In the episode that lends the book its title, the "ugly American" is Homer Atkins, a plain and plain-spoken man, who has been sent by the U.S. government to advise the Southeast Asian country of Sarkhan on engineering projects. When Atkins finds badly misplaced priorities and bluntly challenges the entrenched interests, he lays bare a foreign policy gone dangerously wrong.
First published in 1958, The Ugly American became a runaway national bestseller for its slashing expose of American arrogance, incompetence, and corruption in Southeast Asia. In linked stories and vignettes, the book uses gripping storytelling to draw a devastating picture of how the United States was losing the struggle with Communism in Asia.
- ISBN10 0449204650
- ISBN13 9780449204658
- Publish Date 12 August 1983 (first published December 1959)
- Publish Status Out of Stock
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Fawcett Books
- Format Paperback (US Mass Market)
- Language English