Following Stalin's death in 1953, during the period now known as the Thaw, Nikita Khrushchev opened up greater freedoms in cultural and intellectual life. A broad group of intellectuals and artists in Soviet Russia were able to take advantage of this, and in no realm of the arts was this perhaps more true than in music. Students at Soviet conservatories were at last able to use various channels--many of questionable legality--to acquire and hear music that had previously been forbidden, and visiting performers and composers brought young Soviets new sounds and new compositions. In the 1960s, composers such as Andrey Volkonsky, Edison Denisov, Alfred Schnittke, Arvo Part, Sofia Gubaidulina, and Valentin Silvestrov experimented with a wide variety of then new and unfamiliar techniques ranging from serialism to aleatory devices, and audiences eager to escape the music of predictable sameness typical to socialist realism were attracted to performances of their new and unfamiliar creations.
This "unofficial" music by young Soviet composers inhabited the gray space between legal and illegal. Such Freedom, If Only Musical traces the changing compositional styles and politically charged reception of this music, and brings to life the paradoxical freedoms and sense of resistance or opposition that it suggested to Soviet listeners. Author Peter J. Schmelz draws upon interviews conducted with many of the most important composers and performers of the musical Thaw, and supplements this first-hand testimony with careful archival research and detailed musical analyses. The first book to explore this period in detail, Such Freedom, If Only Musical will appeal to musicologists and theorists interested in post-war arts movements, the Cold War, and Soviet music, as well as historians of Russian culture and society."

Winner of the 2009 National Jewish Book Award in American Jewish Studies

Recipient of the 2010 Guggenheim Fellowship in Humanities-Intellectual & Cultural History

It has become an accepted truth: after World War II, American Jews chose to be silent about the mass murder of millions of their European brothers and sisters at the hands of the Nazis.

In this compelling work, Hasia R. Diner shows the assumption of silence to be categorically false. Uncovering a rich and incredibly varied trove of remembrances--in song, literature, liturgy, public display, political activism, and hundreds of other forms--We Remember with Reverence and Love shows that publicly memorializing those who died in the Holocaust arose from a deep and powerful element of Jewish life in postwar America. Not only does she marshal enough evidence to dismantle the idea of American Jewish "forgetfulness," she brings to life the moving and manifold ways that this widely diverse group paid tribute to the tragedy.

Diner also offers a compelling new perspective on the 1960s and its potent legacy, by revealing how our typical understanding of the postwar years emerged from the cauldron of cultural divisions and campus battles a generation later. The student activists and "new Jews" of the 1960s who, in rebelling against the American Jewish world they had grown up in "a world of remarkable affluence and broadening cultural possibilities" created a flawed portrait of what their parents had, or rather, had not, done in the postwar years. This distorted legacy has been transformed by two generations of scholars, writers, rabbis, and Jewish community leaders into a taken-for-granted truth.

When Vladimir Putin became President of Russia in 2000, his first priority was to reestablish the intelligence agencies' grip on the country by portraying himself as a strongman protecting Russian citizens from security threats. Despite condemnation by the United Nations, the European Parliament, and European Union, the policy of brutal "ethnic cleansing" in Chechnya continued. For Putin, Islamist attacks on the United States of September 11, 2001, were a welcome opportunity to rebrand the war against Chechen independence, not as the crushing of a democracy, but as a contribution to President George W. Bush's "War on Terror." In the years that followed, Putin's regime covertly supported and manipulated extremist factions in Chechnya and stage-managed terrorist attacks on its own citizens to justify continuing aggression. US and European condemnation of Russian atrocities in Chechnya dwindled as Russia continued to portray Chechen independence as an international terrorist threat. Chechnya's Prime Minister-in-Exile Akhmed Zakaev, who had to escape Chechnya, faced Russian calls for his extradition from the United Kingdom, which instead granted him political asylum as Russia's increased its oppressive operations.

Central Asia has become the battleground for the major struggles of the 21st century: radical Islam versus secularism, authoritarianism versus identity politics, Eastern versus Western control of resources, and the American 'War on Terror'. Nowhere are these conflicts more starkly illustrated than in the case of Tajikistan. Embedded in the oil-rich Central Asian region, and bordering war-torn Afghanistan, Tajikistan occupies a geo-strategically pivotal position. It is also a major transit hub for the smuggling of opium, which eventually ends up in the hands of heroin dealers in Western cities. In this timely book, Lena Jonson examines Tajkistan's search for a foreign policy in the post 9/11 environment. She shows the internal contradictions of a country in every sense at the crossroads, reconciling its bloody past with an uncertain future She assesses the impact of regional developments on the reform movement in Tajikistan, and in turn examines how changes in Tajik society (which is the only Central Asian country to have a legal Islamist party) might affect the region. The destiny of Tajikistan is intimately connected with that of Central Asia, and this thorough and penetrating book is essential reading for anyone seeking to make sense of this strategically vital region at a moment of transition.

This is the third and final 'stand-alone' account of C Squadron SAS's thrilling operations against the relentless spread of communist backed terrorism in East Africa. Drawing on first-hand experiences the author describes operations against communist-backed terrorists in Angola and Mozambique, aiding the Portuguese and Renamo against the MPLA and Frelimo respectively. Back in Southern Rhodesia SAS General Peter Walls, realising the danger that Mugabe and ZANU represented, appealed directly to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. This correspondence, published here for the first time, changed nothing and years of corruption and genocide followed. Although C Squadron was disbanded in 1980 many members joined the South African special forces. Operations undertaken included unsuccessful and costly destabilisation attempts against Mugabe and missions into Mozambique including the assassination of Samora Machel. By 1986 deteriorating relationships with the South African authorities resulted in the break-up of the SAS teams who dispersed worldwide. Had Mike Graham not written his three action-packed books, C Squadron SAS's superb fighting record might never have been revealed. For those who are fascinated by special forces soldiering his accounts are 'must reads'.

Since the 1960s, many influential Latin Americans, such as the leaders of student movements and unions, and political authorities, participated in exchange programs with the United States to learn about the American way of life. In Brazil, during the international context of the Cold War, when Brazil was governed by a military dictatorship ruled by generals who alternated in power, hundreds of union members were sent to the United States to take union education courses. Did they come back "Americanized" and able to introduce American trade unionism in Brazil? That is the question this book seeks to answer. It is a subject that is as yet little explored in the history of Latin American labor and international relations: the influence of foreign union organizations on national union politics and movements. Despite the US's investment in advertising, courses, films and trips offered to Brazilian union members, most of them were not convinced by the American ideas on how to organize an "authentic" union movement - or, at least, not committed to applying what they learned in the States.

The Shock of America is based on the proposition that whenever Europeans contemplated those margins of their experience where change occurred over the last 100 years or more, there, sooner or later, they would find America. How Europeans have come to terms over the decades with this dynamic force in their midst, and what these terms were, is the story at the heart of this text. Masses of Europeans have been enthralled by the real or imaginary prospects coming out of the USA. Important minorities were at times deeply upset by them. Sometime the roles were reversed or shaken up. But no-one could be indifferent for long. Inspiration, provocation, myth, menace, model: all these categories and many more have been deployed to try to cope with the Americans. Attitudes and stereotypes have emerged, intellectual resources have been mobilised, positions and policies developed: all trying to explain and deal with the kind of radiant supremacy the Americans built in the course of the twentieth century. David Ellwood combines political, economic, and cultural themes, suggesting that American mass culture is a distinctively incisive form of American power over time. The book is structured in three parts; a separation based on the proposition that America's influence as a decisive force for or against innovation was present most conspicuously after Europe's three greatest military-political conflicts of the contemporary era: the Great War, World War II, and the Cold War. It concludes with the emotional upsurge in Europe which greeted the arrival of Obama on the world scene, suggesting that in spite of all the disappointments and frictions of the years, the US still retained its privileged place as a source of inspiration for the future across the Western world.

Providing an indispensable resource for students and policy makers investigating the Bosnian catastrophes of the 1990s, this book provides a comprehensive survey of the leaders, ideas, movements, and events pertaining to one of the most devastating conflicts of contemporary times. In the three years of the Bosnian War, well over 100,000 people lost their lives, amid intense carnage. This led to unprecedented criminal prosecutions for genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity that are still taking place today. Bosnian Genocide: The Essential Reference Guide is the first encyclopedic treatment of the Balkan conflicts of the period from 1991 to 1999. It provides broad coverage of the nearly decade-long conflict, but with a major focus on the Bosnian War of 1992-1995. The book examines a variety of perspectives of the conflicts relating to Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, and Kosovo, among other developments that took place during the years spotlighted. The entries consider not only the leaders, ideas, movements, and events relating to the Bosnian War of 1992-1995 but also examine themes from before the war and after it. As such, coverage continues through to the Kosovo Intervention of 1999, arguing that this event, too, was part of the conflict that purportedly ended in 1995. This work will serve university students undertaking the study of genocide in the modern world and readers interested in modern wars, international crisis management, and peacekeeping and peacemaking. Provides nearly 150 entries-written in a clear and concise style by leading international authorities-that summarize the roles of the leaders involved in the Bosnian Conflict of 1992-1995 and beyond as well as contextualizing essays on various facets of the Bosnian Conflicts Considers and evaluates the various strategies adopted by members of the international community in trying to bring the war to an end Edited by renowned genocide scholar, Paul R. Bartrop, PhD

The mid-fifties and early sixties were times when joy and excitement flourished in the hearts of young Americans. With the birth of controversial 'rock n' roll', and the glitter of inescapable Hollywood, teenagers flooded the streets with hot rods and wild attitudes. The generation enjoyed a care free existence and took their lessons of right and wrong from the rugged John Wayne thundering across the silver screen. Unfortunately, the fun times would not last. A cry from the tropical mountains of Vietnam brought the peaceful tranquility in the United States to an abrupt end. The harsh reality of the county's youth being maimed and killed in a foreign land almost destroyed the nation. "The Final Farewell" is a fictional account of how young lives were changed during the violent years of the Vietnam War. It tells the story of two friends Sergeant Cleat Davis and Sergeant John Truman and their journey through some of the most desolate times in our nation's history. Together the war brothers endure the hardships of a brutal post high school life where they are tested beyond measure on the harsh battlefields of Vietnam. This touching and inspiring story brings to life the heart and soul of one of the most influential times in our country's history.

A history of the Official Irish Republican movement, from the IRA's 1962 ceasefire to the Official IRA's permanent ceasefire in 1972. The civil rights movement, outbreak of violence in August 1969, links with the communist party, Official IRA's campaign, ceasefire, and developments towards 'Sinn Fein the Workers' Party' are explored. "This book is the first in-depth study of this crucial period in the history of Irish republicanism. Using his unprecedented access to the internal documents of the movement and interviews with key participants Swan's work will transform our understanding of this transformative period in the history of the movement." Henry Patterson, Author of 'The Politics of Illusion: A Political History of the IRA' and 'Ireland Since 1939'. "There is much fascinating material . and also much good sense." Richard English, Author of 'Armed Struggle, A History of the IRA' and 'Radicals and the Republic: Socialist Republicanism in the Irish Free State'.

By 1945, both the US State Department and US Intelligence saw Czechoslovakia as the master key to the balance of power in Europe and a chessboard for the power-game between East and West. In this book, Igor Lukes illuminates the early stages of the Cold War in postwar Prague. He paints a critical portrait of Ambassador Laurence Steinhardt and shows that although Washington understood that the outcome of the crisis in Prague might shape the political trends elsewhere in Europe, it ignored signs that democracy in Czechoslovakia was in trouble. A large section of the book deals with US Intelligence in postwar Prague. The American intelligence officials who served in Czechoslovakia from 1945 to 1948 were committed to the mission of gathering information and protecting democracy. Yet they were defeated by the Czech and Soviet clandestine services that proved to be more shrewd and better informed. Indeed, Lukes reveals that a key American officer may have been turned by the Russians. Consequently, as the Communists moved to impose their dictatorship, the American Embassy was unprepared and helpless.

Greece in the 1960s produced one of Europe's arguably most controversial politicians of the post-war era. The contrarian politics of Andreas Papandreou grew out of his conflict laden re-engagement with Greece in the 1960s. Returning to Athens after 20 years in the US where he had been a rising member of the American liberal establishment, Papandreou forged a social reform-oriented, nationalist politics in Greece that ultimately put him at odds with the US foreign policy establishment and made him the primary target of a pro-American military coup in 1967. Venerated by his admirers and despised by his detractors with equal passion, the Harvard-educated Papandreou left in his wake no clear-cut answer to the question of who he was and what he stood for. Andreas Papandreou chronicles the events, struggles and ideas that defined the man's dramatic, intrigue-filled transformation from Kennedy-era modernizer to Cold War maverick. In the process the book examines the explosive interplay of character and circumstance that generated Papandreou's contentious, but powerfully consequential politics.

Explores the ways television documents, satirizes, and critiques the political era of the Trump presidency. In American Television during a Television Presidency, Karen McNally and contributors critically examine the various ways in which television became transfixed by the Trump presidency and the broader political, social, and cultural climate. This book is the first to fully address the relationship between TV and a presidency consistently conducted with television in mind. The sixteen chapters cover everything from the political theater of televised impeachment hearings to the potent narratives of fictional drama and the stinging critiques of comedy, as they consider the wide-ranging ways in which television engages with the shifting political culture that emerged during this period. Approaching television both historically and in the contemporary moment, the contributors-an international group of scholars from a variety of academic disciplines-illuminate the indelible links that exist between television, American politics, and the nation's broader culture. As it interrogates a presidency played out through the lens of the TV camera and reviews a medium immersing itself in a compelling and inescapable subject, American Television during a Television Presidency sets out to explore what defines the television of the Trump era as a distinctive time in TV history. From inequalities to resistance, and from fandom to historical memory, this book opens up new territory in which to critically analyze television's complex relationship with Donald Trump, his presidency, and the political culture of this unsettled and simultaneously groundbreaking era. Undergraduate and graduate students and scholars of film and television studies, comedy studies, and cultural studies will value this strong collection.

The Korean War occupies a unique place in American history and foreign policy. Because it followed closely after World War II and ushered in a new era of military action as the first hot conflict of the cold war, the Korean War was marketed as an entirely new kind of military campaign. But how were the war-weary American people convinced that the limited objectives of the Korean War were of paramount importance to the nation?
In this ground-breaking book, Steven Casey deftly analyzes the Truman and Eisenhower administrations' determined efforts to shape public discourse about the war, influence media coverage of the conflict, and gain political support for their overall approach to waging the Cold War, while also trying to avoid inciting a hysteria that would make it difficult to localize the conflict. The first in-depth study of Truman's and Eisenhower's efforts to garner and sustain support for the war, Selling the Korean War weaves a lucid tale of the interactions between the president and government officials, journalists, and public opinion that ultimately produced the twentieth century concept of limited war.
It has been popularly thought that the public is instinctively hostile towards any war fought for less than total victory, but Casey shows that limited wars place major constraints on what the government can say and do. He also demonstrates how the Truman administration skillfully rededicated and redefined the war as it dragged on with mounting casualties. Using a rich array of previously untapped archival resources--including official government documents, and the papers of leading congressmen, newspaper editors, and war correspondents--Casey's work promises to bethe definitive word on the relationship between presidents and public opinion during America's "forgotten war."

Some see the 1980s as a Golden Age, a "Morning in America" when Ronald Reagan revived America's economy, reoriented American politics, and restored Americans' faith in their country and in themselves. Others see the 1980s as a new "Gilded Age," an era that was selfish, superficial, glitzy, greedy, divisive, and destructive. This multifaceted exploration of the 1980s brings together a variety of voices from different political persuasions, generations, and vantage points. The volume features work by Reagan critics and Reagan fans (including one of President Reagan's closest aides, Ed Meese), by historians who think the 1980s were a disastrous time, those who think it was a glorious time, and those who see both the blessings and the curses of the decade. Their essays examine everything from multiculturalism, Southern conservatism, and Reaganomics, to music culture, religion, crime, AIDS, and the city. A complex, thoughtful account of a watershed in our recent history, this volume will engage anyone interested in this pivotal decade.

In "Selling Air Power," Steve Call provides the first comprehensive study of the efforts of post-war air power advocates to harness popular culture in support of their agenda. In the 1940s and much of the 1950s, hardly a month went by without at least one blatantly pro-air power article appearing in general interest magazines. Public fascination with flight helped create and sustain exaggerated expectations for air power in the minds of both its official proponents and the American public. Articles in the "Saturday Evening Post," "Reader's Digest," and "Life" trumpeted the secure future assured by American air superiority. Military figures like Henry H. "Hap" Arnold and Curtis E. LeMay, radio-television personalities such as Arthur Godfrey, cartoon figures like "Steve Canyon," and actors like Jimmy Stewart played key roles in the unfolding campaign. Movies like "Twelve O'Clock High ," "The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell," and "A Gathering of Eagles" projected onto the public imagination vivid images confirming what was coming to be the accepted wisdom: that America's safety against the Soviet threat could best be guaranteed by air power, coupled with nuclear capability. But as the Cold War continued and the specter of the mushroom cloud grew more prominent in American minds, another, more sinister interpretation began to take hold. Call chronicles the shift away from the heroic, patriotic posture of the years just after World War II, toward the threatening, even bizarre imagery of books and movies like "Catch-22," "On the Beach," and "Dr. Strangelove." Call's careful analysis goes beyond the public relations campaigns to probe the intellectual climate that shaped them and gave them power. "Selling Air Power" adds a critical layer of understanding to studies in military and aviation history, as well as American popular culture.

Syria's descent into chaos since 2011 has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, while more than nine million people have fled their homes. In this timely account, John McHugo charts the history of Syria from the First World War to the present and considers why Syria's foundations as a nation have proved so fragile. He examines the country's thwarted attempts at independence under French rule before turning to more recent events: two generations of rule by the Assad family, sectarian tensions, the pressures that turned an aborted revolution into a proxy war, and the appearance of ISIS. As the conflict in Syria rages on, McHugo provides a rare and authoritative guide to a complex nation that demands our attention.

This oral history of the air war in Vietnam includes the stories of more than thirty pilots who all had one thing in common-after returning from Southeast Asia and separating from the service, they were hired as pilots by Western Airlines. As the chapters begin, Bruce Cowee tells his story and introduces us to each pilot. The interesting theme is that all of these men served in Southeast Asia and in most cases never knew each other until they came home and went to work for Western Airlines. Each of the pilots featured in this book is the real thing, and in an age of so many "Wannabees," it is reassuring to know that each of them was a pilot for Western Airlines and someone who Bruce worked with or knew professionally. The stories span a 9 year period, 1964 - 1973, and cover every aspect of the Air War in Southeast Asia. These 33 men represent only a small fraction of the Vietnam veterans hired as pilots by Western Airlines, but this book pays tribute to all of them.

The first decade of the twentieth century was the Ottoman Empire's 'imperial twilight'. As the Empire fell away however, the beginnings of a young, vibrant and radical Turkish nationalism took root in Anatolia. The summer of 1908 saw a group known as the Young Turks attempt to revitalise Turkey with a constitutional revolution aimed at reducing the power of the Ottoman Sultan, Abdulhammid II- who was seen to preside over the Ottoman Empire's decline. Drawing on popular support for the efence of the Ottoman Empire's Balkan territories in particular, the Young Turks promised to build a nation from the people up, rather than from the top down. Here, Y. Dogan Cetinkaya analyses the history of the Boycott Movement, a series of nationwide public meetings and protests which enshrined the Turkish democractic voice. He argues that the 1908 revolution the Young Turks engendered was in fact a crucial link in the wave of constitutional revolutions at the beginning of the twentieth century- in Russia (1905), Iran (1906), Mexico (1910) and China (1911) and as such should be studied in the context of the wider rise of democratic nationalism across the world. The Young Turks and the Boycott Movement is the first history to show how this phenomenon laid the foundations for the modern Turkish state and will be essential reading for students and scholars of the Ottoman Empire and of the history of Modern Turkey.