Wilsonianism also accentuated another latent split in American thought on international affairs. Did America have any security interests it needed to defend regardless of the methods by which they were challenged? Or should America resist only changes which could fairly be described as illegal?…
It was only at the end of the nineteenth century that Russian archaeologists, ethnographers and orientalists began to take a serious interest in the Mongols and their influence. Archaeological excavations showed that Sarai had not been a settlement of tents, as imagined by the Russians until then, but a large medieval city of 75,000 people with stone buildings, well-laid-out streets and hydraulic systems, craft workshops and schools.…
One of Batu’s first moves was to summon the Russian princes to Sarai to swear an oath of allegiance to the Mongol khan. These trips became a regular phenomenon, for no prince could rule without a patent (yarlyk) from the khan.…
Through Byzantium the Russians were connected to the Greeks, Bulgarians, Serbs, Albanians and Romanians, all affiliated to the Eastern Orthodox Church. Through its broader links to Christendom, they also entered into closer contact with Europe, becoming conscious of themselves as Europeans belonging to a common faith.…
The “small deeds liberalism” of the provincial zemstvos was not a challenge to the central state. Indeed, in so far as the crucial weakness of the tsarist system was the under-government of the localities, they were a vital supplement to it.…
The Emancipation Decree was proclaimed on 19 February 1861. It was not read to the peasants until 7 March, the first day of Lent, when, it was assumed, they could be counted on to listen to their priests, charged with its communication, in a sober and submissive mood.…
Poland too was a battleground, particularly after the Polish uprising of 1863, when Alexander II intensified the Russification of the empire’s western provinces, areas where the Polish landowners remained strongly nationalist. Russian was made compulsory in schools and public offices. Polish students at Warsaw University had to suffer the indignity of studying their national literature in Russian translation.…
Ежов присутствовал на ноябрьском параде, но стоял на мавзолее не рядом со Сталиным, как раньше, а позади. Вскоре он вообще исчез. Его заменил Лаврентий Берия в синей фуражке и форме комиссара государственной безопасности первого класса.
Узнав, что Сталин приказал арестовать его друга, шефа украинского НКВД Успенского, карлик предупредил того об опасности.…
Николай Ежов и не думал менять свою ночную жизнь вампира, наполненную пьянками и пытками. Его раздавила гигантская работа. От Сталина, конечно, не укрылось, что его любимый нарком морально разлагается. «Позвонишь в комиссариат – говорят, что он уехал в Центральный комитет. Позвонишь в Центральный комитет – выясняется, что он уехал в комиссариат.…
Из Саратова Андреев направился в Куйбышев, потом – в Среднюю Азию, где сменил все руководство. Видя его решительность, Сталин дал карт-бланш: «Вы можете действовать, как считаете нужным». Развязав себе руки, Андрей Андреевич с новой энергией набросился на несчастных большевиков. «Я арестовал семь наркомов, 55 начальников отделов ЦК и трех секретарей ЦК», – написал он из Сталинабада.…