Administration as a consequence of the Vietnam War and for the sake of a mere strategic design. The study stresses how the decision to attack a neutral country was a patent violation of the American Constitution. As in his previous two books, Shawcross combines an interest in international policies with a private focus on the personal relationship between Nixon and Kissinger. The study argues that the President and his Secretary of State reproduced in their international relations the same pattern of falsehood that characterized their own personal association. The book's penultimate, conclusory sentence — "Cambodia was not a mistake; it was a crime" — is frequently quoted; whenever Shawcross's lifetime of writing is reduced to one sentence, that's it.Sideshow received high praise and awards. The Pulitzer Prize jury recommended a special citation for it in the 1980 awards based on its "extraordinary qualities", although it was ineligible for the prize because its author was not American; the Pulitzer board declined that recommendation, however. The New York Times Book Review selected Sideshow among its top 17 "Editor's Choice" books of 1979, describing it as an "indictment" of Kissinger and Nixon. It won the George Polk Award in Journalism's Book Award for 1979. Columnist Anthony Lewis wrote in The New York Times, I think it is the most interesting and the most important book on American foreign policy in many years. On more than foreign policy, really: on the American constitutional system. For it is a textbook — a gripping, factual textbook — on what can happen when the system is violated. John Leonard of The New York Times wrote that in addition to being "meticulous[ly]" documented, "it has the sweep and the shadow of a spy novel as it portrays the surreal world of power, severed from morality, paranoid, feeding on itself." Kissinger, who declined Shawcross's interview requests when the book was being written, vociferously denounced Sideshow, as did American conservatives. In an angry letter to The Economist, Kissinger described the book as "obscene" and "absurd." Observing that both Sideshow and Kissinger's memoir, White House Years, were included among The New York Times Book Reviews best books of 1979, Herbert Mitgang asked each author about the other's volume. Kissinger called Sideshow "a shoddy, outrageous work that is filled with inaccuracies," adding, "And you can quote me." Following the publication of Sideshow, Peter Rodman, an aide to Kissinger, concluded that Shawcross's work