But Hitler's armies did not fight in multiple theaters, his empire did not span the Eurasian continent, and he did not inherit the spoils of war. That role belonged to Joseph Stalin. Hitler's genocidal ambition may have unleashed Armageddon, but as celebrated historian Sean McMeekin shows, the conflicts that emerged were the result of Stalin's maneuverings, orchestrated to unleash a war between capitalist powers in Europe and between Japan and the Anglo-American forces in the Pacific. Meanwhile, the United States and Britain's self-defeating strategy of supporting Stalin and his armies at all costs allowed the Soviets to conquer most of Eurasia, from Berlin to Beijing, for Communism.A groundbreaking reassessment, Stalin's War is essential reading for anyone looking to understand the roots of the current world order.

    Khrushchev told jokes, threw tantrums, sparked a riot in a San Francisco supermarket, wowed the coeds in a home economics class in Iowa, and ogled Shirley MacLaine as she filmed a dance scene in Can-Can. He befriended and offended a cast of characters including Nelson Rockefeller, Richard Nixon, Eleanor Roosevelt, Elizabeth Taylor, and Marilyn Monroe." Published for the fiftieth anniversary of the trip, K Blows Top is a work of history that reads like a Vonnegut novel. This cantankerous communist's road trip took place against the backdrop of the fifties in capitalist America, with the shadow of the hydrogen bomb hanging over his visit like the Sword of Damocles. As Khrushchev kept reminding people, he was a hot-tempered man who possessed the power to incinerate America.

    It made him one of the most recognized personalities of the Twentieth Century, a global icon of radical change. Yet just months earlier, this same Lev Trotsky was a nobody, a refugee expelled from Europe, writing obscure pamphlets and speeches, barely noticed outside a small circle of fellow travelers. Where had he come from to topple Russia and change the world? Where else? New York City. Between January and March 1917, Trotsky found refuge in the United States. America had kept itself out of the European Great War, leaving New York the freest city on earth. During his time there—just over ten weeks—Trotsky immersed himself in the local scene. He settled his family in the Bronx, edited a radical left wing tabloid in Greenwich Village, sampled the lifestyle, and plunged headlong into local politics. His clashes with leading New York socialists over the question of US entry into World War I would reshape the American left for the next fifty years.

    B. West, chief usher of the White House, directed the operations and maintenance of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue—and coordinated its daily life—at the request of the president and his family. He directed state functions; planned parties, weddings and funerals, gardens and playgrounds, and extensive renovations; and with a large staff, supervised every activity in the presidential home. For twenty-eight years, first as assistant to the chief usher, then as chief usher, he witnessed national crises and triumphs, and interacted daily with six consecutive presidents and first ladies, their parents, children and grandchildren, and houseguests—including friends, relatives, and heads of state.In Upstairs at the White House, West offers an absorbing and novel glimpse at America’s first families, from the Roosevelts to the Kennedys andthe Nixons. Alive with anecdotes ranging from the quotidian (Lyndon B. Johnson’s showerheads) to the tragic (the aftermath of John F. Kennedy’s assassination), West’s book is an enlightening and rich account of the American history that took place just behind the Palladian doors of the North Portico.

    Since known as “The Miracle of the Vistula,” it remains one of the most crucial conflicts of the Western world. Drawing on both Polish and Russian sources, Norman Davies shows how this war was a pivotal event in the course of European history.

    To convert the working class to Marxism, Lenin insists that Marxists should form a political party, or "vanguard", of dedicated revolutionaries to spread Marxist political ideas among the workers. Lenin said that the article represented "a skeleton plan to be developed in greater detail in a pamphlet now in preparation for print".

    To cheer the fall of a bankrupt totalitarian regime is one thing; to build on its ruins a stable democratic state is quite another. The challenge of helping to steer post-Soviet Russia-with its thousands of nuclear weapons and seething ethnic tensions-between the Scylla of a communist restoration and the Charybdis of anarchy fell to the former governor of a poor, landlocked Southern state who had won national election by focusing on domestic issues. No one could have predicted that by the end of Bill Clinton’s second term he would meet with his Kremlin counterparts more often than had all of his predecessors from Harry Truman to George Bush combined, or that his presidency and his legacy would be so determined by his need to be his own Russia hand.With Bill Clinton at every step was Strobe Talbott, the deputy secretary of state whose expertise was the former Soviet Union. Talbott was Clinton’s old friend, one of his most trusted advisers, a frequent envoy on the most sensitive of diplomatic missions and, as this book shows, a sharp-eyed observer. The Russia Hand is without question among the most candid, intimate and illuminating foreign-policy memoirs ever written in the long history of such books. It offers unparalleled insight into the inner workings of policymaking and diplomacy alike. With the scope of nearly a decade, it reveals the hidden play of personalities and the closed-door meetings that shaped the most crucial events of our time, from NATO expansion, missile defense and the Balkan wars to coping with Russia’s near-meltdown in the wake of the Asian financial crisis. The book is dominated by two gifted, charismatic and flawed men, Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin, who quickly formed one of the most intense and consequential bonds in the annals of statecraft. It also sheds new light on Vladimir Putin, as well as the altered landscape after September 11, 2001.The Russia Hand is the first great memoir about war and peace in the post-cold war world.From the Hardcover edition.

    A biography of the Saudi Arabian king who ruled from 1964 until his assassination in 1975 and who became, during his reign, an important world leader through his control of his country's vast oil resources.

    Written during this time, this is the account of prison life and the people he encountered.There is the guard who delivers blows with no visible traces. The fraudster stitched up by the police for murder. The man who refuses to lie for a packet of cigarettes. The abandoned teenager, the down-and-out, the grass... He describes a hidden world of brutality and corruption, yet one where moments of humanity still manage to shine through.One in ten Russian men pass through prison at some point in their lives. This book is a denunciation of an entire system of bureaucratic criminality, and a passionate call to recognise a human tragedy.

    At its heart, the book is a history of the Soviet Union, the most comprehensive reorganization of human society ever attempted by a nation-state. This is the story of how the agitation of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, two mid-nineteenth-century European thinkers and writers, led to a great and terrible world religion that brought down a mighty empire, consumed the world in conflict, and left in its wake a devastation whose full costs can only now be tabulated.

    In it, Thoreau argues that individuals should not permit governments to overrule or atrophy their consciences, and that they have a duty to avoid allowing such acquiescence to enable the government to make them the agents of injustice. Thoreau was motivated in part by his disgust with slavery and the Mexican–American War (1846–1848).

    Newly-edited corrected version. Danzig is a gripping historical novel in the grand tradition. It has generated rave reviews (90% 4 and 5 stars) for its authenticity and its realistic portrayal of high pressure diplomatic clashes between Hitler and Western nations in the 1930s. The story encompasses fast-paced events in Geneva, Berlin, Warsaw and London, as well as Danzig itself, capturing the drama of unfolding crisis that engulfed Europe on what we now know was the path to war. * "A smartly written, engrossing read. * “Channeling the best of Alan Furst, Danzig, is a must read for the any lover of well written historical fiction. * “Mr. Walker's descriptions made this reader feel as if she were in the middle of the historic drama. The novel builds in intensity until the dramatic ending. It's a terrific read.” * “Danzig is a must read for any lover of riveting historical fiction dealing with Hitler’s rise. Walker makes the saga of the city and the Polish Corridor come alive. The tensions of the time are vividly described in human terms, making for gripping reading.” * “Danzig is an amazing book, putting the reader in the middle of pre WW II in Europe. The time and scene were painted in detail and to perfection. The characters were presented in such a way I felt I knew them and worried for them throughout.” * “Superb historical fiction; good story, good atmospherics. Danzig is a sophisticated journey into European power politics during a time of high drama. I think it bears comparison to the best authors in the popular interwar historical fiction genre and I rate it a very successful effort.” * “The author does a great job of making the reader feel what it was like to be in the center of pre-WWII Europe, with Germany flouting the Treaty of Versailles, England following an ill-fated policy of appeasement and the League of Nations powerless and ineffective in dealing with Hitler and his aggression. For anyone interested in WWII history, especially the lead-up to the war and the dysfunction among the European Allies, this is a great read! The website www.authorwilliamwalker.com offers a link to Amazon Kindle as well as a synopsis, photos and more information.

    But we are not referring to just any knowledge. Gnosis is knowledge which produces a great transformation in those who receive it. Knowledge capable of nothing less than waking up man and helping him to escape from the prison in which he finds himself. That is why Gnosis has been so persecuted throughout the course of history, because it is knowledge considered dangerous for the religious and political authorities who govern mankind from the shadows.Every time this religion, absolutely different from the rest, appears before man, the other religions unite to try to destroy or hide it again.Primordial Gnosis is the original Gnosis, true Gnosis, eternal Gnosis, Gnostic knowledge in its pure form. Due to multiple persecutions, Primordial Gnosis has been fragmented, distorted and hidden.By recovering and uniting the scattered fragments, Primordial Gnosis can be reconstructed and brought to the world once again. This book is a complete synthesis of the forbidden theology of Primordial Gnosis.

    Manchester was his friend, so he gives him to us close up, life size, warts and all. In an epilogue in this revised edition, the author discusses the man, his time, and his place in history.

    Thirty-one years later, after serving a prison term for an attempted assassination, he was expelled to the Soviet Union, a country which he eventually renounced. But before his repudiation of the Soviet system, Berkman attempted to answer some of the charges made against anarchism and to present its case clearly and intelligently. This book, first published in 1929, is the result of those efforts.Thorough and well stated, The ABC of Anarchism is today widely regarded as a classic declaration of the movement's goals and methods. For those who have questions about anarchism, Berkman provides lucid answers. In conversational tones, he discusses society as it existed in the early twentieth century; why in his opinion, anarchy was necessary; the myths surrounding it; and necessary preparations for its successful implementation. Of the book, Emma Goldman said: "People need a primer of Anarchism—an ABC, as it were, that would teach them the rudimentary principles of Anarchism and whet their appetites for something more profound. [The book] was intended to serve this purpose. That it has fulfilled its purpose no one who has read [it] will deny."