War with Russia?: From Putin & Ukraine to Trump & Russiagate

"In a Time of Universal Deceit — Telling the Truth Is a Revolutionary Act" is a well known quotation (but probably not of George Orwell). And in telling the truth about Russia and that the current "war of nerves" is not in the interests of either the American People or national security, Professor Cohen in this book has in fact done a revolutionary act.Like a denizen of Plato's cave, or being in the film the Matrix, most people have no idea what the truth is. And the questions raised by Professor Cohen are a great service in the cause of the truth. As Professor Cohen writes in his introduction To His Readers:"My scholarly work—my biography of Nikolai Bukharin and essays collected in Rethinking the Soviet Experience and Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives, for example—has always been controversial because it has been what scholars term “revisionist”—reconsiderations, based on new research and perspectives, of prevailing interpretations of Soviet and post-Soviet Russian history. But the “controversy” surrounding me since 2014, mostly in reaction to the contents of this book, has been different—inspired by usually vacuous, defamatory assaults on me as “Putin’s No. 1 American Apologist,” “Best Friend,” and the like. I never respond specifically to these slurs because they offer no truly substantive criticism of my arguments, only ad hominem attacks. Instead, I argue, as readers will see in the first section, that I am a patriot of American national security, that the orthodox policies my assailants promote are gravely endangering our security, and that therefore we—I and others they assail—are patriotic heretics. Here too readers can judge."Cohen, Stephen F.. War with Russia (Kindle Locations 131-139). Hot Books. Kindle Edition.Professor Cohen is indeed a patriot of the highest order. The American and "Globalists" elites, particularly the dysfunctional United Kingdom, are engaging in a war of nerves with Russia. This war, which could turn nuclear for reasons discussed in this important book, is of no benefit to any person or nation.Indeed, with the hysteria on "climate change" isn't it odd that other than Professor Cohen's voice, there are no prominent figures warning of the devastation that nuclear war would bring?If you are a viewer of one of the legacy media outlets, be it Cable Television networks, with the exception of Tucker Carlson on Fox who has Professor Cohen as a frequent guest, or newspapers such as The New York Times, you have been exposed to falsehoods by remarkably ignorant individuals; ignorant of history, of the true nature of Russia (which defeated the Nazis in Europe at a loss of millions of lives) and most important, of actual military experience. America is neither an invincible or exceptional nation. And for those familiar with terminology of ancient history, it appears the so-called elites are suffering from hubris.I cannot recommend Professor Cohen's work with sufficient superlatives; his arguments are erudite, clearly stated, supported by the facts and ultimately irrefutable. If enough people find Professor Cohen's work and raise their voices to their oblivious politicians and profiteers from war to stop further confrontation between Russia and America, then this book has served a noble purpose.If nothing else, educate yourself by reading this work to discover what the *truth* is. And the truth is something sacred.America and the world owe Professor Cohen a great debt. "Blessed are the peace makers..."

I have followed Stephen Cohen for a while and read all his books. This is undoubtedly my favorite, it has a good balance between history and current events. If you are interested in current events and want to get informed about Russia, which seems to be on the mind of everyone right now, buy this book.

Stephen Cohen is a well respected scholar who has studied Russia and the Soviet Union for over 50 years. He provides facts often neglected in today’s agenda driven media.An interesting quote found in the book from a surprising source, Henry Kissinger: “The demonization of Vladimir Putin is not a policy. It is an alibi for not having one.” And then notes Cohen, “But Kissinger was also wrong. Washington has made many policies strongly influenced by the demonizing of Putin—a personal vilification far exceeding any ever applied to Soviet Russia’s latter-day Communist leaders.”Cohen’s calm reasoned analysis regarding Russia is sadly all too uncommon. It is difficult to overstate the importance of his work

On the planet I live on, detente was a tactical strategy adopted by Nixon and Kissinger in a moment of weakness after the US defeat in the Vietnam War. With two equally powerful superpowers on the globe capable of mutually-assured destruction, detente was based on the idea that the USSR wasn't inherently evil and worthy of active opposition. Detente was abandoned by Carter after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.On Mr. Cohen's planet, detente is as appropriate a strategy today as it was in the 1970s. Only the situation is now vastly different: The former Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe have switched sides and joined NATO Half of the former USSR is now independent from Russia. Cohen believes that detente remains the appropriate strategy for the last 50 years no matter what Russian has done. Abandoning detente in the wake of Afghanistan and Crimea is the wrong strategy, even though the former led to the US's greatest foreign policy success since WWII.On Mr. Cohen's planet, an aggressive trade pact offered by the EU prompted Mr. Yanukovich's downfall. On my planet, Mr. Yanukovich backed out of a highly popular trade deal negotiated over five years with two Ukrainian administrations. He backed out three days before signing. Since much of the public believed the deal offered a route to greater economic prosperity and less corruption, peaceful occupation of the Euromaidan began immediately. The situation was initially very similar to the peaceful Orange Revolution of 2004-5, that began after Yanukovich was declared a winner (by 3%) despite exit polling showing him losing by 11%. Only in 2013-2014, the government's efforts to remove the demonstrators turned violent. Mr Putin claims the demonstrators (500,000 on Dec 8) were merely hirelings of the CIA and Mr. Cohen doesn't challenge this claim. As the violence grew worse, the US and EU negotiated a settlement between Mr. Yanukovich and his political opponents, but by then it was too late. When publicly informed of the agreement by opposition leaders, the demonstrators (a coalition of many groups who had seen 50 killed the previous day) unanimously rejected the settlement and warned Yanukovich they would be coming for him tomorrow. The police had melted away, many officials had resigned and no one left was willing to protect Yanukovich. He fled to Russia that night. The next day Parliament voted 338-0 to declare the Presidency vacant (17 votes short of the constitutional 3/4), appointed an interim government and scheduled elections. Ignoring Yanukowich's complete lack of internal support and his flight, Cohen calls this a "coup" (p17). The same night Yanukovich fled, Putin launched the operation to seize Crimea and annexed it less than 1 month later. The US has recently undertaken questionable military operations in a number of countries beginning with Kosovo, but never without first taking the time to attempt to negotiate a peaceful settlement.In my world, Ukraine, Russia, the US and the UK signed the Budapest Memorandum pledging to respect the territorial integrity of Ukraine in return for decommission Ukraine's nuclear forces. This agreement isn't found in the index of Cohen's book.On my planet, the evidence linking Putin to the assassination of Litvinecko, Nemtsov, and Politkovskaya and the attempt on the Skripals is strong and consistent with spending his formative years in the KGB. The naive view from Cohen's planet is presented on p 6 and 170.The worst sins in this book arise from its structure. The first 10 pages of the book comprise an overview, and the remaining 200 pages are paste ups of talks, articles and blog posts since 2014, and mostly since 2016. In most cases, these articles consist of Cohen defending Putin's position in response to breaking news. For example, we get Cohen's initial 12/15/16 response to reports that Russia hacked the DNC on p74-75, but we aren't told about the large amount of information collected since then, including reports that the Dutch had hacked into the Russian operation that hacked the DNC. Mueller has indicted several dozens Russians in connection with the break in. Cohen is supposed to be an important scholar and historian. He knows that biased first impressions from breaking news do not constitute history.This "scholarly work" was published to some organization called Hot Books, whose website was non-functional at the time of this review. The book covers contain only one ambiguous comment from a reviewer I don't recognize. The remaining comments are refer to Cohen's previous books. Praise from that Russia scholar Tucker Carlson is mentioned at Amazon. Cohen's previous books were publisher by major publishers. Apparently they agree with me that Cohen is the one living on a different planet.I bought this book hoping to hear a different perspective on our deteriorating relationship with Russia. I had doubts about the expansion of NATO into countries with large numbers of ethnic Russians - countries that need to reach compromises with their powerful neighbor. The Ukraine is a classic example. It has maintained a marginally separate national identity and language, but the east is predominantly Russian. Western Ukraine contains the Polish territory Hitler gave to Stalin and is anti-Russian. The Ukrainians twice drove the Red Army from Kiev during the civil war that followed the overthrow of the tsar. Millions of Ukrainians saw Hitler as a potential liberator of the Ukrainian people and Nazism is a powerful force in some areas. I was hoping to hear some nuanced and realistic information about these issues, not an apologist for Putin.

This is the book to read, if you want to know how we got in this terrible mess. Nuclear War isn’t any longer a remote possibility, it might even be ‘highly likely’. Cohen, who warned in vain all along, tells how it happened, and who’s to blame. Lucid, intelligent, very illuminating and indispensable.

I think this book is slightly misleading in how it is advertised. As Cohen himself addresses in the preface addressed to the reader, this is is not a traditional book but more of a compilation of radio broadcasts and contemporary reports from the 2014 crisis in Ukraine up to 2018. The book is also without a traditional conclusion, with Cohen himself noting that the book "like a biography of a living person" is without an end".As for what is written, I think it's good to have voices such as Cohens to offer a dissenting point of view to the masses. The author's views may challenge your own pre-established world views, and whether or not you put the book down agreeing with him isnt entirely the point. What is important, to me, is looking at events from a different lens.Did I disagree with a lot that was written? Yes, to an extent. In the opening prologue about Vladimir Putin, Cohen takes apart criticisms of the Russian president, blaming the vast majority of Russia's woes on the Yeltzin administration, the oligarchs that appeared in the 1990s and the United States, a lot of which I agree with. But what does strike me as a tad bit hypocritical is Cohen's willingness to criticise those with anti-Putin and anti-Russian views (be they rational or Russophobic), but rather than adress the issues himself he instead prefers 'to leave it to historians'.Whilst I would hardly say I enjoyed this book, I am glad to have read it as I was looking for an opposing viewpoint than that of the vast majority of books published about contemporary Russian politics.As for the physical copy I received, I was disappointed by the quality. It almost looks and feels used.

Excellent purchase. Good book. Would recommend.

Excellent and very informative book from a very reputable journalist.

Hmmm. Curious interpretation of events.

Different outlook