almost any point in time, the united states is more popular than unpopular. americans are much i liked and disliked. as it turned out, you discover there's a very small fringe of political movements in history to see if the teacher in fact were much more popular around the world that we believe in this part of the myth. >> host: over some of the debates? >> guest: it depends on who's asking the question. if you think about the contemporary context, al qaeda seems to have many members were quite angry at the united states for an array of recent and tuition bill. but what i found is very often in the united states our discussion about world opinion sort of rapidly slides into the same that they include foreigners in general. the world hates us to put a washington journalist shortly

after 9/11 during the run-up to the iraq war inexplicably when there was the largest coordinated demonstration in february 2003 against the war with iraq. some estimates it can laypeople including antarctica, demonstrated against the war. americans reacted by saying the most hated us. they hate us because burkett. in fact it turns out that's not a helpful way of for behavior and the concept of anti-americanism so often it is a wall between ourselves and a better understanding of the complexity of the world that i decided to look into its history >> host: what is significant about 1899? >> guest: and nike are were number of critical books printed

about the rise of u.s. industrial power and how post a challenge to european trade and in european countries with the debate over how to ensure the rising challenge of the new world power would take over the markets european slope are essential. that's a dispute about material concerns, but americans read it as the world is coming to hate us and they hate us because were so successful because we are about the country, because we're free and stand for the good, which sounds rather curious enough than a predominately americans have in case you encounter hostility or lack of cooperation. >> host: are there any countries that are legitimately anti-american? >> guest: no, at the moment we have an ongoing dispute with the reigning government, which itself produces all manner of

vicious propaganda against the united states or at about the great and so forth. so are actually quite popular. they are among the most pro-american populations in the greater middle east that it's unusual to find -- pollsters have not been able to find populations filled in any country. you find the rise and fall of approval of u.s. policies, which can sometimes the rep to demonstration where the two disputes between governments that we then throw into this catchall category as to what the problem is this underlying hatred. even though public opinion changes radically month-to-month in year-to-year. germans arrest about their opinion of the u.s. president under george w. bush it fell to a low of 12% approval. within a couple years obama with the day. approval was 92%.

it's people who can make discriminating judgment on the basis of how they assess the new leader of the same country and many western europeans in many places were unhappy with an inarticulate proponent of unilateral u.s. action who have faced swaggering step and didn't seem as interested in their opinion. the president left office who seem to be good at articulating what it was in the u.s. interest to behave multilaterally come to seek cooperation with other countries and so forth and also embodied a set of a deal as people america at the united states is a land of opportunity where anything is possible. so there is a big deep and underlying said hatred. it's actually quite rare. we thank foreigners are able to

make establishing judgments about different aspects of the night dave. >> host: why should we care what germans think of us? was the last time we were asked what we thought of angela merkel? >> guest: many are interested in american opinion and the sister of many countries. >> host: but why? >> guest: partly because the united states has power and resources and when we get a call they get the money out. when we decided to use her tremendously powerful military machine, that can effect people around the world. the united states plans large and for good reasons in the minds of many people around the world. the reason why we should care is not so much whether we should treat those foreigners well. that's not the issue. let's talk in terms of american

interests. how can we best achieve our goals? acting unilaterally? or trying to use multilateral institutions and coalitions of different countries enforce multipliers to ensure live help in pursuing our goals of the policies we decide upon or well thought through. i'll tell you i wrote this book. in 2002 during the dispute over the run-up to the iraq war, the president of france urged americans not to go to war in iraq. he said i fought in algeria. this is going to in radically. will be seen as a western army of occupation. you look weekend nationalists and. so what did we do? reset those french are anti-american. they resent their stars falling dollars is on the rise and so we

poured french wine into the gutter and boycotted french good and famously renamed french fries as freedom fries. we should take up our boys from the fields of normandy in them home for american heroes. after demonstration around the world, we said what is this with an anti-americans? i thought that reminds me of something. it reminded me of the early 60s and the president is saying told the kennedy administration, don't go to war in vietnam. we've been there. we know the terrain. he said this will end badly. the pacing is a western army occupation. he told kennedy are going to sink step-by-step into a quagmire from which a lot of trouble extricating. he said this will be bad for the united states and that for the west. so what did we do?

we launched a boycott import french flags down the drain. we should take up our place in the field of normandy and bring him home because soil is no longer restingplace. we said to cause an anti-american and as there were demonstrations in countries around the world, we said it's a wave of anti-americanism. in each case we ignored and said the problem is your anti-american. they are rational and we marched off in to the two foreign-policy debacles of the 20th and early 21st century. robert mcnamara, secretary of defense 30 years later spoke of his regret that we have been able to listen. he said it was a failure of the imagination to realize a french are the best informed westerners on vietnam and we didn't take them seriously because we send to didn't have an interest.

as the book recounts, i would to the french archives to look at what was going on in the french foreign ministry. they have no culture in their insignificant. but they said as they analyze intelligence from vietnam 17,000 french citizens they are. exiles in paris and they try to share with us. we couldn't here because it is confusing concept we have. >> host: professor friedman a month of been times in there's another anti-nation type feelings? anti-british empire come anti-roman empire? >> guest: indeed. does the right question to ask because it should be to the use of the term we have in the court age of the british empire. perdition officials talk about anglo phobia to explain why they

encountered resistance in the middle east or south asia. their explanation was when people rise up or criticize us, the problem is they don't like your civilization you didn't like the values we stand for. and for phobia has a way of explaining resistant to the british empire. the recursive phobia. they don't understand us. they don't like tolstoy and so forth. what are we doing this in an imperial terrible worried democratic power? is a curious thing is something used by national chauvinist. the used the term window each. they talked about the anti-french conspiracy of the germans, jewish and freemasons to undermine france. why do we turn to return that in other countries is used by national chauvinist and imperialists? the reason is terribly exclusive

among other things that suggest if you criticize aspects of society, government policy, it's not so much i may disagree. i'm saying you are disloyal. you're beyond the pale of session. it's a daring and explicit contexts to the kinds of defensive critiques that are essential to making a more perfect union. that's what the founding generation assuring the rate to criticize the government among the constitution. what could be more american? what i found is for 200 years critics in the united states have been tired with loyalty of anti-americanism or the war of 1812 to the rise of empire in 1897 across the 20th century

to return that doesn't do justice. >> host: to ask you also another book you for it. it's a topic the? >> guest: that was the little-known episode from the second world war when the results administration was very determined immigrant immigrant population in latin america spread across central and south america would rise up, take over countries and this is a concern widely shared in the security establishment in the planning board. a break of their meetings about the possibility. the nascent taligent agencies to thwart the possibility that began a program lost to history until he recovered enough book under which the fbi was dispatched to find in latin

america. the problem is the people who were sent to speak german or spanish and didn't know much about countries where they were supposed to find bad guys. so they did what any of us would do. start by presidents and offering money for information and they were at the nazis? that open up a system riddled with corruption for latin american dictators realized this german who owns a farm is a nazi. take them away. 4000 people of german origin put them in a candid texas as suspect the nazis. producing commanders started writing saying who are you sending us? i found 80 jewish who had fled

germany, were picked up because someone's heard them speaking german them up in a can. some of them knew it was late to the behind barbed wire. it is a case that in some ways is a precursor to the guantánamo is in. that is the use of bounty hunters on local sources that do not teach and to run the people as terrorists who were then locked up in a system deliberately placed outside a judicial review and only as the years pass to realize because some of the wrong people using our resources. >> host: back to your most current book, rethinking anti-americanism, and be sensitive to the church of anti-american as? to the kerry said people? gusto americans seem to have a record of worrying about this.

not only do i find the term itself is used as early as 1767. it appears in the papers of the founding generation franklin, jefferson and correspondent a term that was fought over by left and right through the 19th century and pretty much one by conservatives as a term to quash dissent and social and on policies in the united states and became an official concerned beginning during the second world war and especially the cold war when we began to have a scientific approach to analyzing the sewers and coming up with policies to combat it. the problem is that the soppy category. it's a term that reduces cognitive backs the sum total of our knowledge. it doesn't explain foreign behavior. principal diversity of positions abroad are on the same.

the problem is they don't think like us. there are rational people i talk about latin americans, there hot-blooded and that's why they're having a protest right now. not for example because we fought a war with mexico and one of taking half of the mexican authority. an international dispute we can argue that the narrative. anti-americanism is a way of looking at the world as a kind of mirror and they have this monologue on the lookout of the world of the month marriage to tell us where the fairest of them all. that thinking makes for excellent fairytales. the fairytales are not against any entries. >> host: we've been talking with max paul friedman, "rethinking anti-americanism" a history of an exceptional concept in american foreign relations. here's the cover of the book published by cambridge university press.

you're watching booktv on c-span 2. >> we have to take back the media. independent and you will save us. the most powerful institutions on earth. more powerful than any bomb. more power than any missile is an idea that explodes onto the scene. but it doesn't happen but it contained by that box, the tv screen that we allocate that are so many hours a week. we need to be able to hear people speaking for themselves outside the box. we can't afford the status quo and a more from global warring

to global warming.

>> other generations data we adapt, how to remove, how do we go forward in this fast-paced world? the millennial speak at all in stride because that's the reality of how we grew up and it's also private use and adapt ability. the ability to be resilient, the economic crisis which has led to incredible youth unemployment and incredible data for you people. young people are optimistic about their future because they see in one year it could be totally different because we saw how quickly it started and how quickly a microwave. there is a sense the grass is greener on the other side and we have the ability to know we will get there.