Martin Malia (1924–2004)

Malia necessarily brief history of the Soviet Union is invaluable. He traces the trajectory of Socialism as it moved first away from market economics then when failure loomed, revived limited markets and price setting. Once breathing room was restored, back to building Socialism and suppressing markets. Malia shows how the series of Terrors hammered the populations of the Soviet Union into the mold that made them tools to be used and disposed of by the Party.

In parallel, I read Anne Applebaum's "Gulag: a History" and reading and comparing the evolution of the Gulag in lock step with the developments in larger Soviet command state made clear the fact that all Soviet citizens occupied a vast prison. The Gulag merely was a prison within a prison, able and willing to requisition bodies as needed from the outer prison whenever some more blood was needed to grease the wheels of the Train of History.… (mais)