Odd Arne Westad

The Coming Storm by Odd Arne Westad is an excellent example of how history can be used to warn us about future events by showing how past similarities played out. This isn't predictive but a warning about potentialities.

This is, in many ways, a history book. But not a pure history book in that its purpose is not to simply expound on the past but to make explicit what we can learn from it that can help us with our current world. So there are no digressions from the history since the purpose show more of the book is what some may think are digressions. If you understand the aim of the book you won't make the same misjudgement or experience the same disappointment. In other words, read it for what it is, not what you might have wanted.

Active readers will not only have a lot to consider here but will also be thankful Westad assumed a certain level of intelligence in his readers and didn't feel the need to repeat the purpose of the book every time a point was made about similarities. Early in this volume he explains why he thinks we can look at the period before WWI and draw parallels with what is happening now. He explains how he will demonstrate that idea and also highlight some big picture ideas for how to steer everything away from another global conflict. As long as you're capable of keeping that in mind while reading, you will have no problem understanding how the similarities operate.

I wasn't sure at first just how much I was going to buy into his overall argument, but by the end I was convinced of the potential for events to follow a path not too different than before. Other multipolar periods of history that came before aren't appropriate for comparison for several reasons. The weapons available before 1800 weren't truly weapons of mass destruction, they weren't capable of killing people who were not in the vicinity of where the weapon was deployed. Additionally, the "world" prior to the "age of discovery" was smaller, in fact, there were several "worlds" on our planet, so while there were widespread destructive wars, they weren't global and weren't going to become global.

I think if you read this without trying to make it seem like Westad is saying that there are exact substitutions for the powers between eras and/or that he is claiming the same things will happen now that happened then, you will be able to engage with the big picture without getting lost and thinking there were no connections made. The point is that there are multiple players each with the ability to start a global conflict, even if they are viewing their actions as being more regional and specific. Between alliances and the interconnected nature of every aspect of live globally, regional power plays have the potential to be the beginning of a catastrophic global war.

Again, this is a warning based on historical facts and similarities. These aren't predictions. If we act with these possibilities in mind we can avoid an outcome similar to what came before. That is one of the main benefits of viewing history as something more than a collection of facts and narratives somehow isolated from our current world. This volume is an example of how to use history properly.

Recommended for history buffs and, more importantly, those in policy positions or studying to get into positions influencing policy.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley. show less

Written by not a US or UK national and it tells. It is far more balanced in its assessment of events. I would say it's ±70% ideal. Why 70? Because even in this tour de force equally diabolical acts of the US and the West still leave an impression of being less sinister and nefarious than those of the USSR :(

Во времена продолжающейся мировой напряженности, которую некоторые называют второй холодной войной, show more вышла новая попытка осмысления первой. Автор — норвежец, и это заметно — большинство работ его англосаксонских коллег нашему читателю можно изучать, только если он мазохист: героические силы западного Добра сопротивляются и, наконец, одолевают советское Зло по всему миру. Типичная история, написанная победителями, к примеру, бестселлер йельского профессора Дж. Л. Гэддиса The Cold War: A New History. Скандинаву такое манихейство не свойственно, и дьявольские козни американцев и их союзников он называет своими именами. Впрочем, к СССР он тоже относится без излишних симпатий, но этим книга и ценна — это наиболее объективный рассказ о главном противостоянии XX века. Отойдя от американоцентризма, Вестад смог лучше и глубже рассказать о третьем мире и социалистических странах — тут коллеги из США в основном проходят по верхам. А напрасно, ведь рассказ о том, как банановая корпорация United Fruit (ныне Chiquita) держала за горло всю Центральную Америку, может, не достаточно эпичен, но точно иллюстративен. Таких важных нюансов у Вестада приятно много. show less

A fascinating and wide-reaching new postcolonial account of the Cold War. Instead of the classic view of Cold War contention as chiefly European, Westad argues, here, that the Cold War consisted of colonial-interventionist actions in the Third World by the US and USSR to legitimize their state ideologies and to naively usher in modernity. However, the leaders of Third World had plans of their own. They played each superpower against the other for aid and eventually they revolted, thus show more spelling the end of the Cold War. show less

As the title of this history suggests the narrative goes well beyond the two major protagonists, the Soviet Union and the United States. We have aggressive behaviors all in the name of high ideals of the USSR's military suppression of Hungary and Czechoslovakia and confrontation on the Chinese boarders and in Berlin while the US was undermining democratically elected governments in Iran, Guatemala, and Chile. Why the US early on backed Pakistan and opposed India is another curious story. show more Having lived through most of these times especially remembering at the end of JFK's televised speech on Cuba and its missiles with a strident stirring version of our national anthem, it was good to get this refresher and expansion. This book will be too dense too complete for some but the history presented is impeccable and thorough and needed

Quotes: (page 76) “The Greek disaster led Stalin to demand that other Communists, from China to Italy, not act prematurely. While the Soviets believed that World War II would create revolutions, just as Lenin had taught about the first world war, they expected them mainly in those parts of Europe where the Red Army could help protect them, meaning in the east. Stalin's view was that other Communist parties had neither the experience nor the theoretical understanding to take and keep power on their own. Only when they were guided by the Soviet Union and protected by the Red Army would they stand a chance of permanently defeating their enemies. The Soviet leader remembered well the 'Soviet republics' that had sprung up all over Europe, from Finland to Hungary and Bavaria, after 1918. They had, the Soviet leader was fond of explaining, quickly been snuffed out by a better-armed and better-organized Right-wing, supported by the imperialist countries. What made the 1940's different, Stalin believed, was the existence of the Soviet Union as a political and military great power.”

(page 346) “In 1952 President Arbenz expropriated uncultivated land---against compensation that the owners found to be far too low. The Guatemalan government divided the expropriated land among one hundred thousand landless peasant families. Washington protested, but to no avail.
It was not the complaints of United Fruit executives, or the stories their PR department planted in North American newspapers, however that made that made the U.S. government decide to intervene. It was the fear of Communism. 'In Guatemala,' President Eisenhower told a congressional delegation, 'the Reds are in control and they are trying to spread their influence to San Salvador as a first step of the breaking out...to other South American countries.' By spring 1954 Eisenhower had given the green light to prepare the overthrow of Arbenz, and the CIA put together an operation that also involved military opponents of the Guatemalan president and parts of the civilian opposition. The United States organized the training of rebel troupes, set up a propaganda radio station, and-after the Guatemalan government tried to boost military capacity through buying arms from Czechoslovakia, a member of the Soviet bloc---declared a blockade against the country.

(page 436) “The fear of many founders of the Non-Aligned Movement in 1961 was that the death throws of colonialism could lead to new wars. While 'a lasting peace can be achieved only if...the domination of colonialism-imperialsim is radically eliminated...the Conference resolutely rejects the view that war, including the 'cold war,' is inevitable, as this view reflects a sense both of helplessness and hopelessness...They affirm their unwavering faith that the international community is able to organize its life without resorting to means which actually belong to the past epoch of human history.' For Nehru, the Belgrade declaration was both a design for a future without a Cold War and a warning about how fragile global peace actually was.
...Belgrade was not only different from Bandung because European and Latin American countries were represented: it was also different because the conference was more about the right to independence, sovereignty, and peace than about Third World solidarity.”

(page 559) “While Deng was a daring experimenter in economic policy, he was much less certain in international affairs. He knew that he needed a good relationship with the United States and linked Chinese foreign policy closely to that of Washington. Having imbibed Mao's perception of the Soviet Union as a deadly threat to China, Deng believed that working with the Americans provided protection as well as economic opportunities. And the United States was happy to oblige.” show less