To be honest, I preferred the other book for its deep dives into various political movements and moments, and its heavy application of political theory and ideological analysis to events. The Cold War approaches the subject in more general terms, focusing on the interrelations of events, rather than their internal dynamics. Katusa first became interested in the energy sector through investing. He began in mining, shifted to Uranium, and began to see the unconventional energy sector as a much bigger story. The book is good on suggesting real spycraft and technique plus the use or failings with technology and retains both characters and circumstances that are products of a far more complex and dangerous post-Soviet world as the plot/s move from Turkey to Berlin to London and elsewhere. On another interview Katusa said: "Obama has been outplayed in every form by Putin"; and:"Obama last 6 years:a disaster". Among the many thoughts triggered by Westad’s narrative, some of the most provocative involve how the Cold War might very well have turned out very differently if only:

Simply the best single volume political history of the Cold War. But for its 600+p length, it would be a shoo-in to replace Gaddis as the standard text for classroom use, as it is in all ways a superior book. Organized in part chronologically but mainly geographically, it is really a global history of how the Cold War affected the politics and conflicts of different regions (rather than a different book, which might have been organized for example thematically, about nuclear strategy, cultural competition, models of development, or so forth). The result is to give a good sense of how the Cold War meant very different things in different parts of the world. An arms race between the then-great powers of Germany, Great Britain, France and Russia eventually led to the ghastly human and economic losses of World War I, further contributing to the genesis of the Cold War by unleashing destabilizing forces that battered Europe, such as the collapse of the old Austria-Hungarian, Ottoman, and Russian empires, the birth of Soviet Russia, simmering resentment in Germany over its defeat that contributed to the eventual rise of Hitler, and imperial Japan’s hunger for territorial and economic gains in both China and the western Pacific.Nonetheless, for all of the missteps and misjudgments – and there were many by all involved – major disasters were somehow avoided. This is all the more amazing because the Soviet Union, the United States and China all had significant internal destabilization at some point during these long years: within Russia it was the period of “de-Stalinization,” when Khrushchev attempted to undo many of the excesses embraced by Stalin during his long rule; in the US, the hysteria of the “Red scare” of the ‘40s and ‘50s was soon followed by domestic unrest resulting from the civil rights movement and the country’s deepening involvement in the unpopular war in Viet Nam; and in China Mao struggled with the Olympian task of rapidly bringing his poor and rural country into the modern age. The strongest aspect of the book overall is its depiction and analysis of the global impact of the Cold War. (This is to be expected, since the author is an expert in this area.) The Non-Aligned Movement, especially major players Nehru of India and Nasser of Egypt, are discussed at considerable length. Regions that were more peripheral to the conflict (compared to Europe and Asia), such as Africa, also receive plenty of attention. Frustratingly, like the Gaddis book, coverage of the main events of the Vietnam War is brief and muddled--it gets a chapter of its own, but a third of that is taken up with matters elsewhere, and the conclusion of the war waits in a later chapter. Therefore it’s hard to see the progression of how the U.S. blundered into the quagmire, and eventually retreated out. On the other hand the chapters that cover how the Eastern bloc and shortly after the USSR itself unravelled are done well. Gorbachev gets his due as the key figure in all this, and is depicted partly tragically, as he loses control of his reforms and ultimately even the Soviet state.

Russia is flexing its muscles. It has annexed Crimea and is now putting the screws to the Ukraine. At the same time, Putin has again charged another billionaire industrialist with crimes, in a power play to probably get his company. The world may be on the brink of a new cold war. It is fertile ground for a top notch spy novelist. Okay, confession time. Espionage novels really aren't my thing, but I was prepared to give this one a shot, firstly because I've never read any of the authors work before and secondly because it was chosen for the Richard and Judy Spring Book Club this year. I follow their recommendations religiously and 9 out of 10 times they get it right for my personal reading interests. Unfortunately this time, I was sorely disappointed. As the story begins, the chief of MI6, Amelia Levene, also known as "C," is having a terrible time. A few agents abroad in Greece, Turkey and the Middle East that have defected to working for the West have been killed and rumours are flying around that there is a mole within the service. To add to this, one of her British agents Paul Wallinger (whom she was having a long-standing affair with) has been killed in a light aircraft crash yet the manner of his death is arousing her suspicions. The love-hate relationship between the MI-6 and CIA is an interesting dimension. Cumming knows his stuff well. Book Genre: Business, Cultural, Economics, Finance, History, Nonfiction, Political Science, Politics, Russia But once I grasped the entity of Istanbul and Odessa and each ferry etc- I couldn't put the book down. And it was NOT only because of all the excellent "tailing" episodes of 10 or 12 or 15 character inputs, either.The story originally appeared in Spectrum SF No. 3 in 2000, being later reprinted in Gardner Dozois's The Year's Best Science Fiction #18 and in Stross's collections Toast: And Other Rusted Futures (in 2002) and Wireless (2009). In late 2011 it appeared in two Cthulhu-themed anthologies: The Book of Cthulhu by Night Shade Books ( ISBN 1597802328) [7] and New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird by Prime Books ( ISBN 1607012898). [8] Plot synopsis [ edit ] Teresa at * 34 comments (25 September 2004). "Making Light: More on the Lovecraftian far right". Nielsenhayden.com . Retrieved 10 February 2012. Stephen Jay Gould briefs the CIA on the evolutionary implications of the alien lifeforms, confirming they come from no Earthly source. Other nations emulate the superpowers; Iran and Israel covertly plan a joint nuclear defence against Iraq's attempts to open a gate to the stars. Eventually, the Colonel's dealings are leaked, and Jourgensen has to testify before a congressional committee. One congressman, horrified by the accounts of the Colonel's dabbling, inquires about the Great Filter: why no aliens have openly stopped by to visit humanity, and only relics and servants remain. He points out that meddling with relics of the Elder Ones would be a good explanation for why other intelligent life has been exterminated before it could visit. In the Bloomberg interview Katusa revealed he manages a Canadian Hedge Fund; he’s involved in shale oil, copper and uranium; so his money in “on the line”. In 1973, Billy Graham, “America’s Pastor,” held his largest ever “crusade.” But he was not, as one might expect, in the American heartland, but in South Korea. Why there? Race for Revivalseeks not only to answer that question, but to retell the story of modern American evangelicalism through its relationship with South Korea. With the outbreak of the Korean War, the first “hot” war of the Cold War era, a new generation of white fundamentalists and neo-evangelicals forged networks with South Koreans that helped turn evangelical America into an empire.