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1946
- The Making of the Modern World
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 12 hrs and 34 mins
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Publisher's summary
In 1946, Victor Sebestyen creates a taut, panoramic narrative and takes us to meetings that changed the world: to Berlin in July 1945, when Truman tells Stalin that we have successfully tested the bomb; to Ye'nan, China, in January 1946, when General George Marshall tells the Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong that Americans won't send troops to China, assuring that the Communists will attain power; to Delhi, India, in April 1946, when UK cabinet members tell Pandit Nehur and Mahatma Gandhi that the British will leave India within a few months, ending two centuries of British imperialism.
Drawing on new archival material and many interviews, Sebestyen analyzes these major postwar decisions and others as he discusses the economic collapse, starvation, ethnic cleansing, and displacement that followed the war. This was the year when it was decided that there would be a Jewish homeland, when Europe would be split by the Iron Curtain, when independent India would become the world's biggest democracy, and when the Chinese Communists would win a civil war that positioned them to become a great power.
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- Length: 7 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Shimon Peres was in his early 20s when he first met David Ben-Gurion. Although the state that Ben-Gurion would lead through war and peace had not yet declared its precarious independence, the "Old Man", as he was called even then, was already a mythic figure. Peres, who came of age in the cabinets of Ben-Gurion, is uniquely placed to evoke this figure of stirring contradictions - a prophetic visionary and a canny pragmatist who early grasped the necessity of compromise for national survival.
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Great Perfomance, Less than Stellar Story
- By Alexander on 01-02-12
By: Shimon Peres, and others
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Iron Curtain
- The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1944-1956
- By: Anne Applebaum
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 26 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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At the end of World War II, the Soviet Union to its surprise and delight found itself in control of a huge swath of territory in Eastern Europe. Stalin and his secret police set out to convert a dozen radically different countries to Communism, a completely new political and moral system. In Iron Curtain, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Anne Applebaum describes how the Communist regimes of Eastern Europe were created and what daily life was like once they were complete.
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Important story, imperfectly executed
- By jackifus on 12-08-12
By: Anne Applebaum
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1917
- Lenin, Wilson, and the Birth of the New World Disorder
- By: Arthur Herman
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 16 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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In this incisive, fast-paced history, New York Times best-selling author Arthur Herman brilliantly reveals how Lenin and Wilson rewrote the rules of modern geopolitics. Through the end of World War I, countries marched into war only to increase or protect their national interests. After World War I, countries began going to war over ideas. Together, Lenin and Wilson unleashed the disruptive ideologies that would sweep the world, from nationalism and globalism to Communism and terrorism, and that continue to shape our world today.
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Another book you wish was part of every university world history curriculum
- By Bruno Carleston on 11-26-18
By: Arthur Herman
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A Thousand Hills
- Rwanda's Rebirth and the Man Who Dreamed It
- By: Stephen Kinzer
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 12 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Paul Kagame grew up as a wretched refugee. He and a group of comrades, determined to force their way back home after a generation of exile, designed one of the most audacious covert operations in the history of clandestine war. Then, after taking power, they amazed the world by stabilizing and reviving their devastated country.
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Best Most Comprehensive Work on Rwanda
- By Greg on 07-30-10
By: Stephen Kinzer
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The Conquerors
- Roosevelt, Truman, and the Destruction of Hitler's Germany, 1941-1945
- By: Michael Beschloss
- Narrated by: Michael Beschloss
- Length: 6 hrs and 22 mins
- Abridged
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From Michael Beschloss, one of America's most respected historians, The Conquerors reveals one of the most important stories of World War II. As Allied soldiers fought the Nazis, Franklin Roosevelt and, later, Harry Truman fought in private with Churchill and Stalin over how to ensure that Germany could never threaten the world again.
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Poor narration
- By Gary Bradt on 02-01-03
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Operation Snow
- How a Soviet Mole in FDR’s White House Triggered Pearl Harbor
- By: John Koster
- Narrated by: Michael Kramer
- Length: 6 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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On December 7, 1941, the nation of Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and prompted the United States’ entry into the bloodiest war in human history. Americans have long debated the cause of the bombing; many have argued that the attack was a brilliant Japanese military coup or a failure of US intelligence agencies or even a conspiracy of the Roosevelt administration. But despite the attention historians have paid to the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the truth about that fateful day has remained a mystery - until now.
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PUT IT IN THE FILE BLAMING FDR FOR PEARL HARBOR
- By Ron on 11-21-20
By: John Koster
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Forgotten Ally
- China's World War II, 1937 - 1945
- By: Rana Mitter
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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For decades, a major piece of World War II history has gone virtually unwritten. The war began in China two full years before Hitler invaded Poland, and China eventually became the fourth great ally, partner to the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain. Yet its drama of invasion, resistance, slaughter, and political intrigue remains little known in the West.
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Bland
- By Rodney on 01-23-14
By: Rana Mitter
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The Third Reich in History and Memory
- By: Richard J. Evans
- Narrated by: Julian Elfer
- Length: 14 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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In the 70 years since the demise of the Third Reich, there has been a significant transformation in the ways in which the modern world understands Nazism. In this brilliant and eye-opening collection, Richard J. Evans offers a critical commentary on that transformation, exploring how major changes in perspective have informed research and writing on the Third Reich in recent years. Drawing on his most notable writings, Evans reveals the shifting perspectives on Nazism's rise to political power, its economic intricacies, and its subterranean extension into postwar Germany.
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each book is better than the first. your writing is genius
- By Anonymous User on 05-10-24
By: Richard J. Evans
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The General
- Charles De Gaulle and the France He Saved
- By: Jonathan Fenby
- Narrated by: Robin Bloodworth
- Length: 28 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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No leader of modern times was more uniquely patriotic than Charles de Gaulle. As founder and first president of the Fifth Republic, General de Gaulle saw himself as "carrying France on [his] shoulders." In his 20s, he fought for France in the trenches and at the epic battle of Verdun. In the 1930s, he waged a lonely battle to enable France to better resist Hitler's Germany. Thereafter, he twice rescued the nation from defeat and decline by extraordinary displays of leadership, political acumen, daring, and bluff, heading off civil war and leaving a heritage adopted by his successors of right and left.
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Book Great Read. Narrator Horrible-slow dead voice
- By marigoyle on 10-23-13
By: Jonathan Fenby
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What listeners say about 1946
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Hallon
- 08-10-20
1946
A great view of how the events of the post war year determined the next 70 years.
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- GioSailor
- 08-07-22
Recommended !
Very interesting and coincise post world war II history of key events, taking place in 1946 in Europe and around the world. A pivotal time in history. Recommended. Very well narrated as well.
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- John
- 06-11-16
Excellent Analysis
This is a really great book that contains a tremendous amount of history and analysis that helps explain the second half of the Twentieth Century and beyond. I'm a bit of an amateur history buff, particularly about World War II, but there was a lot of new information here for me.
I think this book would be particularly valuable for younger persons who did not grow up in the more immediate aftermath of World War II. As the Greatest Generation is rapidly leaving us, it is important to reflect on not only what they accomplished, but the aftermath. As is the case with the world today, the leaders in 1946 made a lot of compromises, many necessitated by the economic devastation after the war except in the U.S. (which is so vividly depicted). Many other compromises were necessary due to war fatigue in the U.S., and a desire to return to more normal times.
This book is very well written with vivid descriptions. It reads almost like a historical novel. It is well paced and just very well done.
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3 people found this helpful
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- David
- 07-16-16
Quite the surprise this one
This is a remarkable addition to WWII history and something wholely unanticipated on my part. I am not new to the subject and expected simply one more tract from which to gather the occasional kernal from the inevitable blizzard of chaff. The title alone led me to expect this because it is taylor made for the light weight genre. Instead, the author presents one of the most concise, comprehensive and astute commentaries I have encountered. I count it in the first rank of must-read WWII history.
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- LynnJynh9315
- 07-11-19
The Aftermath of WWII.
Essential reading for anyone interested in the subject. Paints a fascinating picture of post-war Europe and Asia. German denazification, creation of Israel, occupied Japan, civil war China, and the first of hints the Cold War. Everything is here, and the facts may well surprise you.
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- Mark Patterson
- 04-11-16
A bit disjointed
For A book with such a simple organizing premise, it's seemed hard to follow at times. The book does paint an important picture of a seldom examined time – the transition from World War II to the Cold War. Sebastyen was great on Europe, fair on China, India and Japan but missed entirely a country that is now the sole remaining and very volatile remnant of the Cold War: Korea.
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- Philo
- 08-20-16
An education. Somber, detailed, many-faceted
My favorite form of film is the documentary. This book, with a bigger canvas in terms of time, takes that form deeper, in its way. It lacks the visuals, of course, but the descriptions are so lucid, I forget that. It has other layers of meaning and detailed descriptions the documentaries must mostly glide over too quickly.
I was attracted in particular to this year because I'd heard such a powerful narrative from my beloved mom, of her as an earnest and hopeful 14-year old in a decent small-town Southern California, that immediately pled for a counter-narrative I knew must be out there.
And I got it. This is harrowing at times, in terms of the suffering and disorder at all scales. Some passages are heartbreaking. But the whole is infused with meaning that gives constant insight, both individually and beyond the personal scale. The political descriptions woven in and out of the individuals' experiences are pellucid. It works at all levels.
A surprise, as I had never focused on the man, was Stalin. What a strange, complex extremity within the human family and story, he occupied. All the well-known major political personalities of the time are portrayed as well, from Mao to Ben-Gurion to Nehru and Jinnah, and so on, of course Churchill and Truman (and the long shadow of FDR; the story whenever called for extends very helpfully to circumstances and back-stories before and after 1946 proper). I also found the recounting of the Japanese occupation eye-opening. But no region or story, it seems, was left out, and every last one was etched, and remains etched, in my mind. This gives a fantastic background for understanding our times, including today's politics, worldwide. It is top-notch history, and I read a lot of the stuff. This is not my mom's 1946!
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- Candice U
- 10-07-24
Definitely Listen
Fantastic, although does not go super deep but hits all the points for the novice. America really was at her best and absolutely unstoppable in the years following the war. Incredible how bad the rot has become, i don’t know to either laugh or cry with Biden likening himself to FDR. Truman, also, great statesman.
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- John Gathly
- 11-17-19
US Empire always good, always justified.
This is a "history" book written from the perspective that everything the US and Western Europe did to expand the US empire after WWII was good and justified. All the death that went into creating markets friendly to US and Western capital, all the people fed to the US capital machine as third world labor are apparently "free", but labor used to fuel Soviet expansion is the only real problem. US controlled everywhere they had military presence, and built up a vast imperial base system in every country, but that doesn't count. It is only evil and bad when the Soviets control the territory they fought over in the war. Every territory the US controlled was good freedomy freedom and everything the Soviet empire did to control their empire was terrible and bad. Both the US and the Soviet empires committed mass murder and tried to control territory, but for some reason, only one side is presented as a negative here, and the other is presented as always entirely justified. Any failures of the West are considered something that couldn't possibly be helped, and presented as something that no one can legitimately criticize. Every move of the Soviets is considered to be deliberate evil perpetrated by evil monsters. Two empires, both doing what empires do, seeking power and territory. Any real history could present both empires and their deeds without making moral judgements. This is not that history.
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