Sources: Dale Herspring 785-532-6839, falka@k-state.edu
http://www.k-state.edu/media/mediaguide/bios/herspringbio.html
News release prepared by: Andy Badeker, 785-532-6415, abadeker@k-state.edu
Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2008
K-STATER'S BOOK ON RUSSIAN MILITARY NAMED A TOP ACADEMIC TITLE FOR 2007
MANHATTAN -- The latest book by Dale Herspring, university distinguished professor of political science at Kansas State University, has been recognized as an outstanding academic title by Choice magazine, whose reviews influence scholars and libraries across the country.
"The Kremlin and the High Command: Presidential Impact on the Russian Military from Gorbachev to Putin" (University Press of Kansas, 2006) was one of 597 books so honored in the January edition of Choice. That group represents less than 3 percent of the titles submitted in 2007 to the magazine, which is published by the Association of College and Research Libraries.
"Choice magazine reaches almost every undergraduate college and university library in the country and is an important tool in collection development," said Susan Schott, assistant director and marketing manager for the University Press of Kansas.
"The inclusion of Herspring's book on its prestigious outstanding titles list will boost its sales in that market and will raise the book's profile in the scholarly community generally," she said.
Herspring's book tracks the morale and readiness of Russia's armed forces over the last 25 years as a struggling democracy grew out of the Soviet era. He studies military bureaucracy, its personalities and particularly the influence that each Russian president has wielded over the officer corps and its decisions.
"The Kremlin and the High Command" joins previous Herspring books on Eastern Europe and Russia that include "Putin's Russia: Past Imperfect, Future Uncertain" (which he edited), "Requiem for an Army" and "The Soviet High Command, 1967-1989: Personalities and Politics."
Herspring, who joined K-State in 1993 after a career in the U.S. State Department and the Navy, has published widely on the relationship between military and civilian leadership in former East Bloc countries as well as in the United States. His 12th book, "Rumsfeld's Wars: The Arrogance of Power," also from the University Press of Kansas, is due out in April.