Waging a Good War

This is an interesting book, and not really for the right reasons. The author is an experienced reporter who covers armed conflicts, but bringing the ideas of military strategy and campaigns to the Civil Rights movement did not settle well with the goals of the movement and underestimated the infighting and lack of control many of the leaders of the Civil Rights movement actually had. People who already know about the Civil Rights movement will not learn any new insights as Ricks focuses on the main groups and individuals that people already know about. Instead of the traditional struggle between non-violence and violent action that dominated the movement, Ricks focuses instead on how both sides used military strategies to get what they wanted. Ricks often uses military terminology to describe organizations, recruiting, training, and more. What is often overlooked by the author is that many organizations struggled with the idea of centralized leadership, even if so-called leaders came about, as many different individuals with their own agendas were all competing for attention and control. Also, reading about a largely non-violent movement with military terminology thrown about was a bit disconcerting.