Customer Reviews

The Rise and Fall of the Communist Revolution

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This is a truly unique history. It is written by a man who lived through the entire life of the USSR and had special contacts at different times which gave him a closer look at the Communist Revolution.

This book deals very fairly with everyone. It doesn't whitewash anyone, or forgive those who are now revered. It also maintains intellectual integrity by openly stating the bias of the author and not making claims that it doesn't back up.

This book is valuable as more than a history. This book is a better read than many novels. It can make you sick to your stomach or angry enough to cry. It is not an uplifting read, if that's what you're looking for, but it is surely enlightening and enthralling. I often could not put it down because I was so caught up in the story.

I guarantee, you will not regret reading this book.

This is an excellent, non-nonsense account of the great struggle of the 20th century. When my children ask me what communism was (and why it was so malevolent), I will hand them this book.

Warren Carroll's history of Communism is well worth reading, but it does have some flaws. For one thing, it assumes that the reader has a basic grounding in the history of the 20th century: he mentions certain famous events, such as the "kitchen debate", in passing, assuming that the reader will recognize them. Considering how little history most people know these days, that assumption is unwarranted. Second, he devotes a great deal of space to the political machinations that the Communists used in Russia and Eastern Europe, thereby leaving the impression that the Communists were devoted to democratic processes before achieving power and suddenly changed their tune once they were in charge. In fact, of course, they were totalitarians from the beginning. Perhaps most seriously, he notes that refugees fled Communist countries by the millions but says only that this is because Communism was "profoundly unpopular". This has to be the understatement of the century. It was not merely unpopular, it was loathed. He never mentions that daily life was a nightmare: inadequate food supplies, drab and crowded apartments, lies and propaganda, the constant fear of arbitrary force, and so on.

All that aside, this is a fascinating book. The narrative moves swiftly, and Carroll sheds light on the often mysterious motivations of Communist leaders. Like Paul Johnson, he deftly picks out telling incidents that changed the course of history or simply reveal character. Particularly good are his remarks on Chiang Kai-shek and on the many blunders or even treasonous acts that led to the tragic defeat in Vietnam. Not for beginners, but good for those who know the basics and want to delve a little deeper.

The back cover of this book briefly describes the author's work as a CIA analyst. Throughout its corpus, inside information is revealed relative to the communist movement and its apparent rise and fall. The discerning reader is left with the distinct impression that, however brief the author's official CIA career may have been, his allegiance to certain Agency men and doctrines, at the very least, has remained.

Carroll begins this 831 page tome with his description of the Bolshevik Revolution, an event he basically depicts as being a natural and nationalistic rising against a sovereign lacking in morals. The reality, of course, is that the Bolshevik revolution was financed by international bankers, such as Jacob Schiff of New York, and led by international freemasons like Lenin and Trotsky. Moreover, for one such as Warren Carroll, who is in sympathy with the hideous Knights Templar freemasons, to describe Czar Saint Nicholas II as being lacking in morals is equivalent to Julian, the Apostate, charging Saint Hilary of Poitiers with immorality. Czar Saint Nicholas II is a canonized saint of the Russian Orthodox Church, the last national leader in world history to be so recognized. Warren Carroll is evidently an unrepentent freemasonic sympathizer.

Carroll moves from this absurdity to eulogize the communist mass murderer Lenin. If I had not read this author's previous works, I would have been terribly shocked at his assessment. As this is the seventh of his books that I have read, I have come to expect the unexpected.

Next on Carroll's list of favorites is mass murderer Leon Trotsky. Carroll's favorable treatment of this blood drenched fiend portrays the author's later allegiance with the lunatic neoconservative cabal of the American "right".

Later in his narrative, Carroll discovers that many of the Soviet leaders were actually Jewish. It is noteworthy that this discovery comes only because those particular leaders were drummed out of the party by Stalin. Sadly, in this, Carroll seems not to have noticed that both Stalin's right hand man, Kagonovich, and his second wife, Kagonovich's sister, were also Jewish. He is a disinformation specialist, but not a very good one.

When we reach the time of Krushchev in Carroll's narrative, an interesting character emerges on the American side of the struggle. That character is John Kennedy, the only Catholic President in the long history of the United States. Now, Carroll calls himself a Catholic, although this is quite obviously untrue. But even as a matter of pretense, one would think that Carroll would have good things to say about America's only Catholic President. He does not. In fact, there is one scant sentence in the 813 page narrative relative to the assassination of America's last great President. Carroll observes merely that Kennedy's death "suddenly brought Johnson to the office of the Presidency". This is astonishing!

We must wonder why Carroll is so singularly deceitful in his treatment of Kennedy. A very good case could be made that Carroll, with his obvious CIA insider information, knows a great deal more about Kennedy's murder than he would have us know. It is interesting to note that Warren Carroll's name shows up in much of the literature extant with respect to the assassination of JFK. In this case, Carroll apparently figures, the less said, the better.

Toward the end of the book, Carroll provides interesting detail relative to CIA involvement in the fall of the Shah of Iran, the usurpation of Nicaragua, the solidarity movement in Poland, and most importantly, the war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. Here, Carroll reveals that is was the CIA that essentially created the mujaheddin movement in Afghanistan, which, of course, later fructified into what we now know as Al Queda.

Now that we have read seven of Carroll's books and much associated material, we can conclude, without a reasonable doubt, that the author is a profoundly evil man. That said, this book includes much worthwhile detail. It is simply imperative for the serious student to cross check whatever it is that this disinformation specialist says.