The Zhivago Affair

The Zhivago Affair PDF Author: Peter Finn
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307908011
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 377

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Book Description
Drawing on newly declassified government files, this is the dramatic story of how a forbidden book in the Soviet Union became a secret CIA weapon in the ideological battle between East and West. In May 1956, an Italian publishing scout took a train to a village just outside Moscow to visit Russia’s greatest living poet, Boris Pasternak. He left carrying the original manuscript of Pasternak’s first and only novel, entrusted to him with these words: “This is Doctor Zhivago. May it make its way around the world.” Pasternak believed his novel was unlikely ever to be published in the Soviet Union, where the authorities regarded it as an irredeemable assault on the 1917 Revolution. But he thought it stood a chance in the West and, indeed, beginning in Italy, Doctor Zhivago was widely published in translation throughout the world. From there the life of this extraordinary book entered the realm of the spy novel. The CIA, which recognized that the Cold War was above all an ideological battle, published a Russian-language edition of Doctor Zhivago and smuggled it into the Soviet Union. Copies were devoured in Moscow and Leningrad, sold on the black market, and passed surreptitiously from friend to friend. Pasternak’s funeral in 1960 was attended by thousands of admirers who defied their government to bid him farewell. The example he set launched the great tradition of the writer-dissident in the Soviet Union. In The Zhivago Affair, Peter Finn and Petra Couvée bring us intimately close to this charming, passionate, and complex artist. First to obtain CIA files providing concrete proof of the agency’s involvement, the authors give us a literary thriller that takes us back to a fascinating period of the Cold War—to a time when literature had the power to stir the world. (With 8 pages of black-and-white illustrations.)

The Zhivago Affair

The Zhivago Affair PDF Author: Peter Finn
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307908011
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 377

Get Book Here

Book Description
Drawing on newly declassified government files, this is the dramatic story of how a forbidden book in the Soviet Union became a secret CIA weapon in the ideological battle between East and West. In May 1956, an Italian publishing scout took a train to a village just outside Moscow to visit Russia’s greatest living poet, Boris Pasternak. He left carrying the original manuscript of Pasternak’s first and only novel, entrusted to him with these words: “This is Doctor Zhivago. May it make its way around the world.” Pasternak believed his novel was unlikely ever to be published in the Soviet Union, where the authorities regarded it as an irredeemable assault on the 1917 Revolution. But he thought it stood a chance in the West and, indeed, beginning in Italy, Doctor Zhivago was widely published in translation throughout the world. From there the life of this extraordinary book entered the realm of the spy novel. The CIA, which recognized that the Cold War was above all an ideological battle, published a Russian-language edition of Doctor Zhivago and smuggled it into the Soviet Union. Copies were devoured in Moscow and Leningrad, sold on the black market, and passed surreptitiously from friend to friend. Pasternak’s funeral in 1960 was attended by thousands of admirers who defied their government to bid him farewell. The example he set launched the great tradition of the writer-dissident in the Soviet Union. In The Zhivago Affair, Peter Finn and Petra Couvée bring us intimately close to this charming, passionate, and complex artist. First to obtain CIA files providing concrete proof of the agency’s involvement, the authors give us a literary thriller that takes us back to a fascinating period of the Cold War—to a time when literature had the power to stir the world. (With 8 pages of black-and-white illustrations.)

Putin's People

Putin's People PDF Author: Catherine Belton
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ISBN: 0374712786
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 405

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Book Description
A New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller | A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Named a best book of the year by The Economist | Financial Times | New Statesman | The Telegraph "[Putin's People] will surely now become the definitive account of the rise of Putin and Putinism." —Anne Applebaum, The Atlantic "This riveting, immaculately researched book is arguably the best single volume written about Putin, the people around him and perhaps even about contemporary Russia itself in the past three decades." —Peter Frankopan, Financial Times Interference in American elections. The sponsorship of extremist politics in Europe. War in Ukraine. In recent years, Vladimir Putin’s Russia has waged a concerted campaign to expand its influence and undermine Western institutions. But how and why did all this come about, and who has orchestrated it? In Putin’s People, the investigative journalist and former Moscow correspondent Catherine Belton reveals the untold story of how Vladimir Putin and the small group of KGB men surrounding him rose to power and looted their country. Delving deep into the workings of Putin’s Kremlin, Belton accesses key inside players to reveal how Putin replaced the freewheeling tycoons of the Yeltsin era with a new generation of loyal oligarchs, who in turn subverted Russia’s economy and legal system and extended the Kremlin's reach into the United States and Europe. The result is a chilling and revelatory exposé of the KGB’s revanche—a story that begins in the murk of the Soviet collapse, when networks of operatives were able to siphon billions of dollars out of state enterprises and move their spoils into the West. Putin and his allies subsequently completed the agenda, reasserting Russian power while taking control of the economy for themselves, suppressing independent voices, and launching covert influence operations abroad. Ranging from Moscow and London to Switzerland and Brooklyn’s Brighton Beach—and assembling a colorful cast of characters to match—Putin’s People is the definitive account of how hopes for the new Russia went astray, with stark consequences for its inhabitants and, increasingly, the world.

Weak Strongman

Weak Strongman PDF Author: Timothy Frye
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691246289
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
"Media and public discussion tends to understand Russian politics as a direct reflection of Vladimir Putin's seeming omnipotence or Russia's unique history and culture. Yet Russia is remarkably similar to other autocracies -- and recognizing this illuminates the inherent limits to Putin's power. Weak Strongman challenges the conventional wisdom about Putin's Russia, highlighting the difficult trade-offs that confront the Kremlin on issues ranging from election fraud and repression to propaganda and foreign policy. Drawing on three decades of his own on-the-ground experience and research as well as insights from a new generation of social scientists that have received little attention outside academia, Timothy Frye reveals how much we overlook about today's Russia when we focus solely on Putin or Russian exceptionalism. Frye brings a new understanding to a host of crucial questions: How popular is Putin? Is Russian propaganda effective? Why are relations with the West so fraught? Can Russian cyber warriors really swing foreign elections? In answering these and other questions, Frye offers a highly accessible reassessment of Russian politics that highlights the challenges of governing Russia and the nature of modern autocracy. Rich in personal anecdotes and cutting-edge social science, Weak Strongman offers the best evidence available about how Russia actually works"--

Against Their Will

Against Their Will PDF Author: P. M. Poli?an
Publisher: Central European University Press
ISBN: 9789639241688
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 456

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Book Description
"During his reign, Joseph Stalin oversaw the forced resettlement of people by the millions - a maniacal passion that he used for social engineering. Six million people were resettled before Stalin's death. This volume is the first attempt to comprehensively examine the history of forced and semi-voluntary population movements within or organized by the Soviet Union. Contents range from the early 1920s to the rehabilitation of repressed nationalities in the 1990s, dealing with internal (kulaks, ethnic and political deportations) and international forced migrations (German internees and occupied territories)."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Sandworm

Sandworm PDF Author: Andy Greenberg
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0525564632
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 370

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Book Description
"With the nuance of a reporter and the pace of a thriller writer, Andy Greenberg gives us a glimpse of the cyberwars of the future while at the same time placing his story in the long arc of Russian and Ukrainian history." —Anne Applebaum, bestselling author of Twilight of Democracy The true story of the most devastating act of cyberwarfare in history and the desperate hunt to identify and track the elite Russian agents behind it: "[A] chilling account of a Kremlin-led cyberattack, a new front in global conflict" (Financial Times). In 2014, the world witnessed the start of a mysterious series of cyberattacks. Targeting American utility companies, NATO, and electric grids in Eastern Europe, the strikes grew ever more brazen. They culminated in the summer of 2017, when the malware known as NotPetya was unleashed, penetrating, disrupting, and paralyzing some of the world's largest businesses—from drug manufacturers to software developers to shipping companies. At the attack's epicenter in Ukraine, ATMs froze. The railway and postal systems shut down. Hospitals went dark. NotPetya spread around the world, inflicting an unprecedented ten billion dollars in damage—the largest, most destructive cyberattack the world had ever seen. The hackers behind these attacks are quickly gaining a reputation as the most dangerous team of cyberwarriors in history: a group known as Sandworm. Working in the service of Russia's military intelligence agency, they represent a persistent, highly skilled force, one whose talents are matched by their willingness to launch broad, unrestrained attacks on the most critical infrastructure of their adversaries. They target government and private sector, military and civilians alike. A chilling, globe-spanning detective story, Sandworm considers the danger this force poses to our national security and stability. As the Kremlin's role in foreign government manipulation comes into greater focus, Sandworm exposes the realities not just of Russia's global digital offensive, but of an era where warfare ceases to be waged on the battlefield. It reveals how the lines between digital and physical conflict, between wartime and peacetime, have begun to blur—with world-shaking implications.

Tom Clancy Commander in Chief

Tom Clancy Commander in Chief PDF Author: Mark Greaney
Publisher: Riverhead Books
ISBN: 0399176764
Category : Jack Ryan
Languages : en
Pages : 738

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Book Description
Jack Ryan is presented with yet another deadly mission in the latest thriller by Mark Greaney, Tom Clancy's last and most successful collaborator

Making the Unipolar Moment

Making the Unipolar Moment PDF Author: Hal Brands
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1501703420
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 482

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Book Description
In the late 1970s, the United States often seemed to be a superpower in decline. Battered by crises and setbacks around the globe, its post–World War II international leadership appeared to be draining steadily away. Yet just over a decade later, by the early 1990s, America’s global primacy had been reasserted in dramatic fashion. The Cold War had ended with Washington and its allies triumphant; democracy and free markets were spreading like never before. The United States was now enjoying its "unipolar moment"—an era in which Washington faced no near-term rivals for global power and influence, and one in which the defining feature of international politics was American dominance. How did this remarkable turnaround occur, and what role did U.S. foreign policy play in causing it? In this important book, Hal Brands uses recently declassified archival materials to tell the story of American resurgence. Brands weaves together the key threads of global change and U.S. policy from the late 1970s through the early 1990s, examining the Cold War struggle with Moscow, the rise of a more integrated and globalized world economy, the rapid advance of human rights and democracy, and the emergence of new global challenges like Islamic extremism and international terrorism. Brands reveals how deep structural changes in the international system interacted with strategies pursued by Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, and George H. W. Bush to usher in an era of reinvigorated and in many ways unprecedented American primacy. Making the Unipolar Moment provides an indispensable account of how the post–Cold War order that we still inhabit came to be.

This New Ocean

This New Ocean PDF Author: William E. Burrows
Publisher: Modern Library
ISBN: 0307765482
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 795

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Book Description
It was all part of man's greatest adventure--landing men on the Moon and sending a rover to Mars, finally seeing the edge of the universe and the birth of stars, and launching planetary explorers across the solar system to Neptune and beyond. The ancient dream of breaking gravity's hold and taking to space became a reality only because of the intense cold-war rivalry between the superpowers, with towering geniuses like Wernher von Braun and Sergei Korolyov shelving dreams of space travel and instead developing rockets for ballistic missiles and space spectaculars. Now that Russian archives are open and thousands of formerly top-secret U.S. documents are declassified, an often startling new picture of the space age emerges: the frantic effort by the Soviet Union to beat the United States to the Moon was doomed from the beginning by gross inefficiency and by infighting so treacherous that Winston Churchill likened it to "dogs fighting under a carpet"; there was more than science behind the United States' suggestion that satellites be launched during the International Geophysical Year, and in one crucial respect, Sputnik was a godsend to Washington; the hundred-odd German V-2s that provided the vital start to the U.S. missile and space programs legally belonged to the Soviet Union and were spirited to the United States in a derring-do operation worthy of a spy thriller; despite NASA's claim that it was a civilian agency, it had an intimate relationship with the military at the outset and still does--a distinction the Soviet Union never pretended to make; constant efforts to portray astronauts and cosmonauts as "Boy Scouts" were often contradicted by reality; the Apollo missions to the Moon may have been an unexcelled political triumph and feat of exploration, but they also created a headache for the space agency that lingers to this day. This New Ocean is based on 175 interviews with Russian and American scientists and engineers; on archival documents, including formerly top-secret National Intelligence Estimates and spy satellite pictures; and on nearly three decades of reporting. The impressive result is this fascinating story--the first comprehensive account--of the space age. Here are the strategists and war planners; engineers and scientists; politicians and industrialists; astronauts and cosmonauts; science fiction writers and journalists; and plain, ordinary, unabashed dreamers who wanted to transcend gravity's shackles for the ultimate ride. The story is written from the perspective of a witness who was present at the beginning and who has seen the conclusion of the first space age and the start of the second.

The Practice of Global History

The Practice of Global History PDF Author: Matthias Middell
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 147429216X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 233

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Book Description
Over recent decades, almost every area of historical study has seen its global turn – from consumption to finance, from politics to migration, from social order to cultural patterns. This volume reflects the vibrant state of global history scholarship in Europe and examines to what extent global history is practiced and conceptualised distinctively within Europe. Drawing together contributions from scholars from France, Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the UK, the book offers a sweeping overview of the state of the field. In particular, the contributors look at histories of colonialism and imperial expansion, knowledge circulation and mobility across borders. This book reflects the diversity of current scholarship on global and transnational history and will offer important insights for anyone interested in understanding the cutting edge of research in this area.

Alternative Globalizations

Alternative Globalizations PDF Author: James Mark
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253046521
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
Globalization has become synonymous with the seemingly unfettered spread of capitalist multinationals, but this focus on the West and western economies ignores the wide variety of globalizing projects that sprang up in the socialist world as a consequence of the end of the European empires. This collection is the first to explore alternative forms of globalization across the socialist world during the Cold War. Gathering the work of established and upcoming scholars of the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and China, Alternative Globalizations addresses the new relationships and interconnections which emerged between a decolonizing world in the postwar period and an increasingly internationalist eastern bloc after the death of Stalin. In many cases, the legacies of these former globalizing impulses from the socialist world still exist today. Divided into four sections, the works gathered examine the economic, political, developmental, and cultural aspects of this exchange. In doing so, the authors break new ground in exploring this understudied history of globalization and provide a multifaceted study of an increasing postwar interconnectedness across a socialist world.