Ukraine and Spain - Reading

[Stranger Than Paradise]

Can anyone recommend me books which detail the revolutions in Spain 1936 and Ukraine 1919, I want books that describe the revolution, the organisation of these areas and their eventual defeat.

[Comrade Gwydion]

Spain:
Anthony Beevor, the Battle for Spain.

Otherwise, read Orwell ^^;;

[Искра]

Orwell is shit. :)

Ukraine:
Alexandre Skirda: Nestor Makhno Anarchy's Cossack: The Struggle for Free Soviets in the Ukraine 1917-1921
Paul Arvich: Russian Anarchists

Spain:
http://www.freedompress.org.uk/images/books/thumbs/0900384549.jpg (http://www.freedompress.org.uk/public/book.oml%3FbookId=40.html) Spain: Social Revolution - Counter Revolution

[Manifesto]

Spain: The Unfinished Revolution

[Искра]

Spain: Anarchism in Action http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/spain/pam_intro.html
Gaston Leval: Collectives in Spanish revolution http://libcom.org/library/collectives-spanish-revolution-gaston-leval

[The Ungovernable Farce]

Orwell is the shit. Beyond that, I'll do what I always do and recommend Ronald Fraser - Blood of Spain, which has fuckloads of interviews with participants from all over the spectrum.
Dunno if History of the Makhnovist Movement by Arshinov (http://www.nestormakhno.info/english/arshinov/index.htm) is any good, but the name sounds useful. In fact, nestormakhno.info looks like it might be useful in general. Beyond that, as ever, the libcom library is your friend.

[Tjis]

Orwell is the shit. Beyond that, I'll do what I always do and recommend Ronald Fraser - Blood of Spain, which has fuckloads of interviews with participants from all over the spectrum.
Dunno if History of the Makhnovist Movement by Arshinov (http://www.nestormakhno.info/english/arshinov/index.htm) is any good, but the name sounds useful. In fact, nestormakhno.info looks like it might be useful in general. Beyond that, as ever, the libcom library is your friend.

nestormakhno.info is very good, and History of the Makhnovist Movement is a good book. The problem though is that it was written by Arshinov, who himself was a Makhnovist. So parts are probably biased, especially in the parts where the only source available to Arshinov was Arshinov's own memory.
The problem is that a lot of information on the Makhnovist movement was simply lost. The only things we still have are some military messages (from both sides, arguably the only thing unbiased we still have), the various party papers of the time (very much biased, they conflict with each other on many facts) and accounts from people like Arshinov and Trotsky.

There are also various fabrications from this time, like for example a diary of Makhno's supposed wife which is still often used by historians. Here are some quotes to give you an idea of its contents:



Mar. 7. In Varvarovka. Makhno got very drunk, began swearing loudly in the street in unprintable language. We arrived in Gulyay-Polye, and something incredible began under Makhno's drunken orders. The cavalrymen used their whips and the butts of their rifles against all the former Red partisans they met in the streets. They charged like a mad horde into innocent people.... Two had their heads broken and one was driven into the river



June 5, 1920. At Zaitsevo station Makhno had telephone and telegraph communications cut, the track in front and behind
train No. 423 torn up, the property on the train plundered and all Communists hacked to pieces.




We were told that our troops had captured 40 prisoners. We went into the village and saw a bunch of people sitting on the ground; then some of them stood up and got undressed. These were the prisoners. They were getting undressed for the shooting... . When they had taken off their clothes and shoes, they were ordered to tie one another's hands. They were all young, healthy-looking Russian boys. We moved back a bit and stopped. When the prisoners were all undressed, they started to lead them away one by one to be shot. After several of them had been shot in this way, the rest of them were lined up and mowed down by a machine gun. One fellow tried to run, but he was overtaken and cut down with a sabre.


This diary is most likely a bolshevik fabrication. It is certainly not from the hand of Makhno's wife. The entire thing has been debunked here: http://nestormakhno.info/english/litvinov-diary.htm.

Things like this make studying this period of time very difficult.

The Spanish civil war is a much easier period to study. Much more groups were involved, and much more was written about it.

[Absolut]

Id recommend History of the Makhnovist Movement by Peter Arshinov and for Russiah anarchism in general, The Unkown Revolution by Voline. Theres a chapter in Volines book that deals with the Makhnovchina.

Speaking of fabrication, I read in a pamphlet from the 70's, that Makhno had decreed that noone had to obey his orders while he was drunk. The pamphlet was small, like 10 pages and I havent been able to find this information anywhere else. Can anyone confirm this? Sounds like a fabrication to me, but Im not sure.

[Искра]

Id recommend History of the Makhnovist Movement by Peter Arshinov
I wouldn't recommend you this book, because I think that Arshinov writes in "Bolshevik style" - too much propaganda, too little history related stuff.

But then, It won't hurt you if you read the book :) I just say that Skidra's book is 100% better ;)

[Tjis]

Speaking of fabrication, I read in a pamphlet from the 70's, that Makhno had decreed that noone had to obey his orders while he was drunk. The pamphlet was small, like 10 pages and I havent been able to find this information anywhere else. Can anyone confirm this? Sounds like a fabrication to me, but Im not sure.

From http://nestormakhno.info/english/litvinov-diary.htm (about the fabricated diary)

We can make reference to a quite unambiguous document – Order #1 of the Revolutionary-Insurgent Army of August 5, 1919. Thus, in paragraph 5 of this order it is directly stated: "Drunkenness is considered a crime. An even worse crime is for an insurgent of the Revolutionary Army to be seen in a non-sober state in public." (P. Arshinov, History of the Makhnovist Movement, p. 214). Such an attitude towards drunkenness goes back to a tradition which took root among the Zaporozhian Cossacks of this region, for whom there was no more shameful offence than drunkenness during military operations. Could Makhno really brazenly ignore his own orders during the developments of 1920?

It's unlikely that Makhno was drunk often, if at all. So such an order would not make much sense.

[Искра]

It's unlikely that Makhno was drunk often, if at all. So such an order would not make much sense.

As I know. Makhno fall in barrel of alcohol when he was kid . That why he haven't drink until he flee to Paris.

[Stranger Than Paradise]

Thanks for the recommendations everyone, I will look into ordering some of those books online, I'm trying to buy lots of Anarchist literature which I have not read already.

[Искра]

Thanks for the recommendations everyone, I will look into ordering some of those books online, I'm trying to buy lots of Anarchist literature which I have not read already.
AK press has most of stuff we told you about

[HEAD ICE]

Is Makhno profiled in Avrich's "Anarchist Portraits" ? He is an anarchist but he takes a very fair view towards things imo.

[Искра]

Is Makhno profiled in Avrich's "Anarchist Portraits" ? He is an anarchist but he takes a very fair view towards things imo.
I don't know.
I think that Mahkno is in "Russian anarchists".

[Nwoye]

[/URL]In addition to Orwell and Beevor, I would recommend Noam Chomsky's [URL="http://question-everything.mahost.org/Archive/chomskyspain.html"]Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship (http://question-everything.mahost.org/Archive/chomskyspain.html). It's obviously from an explicitly anarchist perspective, but it's still a very in-depth and well-researched piece.

[ComradeOm]

If you want an historical account of the Ukraine then I'd avoid both Arshinov and Voline for the same reason I wouldn't reccomend Trotsky. Ditto for Spain


I think that Mahkno is in "Russian anarchists"He is but the portrait presented is curiously confused. On the one hand Avrich is certainly not blind to the movement's failings (particularly in urban centres) but he also accepts the tale of Makhno meeting personally with Lenin - for which I believe the only source for is Makhno himself

[Искра]

He is but the portrait presented is curiously confused. On the one hand Avrich is certainly not blind to the movement's failings (particularly in urban centres) but he also accepts the tale of Makhno meeting personally with Lenin - for which I believe the only source for is Makhno himself
Do you have any proof that Makhno and Leninin never have met?

[ComradeOm]

Do you have any proof that Makhno and Leninin never have met?You are asking me to prove that something never happened?

AFAIK (and I stress that I am going by memory here) the only account of Makhno's meeting with Lenin comes from Makhno himself. There is no record of it in Soviet records, the dairies of other participants, or even Makhno's colleagues/propagandists at the time, such as Arshinov. To uncritically accept this uncorroborated account as fact is poor form for a historian