The Great Conspiracy Against Russia

by Michael Sayers, Albert E. Kahn

75 let nazad v Sovetskom Sojuze opublikovali knigu amerikanskikh zhurnalistov M. Sejersa i A. Kana. V nej opisyvalis operatsij tajnoj vojny zapadnykh stran protiv SSSR s 1918 goda po 1945 god.Knigu srazu zhe izjali iz svobodnoj prodazhi i na mnogie desjatiletija zasekretili. Prichina avtory na osnove ogromnogo kolichestva dokumentalnykh materialov dokazyvali, chto v predvoennye gody vragi rossijskogo gosudarstva veli s nashej stranoj bespretsedentnuju po svoim masshtabam borbu. Ona dolzhna byla privesti k pokoreniju Rossii Zapadom; v nej uchastvovali nedavnie sojuzniki SSSR - Anglija, Frantsija i SSHA. Glavnaja stavka v etoj borbe delalas na antisovetskoe podpole i tekh, kto vystupal protiv politiki Stalina, kotoryj, po mneniju avtorov, byl togda vyrazitelem gosudarstvennicheskoj ideologii Rossii. Posle raspada SSSR byl opublikovan sokraschennyj variant etoj knigi. Vpervye, s 1947 goda - polnyj variant knigi "Tajnoj vojny protiv Sovetskoj Rossii".

Genres: History, Politics, Soviet Union, Theory, Russia, Nonfiction, Soviet History

154 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 1946

About the author

Poet, playwright, and writer whose books co-authored with Albert E. Kahn made him a target of US blacklisting during the McCarthyism era of the 1950s. He wrote scripts for TV in the 1950s, and as a screenwriter in the 1960s for movies including James Bond film Casino Royale.

Reviews

[Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

It doesn't read like straight up Soviet propaganda. But the authors take all the official Soviet Union positions as truth. From the Allied interventions in the Russian Civil War to the Battle of Warsaw. Book makes allegations that the Allies wanted to install Boris Savinkov as Mussolini of Russia and that Trotsky secretly worked with the Nazis.

[Berend Vendel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although it trods the path of sometimes anecdotal evidence a bit too far at times, and doesn't really question the validity of the purges and Moscow trials at all, this book gives a very thorough analysis of how exactly the Soviet Union was under attack from its birth up until the second world war. Definitely highlighted a lot of dimensions and factors most histories of the early Soviet period gloss over. Therefore an important book. Although again, it is quite one-sided, for which, knowing the overall standing of the historical debate, I can forgive the authors. Especially since this was written shortly after the end of WW2.

[Voyager · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is one of unparalleled importance and easily one of the most important works on the history of the Soviet Union, giving a sober account of the many attempts by imperialism to destroy the Soviet Union and crush the Communist movement, politically, militarily, and economically. Moreover, nearly this entire book serves as a scathing indictment against Trotskyism, revealing in meticulous detail how Trotsky and his followers offered their services to the bourgeoisie, placing themselves without a second thought in the employ of the fascists, plotting against Lenin and Stalin, to overthrow the Soviet state, and actively assisting the fascists in Spain, France, and elsewhere.

Making extensive use of first-hand accounts, excerpts from conversations and correspondences, and other documentary sources, the authors recount in brilliant detail the whole course of the war, covert and ouvert, against the Soviet Union and Comintern. The myth of the innocence of the Trotskyites and Bukharinites, of the “peaceful” policies of the imperialist powers are destroyed. From the Entente intervention against the young Soviet Republic to the various underground conspiracies, everything is charted from beginning to the end. The whos, whens, and wheres are all given, the guilt of the perpetrators of this secret war is proven beyond question.

It is not without reason that Trotskyites and their paymasters today still consider this book, despite its pages and pages of sources and careful documentation, a falsification and dismiss it out-of-hand since this book shows whose hands the blood of Kirov and Gorky, who was the fifth column that handed Spain and France over to the fascists, and who allowed Germany, Italy, and Japan to unleash the second world war. The modern narrative of the bourgeoisie in its constant crusade against Communism is that the persecutions in the Soviet Union were unfounded and that Stalin carried out a policy of wholesale murder of innocents. But the reader will find that, in fact, that the Soviet charges against these people were absolutely correct and that the Soviet Union, as the only country to thoroughly root out these scum, saved itself by doing so while the Quislings, Tisos, Jingweis, and the like handed their countries over to fascism.

But this book remains very important beyond its historic value. For, by revealing the programme of the Trotskyites and Bukharinites, the doings of the Trotskyites in countries like France and Spain, etc. and generally by detailing the full lengths to which the bourgeoisie went to destroy the socialist Soviet Union, this book offers a valuable contribution to refuting the slanderous attacks peddled by Maoists (the cousins of Trotskyites), Trotskyites, etc. to the effect that the socialist system contains the seeds of its own demise and that the Bolshevik Party and especially Stalin (who these people hate beyond measure) were responsible for the restoration of capitalism in 1953.

This book, if nothing else, is confirmation of Stalin’s warning that “any serious attempt at restoration can take place only with serious support from outside, only with the support of international capital.” No attempt at capitalist restoration — whether from White Guards or Trotskyites — was able to proceed with significant assistance from the bourgeoisie outside of the Soviet Union. Murder, sabotage, and spying were all carried out with the direct assistance and under the orders of the imperialist powers with a programme of capitalist restoration. Their mission was to infiltrate the Bolshevik Party, kill the actual revolutionary leadership, and place themselves as leaders of the Soviet Union. And if one compares the methods and programme arrived at with the later doctors’ plot and cases connected with the rise of the Khrushchevites, we see that the destruction of the socialism in the Soviet Union was not the “natural outcome of contradictions inherent in socialism” or due to the “problems” of Stalin, but rather that the restoration of capitalism was the last act of this secret war against the Soviet Union.

Hence, not only is this book a striking defence of the Soviet state against all kinds of accusations from bourgeois “historian” hacks, it is a useful weapon against the frenzied slanders of Maoist neo-Trotskyism and Trotskyism. A must-read for any serious student of Soviet history or Marxist-Leninist

[Elias · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first parts were the most rewarding. The middle part about Trotskij's 'fifth column' was a bit tedious. In that part the authors take the official Soviet view, using witness statements from the Moscow trials as evidence, but that makes it interesting in its own right. The book contains many insights into the political climate of the time it was written (around 1948). Before reading, I thought the book would be disadvantaged by being so old. However, having been written so close to the events it described, I felt it was unburdened by the many historical truths that may have been constructed after the fact.

[Toon Melis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Insane good book about the period directly after the revolution where basically all the other super powers try to sabotage the Sovjet Union. As well as buhkanin and Trotsky from within. It gave a good inside in those years where i didnt know what was happening.

[Guevaraxel · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book covers a lot of facts, many many conspirators agains the USSR from the time of the October Revolution 1917 till after WW2 in 1946.
The way the Moscow Trials is talked about is very one sided to the USSR narrative under Stalin.
Sidney Reilly is a very fascinating figure, he is like 007 in real life