The Ultimate Book on Communism
Of the tens of thousands of books on the communist experience, this one resource stands out above all the rest--a massive and fitting epitaph for a totalitarian and bloodthirsty theory that killed one hundred million people in the 20th century.
The historians writing in this 850-page book cover Lenin's murders, Stalin's Gulag, Mao's Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge, and every other case of shocking crime and horror. The narrative moves constantly from the big picture to millions of deaths to the smallest look at how people in the midst of famine turned toward eating the dead.
They establish for all time that the machinery of communism is fueled by crimes, terror, and repression, and ends predictably in massacre.
The book appeared first in France as a collection of pieces by writers with some social-democratic sympathies. They only sought to tell the truth so far as it could be documented. Each is a specialist in the nation and period covered. They pull together all that is known and write an excellent narrative that provides the summary judgment.
What was astounding was the reaction. Not only in France but all over Europe there was sudden, palpable, and extended shock and protest--as if the intellectuals in these countries had never faced the grim reality. The source of the controversy was just as disgusting. You see, Europe's communist parties are still in existence and even flourishing. Former communist officials hold prestigious posts in government. Were these authors saying that these nice gentlemen are actually apologists for mass murder?
Well, yes.
It was also said that by highlighting the crimes of communism, there is a danger of putting the crimes of Nazism into the background. The idea here is palpably absurd. The key issue here is that the crimes of the Nazis are well known whereas the crimes of the communists are routinely whitewashed in the highest circles of academia and government.
In any case, this book stands as the ultimate refutation of the entire gang. It also makes for stunning reading, though it is probably impossible to read straight through without feeling a profound sickness. The detail is fascinating and you find your jaw dropping on every page, whether the subject is Russia, China, Africa, the Far East, or Latin America.
In some ways, this book is a great complement to Mises's own book Socialism. He predicted and explained all of this in his 1922 treatise, and the intellectual establishment never forgave him for it. Three quarters of a century later, the book that historical documented all of Mises's predictions appeared, and the establishment has not forgiven them either. Regardless, this book is an overwhelming vindication of Mises's position.
It is simply not possible to read this book and come away with the slightest sympathy for socialist/communist theory or the states that enact policies along these lines. Not even the authors themselves fully grasp what their own documentation has done to the statist religion of our time.
Read it, but prepare to weep, and fight against everything communism was and is.
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Comments (27)
Comments (27)
Inquisitor
Why weep? The apologists had this coming...
Published: January 19, 2009 3:02 PM
geoih
Too bad they called it "Communism" and not socialism. All the socialists and fascists of today will say that what they're advocating is something totally different.
Published: January 19, 2009 3:08 PM
Patrick
geoih: Good point. Today's socialists try to distinguish themselves very sharply from communism.
Published: January 19, 2009 4:58 PM
Dennis
Unfortunately, even if “socialism” was included in the book's title or subtitle, the statists and totalitarians would then argue that what they advocate is not socialism, but a "third-way," a "middle-of-the-road policy, or "a partnership between business and government." Of course, the fundamental economic doctrine has not changed; at most, the means to institute government control may be less aggressive.
The statists/totalitarians have shown themselves to be quite adept at the manipulation of terms. Perhaps the best example is their fraudulent and shameful co-opting of the word “liberal.”
Published: January 19, 2009 5:04 PM
Inquisitor
Communism is the end goal characterized by worker ownership of the means of production, socialism the means, at least for some of them, usually Marxians.
Published: January 19, 2009 5:08 PM
josh m
Adding to geoih's and Dennis' points above, I think the standard statist reply to the horror described here is that what they support is not totalitarianism, but "liberal democracy", and that "since the people are in control, they can change the system, blah, blah, blah..."
Published: January 19, 2009 5:24 PM
RickC
I actually read this book 8 or 9 years ago. After reading it, I came to the conclusion that the horrendous, bloody history of communism/socialism might be one of the most massive, and infuriatingly curious secrets of all time. There have been a few books, like those of Robert Conquest, which recounted the terrors under the Soviets, but the field is really rather small.
With all the countless stories yet untold, one can't help feeling that there has been a "conspiracy" of omission commited by historians and the media throughout the West. Why? Maybe because the germ of socialism remains alive, especially amongst the so-called intelligensia.
Martin Amis, in his own book about Stalin, made an observation about how a person can ruin a social gathering by joking about the Nazis or Hitler, but people still laugh at jokes about communism or Stalin. Why is that?
Published: January 19, 2009 5:29 PM
Bruce Koerber
January 19, 2009
President Obama: A Recommended Book To Read.
On Sunday I read in Parade the letter that Barack Obama wrote to his two young daughters. In the letter of love and encouragement he speaks to his two daughters about wanting the future to be bright and asks his daughters to see the sacrifices that are part of public life as valuable experiences for their future. He encourages them to help make the world a better place.
So that history does not repeat itself in horrific ways, that are completely avoidable, I suggest that Barack and Michelle Obama read The Black Book Of Communism.
I realize that it may at first seem like I am labeling, I am not. I have read a few historical pieces that indicate that you both have been exposed to ’left’ thinkers.
What is important and indeed critical is for you to read the thorough accounts of the ultimate end of communism and its kin - socialism. Share what is age appropriate with your daughters so they, too, can see the horrors of totalitarianism.
Since you aspire for a peaceful and prosperous world, especially for your daughters and future generations, I suggest that you investigate the principles of classical liberalism. Of course you will have to have the moral courage to brush aside the nonsense of the statist advisors that occupy the advisory seats.
Please accept this humble request as a gift to you and your daughters and to your legacy!
Published: January 19, 2009 5:33 PM
Inquisitor
Haha in Sweden knowledge of Soviet crimes is actually disgustingly low. Many youths think the total tally of deaths accounted for by Stalin is under 10,000... their teachers are largely to blame.
Published: January 19, 2009 5:40 PM
Nuke Gray
The Russians called their version of paradise The Union of Soviet SOCIALIST Republics. ('Soviet' means something like 'County') Nazi comes from the German words for National SOCIALIST. No wonder socialists get upset! People might realise what their game is!
Published: January 19, 2009 5:42 PM
M
I bought this brilliant book three years ago. Absolutely fantastic.
Robert Service's 'Comrades: A World History of Communism' is well worth reading too.
Published: January 19, 2009 6:16 PM
Bruce
I've started reading this book only recently. I'm still going through the year 1918 shortly after the beginning of the Bolshevik revolution; it's every bit as grim already as its reviewers have made it out to be. James Owstrowski's review c. 2000 comes to mind. It's somewhere on mises.org for those who care to look. David Gordon, alas, doesn't seem to have published a review of it.
Published: January 19, 2009 7:25 PM
Fephisto
"Haha in Sweden knowledge of Soviet crimes is actually disgustingly low. Many youths think the total tally of deaths accounted for by Stalin is under 10,000... their teachers are largely to blame."
What? I call for source.
Published: January 19, 2009 8:29 PM
+Baker
Here's a good outlook on the u.S economy:
http://bakerthebrand.blogspot.com/
Thank you.
+Baker
Published: January 19, 2009 8:54 PM
Luis
What is government, but progressive communism (which also lies on the same road as socialism)?
Published: January 19, 2009 8:59 PM
Inquisitor
http://www.thelocal.se/7248/
In case you genuinely doubt what I say.
Published: January 19, 2009 9:28 PM
eric lansing
man do you read a lot, Jeffrey. Working on a book perhaps?
Published: January 19, 2009 10:01 PM
Iván
To "counterattack" this book, the statists made the "black book of capitalism".
The count the two world wars as capitalism... Yeah, especially the WW2 where every economic activity was direct o indirectlly military controlated by the state. Even in the UK.
Published: January 19, 2009 10:17 PM
Miguel
I´ am from Argentina and it´s the first time I write for the blog. I´ ve read the black book of comunism when it just came out in my country in 1998 or 1999. I was 14 years old at the time. The book leave me with the strong impression that the entire idea of communism/socialism was deeply wrong at a moral level and at a conceptual level.
However I wasn´ t able to theoretically figure wthy it had to be always like that, although I was somehow sure that communism lead always to totalitarianism, persecussion and mass murder. So deprived of a satifactory explanation I became a capitalist almost by default. Luckly everything became clear when, at the age of 18, I read Hayek´s Road to Serfdom and a small book of six conferences given by Mises in 1958 in Argentina.
Now, looking back in retrospective, I must say that it was the black book that move me to investigate to the point of finding an answer to the question ¨why?¨ that had no excuse for the ideas of socialism.
Really a book that everyone has to read and use it as a consulting book whenever necessary.
Published: January 19, 2009 11:24 PM
newson
by the way, this is available via scribd. thank you.
Published: January 19, 2009 11:53 PM
Artisan
Stalin, was called "the little father"... yet in fact the idea of communism may even in its essence, be coming from a deceptive conception of "family values" . This may be the root of the never ending problem.
I work in a family business and see how some of us are encouraged to "share" all revenues from the business regardless of the work being done in that structure too... in the name of "personal need" rather than "personal efficiency" (knowing that the family structure is traditionally suppose to take account of the "needs" of every member...).
I'm not saying family violence is a necessary consequence, but injustice is threatening as a source of much evil within families too... you can just look at inheritance fights.
Obviously there's a lot of personal belief involved here to manage a family business. No rule of thumb possible. But this is one of the reasons why state-communism still finds so much sympathy, after all too... and always will to some extent.
Published: January 20, 2009 3:56 AM
Inquisitor
The Black Book of Capitalism only gets its way by redefining imperialism (yes, that includes colonialism) as a capitalist phenomenon. And even then their figures cannot match those of socialism.
Published: January 20, 2009 5:27 AM
P.M.Lawrence
Nuke Gray writes "'Soviet' means something like 'County'".
No, it's not regional except incidentally, it's more the workers' and soldiers' councils sitting in and taking over the enterprises they were involved with. The only similarity is that they were also low level structures that other stuff could be built on and that most individuals would come in contact with (in the early days, at least).
Published: January 20, 2009 6:23 AM
Jim Chappelow
P.M. Lawrence:
That's right, when I took Russian in college I remember the instructor explaining "soviet" as something more like a local union chapter than a political body as we know it.
Published: January 20, 2009 7:44 AM
Richard Spencer
I reviewed this stunning book nov07 for a small military blog http://cargomasterraster.blogspot.com/ of USAF members flying the world's largest cargo plane in the 60's. It seems to be a book not publicly touted. A major reason, I believe, is that the academic/left world world would have to shut the door forever on the concept of Utopia if these misdeeds were researched. The lack of such research and publicity about this evil of the 20th century is almost criminal in itself.
Richard Spencer
Published: January 20, 2009 3:00 PM
Richard Spencer
I reviewed this stunning book nov07 for a small military blog http://cargomasterraster.blogspot.com/ of USAF members flying the world's largest cargo plane in the 60's. It seems to be a book not publicly touted. A major reason, I believe, is that the academic/left world world would have to shut the door forever on the concept of Utopia if these misdeeds were researched. The lack of such research and publicity about this evil of the 20th century is almost criminal in itself.
Richard Spencer
Published: January 20, 2009 3:00 PM
Mr.huh?
"The Black Book of Capitalism only gets its way by redefining imperialism (yes, that includes colonialism) as a capitalist phenomenon. And even then their figures cannot match those of socialism."
This has always been the case ever since Lenin. Marxists have never understood the difference between capitalism and mercantilism.
Published: January 20, 2009 6:43 PM