Background
Burns, Richard Dean was born on June 16, 1929 in Des Moines. Son of Richard B. and Luella (Everling) Burns.
("The Evolution of Arms Control: From Antiquity to the Nuc...)
"The Evolution of Arms Control: From Antiquity to the Nuclear Age" is the first world history of arms control through time.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FDVIX2I/?tag=2022091-20
( The recent commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of...)
The recent commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s election as the thirty-fifth president of the United States serves as a reminder of a period of time that many Americans perceive as idyllic. Just as his election, despite a near-run thing, had instilled a pervasive sense of hope throughout the country, his assassination stunned the entire nation, scarring the psyche of a generation of Americans. More than half a century later, JFK continues to inspire debates about the effectiveness of the presidency, as well as his own political legacy, making the senator from Massachusetts the object of many enduring myths: that he would have been one of the country’s greatest leaders had he lived, he would have kept the US out of a full-fledged Vietnam war, and that he was a martyr of right-wing assassins. His successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, who did get the US deeply involved in Vietnam while pursuing the social reforms of the Great Society at home and abroad, also casts a long shadow in the twenty-first century, as the nation continues to deal with poverty, racism, and social injustice. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of the Kennedy-Johnson Era covers its history through a chronology, an introductory essay, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 300 cross-referenced entries on important personalities, including the president, his advisors, his family, his opponents, and his critics, as well as members of Congress, military leaders, and international leaders. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about John F. Kennedy.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1442237910/?tag=2022091-20
(Chronicles the evolution of the political relationship be...)
Chronicles the evolution of the political relationship between Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, and that relationship's role in ending the Cold War.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FBBJOCS/?tag=2022091-20
(In the history of the United States, few periods could mo...)
In the history of the United States, few periods could more justly be regarded as the best and worst of times than the Kennedy-Johnson era. The arrival of John F. Kennedy in the White House in 1961 unleashed an unprecedented wave of hope and optimism in a large segment of the population; a wave that would come crashing down when he was assassinated only a few years later. His successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, enjoyed less popularity, but he was one of the most experienced and skilled presidents the country had ever seen, and he promised a Great Society to rival Kennedy's New Frontier. Both presidents were dogged by foreign policy disasters: Kennedy by the Bay of Pigs fiasco, although he came out ahead on the Cuban missile crisis, and Johnson from the backlash of the Vietnam War. The 1960s witnessed unprecedented progress toward racial and sexual equality, but it also played host to race and urban riots. And while impressive advances in the sciences and arts were fueling the American imagination, the counterculture rejected it all. The Historical Dictionary of the Kennedy-Johnson Era relates these events and provides extensive political, economic, and social background on this era through a detailed chronology, an introduction, appendixes, a bibliography, and several hundred cross-referenced dictionary entries on important persons, events, institutions, policies, and issues.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0810858428/?tag=2022091-20
( Drawing on his knowledge of the comparative history of ...)
Drawing on his knowledge of the comparative history of warfare and arms control across preliterate, ancient, medieval, and modern polities, Richard Dean Burns focuses longitudinally on such perennial arms control issues as negotiation, verification, and compliance. Although he does not, for example, allege that war elephants and nuclear weapons are of equal destructive potential, he does discern instructive similarities between Carthage in 202 BCE and Iraq in 1991 AD. Arms control and disarmament measures have been pursued and adopted throughout the history and prehistory of human warfare: sometimes as protocols recognizing evolving humanitarian taboos; sometimes as terms imposed by the victors on the vanquished; and sometimes as accords negotiated between rivals fearful of mutual destruction. Arms control measures ramped up in significance and urgency at the dawn of the 20th century by the introduction of rapid-fire weapons, aircraft, chemical agents, and submarines, and again at mid-century with the advent of weapons of mass destruction—nuclear, chemical, and bacteriological—with sophisticated delivery systems. As Burns makes clear, the enormous increase in destructive potential brought about by thermonuclear weaponry essentially changed the nature of war and, therefore, of arms control.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1442223790/?tag=2022091-20
( This work is a contemporary chronicle of the Cold War a...)
This work is a contemporary chronicle of the Cold War and offers an analysis of policy and rhetoric of the United States and Soviet Union during the 1980s. The authors examine the assumptions that drove political decisions and the rhetoric that defined the relationship as the Soviet Union began to implode. This work demonstrates that while the subsequent unraveling of the Soviet empire was an unintended side effect of Mikhail Gorbachev's reforms, termination of the Cold War was not. Ronald Reagan deserves full credit for recognizing Gorbachev's sincerity and his determination to change the direction of Soviet policies. For this, Reagan felt the full wrath of anticommunist hawks for doing business with a communist leader. But it was Gorbachev who concluded the superpowers had become mesmerized by ideological myths which ruled out any meaningful discussions of a possible accommodation of political issues for more than four decades. The evidence is compelling that Gorbachev himself broke the Cold War's ideological straight jacket that had paralyzed Moscow and Washington's ability to resolve their differences. Though politically weakened, Gorbachev conceded nothing to U.S. military superiority. Never did he negotiate from a position of weakness. In doing so, the last Soviet leader faced even greater political and physical risk. Without Gorbachev the end of the Cold War could have played out very differently and perhaps with great danger.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0313352410/?tag=2022091-20
publisher author history educator
Burns, Richard Dean was born on June 16, 1929 in Des Moines. Son of Richard B. and Luella (Everling) Burns.
Bachelor of Science with honors, University of Illinois, 1957; Master of Arts, University Illinois, 1958; Doctor of Philosophy, University Illinois, 1960.
Professor emeritus, California State University, Los Angeles, 1960-1992;
professor, California State University, Los Angeles, 1970-1992;
department chairman, California State University, Los Angeles, 1969-1972, 86-92. Publisher/president Regina Books, since 1980. Visiting lecturer Los Angeles City College, Whittier College, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, 1964-1965, University of California at Los Angeles, University of Southern California.
Program consultant, lecturer Western Center, National Endowment for Humanities, 1973-1975.
( Drawing on his knowledge of the comparative history of ...)
( This work is a contemporary chronicle of the Cold War a...)
(Chronicles the evolution of the political relationship be...)
(In the history of the United States, few periods could mo...)
("The Evolution of Arms Control: From Antiquity to the Nuc...)
( The recent commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of...)
Served with United States Air Force, 1947-1956. Member Conference on Peace Research (national council 1970-1972), Society Historians American Foreign Relations (national council 1986-1989), Phi Kappa Phi, Phi Alpha Theta.
Married Frances R. Sullivan, January 14, 1950 (deceased July 1993). 1 son, Richard Dean; married Glenda F. Burns, September 21, 1996. Stepchildren: Scott E. Burns, Kent C. Burns, Dana Burns Mayadag.