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Article: Hijacked by history; Post-war politics.(Stalin's Wars: From World War to Cold War, 1939-1953)(From Roosevelt to Truman: Potsdam, Hiroshima, and the Cold War)(Book review)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- January 6, 2007
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2007 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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WHAT happens when the leaders of a powerful nation arrive at the end of a long and bloody war and try to give shape to the world beyond it? This question ultimately lies at the heart of two new historical studies, one by Geoffrey Roberts, an associate professor at University College Cork, and the other by Wilson Miscamble, a historian at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana. Both look backward and forward from the bloody fulcrum of 1945 to see how wartime experiences shaped the cold-war world.
Mr Roberts provides the more colourful account. His telling of the basic narratives of the Hitler-Stalin pact, the Nazi betrayal of it and the long gruelling combat on the ...