Friedman looks into his crystal ball, analyzing the political, economic, and military options for the U.S. and the world around us. Each major region of the world is examined, including Europe, Africa, China, Russia, Japan, Mexico, etc. and how our relations with each are likely to be shaped during the next ten years. Interesting, insightful, and we'll see in ten years how good his vision might be. ( )

The author makes a bold and unshakable declaration: America is an imperial empire and that's a fact. Also America could lose itself as a Republic.

The author is CEO of Stratfor, which does intelligence analysis for the CIA and the multinationals. So the opinions in this book count for something.

He gives the big picture that faces America abroad. It is simple power and balance of power. He states that this country is always striving to set other countries at each other so they cannot combine against the United States. Not pretty, but the alternative is like believing pink horsies with wings bring babies.

I learned from this book why politicians always lie to us and why they will continue to do so. The reason is: We cannot handle the truth (wasn't that in a movie or something?). Politicians always have to dose the public with something it can accept.

I quickly noticed what I read in this book was being mentioned in the news of the day. How we are concerned about Egypt falling could be dangerous because the Israel/Egypt combination is important to us.

The book predicts that Germany and Russia will try to combine and that we will interfere with that. It predicts the rise of Japan, the fall of China and ultimately the fall of Russia (Russia cannot make it in the end because the rivers run the wrong way).

There are other areas of the world the book mentioned and that make this book a must read for anyone getting baptized into real world politik.

As I say, this book helps me to follow along with the news.

The author does not get into a detailed discussion about how we may lose our Republic...So I knocked a star off the rating, because I am so unfair. ( )

The Next Decade by George Friedman 2012 243pg
Empire and Republic in a Changing World. The US always saw itself as a republic with an isolationist philosophy. that was possible for a nation made up of 13 states but now that it controls 23% of the worlds economy everything that happens in the world effects the US and so she has had to be more like an empire but does not govern directly. Americans prefer to keep a balance of power in the world and the book discusses every area of the world that gives America problems. The author believes that Iran will somehow make an arrangement with America. The Islamic problem will be less of an issue. Russia and Germany have much to gain from each other. China is not as powerful as we think as her population live in poverty and her banks are in trouble. Anyone keeps up to date with the press would come to the view similar to this book. ( )

Have you ever played the board game Risk? The game board is a map of the world partitioned into different colored continents, subdivided into countries. Each player places their armies on different countries, battles their opponents, and conquers territory with the ultimate goal of taking over the entire world. The difficult decisions are where to place your armies and who to engage in battle. Reading George Friedman's The Next Decade reminded of Risk, but instead of being a game, it's real life and the US is one of the biggest players. Friedman analyzes the world with a geopolitical lens, assessing different countries strengths and weaknesses, based on their natural resources, their borders and alliances with their neighbors, and a myriad of other factors. He gives specific recommendations of how the US should approach different countries in order to maintain it's current dominance in the world.

This book was a huge eye opener for me. In the US, we are naive in our beliefs that we engage in wars for democracy, freedom, or other ideals. Friedman is pretty blunt. The goal of America's role in foreign policy is the balance of power. We want other countries to be fighting battles among themselves to keep us in our current position. The amount of information on our past relationships with other countries and his forecast on the power shifts that will occur in the next decade were interesting and filled with surprises. Very informative. ( )

I enjoyed this book, however not as much Mr. Friedman previous book; The Next 100 Years, A Forecast for the 21st Century. I find Mr. Friedman's books to be part history and current affairs, with his predictions to be a little alternative history/fantasy in good way. He is very straightforward, candid as well as insightful to. The Next Decade really provided several topics for food for thought on the direction the U.S. is headed in. ( )