Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Culture

Some Surprising Jewish Authors Are Guiding Defense Secretary James Mattis

Secretary of Defense James Mattis has, to put it lightly, a very big job. Unlike certain members of the administration he serves, he’s a dedicated reader; luckily for us, that means we have insight into exactly which thinkers are influencing Mattis’s decision-making — which, of course, affects us all.

In an excerpt of “The Leader’s Bookshelf,” a recently published book that aggregated surveys of military officials to assemble a list of 50 books that contribute to effective leadership, Foreign Policy shared an interview with Mattis in which he discussed his carefully curated library. With recommendations ranging from Nelson Mandela’s memoir “Long Walk to Freedom” to Marcus Aurelius’s “Meditations,” the list, Mattis said, was formed in the effort “to read everything interesting in the world and ignore the boring.”

So, what’s interesting in the world? Barbara Tuchman’s “March of Folly” and “The Guns of August” and Henry Kissinger’s “Diplomacy and the World Order,” for a start. Mattis said those books, along with Paul Kennedy’s “Rise and Fall of the Great Powers,” helped him “see what’s happening to a nation in a broader context, which I think is critical.”

For developing a battlefield-ready ethical sense, Mattis recommended Michael Walzer’s “Just and Unjust Wars,” as well as Malham Wakin’s “War, Morality, and the Military Profession.” And for getting a sense of human capability, he recommended both Ron Chernow’s biography of Alexander Hamilton and Will and Ariel Durant’s “The Lessons of History.” (Ariel Durant was born as Chaya Kaufman to Ukrainian Jewish parents.)

What else made the list? To learn, read the full interview here.

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.