M.I.A. Or Mythmaking in America

This paperback edition of M.I.A. or Mythmaking in America adds major new material about Ross Perot’s role, the 1991-1992 Senate investigation, and illegal operations authorized by Ronald Reagan.

“A calm and thoughtful book on a firestorm of a subject. Intelligent, provocative, courageous.” —Kirkus Reviews”

An important and compelling book. Franklin raises and answers all of the hardest questions about an enduring piece of political mythology.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer”

Mr. Franklin’s meticulously researched book . . . casts strong light on the Indochina war’s ghostly and ghastly afterlife.” –Todd Gitlin, The New York Times Book Review”

Finally, someone has put the Vietnam legacy of alleged MIA survival in a wider political and cultural setting. A gripping account of subversion from above, a book that should be read by all Americans.” –Richard Falk, Milbank Professor of International Law, Princeton University”

A major critical study on one of the central public myths of our time.” –Richard Slotkin, Olin Professor of English and American Studies, Wesleyan University”

A book that desperately needed to be written.” —The Asian Wall Street Journal”

Franklin’s scholarship is meticulous, and he has been careful to keep most of the documentation in the endnotes. He wants this book to be read not simply by scholars, many of whom already agree with his conclusions, but by those nonacademic readers most in need of some release from the terrible thralldom of the POW/MIA myth.” –John Carlos Rowe, The Journal of American History”

Written by one of America’s most distinguished literary and cultural historians, M.I.A. OR MYTHMAKING IN AMERICA is in the radical tradition of I. F. Stone and Noam Chomsky. Deliberately written in an open and accessible style designed to reach a wide audience, the book is a crucial work in this field. Meticulously nuanced and scrupulously documented.” –Tony Williams, Viet Nam Generation