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Warning to the West

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I returned to this slim volume following the Sept. 11 attacks. While America is now said to be fighting "terrorism," few have pointed out the similarities between terrorism and our old foe communism. Reading Solzhenitsyn is at once alarming and comforting. In reading these words, now a quarter of a century old, it is not at all a stretch to apply them to our present situation. He writes: "I would like to call upon America to be more careful with its trust to prevent those pundits who are attempting to establish fine degrees of justice and even finer legal shades of equality (some because of their distorted outlook, others because of short-sightedness, still others out of self-interest)to prevent them from using the struggle for peace and social justice to lead you down a false road. They are trying to weaken you; they are trying to disarm your strong and magnificent country in the face of this fearful threat -- one which has never before been seen in the history or the world. Not only in the history of the country, but in the history of the world." This treatise had a monumental effect on me when I was in college, helping to shape much of my politics. Going back and re-reading it, I find that its content is as powerful and as applicable as ever. To boot, Solzhenitsyn writes with a sense of urgency that is uniquely Russian -- he is similar to Dostoevsky in that way -- and, like Dostoevsky, for having been in the Gulag, his words ring powerfully, indeed. A wonderful companion volume to this would be his Nobel lecture (he won the Nobel for literature in 1970), where in speaking about writing and art, he says, "One word of truth outweighs the world." In short, he is one of the most important thinkers/writers of the century. It is disheartening that these speeches are out of print.

It is a somewhat daunting task to attempt to write an articulate review when Solzhenitsyn is so incredibly articulate himself. Suffice it to say that this book should be required reading for all world citizens, but especially those of us who carry American citizenship. We have much to learn from this book and we have a great deal to offer if we choose to engage.

The book is actually a collection of five speeches given in 1975 and 1976; three in the U.S. and two in the U.K.

There are numerous lessons and insights that are highly relevant. Perhaps a selected quote from the author's last speech provides a glimpse at why this work is so worth reading and contemplating. "We have become hopelessly enmeshed in our slavish worship of all that is pleasant, all that is comfortable, all that is material -- we worship things, we worship products. Will we ever succeed in shaking off this burden, in giving free rein to the spirit that was breathed into us at birth, that spirit which distinguishes us from the animal world."

Read this book if you are wondering how polical correctness got this far. He nails the pseudopacifist in their feel good rush from responsibility. I believe he is right in questioning the ethos of the persuit of happiness. What does it mean to be an American? If we have nothing we will die for, don't be suprised when others who do, kill us.

These are powerful reminders of the underlying driving force of secular humanism and communism. We see the u.s. closer than ever, to giving up it founding principals in favor of these "religions of man". Every step taken is ground that is never surrendered. We need to learn these lessons now, before this collapse hits critical mass. you can find audio of some of these speeches online. This book should be required reading for all.

Predictions all correct. Writing clear and prophetic. Coming true in vivid detail. Could be instrumental immediately in averting disaster in the West.

The warnings of the Cold War are just as poignant today with regards to the new enemy of Western Civilization. Appeasement is always doomed to failure.

Reread tonight after a couple of decades. How interesting to see George Meany and Lane Kirkland writing introductions...the American labor movement has "moved" away from these guys for sure. Written in the 70's, this title is as relevant today as it was then: Liberty versus tyranny. This is "brief" for Solzhenitsyn, so take advantage. Highly recommended.

It is not very often that one person can have such an influence and an understanding of what is wrong with our world; the United States in particular.
It isn't even a warning from a religious point of view, but can be viewed as such, even though it is from a secular slant.
We need to wake up to the encroaching persistence of socialism, humanism, and most importantly, atheism. Our need for God back into our government has never been more needed.
Our present governing body (and to a degree that from the past century)has slowly eroded our freedoms given us by our founders. One day we will wake up and say, "what happened?"

Mr. Solzhenitsyn is a well-spoken individual. He is a friend of the West and, as a friend, he warns about failures in Western thought. The speeches in this book were delivered at a time when the USSR was considered to be strong. That is not our precise political or economic position right now; however, his observations are very perceptive. In my opinion, you would do well to read them.

Solzhenitsyn wrote this work at a time when there still was an Iron Curtain and a Cold War. His warning was an effort to somehow reinstill in the West, spiritual values and an awareness of its true duties. The essence of his message was given in his famous Harvard Commencement address,
"If humanism were right in declaring that man is born to be happy, he would not be born to die. Since his body is doomed to die, his task on earth evidently must be of a more spiritual nature. It cannot unrestrained enjoyment of everyday life. It cannot be the search for the best ways to obtain material goods and then cheerfully get the most out of them. It has to be the fulfillment of a permanent, earnest duty so that one's life journey may become an experience of moral growth, so that one may leave life a better human being than one started it. It is imperative to review the table of widespread human values. Its present incorrectness is astounding. It is not possible that assessment of the President's performance be reduced to the question of how much money one makes or of unlimited availability of gasoline. Only voluntary, inspired self-restraint can raise man above the world stream of materialism."

This rejection of Western materialism is also for Solzhenitsyn a rejection of what he sees as too great a focus placed on legal rights, on individual happiness, on a freedom to seek after pleasure.
He believes that all this has ' weakened the West' and that it therefore stands threatened by what he believes are the stronger characters of those who have lived in systems of oppression in the East.
This of course has, as we have seen with the fall of the Soviet Union and the threat Solzhenitsyn so feared, proven to be illusory. The people of the former Soviet Union and especially those in Russia and Ukraine have revealed no special powers and skills in confronting the world.
However the warning to the West ironically does have relevance today in relation to the new threat to Civlization, that from Radical Islamic Terrorism. Here there is something to be said about ' the best lacking all conviction and the worst being full of passionate intensity'. I do believe that the internal divisions within the West itself, the kinds of self- defeating trends Solzhenitsyn noticed are still here.
One more point. Solzhenitsyn fell into a certain disfavor after his warning to the West, because many secular liberals who had supported him were dismayed to see that fundamentally and most deeply he was a Russian Orthodox Christian whose view of the world is far from that of post-modern relativists.
My own sense is that Solzhenitsyn somehow missed the special spirit of freedom which is at the heart of American greatness. My sense is that he somehow did not 'get' America.
But his warning is powerful and strong and certainly touches upon many points of weakness there is much to say and think about.
One other point. The great Solzhenitsyn is not the Solzhenitsyn who is making a Warning to the West, or who is as it were being a Prophet of Mankind as a whole. The great Solzhenitsyn is the one who told of the horrific world of suffering which is Archipelag Gulag. In doing that he was one of mankind's great writer- witnesses.