2010
First Published
3.47
Average Rating
356
Number of Pages
Dropping the Jimmy Carter, the Olympic Boycott, and the Cold War offers a diplomatic history of the 1980 Olympic boycott. Broad in its focus, it looks at events in Washington, D.C., as well as the opposition to the boycott and how this attempted embargo affected the athletic contests in Moscow. Jimmy Carter based his foreign policy on assumptions that had fundamental flaws and reflected a superficial familiarity with the Olympic movement. These basic mistakes led to a campaign that failed to meet its basic mission objectives but did manage to insult the Soviets just enough to destroy détente and restart the Cold War. The book also includes a military history of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, which provoked the boycott, and an examination of the boycott’s impact four years later at the Los Angeles Olympics, where the Soviet Union retaliated with its own boycott.
Avg Rating
3.47
Number of Ratings
15
5 STARS
13%
4 STARS
40%
3 STARS
33%
2 STARS
7%
1 STARS
7%
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Author
Nicholas Evan Sarantakes
Author · 3 books
Nicholas Evan Sarantakes is a historian specializing primarily in U.S. military, diplomatic, and political history during the World War II and Cold War eras. He is an associate professor in the Department of Strategy and Policy at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island.
