The Cynical Historian
Check out Alternate History Hub’s video on Trotsky taking over instead of Stalin: https://youtu.be/o6T7tzrriUk
For a response to comments before they were disabled, go here: https://youtu.be/fyIKpkCSETU
It seems that people are using history as a political bludgeon again, and I’m here to ruin that for everyone. History is much more nuanced and ambiguous than the rhetoric is capable of dealing with. So today, let’s talk about these 10 myths about Soviet history worth busting, basically in chronological order.
Here’s the list of myths:
1. Marx was responsible for Bolshevism
2. Communism has never been tried
3. Cold War tensions began in 1945
4. Lenin never committed purges
5. Stalin was later besmirched
6. Soviets were saved in WWII
7. The USSR wasn’t Imperialistic
8. Every General-Secretary was like Stalin
9. Soviets caused subversion in the US
10. Reagan brought down the wall
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Connected videos:
2:30 – Marxist historian EP Thompson: https://youtu.be/Igb9f_cSRBk
5:10 – the Russian Intervention of 1918-20: https://youtu.be/1mC1bmzbgxY
8:30 – Cody’s (AlternateHistoryHub) video: https://youtu.be/o6T7tzrriUk
15:15 – Death of Stalin: https://youtu.be/KiOsPpvuYuk
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errata
19:58 – Greensboro North Carolina (thx
jelongva)
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references:
Jane Burbank and Frederick Cooper, _Empires in World History: Power and the Politics of Difference_ (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2010). https://amzn.to/33BTIMT
Donald Davis and Eugene Trany, _The First Cold War: The Legacy of Woodrow Wilson in U.S.-Soviet Relations_ (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2002). https://amzn.to/2OpXxwg
Jochen Hellbeck, _Stalingrad: The City that Defeated the Third Reich_ (New York: Public Affairs, 2015). https://amzn.to/2H7US9w
David L Hoffmann, ed. _Stalinism: The Essential Reader_ (New York: Blackwell Publishing, 2003). https://amzn.to/2udigeo
Terry Martin, _The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union, 1923-1939_ (Ithaca, N.York: Cornell University Press, 2001). https://amzn.to/31xUBV8
Andrzej Paczkowski, “The Storm over the Black Book,” _The Wilson Quarterly_ 25, iss. 2 (2001): 28-34.
A good database of primary sources and simplified histories: http://soviethistory.msu.edu
Quick info:
https://www.historyextra.com/period/victorian/your-guide-to-karl-marx-who-was-he-what-was-the-communist-manifesto-and-why-is-he-important/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excess_mortality_in_the_Soviet_Union_under_Joseph_Stalin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_transfer_in_the_Soviet_Union
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_repression_in_the_Soviet_Union
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