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Book Review

Canada and the United States

Kai Bird. The Color of Truth: McGeorge Bundy and William Bundy; Brothers in Arms. New York: Simon and Schuster. 1998. Pp. 496. $27.50.

McGeorge and William P. Bundy, brothers, scions of the American establishment, officers in the Cold War, architects of the Vietnam debacle, liberals, and exemplars of the "American Century," are the subjects of this fine biography by Kai Bird. This is Bird's second biography of prominent, although not dominant, characters who played significant roles in the rise of the United States to global preeminence in the decades after 1940. The first was of John J. McCloy. 1

This book covers more ground, since it describes in detail the careers of two men. Bird worked hard to write it: he interviewed dozens of people and spent hours with the two principals. He did significant research in the unpublished manuscripts available at the time, including important collections in the John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Libraries and the archives of the Council on Foreign Relations. He could not consult some important sources, since they were closed while he was doing his research. Most notably, McGeorge Bundy's records as dean at Harvard University are sealed until 2003, and extremely useful tapes of Johnson's telephone conversations were not available when Bird wrote. The book moves with grace and clarity. Although Bird has written a long work at 495 pages, he keeps the reader's attention throughout. There even are some subjects you would like to know more about. The glimpses Bird offers of both brothers' wives and children are so good that I'd like to read more about their family lives. William Bundy's editorship of Foreign Affairs, which lasted for more than a dozen years, gets only two pages. . . .

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