Mao, Stalin and the Korean War: Trilateral Communist Relations in the 1950s

by Zhihua Shen, Neil Silver (Translator)

This book examines relations between China and the Soviet Union during the 1950s, and provides an insight into Chinese thinking about the Korean War. This volume is based on a translation of Shen Zihua€™s best-selling Chinese-language book, which broke the mainland Chinese taboo on publishing non-heroic accounts of the Korean War.The author combined information detailed in Soviet-era diplomatic documents (released after the collapse of the Soviet Union) with Chinese memoirs, official document collections and scholarly monographs, in order to present a non-ideological, realpolitik account of the relations, motivations and actions among three Communist Stalin, Mao Zedong and Kim Il-sung. This new translation represents a revisionist perspective on trilateral Communist alliance relations during the Korean War, shedding new light on the origins of the Sino-Soviet split and the rather distant relations between China and North Korea. It features a critical introd

Genres: China, History, Nonfiction, Soviet Union, Russia

264 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Shen Zhihua (simplified Chinese: 沈志华; traditional Chinese: 沈志華; (this is a Chinese name; the family name is Shen.) is a professor of history at East China Normal University and adjunct professor at Peking University and Renmin University of China. Shen is an expert in the history of the Soviet Union, Sino-Soviet relations, and the Cold War. He is director of the Center for Oriental History Studies of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and honorary researcher at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. In 2011 Shen was public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.

Reviews

[Patricia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely riveting. Incredibly well written and translated from the original Chinese using documents that only in recent years have come to light after the deaths of all three leaders (revealing the Russian and Chinese documents and transcripts, but not the N. Korean). Every diplomat and anyone interested in Asian history needs to read this book. As you finish the last page, you realize what a brilliant strategist Stalin was in managing to keep the Soviet Union at arm's length from the war while placating Mao's requests for support for the 'Volunteer Army' he sent to Korea (in which his own son was killed), and in so doing, avoiding a third world war. And what a single-minded revolutionary Mao was in enthusiastically engaging China in a new war when his country had just come through a long and brutal Japanese occupation and a debilitating civil war. The deluded man was Kim Il-sung, who convinced both the Soviet Union and Mao that he would win the war in three days. The unspoken hero was the US and its allies, who instantly sprang to South Korea's defense, surprising all three dictators at almost every step. Reading this story was like being able to see into the minds of chess champions as each contemplates his next move. This is without any hesitation one of the best modern history books I have ever read.

[Amoy · Rating 5 out of 5]

非常优秀的关于冷战史的图书，让我明白了很多原来没明白的事情。

[Zeitgeist · Rating 5 out of 5]

苏联档案的解密，足以颠覆传统的叙述，追溯朝鲜战争爆发和解放台湾受阻的源头，居然是《中苏友好同盟互助条约》签订后，苏联被迫放弃了其在东北的核心利益——中长铁路以及大连、旅顺港

[汪先生 · Rating 5 out of 5]

2016-10-30 21:32:22
大量苏联的材料，档案，严肃的题材外加严谨的叙述，历史不是传闻的那么简单，每一个讲出来的故事后面都有无数阅读的心血，沈教授最后那句会在历史海洋中继续奋勇拼搏真是激励后生。