This book discusses key post-Soviet archival discoveries and discusses a critical historical issue -- the COORDINATION OF THE GESTAPO AND NKVD in liquidating the Polish elites as part of the 1939 Pact and invasion. That was more than enough to get me intrigued enough to buy this book. There's a lot more that I learned from the author's research -- even as an analyst in this field (former, now with the Cold War over).

The world still knows very little about the Katyn Massacre, and until recently many people believed that the massacre had been committed by the Germans, so effective was the propaganda machine of the Soviet Union and its supporters and collaborators the worldover. Today we know the truth. The other major event was Great Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33, instituted by Stalin and the communist regime, which the Soviet government was able to keep hidden for decades, and which is only now beginning to be acknowledged.

Yes. The Katyn massacre is a grim reminder of what the Soviet Union and its supporters and sympathizers were all about. Like the Great Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33, the Katyn Massacre has been kept hidden by the Soviet Union until its disintegration. Both are still not widely known - unlike the Jewish Holocaust. Far too little information has been brought to light on either subject. More needs to be done. "Katyn" is a must book for those who want to understand the brutality of the former Soviet Union.

Cannon never explains numbers here. Yet, this is the history of a group of revolutionists who went from two or three leaders of
the Communist party who learned of Trotsky's critique of Stalin, to a group of a few dozens--The Generals without an Army they
were called. They went from only a few to merging and mixing with new currents of workers who came forward as the CIO Upsurge came forward. Their principles helped spark the organization of workers in the great strikes in Minneapolis in 1934 and aftewrards, then to influence workers in the sit down strikes in Flint and Dearborn and Detroit, and to lead demonstrations of tens of thousands against American Nazis. Then to find hundreds of young workers, intellectuals, and student youth in the Socialist party and battle the reformists there, to build Found the Socialist Workers party, founded with more than a thousand members in 1938. But this is not about those numbers. Through most of history, real revolutionists real communists have been forced to fight in small organizations like the movement Cannon built. What this is about is the principles,
the ideas, the lessons, the history, how to do things theoretically, how to do them practically, and how to do them right.

Like all of Cannon's writing, there is so much humor, wit, and much wisdom about not only politics but life on this planet in general.

Aquí se ve la historia temprana de cómo construyeron el núcleo de un partido revolucionario de las masas que participará en la revolución norteamericana que viene. También es la historia de la lucha por la continuidad comunista internacional con su guía de acción frente la más grande obstáculo a la victoria revolucionaria que hubo desde los veinte hasta los cuarenta ( y más despues ): el estalinismo, el contrario del comunismo.

También aquí se cuenta la historia de la participación de este núcleo en la lucha dentro de la clase trabajadora norteamericana como dirigentes de algunas de las huelgas más militantes de esos años.

Finalmente se explica la estrategia para vencer el fascismo: seguir el ejemplo del frente unido, como hizo el partido bolchevique en la Rusia en 1917 durante su trayectoria al poder. ¡Nosotros los trabajadores necesitamos hoy y necesitáramos mañana entender esta experiencia en todos nuestros países para vencer sobre la marcha capitalista actual hacia fascismo y la guerra mundial!

Sufrimos una época de guerras y revolución porque el sistema actual, fundado en la avaricia individual, padece cada vez más de sus trastornos mortales. Ya que año con año se avecina la Tercera Guerra Mundial, la editorial Pathfinder nos aconseja aprender de las otras dos ocasiones en que nos llevó al borde de la barbarie.

Los libros de Cannon no son sobre el pasado, sino cómo sacar mayor ventaja de las aperturas y oportunidades que necesariamente se van a presentar en el camino para forjar partidos de los trabajadores de común acuerdo en aprender de las luchas de los explotados donde sea que surgen y unidos en la trayectoria de construir un mundo libre del capitalismo.

Cannon era miembro fundador del movimiento del Obrero Mundial (IWW), los antecedentes del Partido Comunista y el Partido mismo. En los 20 era dirigente de la Defensa Internacional del Obrero (ILD) y fue representante norteamericano en el presidio del Internacional Comunista con Lenin y Trotsky.

Dado que el estalinismo ya no trompea el camino para que los luchadores se reúnen, hoy en día el movimiento comunista no necesita valerse del nombre "trotskista" para diferenciarse de los estalinistas; con este simple cambio de nomenclatura el contenido de La historia del trotskismo estadounidense sigue en pie de lucha. Traza la continuidad ideológica y marca la pauta para que detengamos la marcha de los explotadores hacia su tercera guerra mundial, que ellos mismos no pueden parar debido a su permanente caída en la taza de ganancias.

Organizing and Defending a Revolution

Leon Trotsky was a participant in the most significant class battles of the 20th century. This book collects some of Trotsky's key speeches and writings from the Russian Revolution, and his effort to defend it even when persecuted by the Stalin gang that usurped power and murdered the revolution's leaders. It is a great introduction to the Russian revolution and to Trotsky's other works. Read about how the Soviet of Workers and Soldiers Deputies (Trotsky was the President) organized the insurrection; the revolutionary government's efforts to lead working people forward; how Stalin undermined the Soviet Union by seeking a pact with Hitler.

I found a lot to be learned from this collection of talks, reports and declarations by this leader of the Russian Revolution, given in wildly different settings to different audiences, over decades of revolutionary working class struggle.

Above all, you see Trotsky appealing to, educating, and inspiring workers and peasants with an understanding of the challenges they faced and a confidence in their ability to take on unprecedented historical tasks.

His speech in a Czarist court defending the workers councils (Soviets) of the 1905 Russian revolution is of the same spirit as Nelson Mandela or Fidel Castro when they in turn were on trial by their oppressors. Read the messages and transcripts of speeches given during the whirlwind of the October Revolution in Russia-- a working class leader in day-by-day action.

And especially worth studying, Trotsky's talks to gatherings of workers, soldiers, and party members analyzing the changing relations between the major world powers and between the toiling and exploiting classes of those nations, and the different policies pursued by the new Soviet government as these circumstances changed-- you'll learn a lot about how society works and what it takes to really change it.

Trotsky was a great orator, a great writer, but above all he was impassioned by his faith in the power of working people to change the world, a vision he never lost. This is where the power of these great speeches comes from. Read them and learn how to harness that power for today's fights. The speeches here don't appeal to cheap emotion, nor do they appeal to fancy phraseology, they appeal to reason, they appeal to history, they appeal to the power of working people to change the world. Read these speeches not for history, but for how their ideas can be used to fight our way out of the disaster modern capitalism has left the world in, and to find a way out for the peoples in the former Stalinized countries.

Protokol is an electrifying fictional story of international intrigue that had me asking "Is it true?" The story weaves pieces of history of the Cold War in such a way that it was exciting, gripping and very plausible. I couldn't put it down. It is a real page-turner. The characters captured my imagination in this moving story that illustrates just how far people will go in their quest for money and power. In this story, everything is a deal.

The story begins in 1998, GlobusBank is partnering with the American firm Olen Europe, headed by David Olen, international real estate developer, to renovate a historical building. The sudden cold-blooded killing of Alexei Sokolov, GlobusBank Official, in St. Petersbug, Russia starts to upset the current delicate balance of global power. David Olen travels from his home in Chicago to Europe to prevent a pack made in the 1970s between an American government agency, the Soviet Union, and the Vatican that selected the pope from resurfacing and putting his life and reputation at risk. The story describes how high-profile political figures, successful businessmen, and criminals may have become reluctant partners in their quest for power and money to reshape the course of Western history.

The author, Eugene Golub, is the founder and Chairman of Golub & Company. In 1989, Golub & Company entered the international marketplace through its subsidiary, Golub-Europe, now GE Capital Golub-Europe, L.L.C., a Company whose members are affiliates of Golub & Company and GE Capital Corporation. That entity was the first major U.S. real estate company to undertake development projects in Central and Eastern Europe and Russia just prior to their re-emergence as market-driven economies. With Golub's vast real estate experience, this exciting story of international intrigue will force you to review events in history and perhaps change the way you think and ask---could this really happen?
Dr. Margot B. Weinstein

Having read Le Carre, Clancy, and Condon, I rate this new novel as one of the best I have ever read. This is a thriller with historical interest. A real page turner to say the least.

In 1998 St. Petersburg, Russia, GlobusBank official Alexei Sokolov heads to his meeting with officials from the European Development Bank. GlobusBank is partnering with the American firm Olen Europe to renovate a historical building. However, two Mercedes block the vehicle containing Alexei. Men leave the other cars, approach Alexei's auto, and assassinate him.

The cold-blooded killing of Alexei impacts the Russian presidential election. That in turn begins the potential toppling of the current delicate balance of global power like a series of dominoes if secrets are revealed. David Olen travels to Europe to prevent an international collapse. He knows first hand of the deal set in the 1970s between a clandestine American government agency, the Soviet Union, and the Vatican that chose the Pope. If the agreement surfaces global relationships and confidence could be destroyed.

On first look, readers will brush aside PROTOKOL: A NOVEL OF INTERNATIONAL INTRIGUE as the imagination of the authors. However, as the audience digs deeper into the action filled plot with ever increasing suspense, the readers will realize the premise is plausible and the details make one wonder did it really happen that way? The only reason not to believe it happened that way is inductive as this book is published with the writers still alive. Conspiracy thriller fans will love this exciting tale that substantiates many beliefs and demand Eugene Golub and Quinton Skinner look at Yalta next.

Harriet Klausner

I found this to be an excellent compilation of hard data on the July,1943 Battle of Kursk. Huge amounts of data is presented in a manner that makes it easy(relatively speaking)to understand the largest tank battle of WW2. The author begins by presenting a concise background that allows the reader to understand the overall strategic situation on the Eastern Front in the spring of 1943. He then presents an astonishing amount of material that shows in great detail the manner in which the opposing forces were organized,the structure of the units involved (both Soviet and German),the types of tanks and assault guns employed by both armies,a chapter on the impact of both combatants air forces on the battle ,and a chronology of the battle,including a seperate chapter on the armored clash at Prokhorovka.The final three chapters of the book are devoted to the costs and consequences of the battle and an analysis of the battle. Each of these chapters is extensively footnoted. Finally,there are 16 appendices covering just about every conceivable facet of Operation Zitadelle including what may be the most detailed order of battle ever presented on this battle. There are also a large number of tables and figures that further illuminate the size and composition of the opposing forces. I am very impressed by this book and can heartily recommend it.

I guess the book that Mr. Gwane reviewed is "Normandy 1944", another book written by Niklas Z. and published by J.J. Fedorowicz in 2000.

I like both "Kursk 1943" and "Normandy 1944". This is the first time I can read data generated from systematically statistic analyses on the strength and losses of involved forces in WWII. The result of the statistics, rather than personal opinions or recollections, tells the truth of these campaigns. These books clarified many long-standing errors and misconceptions, though readers should still keep in mind that the authors could make mistake or use unreliable reference too. Highly recommended.

I feel I have to make some serious correction about Mr. Gawne's review. This book has NOTHING TO DO with the German Army in Normandy. Rather, it is a statistical analysis of the battle between the German and Soviet armies in the region of Kursk (Western Russia) in the summer of 1943.

Mitla Pass is a layered, inspirational tale of love, war(amidst other things) and portrays the main character in a realistic and gritty manner.I first read the book when I was 12 years old and it has remained my favourite novel of all time. Gideon Zadok's struggle is very moving and his remniscing of loved ones helps to emphasise his conflict with himself and those around him. Mitla Pass spans over generations, but contrary to what one might think, you don't lose track.Uris's writing style is exceptional and captures the different settings of the novel beautifully and brings out their individuality.

Another fantastic human historical drama from Leon Uris Gideon the Writer is struggling to come to terms with a dysfunctional family (made up of a host of colourful characters make it read like a Jewish Dickens) and a difficult marriage to a wife who he takes for granted as well as his own wavering career He gets an assignment to write on Israels struggle to survive at the time of the Sinai War and has a steamy relationship with a sophisticated and powerful Jewish woman -who is a holocaust victim and an important consultant to the Israeli government But the story goes back to that of Gideons family many years before he was born and is exciting,illuminating,sad,humorous and pictureresque

Another fantastic historical human historical drama from Leon Uris Gideon the Writer is struggling to come to terms with a dysfunctional family (made up of a host of colourful characters make it read like a Jewish Dickens) and a difficult marriage to a wife who he takes for granted as well as his own wavering career He gets an assignment to write on Israels struggle to survive at the time of the Sinai War and has a steamy relationship with a sophisticated and powerful Jewish woman -who is a holocaust victim and an important consultant to the Israeli government But the story goes back to that of gideons family many years before he was born and is exciting,illuminating,sad,humorous and pictureresque

This is one of those inclusive and thorough travel guides that's complete. Carried it with me, matched the pages and the places, and it all fit. A lot of history and overview, which makes it better than the books that tell you "turn left at the statue and look at the palace."

The photos are better than most local postcards, too bad you can't tear them out and mail them to friends.

Overall, a terrific companion, but make sure to pack it when you go. The other couple traveling with us kept borrowing ours, and we had to keep asking for it back.

Masha Nordbye has provided far more than a simple guide to these fascinating cities. She writes with a clarity and deep personal knowledge that can bring these places alive for even the most armchair bound traveller. The specifics are there, certainly, but it is her love for these places that establishes this wonderful book as an adventure in just the reading of it. It is alone at the top of the list.

Man,has this author been there - to Moscow and St. Pete - and done just about everything that any of the rest of us might imagine as we plan our trip. A GREAT guidebook with great pics. Don't leave homw without it!!

Phil Penningroth, Longmont, CO

The book is long and melodrmatic. Deeper than that, the nihlistic movments in Russia is intresting to see devolop.

I was intrigued when John Updike picked this over Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov as one of the ten greatest works of literature of the millenium. After reading it I still claim that Karamazov is better, but this novel is certainly not to be missed. It is touter than some of Dostoevsky's other works, and it contains some of his best characterizations, all suffused with a very dark and very penetrating sense of humor. No one will forget the nihilist Kirilov, who wishes to kill himself in order to become God, the naive aesthete Stepan Trofimovitch and his final, farcical escape into peasant Russia, or Nikolai Stavrogin, haunted by a terrible crime that is made all the worse because it is too ordinary. The whole novel is an unabashed piece of anti-revolutionary (indeed, reactionary) propaganda, but even the characters that are intended as caricatures come across as fascinating and oddly believable. This novel displays as well as any other of his works the author's extraordinary understanding of the tortured ways of the human spirit.

This books improves upon the Divine Comedy and revives the New Testament. This book is a bible of Dionysiac dismemberment. Dostoevsky has translated Job's Jehova for us, from the original thunder.

Dr Getty's study of the Terror is among the most groundbreaking and insightful of the last decade. I believe it is the best book on the Terror yet written. What began as a moderate attempt to clean up the Party in 1933 through controled means turned into violent chaos in mid-1937. The Yezhov years are covered deeply with a great reliance on archives avalible. For the first time the documents themselves can be viewed by the reader. Getty clearly defines the periods of the Terror according to their severity. In 1933 people were purged from the Party but it only ment dismissal and a chance for readdmition. In 1936 things began to get bloody but it was still controled by the elites. The explosion of 1937 with the liquidation of top Soviet Marshals signaled the coming of a full blown bloodbath. This period lasted from the last half of 1937 to the first half of 1938. This was largely directed by the NKVD under Yezhov but Getty stresses Yezhov was ordered by Stalin and the Politburo to conduct arrest and executions of party elites in both the Center and provinces along with mass shootings of social marginals. The Terror was horrible yet more conservative numbers of deaths are given. Elites were the primary victims. Getty's statistics appear to be correct. Millions were not executed but social trama of the Terror was horrid. This work shreds Robert Conquest to pieces...

Unlike other mass murderers, the Bolsheviks left a paper trail detailing their horrific criminal deeds. Naturally, dictator Josef Stalin is prominently cited in the formerly top secret transcripts of the Soviet's Central Committee. Others, however, like his nomenklatura henchmen; Lazar Kaganovich, a Jew and rabid Christian hater; Vyacheslav Molotov; Lavrenti Beria; and Genrikh Yagoda, were just as complicit as him. The historian, H. R. Trevor-Roper put it well, "Great massacres may be commanded by tyrants, but they are imposed by people." The authors conservatively estimate that "1.5 million" Communist Party members were killed during the "Great Terror" purges of the 1930s. The majority were shot to death, others died in the GULAG camps, originally established by the fanatical Bolshevik thug, Vladimir I. Lenin. This riveting story opens by telling the sad tale of one Alexander Yulevich Tivel. It is typical of what happened to many of Marxism's true believers. A hack propagandist for Pravda, Tivel was shot as an "enemy of the people" on March 7, 1937, in Moscow, after a perfunctory trial. He was also a Zionist, who had made the fatal mistake of knowing Grigory Zinoviev and Karl Radek. Like Tivel, they were all Jews, who were suspected by the Kremlin elite of plotting with its arch rival, the exiled zealot, Lew Davinovich Bronstein, a/k/a Leon Trotsky. The Tivel drama didn't end there. His wife was sent to Siberia and she wasn't freed until 1953. Their young son was placed in an orphanage for being a "member of the family of a traitor of the Motherland." In this book, too, surprisedly, you will find the modern seeds of the dubious "Hate Crime" concept, championed by Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY). Stalin, in a rant about the putative enemies of his Communist hell hole, is quoted in October, 1937, as saying, "Anyone who by his actions and thoughts-yes, his thoughts-encroaches on the unity of the socialist state, we will destroy them and their kin." I'm sure Schumer, a pompous windbag, will deny the alien-based connection to his legislative scheme. This is an authoritative book that exposes the unspeakable crimes of Stalin's Bolshevik gang against its own party faithful. It should be a sobering lesson to anyone who tends to believe in extremist solutions.

William Hughes, J.D. Baltimore, MD. (Published in the journal of the Social Justice Review, July-August, 2000 issue.)

This book is tremendously useful because it gives a hitherto unknown insight into exactly how Stalin and his closest cronies set in motion the purges of the 1930s. The heart of the book consists of around 200 secret Communist Party documents interspersed with commentary from the authors. The archival material suggests very strongly that the path to the terror was not planned meticulously from the start but consisted of a series of false starts and zigzags until Stalin decided in 1937 to crush all resistance to the party's rule. Of particular interest are a couple of documents which show how many members of the inner Politburo demanded stricter punishments for alleged wrong-doers than Stalin did himself. Barring the discovery of Stalin's diary many of the dictator's motives will remain unknown forever but the documents in this book do paint a largely convincing portrait of an unpopular regime in Moscow lurching from crisis to crisis, trying both to stablise the internal situation and also to eliminate the possibility of serious internal resistance. What does come through very clearly is how arbitrary the terror was and how many of those charged with repressing alleged foreign spies and saboteurs were almost guaranteed to be shot themselves. First the Politburo lashed out at the secret police for not doing enough to stamp out centres of Trotskyite resistance and then issued orders demanding the execution and arrest of millions of people across the country. Later the secret police came under fire for allegedly indulging in indiscriminate terror and repressing too many people. I can understand the point of the Kirkus Reviews contributor who doubted the authors' explanation that the Politburo pushed ahead with the purges because they were indeed convinced enemies lay behind every corner and a coup was always possible. A sense of self-preservation and the need to show Stalin they were onside surely did partly explain their enthusiasm for spilling blood. But this is a minor quibble about an otherwise excellent book.

No one book has more information than this one, and it's simply the best all-in-one traveling companion available. But it isn't perfect. Personal anecdotes and incidents sometimes seem amateurish, and Moscow changes so quickly that some of them are now quaintly outdated. The maps are minimal to the point of being useless; the best maps are in "Great Moscow", "Three Days in Moscow" (if you can tolerate the outdated street names), or one of the building-by-building atlases now available (all of these are published and available only in Russia). Finally, the level of detail is so great that some errors inevitably crept in, and hopefully they will be corrected in the next edition.

Rough Guide's book on Moscow is by far one of the best tour books I have seen for that city. Recently we had the chance to live in Moscow for two months. This book, along with the Rough Guides Russian phrase book, were our constant companions. The Moscow book was essential for giving us really indepth information about most of the sites we went to see. Also, the history section was invaluable to us as we found it necessary to do a little homeschooling of our children while there. I still refer to the history section of the Moscow book to refresh my memory on the complicated story of Russian history.

We also had Fodor's along with us but found that we relied much more on Rough Guides as a source of important and reliable information. Rough Guides is a must if you visit Moscow.

When I packed my bags for Moscow last summer I included about 4 different guide books, and the only one that came home ragged was this one. Absolutely the best I have seen or ever expect to see -- Step by step suggestions to get you exactly where you need to go, maps and more maps, and a small language primer. The thing that puts this book above the rest is that it gives you a complete historical story behind each destination. I came away with beautiful pictures and the history to go with them. This book even features short day trips outside of Moscow. The Rough Guide pocket sized language primer (available from Amazon) is also an essential. Take these two books and prepare yourself for some of the greatest times you will ever have. P.S. -- Check out the new edition