Rebecca Hagelin's column here provides an interesting review of John Taylor's new book, Global Financial Warriors: The Untold Story of International Finance in the Post-9/11 World. Taylor has headed the Treasury Department’s international finance division under President Bush and, in that capacity, has fought his own war against terrorism by tying up the enemy's purse strings. Hagelin's article reminds us that this is a critically-important (but little known or appreciated) part of our overall struggle....It’s easy to overlook the financial aspect of the war -- after all, it doesn’t offer anything as snappy as battlefield footage and frontline reporting. But as President Bush pointed out shortly after 9/11: “The War on Terrorism will be fought on a variety of fronts … The front lines will look different from the wars of the past … It is a war that will require the United States to use our influence in a variety of areas in order to win it. And one area is financial.”The reason is obvious: Terrorists can’t operate without funds. Taylor’s task in the days that followed 9/11 was to freeze terrorist assets and to track them. In short, while our troops hit the terrorists hard in the front, Taylor’s team of “financial warriors” would hit them in the rear -- specifically, in the wallet, hampering their ability to fight back...
...Global Financial Warriors also shows, contrary to liberal myth, just how engaged President Bush has been throughout this war. Taylor, who attended hundreds of meetings in the White House Situation Room, writes: “I was never at an NSC meeting where President Bush did not run it in an intelligent, businesslike way, starting and ending on time, encouraging discussion, keeping people at ease, using humor when appropriate, listening carefully, asking penetrating questions, getting to the heart of the matter, making the decisions, and giving the commands...”
Again, right here is the Hagelin review in full and over here is a page of the Heritage Foundation website where you can view/listen to Dr. Taylor's personal presentation about the book to a live audience. Also, here and here are places you can go to purchase Global Financial Warriors for yourself.
