
Stalin's War
A New History of World War II
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Narrated by:
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Kevin Stillwell
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By:
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Sean McMeekin
About this listen
A prize-winning historian reveals how Stalin - not Hitler - was the animating force of World War II in this major new history.
World War II endures in the popular imagination as a heroic struggle between good and evil, with villainous Hitler driving its events. But Hitler was not in power when the conflict erupted in Asia - and he was certainly dead before it ended. His armies did not fight in multiple theaters, his empire did not span the Eurasian continent, and he did not inherit any of the spoils of war. That central role belonged to Joseph Stalin. The Second World War was not Hitler’s war; it was Stalin’s war.
Drawing on ambitious new research in Soviet, European, and US archives, Stalin’s War revolutionizes our understanding of this global conflict by moving its epicenter to the east. Hitler’s genocidal ambition may have helped unleash Armageddon, but as McMeekin shows, the war which emerged in Europe in September 1939 was the one Stalin wanted, not Hitler. So, too, did the Pacific war of 1941-1945 fulfill Stalin’s goal of unleashing a devastating war of attrition between Japan and the “Anglo-Saxon” capitalist powers he viewed as his ultimate adversary.
McMeekin also reveals the extent to which Soviet Communism was rescued by the US and Britain’s self-defeating strategic moves, beginning with Lend-Lease aid, as American and British supply boards agreed almost blindly to every Soviet demand. Stalin’s war machine, McMeekin shows, was substantially reliant on American material, from warplanes, tanks, trucks, jeeps, motorcycles, fuel, ammunition, and explosives, to industrial inputs and technology transfer, to the foodstuffs which fed the Red Army.
This unreciprocated American generosity gave Stalin’s armies the mobile striking power to conquer most of Eurasia, from Berlin to Beijing, for Communism.
A groundbreaking reassessment of the Second World War, Stalin’s War is an essential book for anyone looking to understand the current world order.
©2021 Sean McMeekin (P)2021 Basic BooksListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
“A provocative revisionist take on the Second World War...an accomplished, fearless, and enthusiastic ‘myth buster’...McMeekin is a formidable researcher, working in several languages, and he is prepared to pose the big questions and make judgments.... The story of the war itself is well told and impressive in its scope, ranging as it does from the domestic politics of small states such as Yugoslavia and Finland to the global context. It reminds us, too, of what Soviet ‘liberation’ actually meant for eastern Europe.... McMeekin is right that we have for too long cast the second world war as the good one. His book will, as he must hope, make us re-evaluate the war and its consequences.” (Financial Times)
"Indispensable.... There are new books every year that promise ‘a new history’ of such a well-studied subject as World War II, but McMeekin actually delivers on that promise.” (Christian Science Monitor)
"Sean McMeekin’s revisionist Stalin’s War: A New History of World War II isn’t just one of the most compelling histories written about the war this year, it’s one of the best ever. I doubt anyone who reads it will think about the Second World War in the same way." (David Harsanyi, The Federalist's Notable Books of 2021)
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The Ottoman Empire has long been depicted as the Islamic Asian antithesis of the Christian European West. But the reality was starkly different: the Ottomans’ multiethnic, multilingual, and multireligious domain reached deep into Europe’s heart. Indeed, the Ottoman rulers saw themselves as the new Romans. Recounting the Ottomans’ remarkable rise from a frontier principality to a world empire, historian Marc David Baer traces their debts to their Turkish, Mongolian, Islamic, and Byzantine heritage.
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Great except for pronunt of Turkish names
- By Anonymous User on 11-04-22
By: Marc David Baer
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Istanbul: A Tale of Three Cities
- By: Bettany Hughes
- Narrated by: Bettany Hughes
- Length: 24 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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From the Koran to Shakespeare, this city with three names - Byzantium, Constantinople, Istanbul - resonates as an idea and a place, real and imagined. Standing as the gateway between East and West, North and South, it has been the capital city of the Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman Empires. For much of its history it was the very center of the world, known simply as "The City", but, as Bettany Hughes reveals, Istanbul is not just a city but a global story.
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A daunting undertaking pulled off superlatively
- By SGS on 12-24-17
By: Bettany Hughes
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July 1914: Countdown to War
- By: Sean McMeekin
- Narrated by: Steve Coulter
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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When a Serbian-backed assassin gunned down Archduke Franz Ferdinand in late June 1914, the world seemed unmoved. Even Ferdinand’s own uncle, Franz Josef I, was notably ambivalent about the death of the Hapsburg heir, saying simply, "It is God’s will." Certainly, there was nothing to suggest that the episode would lead to conflictmuch less a world war of such massive and horrific proportions that it would fundamentally reshape the course of human events.
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Great Book, Narrator Isn't the Best though
- By Richard Valdez on 08-31-13
By: Sean McMeekin
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The Middle Kingdoms
- A New History of Central Europe
- By: Martyn Rady
- Narrated by: John Curless
- Length: 22 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Central Europe has long been infamous as a region beset by war, a place where empires clashed and world wars began. In The Middle Kingdoms, Martyn Rady offers the definitive history of the region, demonstrating that Central Europe has always been more than merely the fault line between West and East. Even as Central European powers warred with their neighbors, the region developed its own cohesive identity and produced tremendous accomplishments in politics, society, and culture.
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Marred by the errors in the modern section
- By Paul Boothroyd on 10-20-23
By: Martyn Rady
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American Civil Wars
- A Continental History, 1850-1873
- By: Alan Taylor
- Narrated by: Graham Winton
- Length: 17 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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The American Civil War stands at the center of the story, its military history and the drama of emancipation the highlights. Taylor relies on vivid characters to carry the story, from Joseph Hooker, whose timidity in crisis was exploited by Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson in the Union defeat at Chancellorsville, to Martin Delany and Mary Ann Shadd Cary, Black abolitionists whose critical work in Canada and the United States advanced emancipation and the enrollment of Black soldiers in Union armies.
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fascinating!
- By Brandon Marken on 07-12-24
By: Alan Taylor
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American Betrayal: The Secret Assault on Our Nation’s Character
- By: Diana West
- Narrated by: Diana West
- Length: 20 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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"Russian influence" may have entered our national pop-consciousness in Election 2016, but it is the shiny, deceptive, contested, and buried X-factor of a century of wars in Washington. In American Betrayal, Diana West digs deep to uncover a body of lies that Americans have been led to regard as the near-sacred history of World War II and its Cold War aftermath. Part real-life thriller, part national tragedy, American Betrayal lights up the massive, Moscow-directed penetration of America's most hallowed halls of power.
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True history of WWII &its consequences then & now
- By jac on 04-24-18
By: Diana West
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Hitler's First Hundred Days
- When Germans Embraced the Third Reich
- By: Peter Fritzsche
- Narrated by: Jim Seybert
- Length: 14 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Amid the ravages of economic depression, Germans in the early 1930s were pulled to political extremes both left and right. Then, in the spring of 1933, Germany turned itself inside out, from a deeply divided republic into a one-party dictatorship. In Hitler's First Hundred Days, award-winning historian Peter Fritzsche offers a probing account of the pivotal moments when the majority of Germans seemed, all at once, to join the Nazis to construct the Third Reich.
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Whoa! This Is Too Tense To Be A Horror Novel!
- By Ted on 07-02-20
By: Peter Fritzsche
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Beyond the Wall
- A History of East Germany
- By: Katja Hoyer
- Narrated by: Sam Peter Jackson
- Length: 16 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1990, a country disappeared. When the Iron Curtain fell, East Germany ceased to be. For over forty years, from the ruin of the Second World War to the cusp of a new millennium, the German Democratic Republic presented a radically different Germany than what had come before and what exists today. Socialist solidarity, secret police, central planning, barbed wire: this was a Germany forged on the fault lines of ideology and geopolitics. Acclaimed historian Katja Hoyer sets aside the usual Cold War caricatures of the GDR to offer a kaleidoscopic new vision of this vanished country.
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Good summary of ordinary life in the DDR
- By Z' on 03-09-24
By: Katja Hoyer
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Tip of the Spear
- The Incredible Story of an Injured Green Beret's Return to Battle
- By: Ryan Hendrickson
- Narrated by: Brock Vickers
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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The inspiring true story of a US Special Forces soldier who was medically retired after stepping on an IED and his incredible return to active duty. An engaging and harrowing account, Tip of the Spear tells the amazing story of one Green Beret's indomitable spirit.
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Amazing story
- By Laura Gonzales on 08-09-20
By: Ryan Hendrickson
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The Big Myth
- How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market
- By: Naomi Oreskes, Erik M. Conway
- Narrated by: Liza Seneca
- Length: 21 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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In the early 20th century, business elites, trade associations, wealthy powerbrokers, and media allies set out to build a new American orthodoxy: down with 'big government' and up with unfettered markets. With startling archival evidence, Oreskes and Conway document campaigns to rewrite textbooks, combat unions, and defend child labor.
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Refuting the Chicago School
- By Todd W. Laveen on 06-01-23
By: Naomi Oreskes, and others
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The Red Thread
- A Search for Ideological Drivers Inside the Anti-Trump Conspiracy
- By: Diana West
- Narrated by: Diana West
- Length: 4 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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The first investigation into why a ring of senior Washington officials went rogue to derail the election and the presidency of Donald Trump. There was nothing normal about the 2016 presidential election, not when senior US officials were turning the surveillance powers of the federal government - designed to stop terrorist attacks - against the Republican presidential team. These were the ruthless tactics of a Soviet-style police state, not a democratic republic.
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Welcome addition to "American Betrayal"!
- By Kurt on 04-23-19
By: Diana West
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Arabs
- A 3,000-Year History of Peoples, Tribes, and Empires
- By: Tim Mackintosh-Smith
- Narrated by: Ralph Lister
- Length: 25 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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This kaleidoscopic book covers almost 3,000 years of Arab history and shines a light on the footloose Arab peoples and tribes who conquered lands and disseminated their language and culture over vast distances. Tracing this process to the origins of the Arabic language, rather than the advent of Islam, Tim Mackintosh-Smith begins his narrative more than a thousand years before Muhammad and focuses on how Arabic, both spoken and written, has functioned as a vital source of shared cultural identity over the millennia.
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“The hourglass that swallows you”
- By Jefferson on 05-22-21
What listeners say about Stalin's War
Highly rated for:
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- M. G. Zink
- 05-07-21
A fresh and disturbing reassessment of WWII
This is a superb book, well worth the time to absorb its nearly 700 pages. This could spark a new assessment of World War II. Josef Stalin is as cruel and ruthless as might be expected. The world leader
who shines less brightly in this book is Franklin Delano Roosevelt. FDR and his inner circle, in particular Harry Hopkins, seem more tarnished, swimming in a toxic cocktail of hubris and naïveté.
This is the third book I have read by Professor McMeekin. He takes full advantage of his access to archives in Russia and other countries that suffered behind the Iron Curtin for so many years.
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11 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 05-10-21
The best WW2 book ever
Well, after an interesting introduction, the book unraveled into a great deal of interesting diplomatic and intriguing affairs. I’m very pleased and I highly recommend reading this book!
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6 people found this helpful
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- Cmoon
- 05-11-21
a must listen
From the research to the conclusions and everything in between, this is a fantastic book. I can't recommend it enough. I'll probably buy a hard copy, so I can feel its substance in my hands.
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5 people found this helpful
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- JustinT
- 04-25-24
Long but worth it
Very good listen, a little long to get thru but worth the effort . Added some new perspective to my Ww2 readings so far
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- Scott
- 11-18-24
Good Story-- Poor Production
The presentation of events is clear and digestible, but its doubtful this can be considered a dispassionate or balanced history. The authors resentment for Stalin bleeds through the chapters and though this can make for some engaging listening, at times it feels like the author has crossed a journalistic line and simply begun proselytizing.
However, the real reason i have been motivated to write a review is the incredibly annoying narration work. The narrators voice is fine, but the composition of the lines is terrible. Good God, every comma is treated as a full stop with a long pause afterwards, and each one of these commas ends with an upward inflection of the voice to make the line a question. Attempting to understand a passage with these elements makes a single thought sound like 4 or 5 unanswered questions.
An example: "Although he was short? About 5 feet 5 inches? And his face was flawed by pock marks? Stalin cut a dashing figure."
Though written as a single sentence, the production team has edited the narration such that the line now appears to be three questions and a disconnected statement.
A shame, because despite the one-sidedness of the argumentation, the title does do a good job of presenting accounts and evidence that is rarely mentioned in the classic WWII histories.
4/5 rating because the content is readable and interesting but i want it on record how bad the production team fumbled the narration here.
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- Olivia Lovell
- 04-05-22
New Perspective
I'm no historian, so I'm sure there were some biases or inaccuracies that I didn't catch, but overall I enjoyed hearing a perspective on WW2 that we seldom hear about from what I believe to be a very objective point of view. Russia, and more specifically Stalin, played a huge role in the war that is often seen from the US perspective as US vs Hitler (and Japan, which seems to be another thing Americans forget about aside from Pearl Harbor). It's often neglected how Stalin/Russia played both sides - frankly I think it helps bring clarity to how the US is involved in foreign affairs, as well as clarity on how modern day Russia got to be the considerable super power it is today.
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- Somermom
- 03-04-22
Great book!
Fascinating, this is a must listen for anyone interested in a different perspective on the WW2 conflict …… great insight
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- Eric Ring
- 05-19-21
A New Look on an Old War
This book provides and opens one’s eyes to a bitter side of World War 2 that most Americans have never seen or heard before. This jaw dropping book accounts how America’s politicians of the Great Generation conspired to give Stalin a blank check to murder millions and conquer vast amounts of Eastern European land. It sheds light on the fact that workings and people within our own government provided for these evil deeds and lied to the American people about it. Causing undo suffering on the home front while Stalin reaped the benefits of American stupidity and ignorance. Please, I recommend this book to anyone out there, not only as a fantastic read/listen, but also as a glimpse into the real history of World War 2.
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- Marky Maypo
- 05-26-21
Eye Opening Research
Good lord. What did FDR wrought? listen to this amazing work and find out! Incredible.
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- JR
- 01-16-23
New Information Brought to Light
The research and work put into this book stands out with the amount of in depth analysis the author covers.
This book has been a great listen as it’s saturated with new information that brings an entirely new perspective into WWII and the inner workings of the lend lease program. Very thought provoking!
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1 person found this helpful