CRIMEAN QUAGMIRE: TOLSTOY, RUSSELL, AND THE BIRTH OF MODERN WARFARE by Gregory Carleton

(An illustration of the charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava during the Crimean War. (Photo by Time Life Pictures/Mansell/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images)

In his consummate diplomatic history, THE STRUGGLE FOR MASTERY OF EUROPE 1848-1918, A.J.P. Taylor describes the Crimean War as a largely pointless conflict driven by miscalculation and misplaced ego on the part of the leaders of Britain, France and Russia. As many historians have described the war originated because of a series of careless decisions on the part of all involved in events leading up to the conflict which ended the post-Napoleonic War period. According to Taylor the war was fought for imprudent reasons as its outbreak was due supposedly because of England and France’s desire to protect Christian interests in the Ottoman Empire, but that was a smokescreen for the European powers to weaken the Turkish domain and assert their dominance.

Taylor stresses the role of domestic political pressure and the need to maintain national prestige pushing the powers toward war making it difficult to pull back and secure the peace. An accurate phrase that encapsulates the outbreak of war can be summed as “a war that didn’t boil” which reflects how a minor incident escalated into a major confrontation because of the inability of politicians to deescalate. The Treaty of Paris (1856) ended the fighting, and its results were rather inconsequential as it was designed to guarantee the integrity of the Ottoman Empire and neutralize the Black Sea. However, decisions which originated at Paris in the years following the war would in the end prove to be very consequential.

(William Howard Russell, ca. 1854)

In his new book, CRIMEAN QUAGMIRE: TOLSTOY, RUSSELL, AND THE BIRTH OF MODERN WARFARE Russian specialist Gregory Carelton argues that the Crimean War transformed how we understand war, eradicating 19^th century Romanticism which followed the Napoleonic War. Focusing on two young writers; Russian officer Lev Tolstoy, and The Times journalist William Howard Russell, Carelton relates how these men exposed government misinformation and coverups as their countries engaged in what military historians describe as the first modern war. Both men would pay dearly for exposing the actions of their governments, but their legacy certainly outlived them.

Carelton correctly argues that the war developed major aspects of modern warfare introducing a number of technological achievements. First, the destructive power of the rifle; others include long-range artillery, the railroads and telegraphs, photography, improved medical treatment, iron-clad steam powered ships, explosive shells, and land mines, all contributing to the carnage of warfare.

Carleton’s thesis continues as he argues that what also made the war significant were the ways in which we understand war and how we inform the public as for the first time the domestic audience learned of the true horrors of war that took place on the battlefield. The Crimean War was the first whereby public opinion helped push combatants to the negotiating table.

In Carleton’s narrative it was Tolstoy and Russell who deserve the credit for introducing the public to the images of war it had rarely, if ever, had witnessed before as they offered graphic scenes from the conflict. What enhanced their dispatches was the rise in literacy rates, particularly among soldiers in the British army who could then inform their families and the public in general with their experiences through letters, diaries, and memoirs. For the first time in history warfare technology allowed the public immediate insights as to what was occurring on the battlefield.

(Leo Tolstoy)

As to the direct causes of the war that threatened the post-Napoleonic settlement balance of power, Russia was deemed most culpable. The Tsarist autocracy would soon replace Napoleonic France as the main threat to British influence and power as it continued to expand across the Caucasus and Central Asia along with its domination of Eastern Europe. Few diplomats, politicians or generals trusted Russia which did accept any threat to the European order and was always willing to dispatch troops to put down any revolutionary threat as occurred in Hungary during the Revolutions of 1848. This fact was highlighted by the century-long conflict with the Ottoman Empire throughout Southeast Europe, across the Black Sea and the Caucasus. Another useful argument is represented by the Crystal Palace and Great Exhibition of 1851 in England which focused the world on the technological and intellectual achievements and potential of the British Empire as compared to the backwardness of Russia who saw innovation and change as a threat to its rule and power. For an in depth analysis encompassing the immediate causes, the outbreak, and the course of the war consult Orlando Figes’ excellent study THE CRIMEAN WAR: A HISTORY, Trevor Royle’s CRIMEA: THE GREAT CRIMEAN WAR 1854-1856, and Robert Edgerton’s DEATH OF GLORY: THE LEGACY OF THE CRIMEAN WAR.

To quote Richard Haas whose excellent book, WAR OF NECESSITY, WAR OF CHOICE his views on the war in Iraq are very pertinent as the Crimean War was a war of choice initiated by empires infatuated with their own exceptionalism which were guilty of causing a stalemate on the battlefield, produced contradictory arguments and lies to justify their actions leaving both sides embittered with intense domestic blowback, all of which produced a quagmire as, it did in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and currently in Ukraine. Carelton argues that the effect of quagmires lasts long past the conclusion of the fighting. The results can break nations, bring down governments or lead to different types of revolution.

A key chapter in Carleton’s monograph is a comparison of the impact of Tolstoy’s and Russell’s socialization. Tolstoy on the one hand developed intellectually in a backward autocratic state with an 80% peasant population which was mostly illiterate. Russell, on the other hand, was impacted by a country that praised democratic principles, conducted elections, and had a mostly literate population. The impact of these writers was also different as Russell focused more on the tragedy as governments tried to cover up and deny the brutality of their war and the incompetence of the leaders who directed it. Tolstoy as a junior artillery officer focused on his direct experiences commenting on trench warfare, the siege of Sevastopol, and other examples of devastation in his short stories and later novels, WAR AND PEACE and ANNA KARENINA. As Carleton repeatedly points out, both men “laid the groundwork for veterans of World War I and later conflicts to try and understand and cope with their own experiences.”

The war itself would result in changing the governments of England and Russia. Russell wrote that Prime Minister Lord Aberdeen’s government was an aristocratic den, “aloof, out of touch, inept, and so it seemed uncaring.” He further pointed out that “the finest army that ever left these shores will soon cease to exist.” By the end of January 1855, Aberdeen’s government fell and was replaced by the former Home Secretary, Lord Palmerston. In Russia, Nicholas passed away and was replaced by Alexander II as Tsar who immediately wrote that the war was “a bottomless pit.”

(Cossack Bay, Balaklava)

Carleton does an excellent job integrating Russell and Tolstoy’s dispatches and stories describing the course of the war and the carnage they witnessed. The fact that both men were embedded with their armies gives further credence to support their views and how the public interpreted their ideas. Excerpts of their descriptions of the siege of Sevastopol provide the reader with many insights as to how the war was fought, the incompetence of the bureaucracies that hindered supplies, the brutal weather that soldiers endured, the lack of infrastructure limiting efforts to provide soldiers with what they needed, and the impact of the social class system that affected both armies. The end result was that the siege would soon devolve into a Somme-like catastrophe, albeit on a smaller scale.

Carleton’s use of letters, diaries, and memoirs by combatants in addition to the writing of Russell and Tolstoy add a high degree of authenticity in understanding the horrible conditions in which the war was fought and the incompetent leadership at home and on the battlefield. Carleton has produced a concisely written and tight monograph that provides numerous insights concerning the war, how it was fought, the results, and the implications for future wars. The author argues further that the war changed war writing forever and by breaking down different examples of Russell and Tolstoy’s works, i.e., “Sevastopol in September,” and “Sevastopol in May” Tolstoy has crossed the threshold, leaving behind Homeric expectations of glory with the truth about how a peasant army was being slaughtered. In Russell’s case his commentary on “the Charge of the Light Brigade” pulls no punches as it was not only a defeat, and its results had no consequences for the war. For Russell, the age of cavalry had passed as he described the siege as a “quagmire-like stalemate.”

The author spends an entire chapter tracing the myths associated with the “Charge of the Light Brigade” which would be immortalized by Alfred Lord Tennyson. The poet’s interest was piqued by Russell’s dispatches resulting in a remarkable poem in which Carleton beaks down stanza by stanza.

(British mortar batteries)

The writing of our subjects reflects the evolution of the transition from the Age of Romanticism to the Age of Realism leading to a revolution in war writing. Carleton makes the important point that Russell’s writing angered a public that grew tired of government obfuscation, and it became the major source of information for people to follow the war and understand it. Russell’s writings created a furor in government circles, and they put pressure on The Times’ editor, John Delane who refused to back down and would allow commentary such as the governments “incompetency, lethargy, aristocratic hauteur, official indifference, favor, routine, perverseness, and stupidity reign….the noblest army ever sent out from these shores has been sacrificed to the grossest mismanagement.” Russell went on to describe the soldiers as “victims” and for the first time newspapers began to publish lists of soldiers who had died. For Tolstoy, his wartime experiences convinced him to resign his military commission and pursue a writing career.

Carleton is clear as he reiterates how Russell and Tolstoy remapped how death should be understood on the battlefield and off, perhaps their most important contribution to understanding modern warfare. For both it came down to three principles: who died, how they died, and more importantly, why they died. In all areas they broke all previous conventions in their writing be it anyone could be a victim of war with no relation to rank, societal status or nationality. Further, they explored the true conditions on the battlefield. Lastly, they argued that Crimea does not fit the longtime view accepted of why wars are fought. The Crimean War, in short, had no precedent in the European mindset as it was the first to be recognized as a quagmire – literally where opposing armies struggled to take a few yards in deepening mud, trenches, disease, and resulting despair as an estimated 700,000 perished, three-quarters of which were Russian. The concept of a quagmire developed in the Crimea can easily be applied to today’s fighting in Ukraine.

(Camp of the 4th Dragoons, English and French)

The author’s short volume is loaded with examples to support each of his points and is an exceptional synthesis of the available material, primary and secondary. It looks at the war from a different perspective as Carleton argues it established truth as the aim of war reporting and understanding the power of words/lies to create war, death, and destruction. It helped establish a script with which to understand “quagmire conflict.”

As to the lessons learned from the war Donald Rayfield’s review published in History Today Volume 74 Issue 10 October 2024 is spot on as he writes: “The heritage of the Crimean War is mixed. Both sides realized that doctors and nurses, not generals and sergeants, were needed. In Britain and Russia, there was energetic medical progress: chloroform was now offered not only to officers and gentlemen. Sanitation, nutrition and nursing were given the same priorities as shells and fortifications. In Russia a military-medical academy started training thousands of doctors, including women, so that in the next Balkan war, 20 years later, Russia could boast of having women doctors serving at the front.

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(Alfred Lord Tennyson, poet)

Military lessons were learnt, too: Alexander II’s generals turned to the conquest of Central Asia and the Far East. As the world gradually conceded the Russians the freedom of the Black Sea, Alexander, the so-called liberator, began a genocidal deportation of hundreds of thousands of indigenous Caucasians and Crimean Tatars to Anatolia. The Crimean War, however, did initiate Russia’s most progressive era: serfs were freed, the arts flourished, a national health service was created. In Britain complacent aristocrats such as Lord Aberdeen yielded to energetic radicals such as Disraeli and Gladstone. Russians and Britons, but, alas, not the Ottomans, emerged wiser from their quagmire.”

According to Carleton the lessons to be learned are clear. “Quagmires become veritable graveyards of exceptionalism.” Need proof, look at the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the American war in Vietnam. Each resulted in the collapse of government and major policy implications for the future. As these wars were fought the calling cards of quagmires emerge – atrocities and war crimes. To cover this up the key link of 20^th and 21^st century quagmires is the “foundational lie,” as in any quagmire truth is the first casualty.

(Old engraved illustration of the Siege of Sevastopol during the Crimean War. (Picture by GettyImages)

ISTANBUL PASSAGE by Joseph Kanon

March 9, 2025szfreiberger Historical Fiction, Mystery/Thrillers Leave a comment

Istanbul is a historic city that sits at the crossroads of east and west and has a long and complex history that lends itself to spy thrillers in the milieu of John le Carre, Graham Greene, Eric Ambler, and Alan Furst. The city itself sits at the entrance to the Bosphorus that flows into the Black Sea and was the center of Russo-Turkish conflict from the 18^th century to the conclusion of World War II. During the war, the city like Stockholm, Lisbon, and Geneva were supposedly neutral, but in the clever and credible hands of novelist Joseph Kanon its reality is a world of espionage which snares the reader in the complex world of spies.

The plot for Kanon’s ISTANBUL PASSAGE evokes his past technique of using an urban site as the center of his story as he has done in previous and later books. From Hollywood, to Moscow, Berlin, Shanghai, Venice and Buenos Aires they are all central to the stories that evolved in SHANGHAI; LEAVING BERLIN; STARDUST; THE GOOD GERMAN; DEFECTORS; LOS ALAMOS; and THE ACCOMPLICE. All of these works are provocative, fully realized fiction that investigates the reality of history as it is experienced by individual men and women.

The novel begins with allied veteran Leon Bauer who is running spy missions under the cover of a U.S. tobacco-importing business waiting for a boat to arrive and deliver a package, a.k.a , a man for whom he would be responsible. After the package did not arrive he decides to visit his wife Anna who is being treated at the Dr. Obstbaum’s clinic for a form of melancholia. In the recent past Anna had worked for the Mossad that funneled Jewish refugees through Istanbul to Palestine operating around the British blockade who wanted to keep the Jews at bay and not aggravate their Arab allies. Her work became a cover for Leon’s own, but dealing with so much secrecy, lies, and deaths she had a nervous collapse, retreating into a catatonic state. Leon is loyal to his wife, visiting often, hoping that in the near future the sound of his voice will return her to reality – it is her condition that keeps him anchored to Istanbul.

Periodically Kanon integrates Turkish history into the novel. Examples abound; Turks stealing from Armenians and Jews; Russia’s goal of controlling the Black Sea; the Truman Doctrine designed to assist Turkey and Greece against the communist threat; the smuggling of Jews who escaped the Holocaust across Turkey as a means to avoid the British blockade of Palestine. There are many other examples, providing evidence of Kanon’s success as a purveyor of historical fiction.

(The Blue Mosque, Istanbul, Turkey)

A key theme for Kanon which permeates the novel is a moral one. Leon has spent time with his wife, Anna assisting the smuggling of Jews into Istanbul, loading them on to freighters designed to outrun the British blockade of Palestine. At the same time, he is tasked by his boss, Tommy King, a spy stationed in the American consulate in Istanbul; to assist a Romanian defector named Alexi, whose real name is Jiani who has intelligence against the Russians to escape to the United States. The problem is that four years earlier he was part of a massacre of Jews as during the war he was a member of the Fascist Romanian Iron Guard. The Romanians set up concentration camps – only the ones the Germans didn’t run themselves. They killed about 200,000 Jews. As part of a later plot twist Leon will become implicated in two murders. First, Tommy King who may have been a double agent working with Moscow,, and later Fran Bishop, an American diplomat stationed in Ankara. The evidence points to Leon who is also having an affair with Bishop’s wife, Kay. Eventually Leon’s fate is intertwined with Alexi as he must escape the Istanbul police, and the Turkish secret police – the Emniyet.

The Cold War atmosphere dominates the background of the novel as Leon and Alexi wonder if the Russians are responsible for the killings. Apart from the Truman Doctrine, we learn of deals with former Nazi scientists and spies as the Russians and Americans vie for their services.

Leon was not a career operative and was not trained as an interrogator. It is interesting how Alexi educates Leon about spy craft, especially when Leon questions him about the massacre at Straulesti. With no choice and King dead Leon becomes Alexi’s partner as he must hide and protect him as he arranges his escape.

(Inside Hagia Sophia)

Kanon creates a series of complex characters who dominate the novel. The most important is Leon who is a flawed character who loves his wife, who has been hospitalized, possibly permanently visiting a prostitute each week and has an affair with Kay Bishop, apart from his role of smuggling Alexi. Tommy King, who was to manage Alexi’s escape, is murdered, but the question is by whom since his loyalties are in question. Mihai, a Romanian Jew who worked with Anna to transport Jews to Palestine. He continues that work without Anna and is appalled by the deal he makes with Leon concerning Alexi. Lily Nadir, a worldly widow who first arrived in Istanbul as a Circassian slave at age fourteen at the Sultan’s harem. She now gives society parties at her waterfront villa as she brings together many noteworthy characters especially those involving the Emniyet. Colonel Murat Altan who guides Leon at times, but as Turkish secret police he has a strong duplicitous side. Throughout, the question remains who can be trusted, but the key relationship is between Leon and Alexi. At first, Alexi is dependent upon Leon for his survival, as the plot unravels Leon becomes dependent upon Alexi.

ISTANBUL PASSAGE contains many ebbs and flows as the story develops layer upon layer. It is not the type of historical thriller Kanon usually delivers. There are plenty of action and plot shifts, but many of the scenes are dominated by lengthy innocuous dialogue which does little to maintain one’s interest. The story contains too many peaks and valleys and needs to stick to the pertinent aspects of the story and not wander off into areas that do not enrich the reader’s experience. Despite this Kanon edifies the reader with intelligent plotting and its vivid presentation of Istanbul, a setting rich in centuries of intrigue encapsulating the Ottoman years, the Byzantine sights, the influx of Germans in the 1930s, and the Ottoman Empire’s long imperial past.

Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey

SHANGHAI by Joseph Kannon

March 1, 2025March 1, 2025szfreiberger Historical Fiction Leave a comment

shanghai 1930s why is it called paris of the east

In the opening scene of Joseph Kanon’s latest novel, SHANGHAI, people are crowding on the dock to board the Raffaello, a ship out of Nazi Germany. Following the destruction, violence, and death against Jews during Kristallnacht in November 1938 it was becoming clear as to what Hitler’s ultimate goal was – the Jews had no choice but to try and get out. The question was where to go – even if you were able to acquire the proper paperwork. If you were lucky enough to obtain the necessary documents to leave Germany you would have to relinquish all of your property and possessions by a devalued sale or outright seizure. You would only be allowed to take some clothing and ten Reichsmarks out of the country.

For Daniel Lohr, whose father Eli, a judge was murdered at Sachsenhausen concentration camp it was time to leave. He was asked by Leah Auerbach; a person he met on the crowded dock why he was going to China? His terse answer was “It is not here.”

paris of the east departmental stores nanking road 1927

(Aerial view of department stores on Nanking Road in Shanghai, 1930, via Jack Ephgrave Collection, Historical Photographs of China)

For thousands of desperate people in the 1930s, this Chinese metropolis was a last resort. Most countries and cities had restricted entry for Jews trying to flee violent persecution by Nazi Germany. Not Shanghai, however. This multicultural oasis – that included British, French, American, Russian and Iraqi residents – was among the very few places Jewish refugees were guaranteed to be accepted, with no visa required.

Despite Shanghai being more than 435 miles from their homes in Germany, Poland and Austria, more than 20,000 stateless Jews fled to China’s largest city to escape the Holocaust between 1933 and 1941. Shanghai was not just a safe haven. It was also a modern city with an established community of Russian Jews.

At first, life in Shanghai was peaceful for its newest residents. The Jewish refugees were welcomed by Shanghai residents, and they created a strong community with schools and a vibrant social scene. What the refugees couldn’t foresee was they would travel across the globe only to fall into the clutches of the Nazis’ most powerful ally. In 1941, Japan seized Shanghai. Acting under instruction from the Nazis, Japanese troops rounded up all of the city’s Jews and confined them in Tilanqiao. Shanghai’s Jewish ghetto was established.

cafes-cabarets-banks-blood-alley-shanghai-1937

(Blood Alley in Shanghai, 1937 via Malcolm Rosholt Collection, Historical Photographs of China)

Kannon’s effort reads as if we are watching the film, “Casablanca” as everything seems to have an undercurrent as relationships keep shifting and with it events. For the characters who arrive in Shanghai, they soon realize that Shanghai, the corrupt, violent city with an underclass of Chinese, and Europeans who are living out their dreams are now faced with the Japanese threat as at anytime they can take over the city.

Daniel is lucky because his Uncle Nathan is a character with an empathetic side and a gangster side which at times is difficult to determine which dominates his actions. In this case he sends the necessary funds and first class passage on one of the great Lloyds of London ships, making the arrangements for Daniel to escape Berlin. Aboard ship he will meet two of the dominant characters in the story, Leah Auerbach, a beautiful woman who he will fall in love with, and Colonel Yamada, a Japanese attached to the Kempeitai, the Japanese version of the Gestapo.

The book reflects the author’s historical knowledge as throughout the ongoing Sino-Japanese war continues, the fact that Chiang Kai-Shek and his Kuomintang refuse to fight the Japanese, holding back American aid and pressure focusing on the coming Civil War with Mao Zedong and the Communists, and the seamy side of what Shanghai is and will develop into further. Kannon’s historical reflections are accurate and give the story a high degree of authenticity.

duyuesheng gangster shanghai paris of the east 1930s

(Du Yuesheng (right), the godfather of the underworld in 1930s Shanghai, via China.org)

Kannon’s description of Shanghai is fascinating as it is unlike any other area of China. Its European waterfront, neoclassical banks and office towers, and art deco hotels reflected its commercial swagger much like Liverpool, Trieste, and other western cities with its sleek new cars, trams, and Department stores. However, the underside of the city cannot be hidden with coolies, old men in silk robes, beggars, gangsters, the presence of Japanese warships, and the drive for profit in the guise of a commercial entertainment sector dominating – this is not a typical European city.

Upon arriving it is clear Uncle Nathan wants to bring Daniel into his business operations – nightclubs, prostitution, laundering money, and other avocations. Their relationship is a key component of the plot as Daniel slowly is absorbed into his uncles’ world but always keeping a moral compass when possible. Obviously in this type of environment payoffs, protection money, murder are a daily occurrence. The term that is used is the “squeeze,” as Nathan and other businessmen must share their profits with the various gangs and their leaders. In Nathan’s case he is in business with gang leaders like Xi Ling who is in competition with another gangster, Wu Tsai. Daniel will soon learn the ropes, be educated by his uncle and more importantly become a player in the corrupt night club world, even doing business with Colonel Yamada, who has his eyes on Leah.

The main characters are somewhat formulaic, but that does not distract from the novel. Colonel Yamada is a Japanese militarist and a hood; Uncle Nathan is like a cat with nine lives; Daniel, starts out somewhat naïve, but soon becomes a major force in his own right; Leah is just trying to survive employing any assets at her disposal; Selden Loomis, the gossip columnist at the North China Tribune who seemed to know everything; and Irina, Nathan’s former lover and loyal bookkeeper are all impactful.

debris cathay hotel bombing war 1937 photograph

(Cathay Hotel bombing in Shanghai, 1937 via Archibald Lang Collection Historical Photographs of China)

Shanghai can best be described as an oasis protecting people from the ever expanding World War. The problem is how long will this haven last with the coming Japanese aggression to implement its Greater Co-Prosperity Sphere to dominate Asia, and its alliance with Nazi Germany. The question that dominates the constantly shifting story of relationships and human depravity is when will Japan shut the door on Shanghai as they have already begun assassinating Chinese Communists and some Europeans who would be a problem once they take control.

Kannon has written a thriller with many layers. In part, a gangster story, in part a love story that slowly develops between Daniel and Leah, Chinese violence and corruption, and lastly, Japanese ruthlessness. Daniel’s past is an interesting one in that he left from Trieste to travel to Shanghai due to the fact he had fled Berlin after his group of Jewish resistance fighters had been killed or were being tortured by the Nazis. His background will reappear in Shanghai under the guise of Dr. Karl Markowski who was one of his compatriots in Berlin. Kannon has chosen the perfect location for intrigue, danger, and treacherous political dynamics as the International Settlement which he presents contains Europeans, British, Americans, who are trying to do business amid warring gangs in the city. As Daniel becomes stuck deeper and deeper in the abyss that is crooked and murderous Chinese, and Colonel Yamada, his options become limited and he realizes he must get Leah out of the city, and once Nathan passes after a heart attack he must leave also.

The strength of Kannon’s novel is adroit plot development. With a myriad of twists and turns appropriate for the time period in which the novel takes place. Returning readers of Kannon’s past novels, and new readers will be entertained and should enjoy a gripping plot.

paris of the east shanghai ciros nightclub 1937 — (Ciro’s nightclub in Shanghai, 1937 via Malcolm Rosholt Collection, Historical Photographs of China)

THE GATES OF GAZA by Amir Tibon

February 25, 2025szfreiberger Middle Eastern History Leave a comment

(Memorial candles line the charred desks in the destroyed command center of Nahal Oz base, February 23, 2024.)

One of this morning’s lead articles in the New York Times read “Fate of Bibas Family Recalls Trauma of October 7, Renewing Fears of Gaza Truce.” The crux of the article centered on the return of three Israeli citizen’s bodies, two babies and their mother. The problem emerged that the body of the mother was misidentified, it was another victim of this war. According to the article the “news set off a paroxysm of fury and agony in Israel rarely seen since the tumultuous days that followed the Hamas led attack on Oct. 7, 2023, when up to 1,200 people were killed and 251 were abducted, including Ms. Bibas and her sons, on the deadliest day in Israeli history.

For Palestinians, the devastation wrought by Israel’s military response to the Oct. 7 raids — a reaction that, among other consequences, razed Palestinian burial grounds and killed thousands of children including some younger than Kfir Bibas — has long overshadowed Hamas’s terrorist attacks at the start of the war.”

(Nahal Oz Kibbutz residents Miri Bernovsky-Tibon and Amir Tibon)

But Israelis remain deeply traumatized by the October assault, and the return of the Bibas boys, coupled with the uncertainty about their mother’s whereabouts and the disrespectful way that Hamas paraded the coffins on Thursday, revived the torment. The war has resulted in the death of between 40-50,000 Palestinians according to the Arab Red Crescent and the near total destruction of Gaza and its infrastructure.

The brutal attack by Hamas and the Israeli response has set the Middle East on fire resulting in an Israeli invasion of Lebanon targeting Hezbollah, a “pseudo-war” with Iran, and a long range conflict with the Houthis in Yemen. Currently, the region is experiencing a ceasefire in Gaza, which is only in its first phase and there are doubts it will continue to the next phase. The question is how did we get here, what was the experience of the attack like, and historically what events led to the attack. Answers to these questions are discussed and analyzed in Amir Tibon’s THE GATES OF GAZA. The superb monograph is part memoir as Tibon and his family reside in Nahal Oz, a Kibbutz that borders the Gaza Strip, and a historical look at events and outcomes as Tibon is an award-winning diplomatic correspondent for Haaretz, Israel’s paper of record.

One of the questions that is repeatedly asked is why Israelis settle on land so close to the Gaza border where rockets, snipers, intruders are a constant threat. The answer lies in Israeli defense policy that emerged in October 1953 when Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and General Moshe Dayan argued that the border with the Gaza Strip needed more military installations in order to be totally fortified. The border itself was not an “internationally recognized” border, but a cease fire line drawn to end the 1948-9 Israeli War of Independence. As Tibor writes, “there needed to be civilian life at the border – especially agriculture – before the region would be completely safe. A permanent population to detect and deter attacks and to convince the Arab world that the young recently founded state of Israel was there to stay.” The kibbutz which the Tibon family settled on and was attacked on October 7 was founded by sixty men and women members of a military unit called Nahal in 1953.

Israel enters the West Bank with tanks and raided Jenin for the first time since 2002

(Israeli tanks enter the city for the first time since 2002, in Jenin, in the northern West Bank, Feb. 23, 2025.)

The title of the book was derived from a speech given by General Moshe Dayan on a day when four couples were to be married. Instead, it became a funeral oration, “the Gates of Gaza,” which originated from the biblical story of Samson fighting the Philistines. In this case the speech was to honor Roi Rothberg who had been murdered by Egyptian fire as he patrolled the boundaries of the kibbutz and tried to return Palestinians who had crossed the “demarcation line” and entered Israeli territory. The Egyptians did return the “mutilated body” of their victim.

Aftermath of a deadly infiltration by Hamas gunmen in Kibbutz Beeri

(Children’s toys and personal items lie on the bloodstained floor of a child’s bedroom, following a deadly infiltration by Hamas gunmen, in Kibbutz Beeri in southern Israel, October 17. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun)

If one fast forwards to 2025 nothing has really changed between Palestinians and Israelis. Wars seem to break out every few years, constant rocket fire from Gaza with the inevitable Israeli response, border incursions from both sides leading to numerous deaths, and leaders on both sides whose ego’s, lust for power, and what I guess is called ideology dominate. Tibon focuses on these aspects throughout the narrative, along with his family’s personal journey and survival on October 7.

Israeli military officers organise dead bodies before relatives are called to identify them, following a mass infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip, in Ramla

(Israeli military officers stand by a container in which bodies of the dead are stored before their relatives are called to identify them, in Ramla, Israel, October 13. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun)

Tibon structures his book with alternating chapters. First we have the attack of October 7, then a history lesson. He moves on with chapters alternating between the events he and his family experienced on October 7, continuing with a careful historical analysis of events and personalities leading up to today. Tibon integrates the Hamas attack on his family, their escape into the “safe room” in their house to wait out the violence occurring outside the front door. Tibon assumed that the “all clear” would be sounded within a few hours as usually is the case, but much to his surprise this was different as the bullets, mortars, and rockets continued. Tibon would soon realize that this was not a random attack by a terror cell, but a large well planned operation that would not be over quickly. The key for Tibon was his two toddlers, Carmel and Galia, and his wife Miri. The task was to keep the children quiet as not to give the terrorists another family to murder. Tibon did not realize how bad the situation had become with a nearby military base overrun by Hamas and the hundreds of bodies scattered between Nahal Oz and the base – throughout the early hours, Tibon wondered where the Israeli Defense Force was. Women and children were being murdered, and the IDF was nowhere to be found.

benjamin netanyahu smiles and looks to the left, he wears a gray suit jacket, light blue dress shirt, red tie and israel flag pin

(Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu)

The historical narrative and analysis are succinct and damning in terms of Israeli and Palestinian Authority and Hamas leadership. Tibon chooses certain historical aspects as a means of explaining how the Israeli and Palestinian people have reached the abyss they now found themselves in. A key turning point was reached in 1987 as Palestinians could no longer accept the loss of prime agricultural land, which in part led to the first Intifada. Interestingly, Yasir Arafat and the PLO ;leadership were totally caught off guard by events. As a result of the violence Sheik Ahmed Yassin and Palestinian Islamists formed a new organization called Hamas – Islamic Resistance Movement. The Intifada turned Hamas into a central force in the Palestinian community. The more forceful the Israel response, the more Hamas’ popularity and ideology were enhanced, reducing the influence and power of the PLO.

Two villains emerge in Tibon’s discussion. First is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who has been in office most of the last two decades. In 1993 Tibon argued that Netanyahu worked to prevent a peace settlement following the Oslo Accords. He worked to incite Israel’s right wing which led to the assassination of then Israeli Prime Minister and architect of Oslo, Yitzhak Rabin. Netanyahu would defeat Shimon Peres in the next election and slowed down the peace process increasing Hamas’ popularity at the expense of Arafat. He then ordered the assassination of Khaled Mashal, the head of Hamas’ Political Bureau. After the attempt was botched, Netanyahu agreed to release Shiek Ahmed Yassin, Hamas’ spiritual leader, and blocked the extradition of Mussa Abu-Marzouk who raised millions of dollars to fund Hamas, allowing him to settle in Jordan. If one fast forwards to October 7, Netanyahu’s fingerprints are all over the disaster even though he was thrown out of office in 1999.

(An aerial view shows damage caused following a mass infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip, in Kibbutz Beeri in southern Israel, October 11. REUTERS/ Ilan Rosenberg)

Netanyahu would return to power in 2009 and would later be accused of corruption. The Israel Police began investigating Netanyahu in December 2016 and subsequently recommended indictments against him. On 21 November 2019, Netanyahu was officially indicted for breach of trust, accepting bribes, and fraud, leading him to legally relinquish his ministry portfolios other than prime minister. His legal problems led to legislation by the Israeli right wing in the Knesset designed to reduce the power of the Israeli Supreme Court which provoked enormous demonstrations in Israel in 2022 and 2023. For many, Netanyahu’s legal problems were a national security threat for the state of Israel as he put his own personal quest for power to escape prosecution above the needs of the Israeli people. Netanyahu’s behavior and policies further emboldened Hamas as he approved Qatari funding of Hamas whereby millions of dollars were used to build the tunnel infrastructure that allowed for attacks against Israel for years and finally the events of October 7.

Israel Defense Forces handout at Al Shifa hospital in Gaza City

(Israeli soldiers inspect the Al Shifa hospital complex, in Gaza City, November 15. via Israel Defense Forces)

Netanyahu also approved the trade of 1027 Palestinian prisoners for Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier seized by Hamas in 2007. Among those released in 2011 was Yihyia Sinwar, the Hamas tactician and ideologue who designed the plan that was carried out on October 7. Further damning of Netanyahu took place in 2016 as Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman warned him, a right wing member of Likud that Israel intelligence uncovered a plot which would be catastrophic for Israel: “a secret plan by Hamas to cross the border fence at several points simultaneously, attack a long list of Israeli communities near Gaza, murder hundreds of citizens, and take dozens of hostages into Gaza. With this evidence and the fact that Hamas was using Qatari money to build tunnels and rockets, Netanyahu did nothing.

There are obviously others who deserve condemnation for the events of October 7. Yasir Arafat’s refusal to make peace in 2000, the corruption of the PLO and later the fecklessness of Arafat’s replacement Mahmoud Abbas and his corruption laden administration in the Palestinian Authority which was defeated by Hamas in elections and the battlefield. Sinwar is also a key figure who spent years in an Israeli jail for murdering Israeli citizens. While in prison he learned Hebrew and studied every aspect of Israeli life and politics he could and began to develop his plan for a massive incursion of Israel from Gaza. Even when released from prison Sinwar worked methodically applying Qatari money, Netanyahu’s errors, and the fact that by March 2023 Israel was being torn apart from the inside with many reserve soldiers and pilots refusing to carry out orders because of the demonstration by Israeli citizens against Netanyahu’s cohorts in the Knesset’s attempts to reduce the power of the Israeli Supreme Court for the benefit of its Prime Minister. Sinwar would ramp up attacks in the West Bank in the summer of 2023 in hindsight a diversion for October 7. Netanyahu sent 30 battalions of soldiers to the West Bank, leaving only 4 to defend the kibbutzim on the Gaza border. As this was occurring Netanyahu encouraged Qatar to continue to send millions to Hamas.

IDF handout image shows Israeli soldiers take position in the Gaza Strip

(Israeli military vehicles manoeuvre during the ongoing ground operation of the Israeli army against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, as seen in an image released on November 13. Israel Defense Forces/via REUTERS)

A key event which Tibon uses to tie Israeli history to the events of October 7 revolves around the first time Nahal Oz was attacked in 1956 when Palestinian fedayeen encouraged by Egyptian president Gamal Nasser crossed the border and killed Roi Rotberg, a young member of the kibbutz, and taking his mutilated body back to Gaza. As Max Strasser writes in his November 4, 2024, New York Times book review entitled “The Reckoning”; “The next day, Moshe Dayan, then the military’s chief of staff, delivered the most famous eulogy in Israeli history.

“For eight years they have been sitting in the refugee camps in Gaza, and before their eyes we have been transforming the lands and the villages, where they and their fathers dwelt, into our estate,” Dayan said. “How did we shut our eyes and refuse to look squarely at our fate, and see, in all its brutality, the destiny of our generation? Have we forgotten that this group of young people dwelling at Nahal Oz is bearing the heavy gates of Gaza on its shoulders?”

IDF handout image shows Israeli soldiers taking position in a location given as Gaza

(Israeli soldiers take position during the ongoing ground operation of the Israeli army against Hamas, in a location given as Gaza, in this image released on November 13. Israeli Defense Forces/via REUTERS)

This was, Tibon writes, “a rare recognition by an Israeli leader of the Palestinian Nakba.” Dayan had identified Israel’s tragic endowment — a country built on displacement — and declared that the only response could be strength, a country where thriving in a kibbutz on a border forged in war would help secure peace.

But Tibon does not offer the whole quote. “We are the generation of settlement,” Dayan went on. “Our children will not have a life if we do not dig shelters, and without barbed wire and machine guns we will not be able to pave roads and dig water wells.”

In the epilogue, Tibon goes back to visit his deserted, bullet-scarred kibbutz and stands looking over the border at the rubble of Gaza. He rereads Dayan’s eulogy and wonders if his former neighbors at Nahal Oz will someday be able to return if peace with the people on the other side of the border is conceivable. It’s certainly hard to imagine, so long as the people of Gaza live with barbed wire and machine guns.”

(Shiri Bibas and her children Kfir and Ariel)

AGENT ZO: THE UNTOLD STORY OF A FEARLESS WORLD WAR II RESISTANCE FIGHTER ELZBIETA ZAWACKA by Clare Mulley

February 20, 2025szfreiberger World War II Leave a comment

(The General Elżbieta Foundation, ToruńZo, as seen on her student pass, graduated from Poznań University with a higher degree in mathematics)

During World War II Poland witnessed many individuals engaging in serious heroic actions. The list is long and includes people like Witold Pilecki, an intelligence agent and resistance leader who volunteered to enter Auschwitz to gather intelligence and then escaped; Arena Sendler, head of the children’s division of the Zegota Council for the aid of the Jews which smuggled 2500 children out of the Warsaw Ghetto; Jan Karski, a Polish soldier, resistance fighter, and diplomat who provided evidence of the Holocaust to western leaders, and acted as a courier for the Polish government in exile to western allies; Mordechai Anielewicz, led the Jewish Combat Brigade (ZOB) during the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, and numerous others. However, none are more remarkable than Elzbieta Zawacka, aka “Agent Zo,” the only female member of the Polish Elite Force during the war and took a leading role in many areas including the Polish uprising in Warsaw in August 1944. Her actions, and the actions of many of her compatriots in the Polish resistance during the war and after are accurately chronicled in Clare Mulley’s latest book, AGENT ZO: THE UNTOLD STORY OF A FEARLESS WORLD WAR II RESISTANCE FIGHTER ELZBIETA ZAWACKA.

Mulley presents a series of themes in her monograph, but none is more fascinating then how women were viewed by Polish and English authorities during World War II. Mulley correctly argues that thousands of Polish women rushed to defend their country in response to the twin invasions led by Germany in the west, and the Soviet Union in the East in September 1939. Eventually over 40,000 Polish women were sworn in as members of the Polish Home Army, 10% of which were soldiers, none more important than Agent Zo who was a member of the Cichociemni or “Silent Unseen” made up of Polish Special Forces paratroopers. The other 90% of women engaged in a myriad of activities ranging from acting as couriers, medical technicians, clerks, bomb makers, and gathering intelligence. Agent Zo and her partners passionately argued that women could fight as well as men and should be declared part of a “legitimate” military force to be covered by the Geneva Convention, which when finally recognized by Polish and British bureaucrats in London would save many lives. This theme pervades the narrative and provides great insight into the misogyny experienced by women in dealing with military and diplomatic decision makers during the war. For example, Colin Gubbins, head of the British Special Operations Executive which engaged in sabotage against the Nazis throughout Europe, upon learning of Zo’s exceptional bravery and accomplishments referred to her a “grand gal.”

(The General Elżbieta Foundation, ToruńZawacka (centre) took the nom-de-guerre Zo after being sworn into the Polish resistance)

Agent Zo’s remarkable life is examined in detail. After explaining her familial roots Mulley examines Agent Zo’s rise from a senior instructor with the Polish “Woman’s Military Training Force (PKW)” to her varied assignments during the war as she craved serious military service once Nazi Germany had violated her country. Mulley does a remarkable job recounting Agent Zo’s various relationships with both men and women. All were Polish patriots with the same goals of working to keep the allies informed about Nazi atrocities, troop movements, and any intelligence they could gather. The author explains Agent Zo’s many relationships, who influenced her the most, and who she relied upon and trusted. A few stand out like Marianna Zaodzinska, a literary person and poet who was tactical instructor who would wind up as a commander during the Warsaw uprising. General Stefan Rowecki who worked to unite all Polish resistance groups and create the Home Army who was also Zo’s commander. Maria Witteck, Zo’s close friend and Commander of the Women’s Auxiliary Services. Emelia Malessa, Zo’s superior who oversaw the Farmstead, the Polish overseas communication team. Zofia Franio, supplied weapons to Jews fighting in the Warsaw Ghetto. Sue Ryder, who volunteered at the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (FANY), lying about her age, further as part of the SOE she transported agents for the ”Silent Unseen.” Kazimierz Bilski, known as “Rum,” a member of the “Silent Unseen” and the Polish Sixth Bureau in London; and General Tadeusz Komorowski, “Bor,” Rowecki’s former deputy who succeeded him as head of the Home Army.

The role of female couriers was of major importance in the war. Their harrowing experiences crossing Europe to provide intelligence hidden on microfilm to London from Warsaw are fully explored. Zo and her fellow resistance fighters experienced numerous run-ins with the Nazis as they carried out their assignments. Their fears of arrest, torture, and death were constant, but they did not let their anxieties interfere with completing their missions. They provided evidence of Nazi atrocities, the Holocaust, technical information concerning Hitler’s miracle weapons – VI and V2 rockets, German troops positions, the needs of the Home Army, etc. These brave women accomplished remarkable things and were willing to sacrifice their lives for their country. A few examples include how Zo leaped from a moving train when Nazi soldiers entered and asked for identification on a trip in Silesia, or her parachute training which she had never done before the war leading her to jump behind Nazi lines.

Getty Images Black and white photo of Polish troops with guns surrounded by rubble in Warsaw (Getty ImagesThe Warsaw Uprising was the largest organised act of defiance against Nazi Germany during World War Two)

From the outset of the war Zo argued for a Woman’s Auxiliary Officer Corps, which would eventually be ratified into law. British and Polish “higher ups” described Zo as “an insane feminist and pioneer of the liberation movement and equality of women….a hysterical women.” It took until October 1943 for a decree on “Women’s Voluntary Service,” providing women between 18 and 45 the same rights and duties as men in the armed forces. The result – thousands of Polish women came forward to volunteer.

Mulley’s research is impeccable, and she devotes a great deal of time to the political and diplomatic components of the war. A few stand out. It became clear to Zo that by the Fall of 1943 Polish influence and/or importance to the British government was waning, especially when there were no Polish diplomats present at the Tehran Conference. As the Soviet Union broke through in the east, Stalin’s plans for a post war Poland began to become clear. The Russian dictator planned to seize areas in eastern Poland, and shift Poland’s border westward in return. Stalin denied that Russian soldiers committed the Katyn massacre which took place in the spring 1940 which was a series of mass executions of nearly 22,000 Polish military and police officers, border guards, and intelligentsia prisoners of war carried out by the Soviet Union, specifically the NKVD, at Joseph Stalin’s orders. Stalin would not recognize the Polish government in exile and appointed his own government in Lublin, Poland toward the end of the war. Another egregious action or non-action by Stalin was his refusal to allow any military assistance, be it bombers, supplies, men, the use of Russian airfields in order to assist Polish resistance fighters as they rose up against the Nazis in Warsaw in August 1943. Stalin’s goal was clear – to wipe out any Polish opposition to Russian hegemony in Eastern Europe after the war. Franklin Roosevelt felt the need to appease the Russian dictator, in part, because the Soviet military had done the bulk of the fighting against the Nazis. Churchill had little choice but to go along.

The Nazis finally identified Zo, resulting in a price on her head in March 1944 as the Nazis b targeted all women in their thirties as a means of finding her. Mulley describes her clandestine life and travels in detail as she was ordered to remain in a convent to escape the Nazi dragnet. Finally, she emerges to play a key role in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, but not as a fighter which was against her wishes. With her experience and knowledge of the city, its sewers, basements, and neighborhoods in general she was put in charge of organizing women to deliver supplies, make incendiary bombs, deliver medical supplies, organize ambulances, and use couriers as a means of getting the truth out to the world. In the end 18,000 resisters, and 200,000 civilians were killed in the uprising. Once the city succumbed, Zo escaped and spent her time trying to reorganize the Farmstead.

Clare Mulley Two images of a tall communist-era apartment block with a mural featuring several paintings of Zo on the side of it (Clare Mulley/A mural depicting Zawacka has been painted on the side of the communist-era apartment block where she lived in Toruń)

Once the war ended Zo’s personal battle for Polish independence did not end as the new communist regime imposed by Stalin began to show interest in her just as they wanted to destroy any remnant of the Home Army that may have remained. Stalin’s henchmen rounded up any Home Army veterans who they saw as part of a possible anti-communist resistance. For Zo, the peace she fought so long and hard for instead “she felt that her country’s occupation by one hostile foreign power had now been replaced by another, and Poland was still not free.” As Marissa Moss points out in her December 11, 2024, review in The New York Journal of Books; “Zo herself was sent to prison, arrested for being part of a network spying on the communist government. She wasn’t part of any such group but looked guilty simply because of her past. Like many of her compatriots in the Home Army, her real crime lay in telling the story of Poland’s resistance, a story that contradicted the official Soviet version.” She was tortured and imprisoned and finally freed after Stalin died in March 1953, but she was not allowed to teach because of her “criminal record” and her refusal to join the communist party. It was not until the arrival of the Solidarity movement and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 that she could be sure that her secret archive detailing the Home Army would be secure, as she was determined to collect even more stories of the Home Army, especially the part played by women.

Zo was the recipient of many awards and medals for her bravery and devotion to her country, but to her what really mattered was the history through which she had lived. She created a vast archive, hoping to educate a new generation about their country’s history. This book serves her mission well.

(The General Elżbieta Foundation, ToruńElżbieta Zawacka crossed international borders more than 100 times as she smuggled military intelligence to the Allies)

BLACK BUTTERFLIES by Priscilla Morris

February 12, 2025February 12, 2025szfreiberger Historical Fiction Leave a comment

A Bosnian soldier returns fire in downtown Sarajevo as he and civilians come under fire from Serbian snipers, April 1992.

(A Bosnian soldier returns fire in downtown Sarajevo as he and civilians come under fire from Serbian snipers, April 1992)

In the 1970s CIA analysts warned that if Josip Broz Tito, the authoritarian leader of Yugoslavia died eventually the country would break apart and the result would be a nasty civil war. Tito would pass from the scene in 1980, and it took until January 1992 for the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to cease its existence, dissolving into its constituent states. Earlier an American National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) 15-90 presented a dire warning; “Yugoslavia will cease to function as a federal state within a year and will probably dissolve within two….A full-scale interrepublic war is unlikely, but serious intercommunal conflict will accompany the breakup and will continue afterward. The violence will be intractable and bitter.”

Slovenia was the first to declare its “sovereignty” in 1990. Croatia followed in May, and in August, the Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina also declared itself sovereign. Soon after, Slovenia and Croatia both declared formal independence on June 25, 1991. Bosnia-Herzegovina declared its independence in May 1992, while the Serbs in Bosnia declared their own areas an independent republic.

(Women run for their lives across ‘Sniper Alley’ under the sights of Serb gunmen during the siege of Sarajevo. 1992)

Serbia and Montenegro formed a new Federal Republic of Yugoslavia as a successor state to the old Yugoslavia, but the international community did not recognize its claim. Over the next three years war would ensue in Bosnia and Herzegovina claiming hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced millions from their homes, as Europe experienced the most horrific fighting since World War II. One major component of the fighting was the siege of Sarajevo which came about because the Bosnian Serbs wanted to create a new Serb state of Republika Srpska and would encircle the city, located in the southern part of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Starting in April 1992, Serbia set out to “ethnically cleanse” Bosnian territory by systematically removing all Bosnian Muslims, known as Bosniaks. Serbia, together with ethnic Bosnian Serbs, attacked Bosniaks with former Yugoslavian military equipment and surrounded Sarajevo, the capital city. The resulting blockade and the ensuing assault with artillery, tanks, and 500,000 bombs resulted in the death of 13,952 people, including 5,434 civilians. The population of Sarajevo dropped by a third because of the siege which lasted from April 5, 1992, to February 29, 1996, three times longer than the siege of Stalingrad, and a year longer than the siege of Leningrad.

The reasons behind the country’s breakup ranged from cultural and religious divisions between the ethnic groups that made up the former Yugoslavia, including Serbs, Croats, and Muslims. Sarajevo’s 1991 ethnic population consisted of a total of 527,049, including; 259,470 ethnic Muslims; 157,143 Serbs; and 34,873 Croats. In addition, the memories of World War II and the atrocities committed by all sides greatly contributed to the breakup, as did the growing nationalist forces. Another major contributing factor was following the death of Tito in 1980, the provisions of the 1974 constitution kicked in providing for the dissolution of all power away from the federal government to the republics and autonomous provinces within Serbia. The result was that the federal government maintained little control over the country.

This situation forms the background for Priscilla Morris’ evocative novel, BLACK BUTTERFLIES. The story begins as Zora, an artist and teacher, and her husband, Franjo arrive at Zora’s aged mother’s apartment to find three people squatting and refusing to leave arguing that the city government had decided that if a flat was unoccupied anyone could live there. Their daughter Dubravka was married to an Englishman and resided near Salisbury, and they decided to send her mother to visit because of the stress of the situation and her declining health, accompanied by Franjo leaving Zora alone in Sarajevo.

(A wounded woman is helped to get out of her apartment building after it was hit by a rocket fired from Bosnia Serb positions, June 1995)

The novel focuses on the experiences of Zora Kocovic, an artist and teacher at the National Academy of Art and her attempts at survival as Sarajevo is being pounded by artillery and sniper fire by Bosnian Serbs who want to ethnically cleanse the city of Muslims and Bosnian Serbs who do not support them. Zora’s family has left for England and Zora thought it would be safe to remain in the city, but that turned out to be a “pipe dream.” Along with her neighbors they try to navigate a situation where electricity, water, phone lines, and the airport have been cut off and it is too dangerous to walk the street to find food and water because of sniper fire. Bodies lay in the street for days and city services are non-existent.

One of Morris’ most important themes is the importance of art in wartime, particularly those who are suffering. This can be seen in numerous ways. Zora continues to instruct those students who are able to make their way to her flat, even creating an art exhibition out of any material they can employ for the neighborhood. When she runs out of paper and canvas, she and her eight year old neighbor’s daughter Una draw on the walls and paint natural scenes. To further her work, Zora takes her last few coins to purchase art supplies from the wife of an artist who has disappeared.

(UN peacekeepers and Sarajevo citizens take cover from gunfire on the city’s infamous ‘Sniper Alley’, March 1993)

Morris’ description of Sarajevo is vividly rendered from its cobblestone streets, grandfathers playing chess outside, the shade offered by the spires of Orthodox churches, and the minarets dating to the Ottoman era. It was a beautiful city before the siege and served as a bridge between east and west based on its multi-ethnic culture and religions. But as the siege begins to take its toll people are reluctant to leave despite the danger for fear squatters would take over their flats, stealing their possessions. Morris uses the dialogue between her characters to shine a light on the ethnic hatred that exists in the city. A comment by Zora’s neighbor Vensa, an orthodox Christian is emblematic of how people feel, she says to Zora; “But God, I’m terrified, aren’t you? Day by day, Sarajevo is becoming more Muslim.” Zora visits her Uncle Vuk who believes that the Muslims want an Islamic state, and Serbs would then be treated as if the Ottoman Empire were reconstituted. This leads to constant anxiety among her characters as she goes on to describe “Bosnian Serb snipers lying behind sandbags on the tops of buildings and taking aim at people in the street below as if they are sparrows.”

Serb nationalists cannot accept that people like Zora want to go on living with Muslims and Croats as they have always done – historically, Sarajevo was always seen as a model of tolerance. The situation is very trying for Zora. Her studio was her sanctuary, but once Bosnian nationalists banned it, she hurried to recoup as much art supplies and her paintings as possible, but they would soon run out. Zora becomes further depressed when she was promised a seat on a UN bus leaving the city and at the last minute it fell through.

In one of the most poignant scenes in the book is also its title, Zora and her neighbors are outside when it seems to be raining black puffs of paper. In reality it is paper from books that have been destroyed from the National Library by the shelling. They refer to the paper flying around as “Black Butterflies.” For Zora, her national heritage has been destroyed. She states, “Zora Kocovic, the painter, is dead.” Her survival rests on her relationship with her neighbor Mirsad, who owns a bookstore and his son Shamir, who has joined the anti-nationalist forces. Their camaraderie, along with other neighbors, becomes the core of each other’s existence. The people become their own family, and their relationships carry them through the harshest aspects of the shelling. They create a sumptuous meal for all in Zora’s flat, they work to find a phone that works so Zora can speak with her daughter in London, Zora cooks pigeons, spending money needed for art supplies to buy garlic so she can cook for all, among other examples. Even when Zora falls in love with Mirsad, which occurs after many seasons of mutual suffering, it is a love doomed to fail as the conflict rages on, as it is born out of proximity and trauma and the constant fear of loss, rather than a betrayal of her husband in England.

Morris takes a narrow approach in developing her story and toward the expanding fighting. Her focus on Zora and her compatriots allows her to keep the burgeoning war in the background as she focuses on the daily travails of her characters. According to Malavika Praseed in her August 28, 2024, book review entitled, “Rebirth Amongst Despair in “Black Butterflies” in the Chicago Review of Books; “While it is easy for a book of this nature to end either in soul-crushing despair or unrealistic optimism, Morris is savvy in her story craft and chooses neither. This is true to Zora’s character arc compared to her life arc; while the former ends, the latter must continue in new circumstances and with new knowledge of the suffering that came before. It is also true to the Bosnian genocide as a whole, which only just begins in Sarajevo and escalates to a multi-year conflict with an Islamophobic focus. Nevertheless, Black Butterflies is both a historical portrait as well as a character one, with emphasis on the latter. Morris understands her intent, to tell a single story touched by many other characters, but still unmistakably Zora’s, instead of widening her scope and losing tender moments and pinpoint detail in the process.”

Further, Bea Seaton wrote in the New York Times on September 3, 2024 ,a view I agree with wholeheartedly; “This is a dark novel that wrests beauty and hope out of suffering. It is a work of literature that transforms horror and violence into a life force.”

(A boy playing on a tank in the Sarajevo neighbourhood of Grbavica, April 1996)

SYMPHONY FOR THE CITY OF THE DEAD: DIMITRI SHOSTAKOVITCH AND THE SIEGE OF LENINGRAD by M. T. Anderson

February 8, 2025szfreiberger Biography, Russian History Leave a comment

(Dimitri Shostakovitch)

There are many historical works that describe the Nazi siege of Leningrad during World War II. The monographs that stand out are Anna Reid’s LENINGRAD: TRAGEDY OF A CITY UNDER SIEGE, 1941-1944; Harrison Salisbury’s THE 900 DAYS: THE SIEGE OF LENINGRAD; and David M. Lantz’s BATTLE FOR LENINGRAD: 1941-1944. All reflect the military strategy pursued by the Germans and the utter devastation they employed. Further, they are well researched and reflect each author’s mastery of the material. Another piece that describes the horrors of the siege, but in a different manner is M. T. Anderson’s SYMPHONY FOR THE CITY OF THE DEAD: DIMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH AND THE SIEGE OF LENINGRAD. The book is the story of the siege, mostly through the eyes of Russian musician and composer, Dimitri Shostakovich, and its impact on his beloved city of Leningrad.

The narrative is different from other works that explore the siege and is a story according to the author “about the power of music and its meanings – a story of secret messages and double speak, and how music itself is a code; how music coaxes people to endure unthinkable tragedy; how is allows us to whisper between the prison bars when we cannot speak aloud; how it can still comfort the suffering, saying whatever has befallen you – you are not alone.”

(Dmitri Shostakovich and second wife Margarita Kainova in the Bois de Boulogne in Paris. May 1958)

Anderson educates the reader as to Shostakovich’s early years and career, reviewing his symphonies and other artistic works. He also provides the reader with the historical background that impacts Shostakovich. Beginning with World War I, the Russian Revolution, the role of Vladimir Lenin, the rise of Stalin and the implementation of the Five year plans, the resulting collectivization of the peasantry, and the purges and “show trials” that were employed to foster blame for the death of millions of peasants. Anderson is able to integrate Shostakovich’s artistic development during the period and his relationships with other intellectuals, artists, i.e., Vsevolod Meyerhold, Vladimir Mayakovsky who would commit suicide because of Stalin’s repressive regime, Boris Pasternak, and the poet Osip Mandelstam who died in a transit camp near Vladivostok.

Interestingly, the horrors that Stalin inflicted on the Russian people in the 1930s did not immediately affect Shostakovich. However, as the decade progressed and intellectuals, artists and poets were sent into internal exile or murdered he realized he would have to deal with the authorities. For Stalin, literature and the arts were the gear and screw of his propaganda machine. Anderson carefully lays out the impact of the new Soviet system on the arts and literature. He describes in detail how writers, musicians, poets, etc. were manipulated by the regime to propagandize the masses, i.e., using symphonies to depict the joys of collective farming!

Shostakovich’s problems began when Stalin attended Lady Macbeth at the Bolshoi for which he had written the score. Stalin was not pleased and complained “that’s a mess, not music.” Shostakovich became a target in Stalin’s war against culture. He was accused of “formalist” crimes which no one really understood as Stalin pushed “Socialist Realism.” Shostakovich was attacked for “being too simple, being too complex, being too light and trivial, being too gloomy and despairing, being too emotional, being too unemotional, including popular dance tunes, neglecting music of the people, tossing out the old ways of the great composers, and following the old ways of the great composers from the pre-Revolutionary past.” The government refused to allow Shostakovich to play his Fourth Symphony in public (it would remain banned for twenty-five years).

(Dmitri Shostakovich with his first wife Nina Varzar, Ivan Sollertinsky (far left), Alexander Gauk, and unidentified. Photograph from the 1930)

The effect of the Great Terror (see Robert Conquest’s book of the same title for a comprehensive look at Stalin’s murderous repression of the 1930s) on Shostakovich’s relatives and friends was immense as some were arrested, some went into internal exile, some were tortured, some were murdered. Shostakovich was listed by the NKVD as a “saboteur.” When Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony was completed, two members of the Committee for Artistic Affairs stated the “Symphony’s success has been most scandalously fabricated.” As Shostakovich watched everyone disappear he assumed he would be next. The Great Terror was a period of insanity as Stalin even purged the military including Marshal Tukachevsky, the Soviet Union’s most talented general who was murdered. Roughly 60-70% of the Soviet officer corps were eliminated; 27,000 officers were killed or lived in exile in the east. This would come home to roost as the Nazis invaded Russia in 1941 and the Russians offered little resistance at the start.

In the end the Great Terror resulted in eight million arrests; one million shot; and seven million sent to prison camps. As Anderson chronicles the horrors – two million died in camps between 1937-8. The question is how did Shostakovich avoid arrest. First, he was an international celebrity. Second, even though the NKVD paid a great deal of attention to him, gathering a case for prosecution, once the war drew closer it diverted their attention away from him.

(TASS/Getty ImagesHorses transport supplies to Leningrad over the frozen Ladoga Lake, dubbed the “Street of Life.”)

In part one of the narrative Anderson prepares the reader for the coming of the Second World War. Shostakovich’s life is studied and analyzed in detail. After recounting the impact of Stalin’s terror, in Part II, the author turns his attention to Russia in June 1941 as Germany invades and ultimately Shostakovich’s beloved Leningrad is placed under siege. Anderson lays out Nazi policy toward Russia and Hitler’s desire for lebensraum or living space in the east. Stalin had read MEIN KAMPF, and like Winston Churchill believed that a German invasion was inevitable. Anderson explores Stalin’s coping strategy which culminated in the Nazi-Soviet Pact of August 1939, which failed to stop a Nazi invasion, but in Stalin’s eyes it allowed Russia over a year to prepare. Interestingly, at the same time Stalin could not believe that Hitler would go back on his word as they split Poland in two. The first days of the Nazi invasion were a massacre, and Stalin would disappear for ten days as he could not believe the Russian people would support a murderer, but in reality what they opposed even more was a German murderer. During this time Shostakovich composed music for the soldiers, dug ditches, and became a rooftop fire fighter. Shostakovich and the Russian people believed that “the Nazi barbarians seek to destroy the whole of Slavonic culture.” Shostakovich’s music was designed to remind Russians of the power and legitimacy of their own culture, so slandered by the invading German horde.

Anderson does a wonderful job mining period photographs of the war and the siege of Leningrad depicting the horrors that the Russian people were subjected to over a three year period. Famine, cannibalism, eating corpses, and other demeaning behaviors dominated the people of Leningrad as they tried to survive. Anderson’s chapter “The City of the Dead” explores the dreadful experiences of the Russian people in detail, to the point he explains the differences between cannibalism and eating dead corpses. The city’s population remained about 2.5 million, after 636,000 evacuated. The losses from starvation in part can be blamed on the incompetence of Russian leadership. For example, Andrei Zhdanov and Kliment Voroshilov, the Leningrad city bosses stored all of the city’s emergency food supply in one place, a group of thirty-eight year old wooden warehouses which made it easy for the Germans to destroy massively contributing to the city’s famine. The Nazi nutritionists figured out how much food intake the Russian people would need to survive. Once they decided that there was not enough food supply to feed the city’s residents they stopped bombing the city, implemented a siege, all to save German soldiers, and eradicate the subhuman Slavs. This would drive the Russian people to make many moral decisions dealing with who should live and who should die.

Citizens Dig Through Rubble And Snow Leningrad

(Sovfoto/UIG/Getty ImagesResidents clearing snow and ice. The city declared a clean-up operation to prevent the spread of disease from scattered feces and unburied corpses)

Anderson follows Shostakovich’s personal journey as he fled Leningrad and settled in Kuibyshev, a Moscow suburb. He decided on his latest symphony; the 7^th would be a testimonial to Leningrad’s struggle. He would broadcast for the Radio Committee and worked to raise morale, a key component in any war. This coincided with the turning point in the war as Nazi troops were finally stopped twenty miles south of Moscow, and the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor bringing the United States into the war which provided massive amounts of equipment, planes, and weaponry. At the same time, December 1941, Shostakovich completed his 7^th Symphony. As the symphony was analyzed, was it anti-Stalin, was it anti-Hitler, was it anti Stalin and Hitler or something else. From Shostakovich’s perspective it “was an abstract depiction of the bondage of the spirit; all those petty, ugly things that grow disastrously within us and lead us all in a dance of destruction.” The symphony was dedicated to the people of Leningrad. The playing of the composition had to be put off for months as it required a large orchestra, however, half the number of musicians needed were dead. Anderson’s portrayal of how the orchestra was pieced together and the impact of the concert which took place August 9, 1942, is extremely moving and important, as it showed the Russian people how committed they were to their country as they finally experienced normality for a brief period of time.

Stalin’s regime decided to use the 7^th Symphony as a vehicle to cement the United States as a Russian ally and convince the American people to support the Soviet Union. At the outset of the book Anderson describes how a microfilm of the symphony was transported from Russia to the United States “across steppe, sand, sea, and jungle” in the midst of the war. Once it arrived it was performed in New York and Leningrad to try and shift the negative mood of the Russian people and even went as far as placing Shostakovich on the cover of Time magazine.

(A soldier buys a ticket for the first concert of Shostakovitch’s 7th Symphony)

If there is one area that the author could have improved upon it is his sourcing. To his credit the photos are remarkable, as are the excerpts from survivor’s diaries, and literary figures depicting the plight of the city. However, too many citations are from secondary sources which Anderson summarizes. But, there is enough primary material available so as to not rely so much on secondary works.

Anderson’s historical portrayal contains all the World War II intrigue of an Alan Furst novel. It tells of the horror of living during a three year siege and describes the physical oppression and daunting foes within and outside Leningrad. This is also a story of survival against impossible odds. Throughout, the author weaves the thread of Shostakovich’s music and the role it played in this appalling drama. Anderson’s writing flows beautifully despite his topic and is a useful tool to explore its subject matter without getting bogged down in minute detail.

Black and white photograph of composer Dmitri Shostakovich

(Dimitri Shostakovitch)

AN UNFINISHED HISTORY: A PERSONAL HISTORY OF THE 1960S by Doris Kearns Goodwin

January 29, 2025szfreiberger American cultural history, American Political History, American Social History, Biography Leave a comment

Image: Richard Goodwin and Doris Kearns Goodwin

(Author Doris Kearns Goodwin with her husband, Richard Goodwin, at commencement ceremonies at UMass-Lowell on May 29, 2010)

For over ten years I had the pleasure of living and teaching in Concord, MA, a town with a deep history and a number of famous residents. One of those residents was Doris Kearns Goodwin who could be seen often on Sunday mornings at the Colonial Inn having breakfast. It was my pleasure as Chair of the History Department at Middlesex School to welcome her as a speaker at our school and expose our students to a gifted historian with a deep understanding of the American condition past and present. Her biographies of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, the Roosevelts, and the Fitzgeralds and Kennedys stand out for their deep research, insightful analysis, and a writing style that draws the reader to her subject. Other books reflected on her experience as a White House fellow in the Johnson administration, an analysis of the leadership of the subjects of her biographies, and even a personal memoir growing up in Brooklyn and sharing a love for the Dodgers with her father. Her latest work, AN UNFINISHED HISTORY: A PERSONAL HISTORY OF THE 1960S can be classified as a biography, a memoir, as well as an important work of history assessing and reassessing the impactful events of the 1960s.

The story centers on her relationship of forty-six years with her husband Richard Goodwin, a significant historian and public figure in his own right. Theirs was a loving relationship between two individuals who loved their country and did their best to contribute to its success. Richard Goodwin, an adviser to presidents, “was more interested in shaping history,” Doris says, “and I in figuring out how history was shaped.” Their bond is at the heart of her latest work providing an intimate look at their relationship, family, and many of the important historical figures that they came in contact with. The book focuses on trying to understand the achievement and failures of the leaders they served and observed, in addition to their personal debates over the progress and unfinished promises of the country they served and loved.

Image: Richard Goodwin and Lyndon B. Johnson

(President Lyndon B. Johnson prepares for his State of the Union address with, from left, Richard Goodwin, Jack Valenti and Joseph A. Califano, Jr. at the White House in Washington on Jan. 12, 1966)

Goodwin’s recounting of her life with her husband encompassing Dick’s career before their marriage, and then after they tied the knot. In a sense it is a love story that lasted over four decades, and it also embraces the many significant roles played by Dick and his spouse. The events of the 1960s are revisited in detail. The major domestic accomplishments and foreign policy decisions are examined in detail from the perspective of the participants in which they were familiar with and had personal relationships. Doris conducts intensive research and analysis and integrates her husband’s actions and thoughts throughout. In addition, she is a wonderful storyteller relating her own experiences and that of her spouse.

Doris begins her memoir recounting her search for the young “Dick” and searching his early diary entries and letters from the 1950s onward. She describes a young man in love with America, a theme that is carried throughout the book. Dick believed in Lincoln’s credo – “the right of anyone to rise to the level of his industry and talents – would inform every speech he drafted, every article he wrote, and every cause he pursued.” The power couple relied extensively on Dick’s personal archive which he assiduously maintained throughout his career and retirement years for many of the stories and commentary that Doris relates. This personal archive was in storage for years and emerged during their senior years, i.e.; they had 30 boxes alone on John F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign.

(Bobby Kennedy)

A major theme of the memoir was “the tremor” that existed in their marriage as Dick was loyal to Kennedy, and Doris to Lyndon B. Johnson. Doris provides intimate details of their marriage and overall relationship relating to personal struggles, politics, and portrayals of prominent figures, i.e.; date night, watching the 1960 presidential debates years later, the origin of JFK’s inaugural address Dicks role in the Peace Corps, Latin American policy, including the Alliance for Progress. etc. Dick developed a special relationship with JFK which was shattered upon his assassination. Interestingly, Doris spends a great deal of time discussing Dick’s transition from an early member of the New Frontier who worked on Civil Rights among his many portfolios to taking his talents as a speech writer in support of Lyndon Johnson.

One of the most enjoyable aspects of the book is how Doris recounts meaningful events decades later. A Cuban Missile Conference in which Fidel Castro and Robert McNamara and co. attending while they were all in their eighties was eye opening, as was Dick’s meeting with Che Guevara which had implications for Dick’s career. Throughout Doris’ wit and humor are on display as she writes “here I am in my eighties and my thirties at the same time. I’m burning my life candle at both ends” as she explored the many boxes Dick kept for decades.

(Doris Kearns Goodwin with LBJ/Richard Goodwin with JFK)

The book’s depth is enhanced by the many relationships the couple developed over the years. The ones that stand out obviously are the two presidents they served, but also Jackie Kennedy, Sarge Shriver, Bill Moyers, Robert F. Kennedy, and numerous others. For Doris it was a magical marriage full of fun, love, and serious debates; she writes, “….my debate with Dick was not a question of logic or historical citation. It was about the respective investments in our youth, questions of loyalty and love.”

Dick’s reputation was formed by his almost innate ability as a wordsmith that produced so many important speeches. From JFK’s Alliance for Progress speech to formulating the term “Great Society,” to authoring the “We Shall Overcome,” Voting Rights, and RFK’s “South Africa’s Day of Affirmation” speeches which all impacted history based on who was speaking Dick’s phraseology and thoughts. After writing for JFK and LBJ, Dick turned to writing and supporting Robert Kennedy, a move that would sever his relationship with LBJ.

(Doris Kearns marries Richard N. Goodwin on Dec. 14, 1975. About 170 people attended their Lincoln, MA, wedding, during which this photo was taken, including Boston Mayor Kevin H. White, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Norman Mailer, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., and Hunter Thompson. Photo credit: Photo by Marc Peloquin. Courtesy of Doris Kearns Goodwin Papers)

Doris Kearns and President Lyndon B. Johnson, White House Cabinet Room, Oct. 29, 1968. Kearns was Secretary of the White House Fellows Association, and the event marked the presentation of the White House Fellows Report on Youth Participation. Doris Kearns Goodwin Papers, courtesy of the Briscoe Center for American History. — (Doris Kearns and President Lyndon B. Johnson, White House Cabinet Room, Oct. 29, 1968. Kearns was Secretary of the White House Fellows Association, and the event marked the presentation of the White House Fellows Report on Youth Participation. Doris Kearns Goodwin Papers, courtesy of the Briscoe Center for American History)

L-R: Ricahrd Goodwin, Bill Moyers, President Lyndon B. Johnson. Photo by Yoichi Okamoto, courtesy of the LBJ Presidential Library.

Perhaps the finest chapter in the book in terms of incisive analysis is “Thirteen LBJ’s” where Doris drills down to produce part historical analysis and personality study. LBJ was very moody and insecure, and he often burst out his emotions. Johnson was very sensitive about the press as he saw himself as a master manipulator and he always suspected leaks which he despised. He went as far as planting “spies” among others he feared like Robert Kennedy. Johnson’s approach to people was called “the Johnson treatment,” which is on display during his meeting with Governor George Wallace of Alabama and Senator Everett Dirkson during the Civil Rights struggles. Johnson could be overbearing, but in his mind what he was trying to achieve on the domestic front was most important.

Political expediency was an approach that Johnson and Robert Kennedy would employ during the 1964 presidential campaign when LBJ ran for reelection and Kennedy for the Senate from New York. Though they despised each other, Kennedy needed LBJ’s political machine and popularity to win, and Johnson needed to shore up his support in New York since he was a southerner. For Johnson he would rather have had “Bobby” lose, but he wanted his vote in the Senate. The LBJ-RFK dynamic dominated Johnson’s political antenna. Johnson was paranoid of Kennedy and feared he would run to unseat him in 1968. When the Vietnam war splintered America and Robert Kennedy turned against the war it substantiated Johnson’s fears. Further, when Dick, then out of government came out against the war, later joining Kennedy’s crusade, Johnson once again was livid. From Dick’s perspective he acted in what he saw as the best interests of America.

Doris nicely integrates many of the primary documents from Dick’s treasure trove of boxes. Excerpts from many of Dicks speeches, his political and private opinions, transcripts from important meetings inside and outside the White House are all integrated in the memoir. As time went on Dick turned to Eugene McCarthy and helped him force Johnson to withdraw his candidacy in 1968 after the New Hampshire primary. Dick would join Kennedy once he declared for president. The campaign was short lived as RFK was assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan in Los Angeles after winning the California primary. Dick was devastated by Kennedy’s death and would eventually attend the 1968 Democratic Convention where he worked with McCarthy delegates to include a peace plank into the Democratic Party platform. Doris was also in Chicago and witnessed the carnage fostered by Mayor Daley and the Chicago police

(Mr. Goodwin with Jacqueline Kennedy and her lawyer, Simon H. Rifkind, rear, in Manhattan in 1966. Mr. Goodwin was for years identified with the Kennedy clan)

One of the criticisms of Doris’ memoir is her lack of attention to the political right and her obsession with the middle to political left. That being said it is important to remember that this is not a history of the 1960s but a personal memoir of two people who fell in love, married in 1975, and the narrative correctly revolves around their firsthand experiences and beliefs. Doris would go on to work for Johnson after he left the White House, splitting her time between teaching at Harvard and flying to Texas , to help with his memoirs. Doris rekindles the spark of idealism that launched the 1960s which is missing today. She introduces readers to the Kennedy-Johnson successes in racial justice, public education, and aid for the poor, all important movements. In addition, she delves into the debate about the conduct of the war in Vietnam, including the anti-war movement, and the toppling of a president. Doris Kearns Goodwin has done a useful service by recasting the 1960s in her vision. It is an excellent place to start a study of the period, and its impact on what appears to be a wonderful marriage.

Doris Kearns Goodwin And Richard Goodwin

THE LUMUMBA PLOT: THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE CIA AND A COLD WAR ASSASSINATION by Stuart A. Reid

January 21, 2025szfreiberger African History, American Diplomatic History Leave a comment

This is a July 3, 1960 file photo of Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of the Republic of Congo. — (Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba of ethe Congo)

The early 1960s was a period of decolonization in Africa. European countries had come to the realization that the burden of empire no longer warranted the cost and commitment to maintain them, except in the case where it was suspected that the Soviet Union was building a communist base. One of the countries which was trying to throw off the colonial yoke was the Congo and separate itself from its Belgian overlords. In 1960 it finally achieved independence and was led by a controversial figure, Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, a man who was ideologically an African nationalist and Pan-Africanist. However, soon after the Congo gained its freedom its army mutinied. The result was chaos and a movement by its Katanga province which was rich in mineral resources and led by Moise Tshombe to secede. What made the situation complex was that Lumumba was the country’s Prime Minister, and his president Joseph Kasavubu were often at loggerheads politically. Further, an army Colonel, Joseph Mobutu was placed in charge of the new Congolese army, the ANC who at times was loyal to Lumumba, and at times was in the pay of the CIA. The United Nations under the leadership of Dag Hammarskjold sought to try and end the chaos and bring a semblance of a parliamentary system to the Congo which in the end was beyond his reach.

The early 1960s witnessed the height of the Cold War, Moscow would aid the new government and sought to spread its influence throughout Central Africa and gain a share of its mineral wealth. Washington’s response was predictable as it worked overtly and covertly to block the spread of Soviet influence and its communist ideology. The background that led up to Congolese independence and subsequent events is expertly told by Stuart A. Reid’s new book, THE LUMUMBA PLOT: THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE CIA AND A COLD WAR ASSASSINATION. The title of the book is a little misleading as the book does not focus much on the CIA in the Congo as it concentrates more on the concern of diplomats in the UN and a series of plots in Leopoldville. The international panic over the havoc in the Congo, Reid writes, helped to transform the Cold War “into a truly global struggle.” The monograph recounts numerous personalities and movements which exhibited shifting positions throughout the narrative. With Lumumba’s continuous machinations President Eisenhower’s inherent racism and anti-communism emerged along with his perceptions of Soviet actions which in the end led to the Congolese Prime Minister’s assassination by the CIA.

(CIA Station Chief Larry Devlin in he Congo, early 1960s)

If one examines the American approach to emerging nations and the Soviet Union during this period it is clear that if a leader labeled himself a nationalist or a neutralist, Washington labeled him a communist. The American foreign policy establishment was convinced for decades that nationalism and communism were one and the same and presented similar threats to American interests. A nationalist is someone who believes that their country should be ruled by their countrymen, not a government imposed from the outside. Historian, Blanche Wiesen Cook’s THE DECLASSIFIED EISENHOWER outlines the Eisenhower administration’s approach to nationalist leaders in the 1950s exploring the overthrow of Mohammed Mossadegh In Iran, Colonel Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala, a coup in Syria called off because of the Suez Crisis, attempts to remove Fidel Castro in Cuba, and of course events in the Congo. This approach continued under the Kennedy administration leading to errors resulting in disastrous approaches toward Vietnam, Cuba, and the Congo as these leaders of these countries believed they had a target on their backs. As a result, they would turn to the Soviet Union for aid which of course Premier Nikita Khrushchev was more than happy to provide.

In 1974 in the US Senate, the Church Committee learned about CIA coups, assassinations and other methods employed to influence foreign governments all in the name of American strategic interests as it did in dealing with Lumumba. The most important question that the author raises is who killed Lumumba? The choices are varied; Belgium which had run their colony with cruelty since the late 19^th century; United Nations officials drawn into the Congo on a peacekeeping mission; the CIA fearing Lumumba was moving too close to the Communist bloc; or a young army officer, Joseph Mobutu who installed himself as leader. Reid’s interpretation of events relies on a multitude of sources, drawing from forgotten testimonies, interviews with participants, diaries, private letters, scholarly histories, official investigations, government archives, diplomatic cables, and recently declassified CIA files.

(CIA chemist Sidney Gottlieb headed up the agency’s secret MK-ULTRA program, which was charged with developing a mind control drug that could be weaponized against enemies)

The book pays careful attention to the role of the United States, its motivations, unscrupulous methods, the damage that was inflicted on the Congo, and how US officials displayed racist contempt for the Congolese, particularly members of the Eisenhower administration. According to Reid, “the CIA and its station chief in the Congo, Larry Devlin, had a hand in nearly every major development leading up to Lumumba’s murder, from his fall from power to his forceful transfer into rebel-held territory on the day of his death.” Events in the region would reverberate far beyond the Congo as its short-lived failure of democracy resulted in poverty, dictatorship, and war for decades. Further it would claim the life of Dag Hammarskjold who was killed under mysterious circumstances during a peacemaking visit to the Congo months after Lumumba’s murder. The mission to the Congo was seen as a dangerous misadventure, and the UN never fully recovered from the damage to its reputation because of what occurred.

Reid details a brief history of Belgian colonization in the Congo. Ivory and rubber were a source of wealth, and their occupation was extremely cruel as depicted in Joseph Conrad’s HEART OF DARKNESS. For a more modern view of this period and Brussel’s heartlessness see Adam Hochschild’s KING LEOPOLD’S GHOST. Despite allowing the Congo’s independence, in large part due to outside pressure, Belgium would work behind the scenes to undermine Lumumba and his government until his death and after. The question is what did Lumumba believe? The governments sitting in Brussels and Washington were convinced that Lumumba was pro-communism and particularly vulnerable to Soviet influence. In fact, Reid argues that all the available evidence suggests he favored the United States over the Soviet Union. The problem was the prejudice against Africa which dismissed any possibility that an African man could successfully lead an African country. Ultimately, Lumumba’s fate is part of a larger story of unprecedented hope giving way to an unrelenting tragedy.

Mr. Reid tells an engrossing storyteller who guides us from events in Leopoldville and Stanleyville to negotiations in New York at the UN, Washington at the National Security Council, and the halls of the Belgian government in Brussels. The tragedy that unfolds is expertly told by the author as he introduces the most important characters in this historical episode. In the Congo, the most important obviously is Lumumba whose background did not lend itself to national leadership. He was a beer salesman, postal clerk who embezzled funds, and a bookworm who was self-educated. He would be elected Prime Minister and formed his only government on June 24, 1960, with formal independence arriving on June 30^th. Other important characters include Joseph Kasavubu, Moise Tshombe, and Joseph Mobutu who all play major roles as Congolese political and ethnic particularism, in addition to Lumumba’s impulsive decision making and messianic belief in himself created even more problems.

(Mobutu Sese Seko)

For the United States, the American Ambassador to the Congo, Clare Timberlake convinced the UN to send troops to the Congo had a very low opinion of Lumumba as did CIA Station Chief Joseph Devlin who would be in charge of his assassination. President Eisenhower’s racial proclivities and looking at the post-colonial period through a European lens interfered with decision making as he ordered Lumumba’s death. He believed that Lumumba was “ignorant, very suspicious, shrewd, but immature in his ideas – the smallest scope of any of the African leaders.” CIA head, Allen W. Dulles called Lumumba “anti-western.” The UN plays a significant role led by Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold who tried to manipulate the situation that would support the United States, and he too thought that Lumumba was shrewd, but bordered on “craziness.” Ralph Bunche who made his reputation in 1948 negotiating with Arabs and Israelis did his best to bring the Congolese to some sort of agreement, but in the end failed. For Russia, Nikita Khruschev at first did not trust Lumumba, but soon realized there was an opportunity to spread Soviet influence and agreed to supply military aid to the Congolese army. Reid integrates many other characters as he tries to present conversations, decisions, and orders that greatly influenced the political situation.

(UN Secretary-General Gag Hammarsjkold)

The strength of the book lies in the author’s treatment of President Eisenhower’s and the CIA’s responsibility in the coup d’etat. The CIA persuaded Colonel Mobutu to orchestrate a coup on September 14. When the coup went nowhere the CIA turned to assassins who failed to carry out their mission. A scheme to inject poison in Lumumba’s toothpaste also went nowhere. In the end Patrice Lumumba at age thirty-five was murdered by Congolese rivals with Belgian assistance in early 1961, three days before John F. Kennedy who espoused anti-colonial rhetoric during his presidential campaign took office. Two years later Kennedy would welcome Mobutu Sese Seko who would rule the Congo, later called Zaire with an iron fist for thirty-two years to the White House.

Reid delves deeply into the personal relationships of the characters mentioned above. Attempts to get Tshombe to reverse his decision to secede from the Congo is of the utmost importance. Trying to get Lumumba and Kasavubu to cooperate with each other was difficult. Reid does an admirable job going behind the scenes as decisions are reached. The maneuvering among all parties is presented. Apart from internal Congolese intrigue the presentation of the US National Security Council as Eisenhower, Gordon Gray, the National Security advisor, Allen W. Dulles, and Secretary of State Christian Herter concluded before the end of Eisenhower’s presidential term that Lumumba was a threat to newly independent African states in addition to his own. In fact, at an August 8, 1960, National Security Council meeting , Eisenhower seemed to give an order to eliminate the Congolese Prime Minister.

(Moise Tshombe)

The role of Belgium is important particularly the June-August 1960 period as an intransigent Lumumba and an equally stubborn Belgium could not agree on the withdrawal of Belgian troops even after independence was announced. Belgium’s Foreign Minister, Pierre Wigney felt Lumumba was incompetent so how could Belgium reach a deal that could be trusted. Belgian obfuscation, misinformation, and cruelty stand out as it sought to leave the Congo on its own terms.

Another major player for the US was Sidney Gottlieb, who headlines a chapter entitled “Sid from Paris,” a scientist and the CIA’s master chemist who made his reputation experimenting with LSD as an expert in developing and deploying poison. He would meet with Devlin on September 19, 1960, and pass along the botulinum toxin which was designed to kill Lumumba but was never used.

Nicholas Niachos’ review in the New York Times, entitled “Did the C.I.A. Kill Patrice Lumumba?” on October 17, 2023 zeroes in on the role of the Eisenhower administration in the conflict arguing that Reid presented “new evidence found at the Eisenhower Presidential Library, Reid tracked down the only written record of an order at an August 1960 National Security Council meeting with the president, during which a State Department official wrote a “bold X” next to Lumumba’s name.“Having just become the first-ever U.S. president to order the assassination of a foreign leader,” Reid writes of Eisenhower, “he headed to the whites-only Burning Tree Club in Bethesda, Md., to play 18 holes of golf.”

Lumumba is re-elevated by the end of Reid’s book, mainly through the sea of indignities he suffered as a captive. Particularly disturbing is an episode from late 1960. His wife gave birth prematurely and his daughter’s coffin was lost when neither of her parents was allowed to accompany it to its burial.

Dwight David Eisenhower — (President Dwight D. Eisenhower)

In 1961, Eisenhower’s fantasies of the Congolese leader’s death — he once said he hoped that “Lumumba would fall into a river full of crocodiles” — were fulfilled. Lumumba was captured after an escape attempt and shipped to Katanga, where a secessionists’ firing squad, supported by ex-colonial Belgians, executed him. Reid shows how the C.I.A. station chief in Katanga rejoiced when he learned of Lumumba’s arrival (“If we had known he was coming we would have baked a snake”)but doesn’t ultimately prove that the C.I.A. killed him.

The C.I.A. has long denied blame for the murder of Lumumba, but I still wondered why Reid doesn’t explore a curious story that surfaced in 1978, in a book called “In Search of Enemies,” by John Stockwell. Stockwell, a C.I.A. officer turned whistle-blower, reported that an agency officer in Katanga had told him about “driving about town after curfew with Patrice Lumumba’s body in the trunk of his car, trying to decide what to do with it,”and that, in the lead-up to his death, Lumumba was beaten, “apparently by men who were loyal to men who had agency cryptonyms and received agency salaries.”

Still, Reid argues convincingly that by ordering the assassination of Lumumba, the Eisenhower administration crossed a moral line that set a new low in the Cold War. Sid’s poison was never used — Reid says Devlin buried it beside the Congo River after Lumumba was imprisoned — but it might as well have been. Devlin paid protesters to undermine the prime minister; made the first of a long series of bribes to Joseph-Désiré Mobutu, the coup leader and colonel who would become Congo’s strongman; and delayed reporting Lumumba’s final abduction to the C.I.A. On this last point, Reid is definitive: Devlin’s “lack of protest could only have been interpreted as a green light. This silence sealed Lumumba’s fate.”

(Patrice Lumumba)

THE PATRIOT: A MEMOIR by Alexei Navalny

January 10, 2025szfreiberger Russian History Leave a comment

(Feb. 21, 2021: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny shows a heart symbol standing in the cage during a hearing to a motion from the Russian prison service to convert the suspended sentence of Navalny from the 2014 criminal conviction into a real prison term in the Moscow City Court in Moscow, Russia.)

The title PATRIOT: A MEMOIR for Alexei Navalny’s posthumous memoir is apropos because the deceased Russian political activist was a firm believer in his country’s potential and saw himself as a nationalist. The book itself is an indictment of the Kremlin encompassing the hope that events of 1991 fostered, the corruption of the Yeltsin years, and the authoritarianism of Putin’s continued reign.

The turning point in the memoir is 2011 as Navalny and his supporters created the Anti-Corruption Foundation (ACF) which sought to educate the Russian masses as to the overt corruption and lying of the Putin regime. Navalny organizes his memoir chronologically after beginning the book with being stuck with Novichok, the FSB’s poison of choice, and his recovery in a Berlin hospital which took months. From then on he proceeds in an orderly fashion employing his own brand of sarcasm and humor to describe his battle with the Kremlin and Putin’s minions. Navalny offers detailed analysis of certain figures, particularly Mikhail Gorbachev who the author feels had the opportunity to do wonderful things for the Russian people but fell short in his accomplishments. However, Navalny thanks him for creating the environment for him to become involved in politics and trying to reform a corrupt government as he writes; “he goofed, and that is precisely what I have to thank him for.” He spends less time analyzing Vladimir Putin leaving that job to historians such as Steven Lee Myers THE NEW TSAR, Masha Gessen’s THE MAN WITHOUT A FACE: THE UNLIKELY RISE OF VLADIMIR PUTINN, Philip Short’s excellent biography PUTIN, Fiona Hill and Clifford G. Gaddy’s MR. PUTIN: OPERATIVE IN THE KREMLIN, in addition to the spate of books published since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

(May 8, 2012: Alexei Navalny is seen behind the bars in the police van after he was detained during protests in Moscow, on a day after Putin’s inauguration.)

The book is written in a somewhat lighter tone than one would expect from an author who has suffered the travails that Mr. Navalny has endured. Despite the tenor of the book Navalny’s remarks are serious and deeply thoughtful. Emotional at times, Navalny writes clearly and concisely as he tries to explain what he has experienced during years of fighting the Kremlin in the name of the Russian people. From outright assassination attempts by poison to the many scenarios the Kremlin could dream up – some violent, some less so, but extremely painful and debilitating physically and emotionally, and of course prison.

After commentary about the war in Afghanistan and the nuclear accident at Chernobyl leading to the events of 1989 and 1991 due to the decision making of the “senile leadership of old men,” Navalny relates the flaws in the Soviet/Russian system be it poor military training where soldiers are treated like convicts so when you return home it is like being released from prison (no wonder they have done so well in Ukraine!). Navalny describes the constant surveillance of the Russian people, the shortages of food and other consumer goods, rock music seen as a pernicious western plot by the west, the selling of the countries assets to Yeltsin’s and Putin’s cronies to create a class of oligarchs which robbed the Russian people of the countries wealth and natural resources when they could have been applied to uplifting the entire population, and of course how Putin rose to power by promising to protect Yeltsin and his corrupt family.

(Sept. 8, 2013: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, right, with his wife Yulia, daughter Daria, and son Zakhar leave a polling station in Moscow’s mayoral election. Moscow is holding its first mayoral election in a decade.)

Apart from the expected criticism of Yeltsin and Putin, Navalny points to the liberal reformers of the 1990s who he skewers for demanding freedom and all it can bring to becoming lackys of the Kremlin in return for the wealth that made them oligarchs. Navalny argues that the 1990-2020 period was stolen from the Russian people and how the Russian per capita GDP has fallen behind so many other countries because of the avariciousness of the Kremlin, their lies, and their contempt for their own people. Interestingly, Navalny began as a Yeltsin supporter but would realize that he was only driven by his lust for power, not the needs of his people.

Navalny’s sense of the absurd is on full display when writing about his arrests, trials, and imprisonment. He consistently points to the hypocrisy of post-1991 Russia where the only way to obtain or achieve one’s goals appeared to be through bribery, ripping off the state with cost overruns, limiting the civil rights of the people all in the name of the “new modern Russia.” Navalny provides intimate details of many aspects of his life. Two situations stand out for me. First, his flight from Berlin to Moscow after he recuperated from the Novichok poisoning by the FSB leading to his arrest upon his arrival at the airport. Another would be charges brought against him for actions he should have taken but could not because he was in prison resulting in further charges against him and lengthening his sentences. It reminds me of Kurt Vonnegut’s “cloud cuckoo land!”

The fact that Navalny was a trained lawyer and had a degree in finance and credit contributed to his investigations of the Kremlin. He was very conversant in how stock markets and exchanges worked, and it made it easier for him to root out corruption. His initial success began in 2011 as he developed a blog where he could post what his ACF staff were learning. He would file lawsuits against Gazprom and Transneft and other state corporations and picked up tens of thousands of followers. Navalny would buy a small amount of stock in companies he was investigating, allowing him to attend stockholders meetings which would turn into a farce when he attended and asked questions. When his blog was shut down by the Kremlin he would turn to YouTube, Instagram, Tik Tok, and Twitter to get his information pertaining to government corruption and lies to his eventual millions of followers. For a time, the Kremlin did not have an answer for him, especially when he labeled Putin’s party, United Russia, as “the party of crooks and thieves.” In a sense he had become the reincarnation of the Soviet dissidence of an earlier period.

(March 6, 2015: Alexei Navalny, a Russian opposition leader, walks out of a detention center in Moscow. Navalny walked out of a Moscow detention center a week after fellow opposition leader Boris Nemtsov was shot dead in what his allies say was a political killing aimed at intimidating them.)

The Kremlin’s goal in filing lawsuits against Navalny was to stop him from being active in politics – if you are convicted of corruption you cannot run for political office as Navalny did by announcing his run for the presidency in 2018 or the mayoralty of Moscow in 2013. Further, the Kremlin resorted to character assassination to discredit Navalny, but instead of losing support, much to the Kremlin’s chagrin, just enhanced his popularity.

(March 26, 2017: Police officers detain anti-corruption campaigner and opposition figure Alexei Navalny during an opposition rally in Moscow.)

What distressed Navalny a great deal was the impact of his work on his family especially when his brother was put on trial and given a three and a half year sentence, the constant harassment of his wife Yulia, and the tactics employed against hundreds of his followers. When he would ask if he should back off, they all stated that he “must” continue his work.

(March 27, 2017: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny gestures while speaking, as his lawyer Olga Mikhailova listens, in court in Moscow, Russia. Navalny, who organized a wave of nationwide protests against government corruption that rattled authorities, was fined 20,000 rubles ($340) on Monday by a Moscow court.)

Navalny integrated a few of his speeches to courts at the end of his trials in his memoir. He pulled no punches in his criticisms of Putin and his regime, the legal system, and anything else that was on his mind knowing full well this would result to his own detriment as his remarks would spread among the Russian people. His commentary would always be logical, cogent, and demeaning to Putin’s regime and would result in further imprisonment which he describes by including a prison diary in the book.

(Jan. 28, 2018: Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, center, attends a rally in Moscow, Russia.The book is not all about corruption and lies. The section on how he met his wife Yulia, their courtship, and their family is heart warming in light of what was to happen to him. Yulia shared his beliefs and worked with him hand and glove. Throughout his memoir Navalny worries about Yulia and his children because in Putin’s Russia no one knows the depths of evil that the Russian autocrat will resort to.)

(September 13, 2015: A man takes a selfie with Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, center, near the Open Russia movement office during Russian regional elections in the town of Kostroma, some 300 km outside Moscow. Russians voted September 13 in a regional election expected to yield few surprises, with the country’s liberal opposition only able to field a handful of candidates.)

PATRIOT is a poignant book, because we know according to Putin that he was close to being exchanged for another prisoner a few months after his death. But his death follows a pattern in Russian dissident history be it Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Vladimir Bukovsky, Andrei Sakharov and many others who used their stature as a megaphone against Kremlin injustice. As Carole Cadwalladr writes in the October 27, 2024, edition of The Guardian entitled “ The Man Who Dared Defy Putin,” “Throughout, there’s the absurdity of the Putinist regime and its casual brutality. At one point, Navalny reports that he is no longer considered an escape risk and can be removed from the intensive surveillance register. “My joy was so boundless the director had to ask me to be calm and speak only when permitted to do so,” he writes. But then, immediately afterwards: “It is proposed that convict Navalny is placed on the intensive surveillance register as an extremist and terrorist.” It’s not so bad, he jokes. He doesn’t have to kiss a portrait of Putin. There’s just “a sign above my bunk saying I’m a terrorist.”

“If they finally do whack me,” he writes at one point, half joking, half deadly serious, “this book will be my memorial.” “It’s less a memorial than a handbook on how to stand up to a bully, the mission of his life. It’s not just Russians he showed how to do so with humor and grace and without fear, but the rest of us too. And there’s a surprise at the end: his Ukrainian grandmother’s religion wins out over his Soviet atheism. It’s the pillar of his faith alongside his unshakable belief in his “beautiful Russia of the future.” To borrow a hint of Navalny’s relentless optimism, maybe PATRIOT is one small step towards making that day come true.”

(May 8, 2012: Alexei Navalny, a prominent anti-corruption whistle blower and blogger, center, speaks to protesters gathered across the street from the presidential administrations building as a police officer tries to stop him in downtown Moscow.)

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