markm reviewed Bloodlands by Timothy Snyder (dtv -- 34756)
Review of 'Bloodlands' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
My question before reading this book was wondering if a rehash of the Holocaust, the Great Terror, the Warsaw Uprising, etc. in which Fourteen million people were deliberately murdered by two regimes over twelve years would be worth the ensuing depression, just because the author organized his treatise based on the physical location of the events. The answer is yes, mostly because the book is more than that. His discussion does the following:
It attempts to accurately determine the number of lives lost and who was responsible for each stage of these crimes.
It highlights the crimes of the Soviets that are sometimes overlooked.
It compares and contrasts the motivations of Stalin and Hitler (if there were any in the usual sense).
It compares and contrasts the justifications needed by the actual physical murderers in the various scenarios in which they acted.
By itemizing, for example, the Holocaust deaths, it …
My question before reading this book was wondering if a rehash of the Holocaust, the Great Terror, the Warsaw Uprising, etc. in which Fourteen million people were deliberately murdered by two regimes over twelve years would be worth the ensuing depression, just because the author organized his treatise based on the physical location of the events. The answer is yes, mostly because the book is more than that. His discussion does the following:
It attempts to accurately determine the number of lives lost and who was responsible for each stage of these crimes.
It highlights the crimes of the Soviets that are sometimes overlooked.
It compares and contrasts the motivations of Stalin and Hitler (if there were any in the usual sense).
It compares and contrasts the justifications needed by the actual physical murderers in the various scenarios in which they acted.
By itemizing, for example, the Holocaust deaths, it helps us understand the historical development of this tragedy.
It discusses alterations of the reported number of deaths that have been made for political purposes.
It tries to provide comparisons to help emphasize the magnitude of these crimes, for example, More Poles were killed during the Warsaw Uprising alone than Japanese died in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.