule-by-technocrat.
  
  Here, every country Kaplan visits feels like it's the linchpin to American security in the area... this is so because every country asserts just that. It feels less like policy analysis than a funding or timeshare pitch.
  
  Ultimately, Kaplan's 2014 "Asia's Cauldron" got the location right for the Asian Pivot and did a better job of analyzing the strategic importance of the region than this somewhat disjointed, but well written, attempt.
• 
  عبد الله القصير

  كتاب يتتبع سياسات الدول المطلة على المحيط الهندي من عمان إلى أندونيسيا وكيف تستطيع الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية التعامل مع هذه الدول. المؤلف يرى أن التهديد للهيمنة الأمريكية في المحيط الهندي يأتي من طرفين: الصين والإسلام شرق الأوسطي (يرى أن هذا الإسلام متشدد ولا يتعايش مع باقي الأديان مقارنة مع أسلام شرق أسيوي).
• 
  Vicki NewMath

  Despite the book being 10 years old, Kaplan nailed it with a lot of predictions and projections.
• 
  John

  The Indian Ocean and her more local adjacent waters are perhaps the world's greatest melting pot of potential issues and opportunities, at least as far as Robert Kaplan is concerned. This thesis, however, is hard to reject given the compelling arguments that fill Monsoon. The Indian Ocean presents the problems of Islamist terror, energy politics, international trade and globalization, climate change, human movement, cultural exchange, piracy, and great power politics within a confined and increasingly interconnected space. And as Kaplan so capably explains, this is not a new phenomenon. The Indian Ocean and her littoral regions, given their relative size and consistent weather patterns was the most interconnected region on earth prior even to Age of Exploration-era European arrivals. As a region and political arena, its waters had flourished with limited Western involvement for quite some time, and the danger now is that as the region develops it will begin to push out these late arrivals.
  
  In his characteristic style, Kaplan relays these trends and lessons through actually going to the places he describes. From Oman to India, Bangladesh, Burma, and beyond, Kaplan delivers a tangible exploration of how the Indian Ocean itself delivers so much opportunity and risk to its enveloping lands. The historical hinge of Oman meets the rising yet uneven rise of India. The great power ambitions of China interact with development in Africa and rebels in Burma. The power of the monsoon rains and the effects of climate instability threaten to wipe Bangladesh from the map, even as they brought trade in the past and necessary rains to millions in the present. The Indian Ocean region is a region in flux as it continues to advance and as capitalism continues to lift tens of millions out of poverty. This, more than any other lesson, is the driving point of the story Kaplan has written. It is a region with a troublesome past and contentious present, but it is one with a nearly limitless future. Whether or not the United States is able to profit from this will depend a great deal on how it nurtures relationships with countries and people groups both within the region and without the Indian Ocean realm. The diverse array of people that fill the countries around the Indian Ocean are in many places looking for the same thing: opportunity and personal freedoms. It would behoove the United States to contribute as it can to the fulfillment of both.
• 
  Vibhor Sahay

  A slightly dated book (2012 print) but enjoyed it.
  
  I had never read about Oman, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Burma and the insights were fascinating. Especially the one of Zanzibar. As an ex-shippie, the draw to the central theme of Indian ocean being the heart of the future growth, was easy. The American angle was also not played out too much, which was a welcome change.
• 
  Boudewijn

  A travel of discovery around the nations along the Indian Ocean and the growing importance of this area in the future. It basically reads as a National Geographic article.
• 
  Blaine Welgraven

  “Today, despite the jet and information age, 90 percent of global commerce and two thirds of all petroleum supplies travel by sea.” - Robert Kaplan, Monsoon
  
  A stark reminder, ensconced in the realist school, that petroleum, pipelines and products will drive - as they have driven - as much or more geopolitical movement as any ideology in the 21st century. Written in 2010, it is worth noting that many of Kaplan's starkest predictions - including China's continued aggressions towards Taiwan stemming from fundamental maritime needs - have essentially played out as he stated they would. Highly recommend.
  
  Update 2/1/21: I finished this brief review, and about three hours later checked social media - to see that Myanmar’s military had successfully conducted a coup. Kaplan’s scholarship in Monsoon is going to remain relevant for a long time, it appears.
• 
  Parth Agrawal

  A 5 star book after so many days!! Who would've wondered it would be coming in the form of a book based on geopolitics which, now, has single handedly improved my understanding of why countries are doing what they are doing, which country falls where, what are the important water bodies for a particular nation, self-interests of nations in break up or patch up of their neighboring states. iF you are interested in these kinda stuff, not only I would love to have a lovely conversation with you but this is the book to grab for you
  
  You know if you really want to rule the world then there are only 4 places that you need to control in this world. I used to imagine that yeah to hell with that the 4 places are not exactly places, they are these huge countries- India, China, USA and Germany maybe? But to my utter surprise these aren't the ones. The four places are:
  
  1) Strait Hormuz-> This particular strait connects the Persian Gulf with the Arabian sea and believe it or not, 70% of the world's oil tankers are passing this area
  
  2) Bab el Mandeb-> This plays the same role between connecting Red sea to the Arabian sea and also the supplies coming from the Mediterranean into the Indian Ocean
  
  3) Strait of Malaca-> This is the island nation near Singapore. 85% of China's energy needs, which are met by oil and natural gas, moves through here and that's a very substantial amount for a 11 mile stretch of water
  
  4) Suez Canal-> This basically connects Mediterranean Sea with Red Sea and also helps in providing the extended extension to the Atlantic Ocean as well
  
  So what is the underlying theme here? Energy needs is one of the primary ones and by design or coincidence, energy hungry nations have been creeping up in Asia. The burgeoning middle class in China and India are alone to account for world's 35-40% of the energy demands and since we can safely establish here that the transition from Non-renewable to renewable sources of energy is a work in progress so at-least in the near future majority of the energy needs will be met through non renewable sources of energy and for that, the above four places will be the choke-points for the safe imports of oil and gas for the Asian Nations
  
  Don't get me wrong. This book is not only about the political and geopolitical shenanigans. It is also about how religion, Islamic extremism to be in particular, will play out in the foreign policy calculations of the nations. Apart from this, there a lot of interesting instances of imperialism and colonialism and their contribution in the engendering of native cultures of the former colonies
  
  "Circumstances will determine the nature of struggle that will pan out in the Indian Ocean"
  
• 
  Krishna

  Kaplan's book is a well-informed and entertaining exposition on the rising importance of the Indian Ocean region in global politics due to a confluence of factors: the continuing reliance on Middle East oil, the presence of internationally active terrorist groups in a broad swathe of the region ranging from Yeman, Afghanistan, and Pakistan to Indonesia and the Philippines, and the rise of China and India, and their competition for resources and influence in Africa and the Indian Ocean littoral.
  
  Kaplan's geopolitical sensibility is deeply influenced by history and geography, and the book brims with thought-provoking observations. For example, though the state of Oman does not loom large in the present world, Kaplan points to it a a global trading power in the Indian Ocean region before the advent of Europeans. Who knew for instance that Gwadar in Pakistan was an Omani possession until 1958 (11 years after Pakistani independence), or that Omani trading communities existed in places as far apart as Zanzibar and Aceh.
  
  The most interesting chapter in the book must be the one on Kolkata, where he contrasts Curzon and Tagore -- the former the arch-imperialist and the latter, the Indian nationalist icon. But in a brilliant inversion, Kaplan labels Curzon as the original proponent of the vision of Greater India who has inspired later generations of Indian strategic thinkers, and Tagore as the advocate of universal humanism who sought to transcend national boundaries.
  
  Similarly the chapter on Burma is finely informative, tracing that nation's current difficulties to the conflict between the majority Burman ethnic group (residents of the central Irrawady valley) and the various hill tribes that live on the periphery of the country. The conflict over names -- Myanmar or Burma -- makes more sense when we remember that Myanmar was one of the three kingdoms (the others being Arakan and Mon) that were central to Burman history (Burman being the ethnicity and Burmese the nationality).
  
  Cleverly, Kaplan ends the book with a chapter on Zanzibar, which before colonialism was a cosmopolitan melting pot and trading center. But in the years after independence, the island has descended into racial tensions, political conflict, and violence, much like the rest of the Indian Ocean region has. Perhaps, Kaplan optimistically hopes, trade can once again restore peace to the region, just as it had in the past
• 
  Jon

  What started off slow with me, gained in momentum. By the end of this book, I really enjoyed myself and appreciated that the author covered such a vast scope of landmass and provided such visual history. Essentially in the author's view the ocean of importance in the 21st century and on onward will be the Indian Ocean from East Africa to Indonesia. His analysis is very erudite all the while lucid and thankfully not over the top scholarly. He provides the reader a virtual and very descriptive history of colonialism, conflict and trade since since the 1400's while taking opportunities to coalesce it to American's current position and future. He starts with Oman, sweeping then East in subsequent chapters to Indonesia and then works his way back to the east coast of Africa, particularly the anarchic horn of Africa. All the while he essentially speaksof who will ultimately dominate or pry the Indian Ocean. He provides his opinion which is hard to argue against that it will be multilateral consisting of three essential powers which are India, China and the U.S. That the U.S. will no longer be the ultimate power and that is OK. India and United States will partner to keep China in check but all the while the U.S. and China will partner too to keep global trade robust. Essentially each of these 3 countries goals are the same and should be preserved. What can destroy it are egos, radicalism and conflict. Partnering is the best solution and Kaplan feels this will be the case. Monsoon is essentially a metaphor for the sweeping winds occuring in the vast part of this world interlocked by the African continent and the archipelago of Malaca and Indonesia. It is truly fascinating all of the various interests, relgions and ethnicities in this part of the world. The end result is that Man as quoted towards the end of the book, "is meant to trade." Let us hope so.
• 
  Matt Ely

  I define a two-star book as one that involved consistent eye rolling, consistent skimming or temptation to skim, and a weak sense of purpose while, at the same time, having some amount of compelling or intriguing material.
  
  This is a selective travel book around an enormous population without much of a premise. You'd think this would have more to do with, you know, the future of American power. But that's addressed haphazardly, if at all, throughout the text. He spends the last few paragraphs of the final chapter honing in on it, but it feels more like a desperate attempt to justify the subtitle than a real summation of the work.
  
  There are lots of interesting data points and well told histories. In fact, if treated as wholly separate articles, they might be okay. The chapter on Sri Lanka was intriguing, for example. But when put together, there doesn't appear to be much linking them thematically, aside from "they sure are all on the Indian Ocean."
  
  I'm not sure what to make of his political statements. The only thing that seems consistent is that he thinks the US Navy should be bigger. Other than that, his tone seems to vacillate throughout, particularly on China.
  
  It might be worth reading a few chapters of this, but I can't recommend the whole book. Not to mention, things have changed so much since in the last ten years that large portions are only relevant as a time capsule, not that that's the author's fault.
• 
  Barrett

  With a couple of his earlier books, I really enjoyed Robert Kaplan's mix of travelogue and political commentary. Unfortunately, that mix is a lot less present in Monsoon, with a few chapters feeling like they were taken straight from the lecture podium, possessing an overly academic air. The personal travel experiences he does reference in this book feel slight and more sheltered than his previous forays. This book also feels significantly more driven by a partisan political agenda than other efoorts of his. Judging from the inside jacket, his profile as a writer has allowed him into some of the inner circles of the beltway, and these connections seem to exert their influence on the "case" presented by Monsoon.
  
  However, Kaplan still brings his paradigm of borders (in the many ways they are and are not important) to this collection, and in light of my very limited reading of similar writers, he still provides a very refreshing perspective on broader geographical relationships. Overall, I got a lot out of this book, and-as i have with previous Kaplan books-found myself adding a lot of his cited sources and background reading to my queue.