This is a brilliant take on a major question pertaining to any revolution. How does a revolutionary movement deal with common prejudice against certain groups of the population? How it deals with its prejudiced supporters? And who, in fact, introduces relevant policies? The author, looking at the Red Army anti-Jewish pogroms during the 1917 - 1920 period, pointed out that particularly in Ukraine antisemitism was a common part of anti-bourgeois sentiment among the local peasantry, that is the group from which the majority of the Red Army soldiers came. He also pointed out that antisemitism was a convenient way for the peasantry to move back and forth between various sides of the civil war, since it provided them with an option to be anti-bourgeois with the Reds and anti-Jewish with the Whites. While the Bolsheviks were anti-racist in principle, the author described their reactions to the Red Army pogroms as sporadic and pointed out that such reactions got serious only when the Bolshevik authorities felt that antisemitism was effectively utilized by their enemies. On the other hand, he pointed out to various Jewish socialist bodies, largely non-Bolshevik though with Bolshevik members and supporting of the government, as consistently pushing towards anti-antisemitic policies, in particular towards anti-racist education in general, and within the army in particular. The main point of this book is that even during a revolution headed by an anti-racist organization, the main brunt of the struggle against racism is still on the activists belonging to a discriminated group and committed towards it, as their first priority. Just to point out that a similar point is commonly made by feminists-socialists while discussing the status of women in revolutionary organization.