MODERN RUSSIA

A dim view of Russian political history from Lenin to Putin.

After overly simplistically defining communism as a brand of socialism that requires “violent revolution” and referring to its “inherent weaknesses,” Blohm goes on to chronicle a history of, as he puts it, “failed expectations, starving peasants, brutal terror against political rivals, and nuclear posturing.” More or less ignoring Russian arts and culture, science, nonmilitary technology, daily life, and regional or ethnic differences, he lays out major events from uprisings in Czar Nicholas II’s reign to the November 2022 stalemate in Ukraine, pausing only to note widespread famines or slaughters or to make critical asides (“Funds that could have been used to improve Soviet agriculture and other industries were diverted to the bomb program”) on the way to a bland but, in context, skeptical speculation about whether the country might one day be willing to “integrate into the twenty-first century as a strong and peaceful member of the global community.” The accompanying set of stock photos and images is scanty but does put faces on leaders and, once, a pair of Afghan mujahedeen; the backmatter offers a rich array of sources and resources.

Distinctly slanted but possibly useful in conjunction with more judicious older sources for background reading and research.