Best historical russia biographies according to redditors

We found 401 Reddit comments discussing the best historical russia biographies. We ranked the 135 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.

Next page

Top Reddit comments about Historical Russia Biographies:

u/RidleyScotch · 168 pointsr/politics

Browder is also the reason these sanctions exist.

His lawyer who was looking into large scale corruption and money fraud in the upper echelons of the Russian government is the "Magnitsky" in The Magnitsky Act

He is and should be considering by all a top expert in this matter.

EDIT:

Listen to these for more information on Bill Browder and The Magnitsky Act:

http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/07/14/537304186/episode-784-meeting-the-russians

http://www.earwolf.com/episode/bill-browder-kremlin-critic/


If you prefer to read his book:

https://www.amazon.com/Red-Notice-Finance-Murder-Justice/dp/1476755744

u/genida · 145 pointsr/politics

I strongly suggest Nothing is True and Everything is Possible, Peter Pomerantsev's exploration of his time as a television producer in Russia.

They've lived under dictatorships and tsars for over a century. Every single Big Promise for the last hundred years or more has gone to the same conclusion, every power vacuum was filled quickly by worse, or at best the same as before. Organized crime is referred to as 'authority'. When the only organization of any kind was criminal, they became the de facto pseudo-government.

This has affected the culture deeply. There's a special kind of permeating philosophy in the day to day mindset, in their relationship to truth, power and certainty.

It's fascinating.

Edit: Ok, thanks for taking my Gold Virginity, random stranger :)

More links: Red Notice by the recently headlined Bill Browder, on the Magnitsky Act and its gruesome origins. I haven't, but I will read this soon.

Bill Browder's lecture on How he became Putin's No.1 Enemy. Basically a longer version of his opening statement to the Senate Judiciary.

Putin's Kleptocracy, a promising but so far a bit dry look into how Putin steals everything.

u/IvorTheEngine · 83 pointsr/pics

The long walk by Slavomir Rawicz

A polish officer captured during WWII and sent to the gulag, escaped and walked over thousands of miles by foot--out of Siberia, through China, the Gobi Desert, Tibet, and over the Himalayas to British India

It's a much easier read that the Gulag Archipelago, although there's some controversy over how accurate it is because he rejoined the war and didn't survive.

u/cricket_monster · 51 pointsr/asianamerican

> Things like going to protests/marches - are they at all effective?

Very much so. Protests at airports all over the country have led to an emergency halt on Trump's immigration ban.

Moreover, consistent protests -- especially ones explicitly calling for inclusion unlike the Obama protests -- sends a clear message to the world. Continue to exercise your constitutional rights for as long as you are able.

> But what else can we do to influence policy that's being made on the national level?

Last year, there were studies and reports talking about how Millennials aren't interested in running for office for a bunch of reasons.

After Trump's election, it looks like things might change. Run For Something announced that they are grooming 1,200 Millennials to run for office. Even scientists are running for office because the Trump administration rejects climate change and is gutting environmentalist programs.

Check if any of these new politicians are running for office in your distrct. Rally behind public servants that run to establish a smarter, more compassionate nation. Work on their campaign trails if you can. Remember, we don't vote for the president -- we vote in the people that do.

Fight gerrymandering. FairVote is one such organization that addresses it on a national level.


> What's most effective and efficient? How can we make a difference as individuals?

Just be a good person. I hate the idea that your job and your activism is what determines your moral worth. People assume that the social worker at charity:water is a "better person" than the guy on Wall Street.

I think how you live your life is far more important than what you do with it. Whatever job you have, do it with integrity and do it well. If you're in a position of power, strive to create a compassionate environment and hire diversely. Follow through with all your promises, even small ones like hanging out with your friends. Show up early to everything early.

In short, be good at the little things, because ultimately, those are the things that matter. Marches and rallies are important but they don't convince anyone who doesn't already agree with you (the purpose of those events is to raise awareness and sustain morale) and they don't happen very often. A march only takes up a few hours of your day, half a day at most.

In contrast, building your character takes an entire lifetime. You are bombarded with opportunities to be a kinder, more dependable person everyday.

And when you're known as someone who never flakes out, who is kind to everyone, and who is always on time, the people in your life will respect you. So the next time you advocate a cause, people will listen. The next time you show up at a march, people will see.

And finally, read up on history. There is nothing new under the sun. Opportunists and bad leaders like Trump have existed all throughout history.

Read about how journalists covered the rises of Hitler and Mussolini. Read up on Berlusconi. Read up on how Golden Dawn continues to seize power in Greece. Read about how Putin went from being your run-of-the-mill pragmatic kleptocrat to an ultranationalist demagogue. Read about the journalists that covered Putin's regime.

Wisdom is learning from those who came before you. Of course, those situations are not 1:1 with ours, but they're a map and a compass. They provide some context to what we're going through so we can adapt and move forward.

u/bigbourbon · 47 pointsr/CombatFootage

I read this book a while back. Holy shit was it depressing. Made me very thankful to not be in the Russian military.

u/Metrodub · 46 pointsr/politics

I mentioned this in a previous thread about Browder's testimony, but if you have a chance, read his book Red Notice. Browder goes into detail about his investments into Russia (becoming the largest foreign investor in Russia) and the rise of Putin's corruption within the Russian government. He was the crusader who got the Magnitsky Act passed, as Magnitsky was Browder's lawyer who discovered a lot of the corruption and the trail that led to the oligarchs and Putin. It really does read like a thriller.

u/dawajtie_pogoworim · 35 pointsr/politics

His cover was as a translator, but per this BBC article and Masha Gessen's book on him, his job was probably pretty boring.

According to WaPo, he may have been ultimately trying to NATO secrets and Western technology. That sounds cool in theory, but idk how fun that would have been in practice, given it was Dresden in the 80s. The WaPo article also says he was probably tasked with recruiting new officers, but as I recall, Gessen's book doesn't make mention of that. In either case, those tasks would have undoubtedly involved a ton of dull work.

Though, I'll admit that while looking into his German career, it occurred to me that his St Petersburg career (in the late 70s) could have been pretty exciting, especially since his work got him selected for an elite spy school.

u/blackcatkarma · 29 pointsr/history

Peter the Great was really into boats and easily offended. He was an indolent young prince not much concerned with his birthright, but as soon as his sister tried to seize power, he went from playing with boats in lakes to making Russia a first-rate power and founding the Russian navy. For more info, I recommend Robert K. Massie's Peter the Great.

u/TravelerInTime1986 · 28 pointsr/CombatFootage

In One Soldiers War, he states Russian soldiers also sold weapons and ammunition to the Chechens.

u/KazarakOfKar · 25 pointsr/TankPorn

https://www.amazon.com/One-Soldiers-War-Arkady-Babchenko/dp/0802144039


Amazing book on the 1st and 2nd Chechen war. Gave guys a bunch of old soviet equipment, not enough food or other supplies, told them to go off and fight Chechens.

They ended up having to trade gear to the Chechens just to have something to eat.

u/Adstrakan · 22 pointsr/worldnews

Technically a ‘spy’, but for most of his career more a low level bureaucrat.


Masha Gessen:

“The Man Without a Face is the chilling account of how a low-level, small-minded KGB operative ascended to the Russian presidency and, in an astonishingly short time, destroyed years of progress and made his country once more a threat to her own people and to the world.”

Book: ‘The man without a face’

u/WildeWeasel · 22 pointsr/MilitaryPorn

It was gloomy in writing as well. I read Arkady Babchenko's "One Soldier's War". Great read and firsthand account of the conflicts, but graphic and depressing. I usually had to read a chapter of another book before I turned out the light because I didn't want to keep thinking about it.

u/northboundtrain0015 · 16 pointsr/europe

I mentioned this below, but I’d just like to add to the top comment that Babchenko’s memoir of the Chechen War, ‘One soldier’s war’, is available in English translation, bloody well-written and a fascinating soldier’s-eye-view of a brutal, filthy and complicated conflict. (Not saying all wars aren’t like that, but this one seems to have under the radar for a lot of people, also because the Russian government hasn’t been open about the death toll).


Sorry for hijacking the top comment, but I’d just like people to remember his work. Honestly, I read the book years ago and I can still remember lines from it to this day. There’s this part where he talks about the sheer terror he feels in the middle of a particular battle, and how the land must be so irradiated with people’s terror and pain that he can’t believe anything will ever grow there. Could be a metaphor for modern Russia to be honest.

u/CitizenTed · 13 pointsr/videos

Great summary. I've read a few books about the Chechen Wars (I'm a layman student of eastern European history) and one of my favorites was written by a low-ranking Russian soldier named Arkady Babchenko. He writes about the barbarity of the wars and the cruelty he suffered at the hands of his own Russian army. This book really stuck with me. It is haunting and heart-wrenching.

One Soldier's War

u/HIGHx1000000NRG · 12 pointsr/politics

>He fired the FBI director so as to stopper investigation of his "Russian ties"? Wait a bit. How do we know that, any more than we know what is meant by "Russian ties"?

Because that's what he told the Russians - you know, the people with whom it's suspected his campaign colluded. And those ties to Russia just might be clearer if his financial records were disclosed.

>As to the Russian angle, may one ask innocently what difference Russian "influence" could really make in an American election? And what payoff are the Russians seeing for it, if so?|

The difference is to either 1) get a convenient stooge elected or 2) sow enough discontent to keep the US politically fractured. The payoff is that anything that's bad for the US is perceived as good for russia. Particularly sanctions. See Masha Gessen's book on putin.

>Have there been any signs of American concessions or moral rollovers that are likely to strengthen Vladimir Putin?

Let's see... a couple of their highest operators have been in the oval office. And so far media coverage has helped prevent any concessions from happening though they were being discussed by the POTUS elect's transition team.

>And did Trump give the Russians sensitive information in a meeting with the ambassador and foreign minister? Not according to his national security adviser.

More bullshit. McMaster gave non-answers. And then the orange one himself opened his maw to spill the beans in a mind blowing "I'm not spilling the beans" denial.

>Trump was selling his country down the river? That's what it sounds like the impeachment crowd is hinting at.

Maybe depending on whom you ask. Mostly what I get is that people are very concerned with the level of fucking incompetence and damage being done.

Seriously fuck William Murchison and the Creators - whatever the fuck that is.

u/xepa105 · 12 pointsr/soccer

I mean, everyone who got rich in Russia in the 90s has a lot of questions around how they did it. It was like the wild west back in those days.

There is a really good book about it called The Oligarchs that focuses on some of those men who became filthy rich after the newly capitalist 90s Russia. It's a fascinating read, highly recommended to understand early post-Soviet Russia.

u/oozles · 11 pointsr/PoliticalHumor

Russia. Check out Red Notice by Bill Browder. If you've ever so much as heard of the Magnitsky Act, you should hear the full story behind it.

When Russia decided to privatize its assets after the fall of the Soviet Union, they did so in a way that let a handful of people accumulate massive amounts of it very quickly, leading to the development of an Oligarchy. Putin eventually maneuvered himself into a position of authority in the government, and after clawing back some power from the oligarchs back to his position, was able to jail and put on a show trial for the richest oligarch in Russia. The oligarch was jailed for years and lost most of his wealth.

What do the other oligarchs do, after seeing their most successful peer utterly demolished by Putin? They go to Putin and ask what it will take to keep them out of jail. Browder guesses that Putin told them "half."

Browder had a bit of experience with one scam that had to be authorized from the very top, a tax rebate scam. His cronies would fraudulently take over companies, gets judgments against said companies for millions of dollars, and then claims against those companies' previously paid taxes and gets those taxes refunded to them by the government.

u/birchstreet37 · 11 pointsr/finance

Red Notice. Definitely more for entertainment than education, you don't need to know much about finance to enjoy it. About Bill Browder's hedge fund Hermitage Capital, which became the largest foreign investor in post-Soviet Russia following some successful activist campaigns by Browder challenging the corruption of the oligarchs. It's a quick and entertaining page turner.

u/TacoDiahria · 9 pointsr/CombatFootage

I read this book about the wars called One Soldier's War. It is some really brutal stuff. The author fought in both wars. The hazing that goes on in the Russian Army is insane. http://www.amazon.com/One-Soldiers-War-Arkady-Babchenko/dp/0802144039/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1426116978&sr=8-1&keywords=one+soldiers+war

u/lofi76 · 7 pointsr/politics

YUP. Anyone thinking this shit is new can find much of the backstory by watching

Putin's Revenge- Part 1

Putin's Revenge- Part 2

Reading Red Notice by Bill Browder

Reviewing the Moscow Project

u/Townsend_Harris · 7 pointsr/badhistory

So ANOTHER biggish problem is the Stalin section -

The story of Stalin here is ,essentially, the Trotsky version. The scheming, plotting, just kinda randomly came into power, was never an heir or protege of Lenin.

Of course the Stalinist version of Stalin isn't accurate either.

Here's what I can add to this :

  • Stalin was made a member of the Bolshevik Central Committee in 1905 by - one guess here - Lenin. Other Bolsheviks objected to Stalin being involved in robberies, Lenin reportedly said that a man of action was exactly what the party needed.

  • Stalin came back from Siberian exile a little before Lenin came back from Switzerland, and he was pretty indispensable, despite not being very visible.

  • During the civil war, Stalin displayed an ability to both blame shift when things when wrong and to get things done. He was 100% ruthless in how he did it, but he did do it. This ruthlessness extended to fellow Bolsheviks as well as to everyone else. Whether or not Lenin knew or cared about the blame-shifting part doesn't seemed to have affected Stalin because....

  • Lenin specially created the General Secretary position for Stalin. Since the RSFSR/USSR was already a single party state that had outlawed factionalism inside the party, this was an incredibly powerful position. And there's no way Lenin didn't know that. Note that this wasn't in 1917 like the comic book portrays but in the 1920s.

  • Stalin's relationship with Kamenev and Zinoviev wasn't nearly as neat as the comic shows. For example Kamenev and Zinoviev were two of the backers of a plot/thing to try and remove Stalin using the (maybe forged maybe not) Lenin's Testament (not actually called as such on the paper). I'm not sure if that was one of the still secret documents when the comic was made, so I don't know if its right to call them out for not knowing about it.

  • There's nothing really unusual about Stalin getting Trotsky's friends fired. That was pretty standard for the Bolsheviks post-civil war.

  • Stalin didn't, maybe, consider Trotsky a rival. As Kotkin put things "...Trotsky proved to be less the obstacle to than the instrument of Stalin's aggrandizement.... Stalin needed "opposition" to consolidate his personal dictatorship - and he found it." I must say I also object to Trotsky wearing Stalin-esque garb (what came to be called the Vozhdika I think, leader clothes) when Trotsky had a major preference for Western style suits.

  • Stalin did not grab Lenin's power. It was handed to him, by Lenin.


    All I got to say about that. Other than read Kotkin's book if you haven't already.
u/Beefsideiron · 6 pointsr/IAmA

It's extremely complex that whole situation, if you like reading and the subject check out this book:

https://www.amazon.com/Oligarchs-Wealth-Power-New-Russia/dp/1610390709

It'll give you a pretty good idea of what happened before and after.

u/mr_fn_wonderful · 5 pointsr/worldnews

Sure there has.

On the other hand, you might want to read this:

https://www.amazon.com/Man-Without-Face-Unlikely-Vladimir/dp/1594486514

u/WARFTW · 5 pointsr/AskHistorians

Peasants level? I would assume then that you mean the Red Army. Try the following:

Blood on the Shores

Over the Abyss

Through the Maelstrom

Red Sniper on the Eastern Front

Panzer Destroyer

Guns against the Reich

u/SnapesGrayUnderpants · 5 pointsr/worldnews

Congress thinks so. That's why it passed the bipartisan Magnitsky Act. For details about Russian fraud, false prosecutions, torture and murder that prompted Congress to pass the Magnitsky Act, I highly recommend the book Red Notice, A True Story of High Finance, Murder and One Man's Fight for Justice by Bill Browder CEO and founder of Hermitage Capital Management investment fund which was once the largest foreign portfolio investment fund in Russia.

u/cinepro · 5 pointsr/politics

For the entire story of Browder and the Magnitsky act, I highly recommend Browder's book "Red Notice". I read it last year and it was shocking and infuriating, but I didn't expect it to be so topical this year.

u/[deleted] · 5 pointsr/CapitalismVSocialism

I would say most developed countries used a great deal of "planning" in their industrializing phases including the United States which basically went to a semi-planned economy and even a practically fully-planned economy during World War II (which had great benefits after the war). I also think most developed capitalist economies today are basically semi-planned corporate oligarchies.

I would also recommend the book "MITI and the Japanese Miracle" by Chalmers Johnson which is about Japanese industrial policy from 1925 to 1975. Description from Amazon:

>The focus of this book is on the Japanese economic bureaucracy, particularly on the famous Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI), as the leading state actor in the economy. Although MITI was not the only important agent affecting the economy, nor was the state as a whole always predominant, I do not want to be overly modest about the importance of this subject. The particular speed, form, and consequences of Japanese economic growth are not intelligible without reference to the contributions of MITI. Collaboration between the state and big business has long been acknowledged as the defining characteristic of the Japanese economic system, but for too long the state's role in this collaboration has been either condemned as overweening or dismissed as merely supportive, without anyone's ever analyzing the matter.

>The history of MITI is central to the economic and political history of modern Japan. Equally important, however, the methods and achievements of the Japanese economic bureaucracy are central to the continuing debate between advocates of the communist-type command economies and advocates of the Western-type mixed market economies. The fully bureaucratized command economies misallocate resources and stifle initiative; in order to function at all, they must lock up their populations behind iron curtains or other more or less impermeable barriers. The mixed market economies struggle to find ways to intrude politically determined priorities into their market systems without catching a bad case of the "English disease" or being frustrated by the American-type legal sprawl. The Japanese, of course, do not have all the answers. But given the fact that virtually all solutions to any of the critical problems of the late twentieth century―energy supply, environmental protection, technological innovation, and so forth―involve an expansion of official bureaucracy, the particular Japanese priorities and procedures are instructive. At the very least they should forewarn a foreign observer that the Japanese achievements were not won without a price being paid.

Now, I'm not dodging your question. Regarding the Soviet Union, I would recommend the book "Farm to Factory" by Robert Allen, who is not a Marxist economics historian by any means. And he shows the absolute superiority of Soviet planning policies in the 1930s and 1940s compared to any realistic alternative, but which ran into serious problems in the 1970s and 1980s.

From one of the reviews:

>The final part of this book contains a much smaller and less detailed discussion of the failures of the Soviet planning models in the late 1970s and the 1980s. The author here makes various subtle and interesting arguments. Firstly, he points out that investment put into military production and upkeep was from a purely economic point of view practically entirely wasted, mostly because it came at the expense of investment in other types of heavy industry than armaments, which the USSR dearly needed. The enormous losses of WWII also contributed here, with much capital being destroyed. A second result here was the enormous costs in manpower for the USSR of their almost Pyrrhic victory in WWII - the end of large quantities of newly free labor coming in from the countryside limited the expansion possibilities of all labor-intensive industry, which the USSR had hitherto relied on. Here again appears as useful the model of Soviet economics developed by Abram Feldman, which explored the interaction between capital and labor and how extra capital in a poor country like the 1920s USSR could lead to a positive feedback loop effect if invested in heavy industry (i.e. production of more 'capital'), since every unit of capital in such a situation led to vastly larger increases in output than every new unit of labor. From the late 1960s on labor, however, became the main constraint in output, and the old Preobrazhensky accumulation strategy no longer worked.

>The main question is of course why the Soviet government did not adequately respond to this, and here Allen is for the first time severely critical: he identifies a number of major planning and investment errors on the part of the Brezhnev leadership. The most important of these is the wasteful retooling and upkeep of old industry where the production of new modern industry would have been more efficient, and secondly extremely wasteful unproductive investment in raw materials production in Siberia. This latter part was the result of the minerals and oil production in European Russia, the Ukraine etc. being largely depleted, so expansion had to be sought in Siberia, where costs were vastly higher. Coal production in the Donbass region peaked in 1976, after which the Soviet government was forced to massively invest in lignite (brown coal) production in Krasnoiarsk. Brown coal is not very efficient and the costs of operating in a vast desolate area as central Siberia are high, so that productivity of capital invested plummeted. Much the same applied to oil. Only natural gas production was something of a success story, which can still be seen today in Russia's position as major exporter of natural gas to the European continent.

>Allen negatively compares this autarkic development strategy to that pursued by Japan, which had much fewer natural resources after WWII, but nonetheless greatly expanded its industrial production in these sectors by importing the raw materials. Drops in transport costs after the war made this profitably possible. Of course, the USSR, as Allen acknowledges, had political reasons for indigenous development even at higher costs, where Japan could operate entirely as an American vassal. It must be said though that Soviet energy use was very high per $1000 of GDP, and that conservation programs and saving the natural environment mostly failed due to the antique state of much of Soviet industry and the enormous scale of its factories. Short term "shock" responses to these problems by Brezhnev and successive governments only made the situation worse. Here Allen points to systematic deficiencies in proper cost accounting and saving, which had (correctly) not been a priority in the 1930s, but had to become one in the 1970s. The Soviet political system at that time was not very well-suited to adapt to this, and Brezhnev et al.'s 'dropping the ball' on these major economic reform issues played a large part in the fall of this system. Allen emphasizes though that it was not planning as such that failed, just that the plans were bad. These analyses are also along the lines of those provided in Paresh Chattopadhyay's excellent study of Soviet economic policy.

u/Tsezar_Kunikov · 5 pointsr/AskHistorians

The answer, in part, is why there are so many Russian oligarchs today. The transition away from socialist ideals occurred before the fall of the Soviet Union. In the 1980s cooperatives were begun and small private businesses began to appear, but they were new and no one really had any idea of what they were doing since the last time something like this was tried was in the 1920s under NEP. After the fall of the Soviet Union a 'privatization' period began where the government printed the equivalent of bonds or shares. Everyone in the Soviet Union received them. What they could do with them was left up to the people themselves. They could invest in newly privatized industries, cooperatives, businesses or hold on to them, sell them, etc. What happened is that those with connections in the government and previous business experience began buying up those bonds from the people and accumulating such large amounts that they could place large yet minimal bids on million dollar industries, buy them for cheap, and then reap enormous profits. Many also speculated on currency and issued the equivalent of promissory notes, acquiring companies for pennies when the ruble devalued, etc. An interesting, although journalistic account, is The Oligarchs: Wealth And Power In The New Russia.

u/Solar_Angel · 5 pointsr/AskHistorians

There's a great little book called "Lenin for Beginners", which I highly recommend.
If you're looking for something more standard, give this one a go.


If you ask me, I'd say you can't view Lenin in a proper context without understanding the workings of the Party as well. The official History of the CPSU is the best one for a complete overview as far as I'm concerned.

u/roylennigan · 4 pointsr/explainlikeimfive

>when really it could just be a bunch of random Russian kids hired to do a job and have nothing to do with the Russian Government.

But you are wrong in that conclusion, especially given this indictment against Russians involved in US disinformation campaigns released today.

The main defendant in question, Yevgeny Prigozhin is popularly known as "Putin's cook" because of his businesses which "host dinners between Vladimir Putin and foreign dignitaries."

Russia is somewhat of a mob state in that there is less of a line between business leaders and state officials. It is for this reason that it is harder to track such operations. But as you can read in this indictment (pdf) there are Russian businesses which act on behalf of the Russian Federation, or Putin himself, in a very secretive and fluid manner.

I recommend reading Bill Browder's book Red Notice, which reveals some of the nature of the corruption in Russia's government through the story surrounding the murder of Sergei Magnitsky.

u/ThreadbareHalo · 4 pointsr/politics

You are working awful hard to point other places on something that required no action to keep criminals from accessing their millions. In fact, the places you're trying to point to ARE these guys. the guys we're discussing are LITERALLY from Rosneft and other Russian oil and fossil fuel interests that are funding a significant portion of climate denial [1]

[1] Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder, and One Man's Fight for Justice https://www.amazon.com/dp/1476755744/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_.DSZDbK74GAXT

u/sethky · 4 pointsr/pics
u/brurino · 4 pointsr/HistoryPorn

> The Soviet commanders in 1995 gave zero fucks.



That's what I also got from Babchenko.

u/JohnnyConatus · 3 pointsr/Entrepreneur

I'm reading a book right now called Red Notice which involves a business man in Russia falling into a terrible situation with Russian Oligarchs. So if I do what you want, and take you at your word that you are genuinely in a feud with the CEO of Dominos Russia, then I can only say this: get the fuck out of the country. Do you have any idea what powers an oligarch has in Russia? Okay, well then picture how much power an oligarch would have if he also controlled the pizza supply. GET OUT. To fight him is to doom yourself and your loved ones to the Siberian Mozzarella Mines.

(Or hire a new PR person because whoever suggested this was an idiot.)

u/redryan · 3 pointsr/socialism

I'd recommend Lars T. Lih's recent Lenin biography and also any of his other works on Lenin.

u/You_R_Dum · 3 pointsr/booksuggestions

I'm sure you do...Comrade...o_O

The KGB was far and away better than CIA in human intelligence. Two books I read and enjoyed. Spymaster and Spy Handler

u/admorobo · 3 pointsr/suggestmeabook

Spy Handler: Memoir of a KGB Officer is a fascinating read by the man who was the case handler for some of America's most notorious spies including Robert Hannsen and Aldrich Ames.

u/Rumking · 3 pointsr/politics

How about Red Notice, since that's the book Browder already wrote on the subject... https://www.amazon.com/Red-Notice-Finance-Murder-Justice/dp/1476755744

u/flyingorange · 3 pointsr/hardcorehistory

What you're looking for is the first book of the Stalin trilogy

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stalin-Paradoxes-1878-1928-Stephen-Kotkin/dp/1594203792/ref=sr_1_2?crid=23KDC6NFEEFH4&keywords=kotkin+stalin+volume+3&qid=1573896635&s=books&sprefix=kotkin%2Cstripbooks%2C199&sr=1-2

Yes it's 900 pages but it's amazing. I actually put off listening to Hardcore history because I was reading this and didn't want to be interrupted. I'm about to read the second book, which is about the 1930-41 period and expect it to be just as good.

u/thefightforgood · 3 pointsr/politics

You should link to Bill Browder's book Red Notice. It puts this whole collusion thing into perspective - and it was published in 2015 before Trump was even a serious candidate.

u/an-ok-dude · 3 pointsr/history

one soldiers war

worth a read

u/Vairminator · 3 pointsr/AskHistorians

I read a really good book on this subject called Spy Handler: Memoir of a KGB Officer, and I certainly recommend it. It was written by the KGB officer who ran Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen, two of the most important spies the soviets ever had in the US.

For those unfamiliar, Aldrich Ames was a CIA officer who sold the identity of western sources (spies for the US) to the KGB for cash.

The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence said:
>Ames admitted that he had compromised "virtually all Soviet agents of the CIA and other American and foreign services known to me" and had provided the USSR and Russia with a "huge quantity of information on United States foreign, defense and security policies". It is estimated that information Ames provided to the Soviets led to the compromise of at least a hundred U.S. intelligence operations and to the execution of at least ten U.S. sources.

Robert Hanssen is the FBI agent who spent 22 years feeding secrets to the KGB. The investigation leading to his arrest is dramatized in the 2007 movie Breach.

Of particular interest in this book is the way Cherkashin talks about the recruiting game. His best spies were motivated by money (Ames) or ego (Hanssen), but he also talks about the use of sexual blackmail. At one point he uses the services of a female agent to collect incriminating photography that he then uses to blackmail the man into providing information. What I love is the way he talks about how these different sources had to be managed, requiring an understanding of human motivations and what people were willing to do. Someone you were blackmailing could only be pushed so far, after all. While he did not operate far outside of Human Intelligence (HumInt) gathering, he does talk a lot about several operations that caught US spies. A very good read!

u/Vestrati · 3 pointsr/europe

I don't know how they're going to get there - conditions sound awful in the Army. I think conscription accounts for something like 15-20% of their Army, and I believe they've been having trouble filling their intended numbers of volunteers for military service.

Was this the book you ready? http://amzn.com/1846270405

u/jahboots · 2 pointsr/RussiaDenies

I've been reading Putin's biography: The New Tsar: The Rise and Reign of Vladimir Putin

If you're interested in how Putin rose to power and what drives him, I recommend you get a copy.

u/dastweinerhund · 2 pointsr/worldnews

False flag opps are also done in Russia. Putin is a terrorist and has killed many of his own people. It's well documented that he kills journalists that speak out against his violent acts. Masha Gessen's book reveals many acts of terror against his own people and the killing of her mentor when she finally returned to Russia from Boston after years of exile for fear of the KGB and Putin. She was killed the moment she arrived in her parent's building on the stairway up to her parents house. She didn't even get to look into her parents eyes after all those years in the US. The web just makes us easier to track and Facebook is the CIA's wet dream come true.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Man-Without-Face-Unlikely/dp/1594486514

u/bunnylover726 · 2 pointsr/politics

Bill Browder's book, Red Notice, is an excellent background on the Magnitsky Act. Browder's writing is super easy to read, and the topic is fascinating. I found the copy I read at a local library.

u/yogiontour · 2 pointsr/CombatFootage

https://www.amazon.co.uk/One-Soldiers-Chechnya-Arkady-Babchenko/dp/1846270405

This is a very dark unfiltered book, but excatly what you're looking for

u/OgreMagoo · 2 pointsr/worldnews

> As for Putin, the short answer to your question is - he's competent. Competent at his job. He's clever, determined, well-spoken and actually does stuff rather than just talk about it.

If anyone wants to learn what Putin is actually like -- and how thoroughly ignorant he is, in all endeavors aside from running a gangster state -- check out Masha Gessen's The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin or Fiona Hill's Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin.

u/DevilSaintDevil · 2 pointsr/truebooks

You don't need to know Russian history to love and learn from Dostoevsky.

I agree that the Pevear and Volokhonsky translations are the best.

If you do want to read Russian history I recommend:

The Icon and the Axe is truly foundational, you have to read this book if you want to understand Russia and join the conversation about Russian history

Massie's biography of Peter the Great is one of the best books I've ever read. Reads like a novel, amazing story of Russia's move from a medieval/dark ages mentality to an enlightenment/scientific mindset. His bio of Catherine is also good--but his Peter is a classic across disciplines.

This is the best recent biography of Stalin.

Happy reading. Russian history is a hole you go into and don't easily come out. So much there, so interesting, so horrifying, so engrossing. American history is all about optimism (from the the non-native perspective). Russian history is all about suffering--from every perspective.

u/KaJedBear · 2 pointsr/booksuggestions

The Long Walk

Skeletons on the Zahara

Both non-fiction stories of survival that I thought were incredible.

Also, not strictly survival but very good non-fiction adventure reads in the same vein are A Man's Life and The Hard Way by Mark Jenkins.

u/Greedyfriend · 2 pointsr/politics

The author of this book
https://www.amazon.com/Red-Notice-Finance-Murder-Justice/dp/1476755744
Was on NPR discussing the Magnitsky act and stated it was the most important sanction that Putin wanted lifted. Haven't had time to go down the rabbit hole, just putting this out there

u/imsurly · 2 pointsr/politics

I believe he learned some english as an adult, but he's not fluent. (I'm reading a biography about him).

u/SqueakySniper · 2 pointsr/OldSchoolCool

They were both based on this book by Vasily Zaytsev.

u/BitPoet · 2 pointsr/rpg
u/RabidBatRat · 2 pointsr/NetflixBestOf

I seriously urge everyone to read the book first. I'm not saying the movie is bad, but it doesn't even come close to the book. They left a lot of stuff out and changed some things in the film. One of the best books I've ever read.

u/cassander · 2 pointsr/AskReddit

I don't remember the page, but Robert Massie talks about it in his biography of Peter the Great. Apparently he started bear hunting with a pike and sword, but decided that it wasn't fair to hunt with steel, so he switched to a wooden pitchfork like implement. Fantastic book actually, a must read if you have any interest in Russia or the late 18th century.

http://www.amazon.com/Peter-Great-Robert-K-Massie/dp/0345298063

u/Deacalum · 2 pointsr/CFBOffTopic

My first master's degree was in Intelligence Studies with a concentration in Intelligence Operations.

My two favorite books are supplemental to each other but talk about the the US v. the USSR during the mid 80s to late 90s. One is from the perspective a former CIA case officer and the other is from the perspective of a former KGB case officer.

The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB by Milt Bearden
Spy Handler: Memoir of a KGB Officer

A great overview of intelligence history is A Century of Spies: Intelligence in the Twentieth Century by Jeffery T. Richelson. Richelson is very knowledgeable about intelligence history and well respected as one of the premiere historians in the field. He has written a ton of other books and I imagine they're pretty good and worthwhile.

Finally, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis is a great book not only about the Cuban Missile Crisis but examining how national security decisions are made.

u/sabinscabin · 2 pointsr/politics

I know you're asking for a broader history of Russia that goes back much further, but for recent events I wholeheartedly recommend (Man without a face: the unlikely rise of Vladimir Putin)[https://www.amazon.com/Man-Without-Face-Unlikely-Vladimir/dp/1594486514] by Masha Gessen. This only deals with the second half of the 20th century, but it is the most penetrating and insightful exposes on Putin and his rise to power I have ever read. Gessen herself is a Soviet/Russian expatriate currently living in the US, and one of the foremost Putin critics of this generation.

u/MasCapital · 2 pointsr/communism101

I've been meaning to read this book, which addresses these questions. Unfortunately, I can't find a pdf. From the book description:

>To say that history's greatest economic experiment--Soviet communism--was also its greatest economic failure is to say what many consider obvious. Here, in a startling reinterpretation, Robert Allen argues that the USSR was one of the most successful developing economies of the twentieth century. He reaches this provocative conclusion by recalculating national consumption and using economic, demographic, and computer simulation models to address the "what if" questions central to Soviet history. Moreover, by comparing Soviet performance not only with advanced but with less developed countries, he provides a meaningful context for its evaluation.

>Although the Russian economy began to develop in the late nineteenth century based on wheat exports, modern economic growth proved elusive. But growth was rapid from 1928 to the 1970s--due to successful Five Year Plans. Notwithstanding the horrors of Stalinism, the building of heavy industry accelerated growth during the 1930s and raised living standards, especially for the many peasants who moved to cities. A sudden drop in fertility due to the education of women and their employment outside the home also facilitated growth.

>While highlighting the previously underemphasized achievements of Soviet planning, Farm to Factory also shows, through methodical analysis set in fluid prose, that Stalin's worst excesses--such as the bloody collectivization of agriculture--did little to spur growth. Economic development stagnated after 1970, as vital resources were diverted to the military and as a Soviet leadership lacking in original thought pursued wasteful investments.

u/vladimirpoopen · 2 pointsr/The_Donald

the more I read about Putin and his alleged assassinations of those that oppose him, the more I worry about Trump's stance on Russia. I think Trump may do a reversal on Putin after getting the intelligence reports on him. here's one attempted assassination. here

this is not concern trolling and maybe we should move a debate on Putin to ATD. has anyone read this book

u/IDthisguy · 2 pointsr/metro

>I just have a personal interest in history, mainly WWII Eastern Front, and an interest in geopolitics mainly Russia.

Awesome I love history; my focus tends to be more global historical trends rather than any specific region, I just finished Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel" (It was awesome, obsessed with food production, but still awesome) and my next book is Yuval Harhari's "Sapiens: A Brief History of Mankind"

>Its pretty sad but interesting stuff. All of it.

"And then it got worse" -I heard this on the internet somewhere, I think it was associated with Russian history.

>But yeah people here don't know much outside of Putin in staged photos, Cold War propaganda and whatever they hear on whatever stupid news channel they watch. :p

Yeah its too bad, you'd be surprised how easy it is for most mainstream news to get distracted. Although you can still find out quite a bit about Eastern Europe/Russia from English language European News sources (however if you're an American with no background on the topic it's definitely much harder to pick up on what they're talking about), Youtube Videos, and Books on Russia from Americans (Bill Browder's "Red Notice" is probably the only book on Russia I've picked up though).

u/StarTrackFan · 2 pointsr/DebateaCommunist

I think I'd be just fine explaining just what Lenin's idea of the vanguard is, what it was for, what he specifically meant etc, but I don't feel fully educated in regards to the arguments that it somehow led to everything bad under Stalin or anything bad under the USSR just because I'm not that versed in the politics/internal struggles etc post-revolution (and especially not post-Lenin) yet.

As for Lih's book, I actually found an excellent in-depth 6-page review of it last night that makes me feel almost as though I've read it.

Here are the links (too lazy to make them nice)

http://www.socialistdemocracy.org/Reviews/ReviewLeninRediscoveredPart1.html

http://www.socialistdemocracy.org/Reviews/ReviewLeninRediscoveredPart2.html

http://www.socialistdemocracy.org/Reviews/ReviewLeninRediscoveredPart3.html

http://www.socialistdemocracy.org/Reviews/ReviewLeninRediscoveredPart4.html

http://www.socialistdemocracy.org/Reviews/ReviewLeninRediscoveredPart5.html

http://www.socialistdemocracy.org/Reviews/ReviewLeninRediscoveredPart6.html

Also if you're looking for a biography of Lenin I'd recommend Lih's which I just got and am already half way through. As I said he has a strange way of framing it; it's based around the idea that Lenin had a romantic/heroic notion of the workers revolution. It makes sense to a degree and I'm sure Lenin did have a somewhat "heroic" idea of the workers, class struggle etc but Lih sells that a bit hard. Outside of that he does an excellent job of sticking to the facts and disassembling many misconceptions of Lenin's personality, deeds and (to some extent) ideas.

u/redbirdsfan · 2 pointsr/AskHistorians

As far as Stalin biographies go, I would recommend you read volume one of Stephen Kotkin's three part bio on him. Here's the link:

Stalin: Volume I: Paradoxes of Power, 1878-1928 https://www.amazon.com/dp/1594203792/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_EsJfvb01P8RMZ

It's very interesting, and definitely not dry at at all.

Edit: Additionally there is also Oxford's History of the Soviet Union post-1945, although seeing as I haven't had the chance to read it yet I can't tell you just how readable it actually is.

Last of the Empires: A History of the Soviet Union 1945-1991 https://www.amazon.com/dp/0192803190/ref=cm_sw_r_awd_WuJfvb0JSYHNT

u/EngelsFritz · 2 pointsr/communism

Thanks very much! Would anyone happen to have a PDF version of 'Farm to Factory' by Robert Allen?

u/pugzilla · 1 pointr/Chechnya

I've enjoyed the following, not being from that part of the world, culture or religion you'd have to take my insight with a grain of salt. There doesn't seem to be that much information about that part of the world, one of the reasons I find it so fascinating. It's fairly invisible. There is typically one viewpoint from this media, red team or blue team, nothing seems to be that unbiased. I found "The Oath" to be the most informative and interesting.

BOOKS-

u/AyeMatey · 1 pointr/news

More on the Magnitsky Act here.

u/wrathofoprah · 1 pointr/worldnews

Had no idea about that. Then I read The Man Without a Face.

u/aquietmidnightaffair · 1 pointr/AskHistorians

Sorry to arrive late to the party, but there is another book regarding the resident KGB officer at the USSR embassy in Washington D.C.

u/history_SS · 1 pointr/SubredditSimulator

A far more appropriate bogeyman would have been happy to refer to the start of the battle. Okay, at this point, but it's important to establish a colony in the New Russia by David E. Hoffman](http://www.amazon.com/The-Oligarchs-Wealth-Power-Russia/dp/1610390709).

u/alan_s · 1 pointr/travel
u/Masylv · 1 pointr/worldnews

http://uncensoredhistory.blogspot.com/2012/09/vasily-grossman-ostfront-eastern-front-ww2-narrative.html

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Panzer-Destroyer-Memoirs-Army-Commander/dp/1844159515 - Vasiliy Krysov goes into detail about an incident where three Red Army sergeants raped a 23 year old German woman and got no punishment because "The Germans did it too".

Nikolai Safinov, who was an infantryman in WWII and writes for IRemember.ru: "There were also cases of raping German women. I remember a widely known fact of a group rape when 33 soldiers raped a German woman. There were talks that after that news reached General Kotikov, the chief of the Political Department of the 61st Army, he shook his head especially wondering at those who were at the tail end of the line of rapists. Nevertheless, that criminal case had been dropped." No punishment.

Yurii Koriakin, Rifleman in the 10th Guards Rifle Division: A Politburo officer told him "Well, and concerning the woman question, you can treat the German women rather freely, but so it wouldn't look organized. 1-2 men can go, do what they need (that's exactly what he said: "what they need"), return, and that's all. Any kind of pointless damage to German men and women is inadmissible and will be punished."

"This conversation made us feel that he himself didn't know exactly what norms of behavior should've been followed. Of course, we were all under the influence of propaganda, which didn't differentiate Germans and Hitlerites in those times. That's why I know of a ton of cases when German women were raped, but not killed. Treatment of German women (we almost never saw men) was free, even vengeful. In our regiment the Sergeant Major of the supply company set up practically an entire harem."

This was literally a five minute Google search. You can research the individual accounts yourself; I don't have the time to do so to win an internet argument.

u/Broken6r · 1 pointr/guns
u/boetzie · 1 pointr/AskEurope

Read this: https://www.amazon.com/New-Tsar-Reign-Vladimir-Putin/dp/0345802799

Really, read it. The sheer amount of money this man has stolen from the Russian people is beyond anything.

u/SEJeff · 1 pointr/worldnews

For those interested in this sort of thing, Bill Browder’s book, Red Notice, is an absolutely harrowing journey into this life:

https://www.amazon.com/Red-Notice-Finance-Murder-Justice/dp/1476755744/ref=nodl_

Money, spies, stolen money, and assassins.

u/henrysmith78730 · 1 pointr/motorcycles

I haven't but I will. Check out The Long Walk. https://www.amazon.com/Long-Walk-Story-Freedom-Tie/dp/1599219751

There are a number of true life adventure stories, especially about escapes from Russia, that are well worth the read. I have read most of these and they are amazing. https://www.amazon.com/gp/buy/thankyou/handlers/display.html?ie=UTF8&asins=1633230473&isRefresh=1&orderId=113-2199401-5946649&purchaseId=106-0134021-8976259&viewId=ThankYouCart

In about 1908 my grandfather and his brother drove from Boston across the States, the the Philippines, Japan, China, Russia and on to Europe. We have the picture album of it but unfortunately his hag of a second wife burned his diaries about the trip shortly after he died.

u/SoakerCity · 1 pointr/worldnews

I'd suggest that you read "One Soldier's War" for an idea of what Russia is capable of.

u/Nibble_on_this · 1 pointr/politics

Masha Gessen's book The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin is an excellent (if slightly dry) read.

As is the article she wrote at the very beginning of Trump's tenure: Autocracy: Rules For Survival

u/Smoke_Me_When_i_Die · 1 pointr/russia

Well of course the first place to start would be Wikipedia. You could look up:

1936 Soviet Constitution, Gosplan, five year plans, collectivization, kolkhoz, Gulags, the Virgin Lands campaign, TASS, Izvestia, Pravda, Elektronika, their incredible space program, etc. And of course the leaders. And the various republics (SSRs) would be good to know. In fact the country itself was CCCP = SSSR.

Read about all the post-collapse conflicts: Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia, Chechnya, Transnistria, Russia-Georgia war, Ukraine Crisis. And about how turbulent the 90s were.

There are personal accounts of the gigantic conflict with the Germans, like those of Vasili Grossman and Marshal Zhukov. There are transcripts of interviews with Khrushchev and the books that Gorbachev wrote on Glasnost and Perestroika. Historian David M. Glantz writes almost exclusively about the Soviet military. There are the accounts of dissidents like Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Andrei Sakharov.

There are some classic pieces of literature like Master and Margarita and Dr. Zhivago. And music on YouTube by people like Shostakovich.

There are surplus stores like Soviet-Power.com that sell helmets, medals, coins, busts, and the like if that is what you are into. And blogs like English Russia.

r/history here on reddit probably has some articles to peruse. r/HistoryPorn often has old Russian photos.

And of course I've talked to several people on this forum who lived during Soviet times. I'm sure some here or elsewhere on reddit would be happy to tell you.

u/balticpuppet · 1 pointr/UkrainianConflict

They should give some books to read to those kids about how Russia waged war in Chechnya. Like this one http://www.amazon.com/One-Soldiers-War-Arkady-Babchenko-ebook/dp/B008RZK5L4

Explains very well why Russian army is such an utter failure and why its not worth considering as a formidable threat in the world.

u/j0be · 1 pointr/ImaginedLife

This episode recommended two books for additional information about Vladimir Putin.

u/harimau22 · 1 pointr/soccer

A lot of the oligarchs were scientists or bureaucrats that happened to be connected with the right people at the right time in a very fluid time in Russia's history.

https://www.amazon.com/Oligarchs-Wealth-Power-New-Russia/dp/1610390709/

Don't really know much about this guy though.

u/jefuchs · 1 pointr/books

FYI: There's another book with the same title. I love first-person non fiction like this. I read it a few years ago, and was enthralled.


I haven't read Stephen King's book, but you guys make it sound tempting.

u/funnymoney17 · 1 pointr/history

I read a pretty decent book by Vasily Grossman called "a writer at war: a Soviet journalist with the red army, 1941-1945." Fairly short read and gives some solid insight to life in the eastern front.

https://www.amazon.com/Writer-War-Soviet-Journalist-1941-1945/dp/0307275337

Also, Antony Beevor's books, "Stalingrad" and "Berlin: the downfall, 1945" are both solid reads about the eastern front.

u/dlbush · 1 pointr/NeutralPolitics

Masha Gessin's book on the rise of Putin The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin https://www.amazon.com/Man-Without-Face-Unlikely-Vladimir/dp/1594486514 does a great job of explaining how the Russian oligarchy functions and includes a detailed account of Browder's experience too.

u/JohnnyApathy · 1 pointr/movies

Along the same lines, but not mentioned: The Way Back
Based on the true story told in the novel: The Long Walk: The True Story of a Trek to Freedom

u/Mike_Cinerama · 1 pointr/CompanyOfHeroes

Some nice books for you to read describing the russian side:

u/riley1231 · 1 pointr/gaming

I've been reading this book about the Chechen War, and it's only reinforced my belief of that quote.

u/valeg · 1 pointr/ukraina

Сурковская писанина — роман «Околоноля», «Машинка и велик», «Ультранормальность» и т.д..

"Red Cocaine: The Drugging of America and the West"

Книжки Голицына, неплохо передают образ мышления корпорации.

The New Cold War: Putin's Russia and the Threat to the West

Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder, and One Man's Fight for Justice

Дугинские «Основы геополитики» и сочинения Ивана Ильина. Местами книжонки Сергея Кара-Мурзы («Россия: точка 2010, образ будущего и путь к нему»), тоже просочились во властное сознание.

u/Hollow_Fangs · 1 pointr/The_Donald

> If you knew me, you would know that I lived in many more countries and varied conditions than you did

Let me just state the same: If you knew me, you would know that I lived in many more countries and varied conditions than you did

> Anyway, there are much worse places than where you live, even in France.

One thing I know for sure is that you've never been to Russia. Otherwise you wouldn't be spouting such nonsense.

> whether you stay in Russia or decide to move to place you deem better. May be you are right, may be it does exist.

Oh, I'm not moving anywhere, I'm gonna stay here and try to change things. One good thing about Russia is that intersectionality and political correctness (in it's Western, "your-breathing-is-offensive-misogynic-and-oppressing" sense) are completely alien concepts here. And unlike their Western counterparts who glorify Marx and Lenin, the majority of our hipsters adore Ayn Rand and libertarianism.

> Here's some first class reading for you. It provides excellent background on the west.

I will read it. And since we're doing book suggestions here are mine:

https://www.amazon.com/Winter-Coming-Vladimir-Enemies-Stopped/dp/1610397193/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

https://www.amazon.com/Man-Without-Face-Unlikely-Vladimir/dp/1594486514/ref=la_B001H6MBXK_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1525652656&sr=1-2

https://www.amazon.com/Day-Oprichnik-Novel-Vladimir-Sorokin/dp/0374533105/ref=la_B001JOLA4G_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1525652758&sr=1-1

The first two are political/historical nonfiction books, written by people who had first-hand experience with Putin's regime.

The third one is a novel, but many of the things and ideas depicted there has come/are coming to life in Russia right now, unfortunately. Orwell's 1984 and Burgess' 1985 (read it too, by the way, great book) are good descriptions of what's going on in the West and where it is headed with its leftist ideology. And this Vladimir Sorokin's book does the same for Russia.

So do me a favor and read these three books (and do check out "1985", I'll say it again - great book). And I'll read your book as soon as I finish "Journey to the End of the Night".

u/cheese0muncher · 1 pointr/booksuggestions
u/Esmerelda-Weatherwax · 1 pointr/Fantasy

hmmmm... well, not much that Ive read fall under that price range. Do you like in the USA, can you use Amazon?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0786884517/ref=mp_s_a_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1495585796&sr=8-6&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=pirate+biography&dpPl=1&dpID=51-foWCviEL&ref=plSrch

That one is 9-10 dollars, the story of Captain Kidd. If you dont mind used editions some of the stuff by Robert K Massie is under 5 dollars for print.

Dreadnought is about Britain and Germany gearing up do WW1

Peter the Great was one of the most famous Tsars of Russia

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ol/0345298063/ref=mw_dp_olp?ie=UTF8&condition=all

Ghenghis Khan and The Making of The Modern world was fascinating

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ol/0609809644/ref=mw_dp_olp?ie=UTF8&condition=all

The republic of Pirates was pretty interesting too

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ol/015603462X/ref=mw_dp_olp?ie=UTF8&condition=all

i linked to used books, so be aware of that - i buy almost all of my books used in "good" or "great" condition and have no complaints so far.

u/WhatATunt · 1 pointr/ChapoTrapHouse

"Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State"

Is good if you're interested in the direct aftermath and the immediate consequences of the collapse. The author was the Moscow correspondent for the WSJ for quite some time, so you'll end up wading through some inevitable bias. Alternatively, you can look into "The Oligarchs: Wealth and Power in the New Russia" and exchange a psychology-based explanation for the modern Russian Federation from Satter's book for a series of biographies of the current top flight of Russian society.

​

I've heard good things about Remnick's "Lenin's Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire" but I have not had a chance to read it myself, so I can't comment much on its historicity or historiography.

u/wow_muchskills · 0 pointsr/worldnews

Pfttt. Russia's military is built on conscription. The average Russian soldier has the tact of an American high schooler. There is no professionalism or expertise. They can't afford to give their troops the hundreds of hours of training like the US.



Read this book - http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1846270405?pc_redir=1397886363&robot_redir=1 -

How shitty their military has fared against Chechens and Georgians is embarrassing considering the technological gaps.

Edit: how the hell did I forget dedovschina. The biggest reason for their lack of discipline and morale. The book goes into it as well. Its sick what those kids have to go through.

u/jonastesch · -2 pointsr/russia

I found this one really interesting: http://www.amazon.com/The-Man-Without-Face-Unlikely/dp/1594486514

I would love to hear other peoples opinions about it.

u/sorenindespair · -2 pointsr/conspiracy

They violated another state's sovereignty, that's illegal and it doesn't matter if a rigged election said that - maybe - some slim majority of Crimean's wanted that. You seem to have a very naive perception of Russia's activity in that region, you should read some history and I recommend this one. We fought a civil war when the south wanted to secede and thank god we managed to keep the union together since then, what are you defending exactly?