This new graphic novel is a beautifully-drawn, powerfully-told story about a group of seven Soviet female snipers during the Second World War. Sara, the best shot in the group, is plagued by doubts…Read more…
Review: The Traitors: A True Story of Blood, Betrayal and Deceit, by Josh Ireland
Having just read The Meaning of Treason by Rebecca West I was keen to read a more recent account of the British subjects who betrayed their country and worked on behalf of Nazi Germany. I…Read more…
Review: The Meaning of Treason, by Rebecca West
This extraordinary book, published in 1949, tells the stories of the trials of a number of British subjects who betrayed their country during the Second World War. The bulk of the book is a long…Read more…
Ann Coulter wants Jared Kushner to be deported
Right-wing pundit Ann Coulter is furious at Donald Trump for, in her view, caving in to the Democrats and putting an end (for now) to the US federal government shutdown. Coulter has long criticised…Read more…
Israeli elections 2019: Battle of the insiders
“I was a minister in Netanyahu’s government and know it’s impossible to create change from there.” Those are the words of Avi Gabbay, the embattled leader of Israel’s rapidly-fading Labor Party. But…Read more…
Review: Soviet Opposition to Stalin – A case study in World War II, by George Fischer
This short book was an early history of Vlasov movement, which during the second world war aimed to create a Russian army of “liberation” that would fight side by side with the Germans…Read more…
Review: German Rule in Russia, 1941-1945 by Alexander Dallin
Alexander Dallin, the son of the well-known Menshevik David Dallin, published this book in 1957. More than sixty years on, it is probably still the definitive text on the subject. The book is a…Read more…
The politicians all agree — and they are all wrong
Israel’s political leaders seem to agree on very little these days. But one thing does unite nearly all of them, which sounds good until you realize that they are all wrong. I’m referring to the…Read more…
Review: Soviet Partisan 1941-44, by Nik Cornish
In some parts of Europe, the stunning victories enjoyed by Hitler’s armed forces resulted in docile, subservient populations that were keen to avoid any further trouble. Whole countries…Read more…
Why Labor is dying — an international perspective
The Labor Party looks set to receive fewer seats in the Knesset than at any other time in its history. There is even the possibility, albeit a slim one, that it will disappear entirely by…Read more…
Review: No Tomorrow, by Luke Jennings
Codename Villanelle was one of the most fun books I read in 2017. I was disappointed by the hit BBC series “Killing Eve” which was based on it, and was reluctant to give this book…Read more…
Review: The London Cage, by Helen Fry
In the end, this is a book about morality. The London Cage was a top secret interrogation centre set up by British intelligence during the Second World War. Located in Kensington Palace Gardens, it…Read more…
Review: Night of Camp David, by Fletcher Knebel
The story about this book goes something like this: Published in 1965 and a best-seller at the time, this was not Fletcher Knebel’s best work. That would be Seven Days in May, a successful…Read more…
A Tale of Two Revolutions
The following is the text of my talk at Tbilisi State University on 30 November 2018. I’d like us all to imagine that it is 100 years ago today, the 30th of November 1918. The…Read more…
Review: Vlasov and the Russian Liberation Movement: Soviet Reality and Emigré Theories, by Catherine Andreyev
Lieutenant General Andrey Andreyevich Vlasov rose steadily in the ranks of the Red Army until finally put in charge of one of Stalin’s “shock armies” and entrusted with the defence…Read more…
Review: The Secret Twenties: British Intelligence, The Russians and the Jazz Age, by Timothy Phillips
Timothy Phillips has written a gripping account of the secret war between the British intelligence services and the Bolsheviks during the 1920s. Based largely on documents he unearthed in the…Read more…
Review: The Spy and the Traitor – The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War, by Ben MacIntyre
Was Michael Foot, leader of the British Labour Party, a Soviet agent? Was Jack Jones, head of the country’s largest trade union, one as well? According to KGB officer Oleg Gordievsky, they both…Read more…
Review: Moonstone: The Boy Who Never Was, by Sjón
I read this book during the same week that I saw a theatrical adaptation of Albert Camus’ novel, The Plague. Both works are concerned with epidemics, but there the similarity ends. While the…Read more…
Review: Fear – Trump in the White House, by Bob Woodward
You know how you go to see a movie and all the best parts were already in the preview? That’s a bit like what happened to Bob Woodward’s 360 page book about the Trump White…Read more…
Review: Hiroshima, by John Hersey
John Hersey’s account of the lives of six survivors of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima was first published just a year after the events. Despite the passage of more than seventy years, the work…Read more…