A doughty chronicle by a well-known popular historian who draws his
material together with banal apothegms on power, reality,
revolution, etc., rather than solid analysis. The past few years
have produced a number of more serious studies on all levels of
generality which render this book rather supererogatory -
especially since Fischer seems unaware that one could condemn
Stalin without upholding the author's thesis of chronic Soviet
aggression. Fischer ignores revisionist scholarship; nonetheless;
the Allied intervention of 1917-21 gives him some trouble. He
recovers by imputing "paranoia" to the beleaguered Bolsheviks, and
goes on to depict the late '30's as a quest for lost tsarist
domains. Few serious works of any political color now agree that
the Russo-German war represented a clash between "two expanding
totalitarian empires," and Fischer's observation that Soviet
territorial gains backfired hardly proves that they weren't
intended as buffer states for defensive security.
Oversimplifications (the "Procapitalist NEP") and blatant
distortions (Russia "fomenting" Chinese revolution in 1927) are not
redeemed by Fischer's personal recollections of Litvinov and Juan
Negrin. Specialists will wince and students will find the book
something of a chore. (Kirkus Reviews)
General
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