The Battle For Spain

[Os Cangaceiros]

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/0297848321.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

Has anyone read it? It's the third book (and a number of different articles) I've read on the Spanish revolution, and by far one of the most interesting. It really made me hate the Communists, even more so than I already do. The paranoia about "Trotskyist/Fascist" infiltration on the front lines was so great that guns were actually trained on the Republicans from their rear flank by the order of some commanders in case any undercover Trotskyists tried to run!

Another thing I found amusing was that for all his hysterical blubbering about the "Reds", Franco pretty much set up a statist economy in Spain that was very similar to various Soviet bloc countries...and became completely stagnant as a result.

[Lamanov]

No, but I can suggest this one: try Hugh Thomas, Spanish Civil War, I-II. Even though the guy was a conservative his awarded book is pretty fair and backed up by huge amount of facts.

Also, read this: Homage to Catalonia (http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0201111.txt) by George Orwell. By far his best book.

[Dean]

Originally posted by [email protected] 06, 2007 05:41 pm
Has anyone read it? It's the third book (and a number of different articles) I've read on the Spanish revolution, and by far one of the most interesting. It really made me hate the Communists, even more so than I already do. The paranoia about "Trotskyist/Fascist" infiltration on the front lines was so great that guns were actually trained on the Republicans from their rear flank by the order of some commanders in case any undercover Trotskyists tried to run!

Another thing I found amusing was that for all his hysterical blubbering about the "Reds", Franco pretty much set up a statist economy in Spain that was very similar to various Soviet bloc countries...and became completely stagnant as a result.
You're really ignorant about Marxism and leftist anarchism.

[darktidus]

I've read the three books mentioned in this thread, and I can safely say Orwell's account is the best I've read, and probably will read.

Nonetheless, Beevor's book is quite good, and the edition I have at least corrects some of the factual inaccuracies in his other editions. He is, of course, correct in his analysis of the main cause of the downfall of the revolution and republic (it was destroyed by foreign intervention, most evidently by the USSR).

A very interesting read, and quite accessible too.

I like Noam Chomsky's article on Thomas' book, found here (http://www.ditext.com/chomsky/1968.html).

[Ander]

Homage to Catalonia, as I remember it, is an excellent account of Orwell's personal experiences during the Civil War. He does touch on some other important aspects of the war as well, the division between Communists and anarchists for example, but to get a good overall history of the Spanish Civil War you need to read a more detailed book.

I find it incredibly unfortunate that this conflict is barely touched upon during high school (at least in the school I went to). There is so much to this war and I can't believe that my old history textbook had nothing more than a tiny paragraph giving the most basic description.

Apparently I have relatives who fought against Franco on the side of the Basque nationalists. Reactionaries the lot of 'em, but still a pretty cool tidbit.

[The Feral Underclass]

I've read it. It's a very good book and fairly balanced.

[Os Cangaceiros]

Originally posted by Dean+November 07, 2007 06:10 pm--> (Dean @ November 07, 2007 06:10 pm)
[email protected] 06, 2007 05:41 pm
Has anyone read it? It's the third book (and a number of different articles) I've read on the Spanish revolution, and by far one of the most interesting. It really made me hate the Communists, even more so than I already do. The paranoia about "Trotskyist/Fascist" infiltration on the front lines was so great that guns were actually trained on the Republicans from their rear flank by the order of some commanders in case any undercover Trotskyists tried to run!

Another thing I found amusing was that for all his hysterical blubbering about the "Reds", Franco pretty much set up a statist economy in Spain that was very similar to various Soviet bloc countries...and became completely stagnant as a result.
You're really ignorant about Marxism and leftist anarchism. [/b]
Do tell.

[Robert]

You're really ignorant about Marxism and leftist anarchism.

He's absolutely right, Agora. Read, and you will learn to appreciate communism in all its glories. Start with this one:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/02/BlackBook.gif

[Robert]

You're really ignorant about Marxism and leftist anarchism.

He's absolutely right, Agora. Read, and you will learn to appreciate communism in all its glories. Start with this one:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/02/BlackBook.gif

Our comrades will tell you that the book has been discredited. Okay. Go ahead and reject 99% of it. What's left will still make you want to puke.

[black magick hustla]

Originally posted by Robert the [email protected] 20, 2007 01:44 am

You're really ignorant about Marxism and leftist anarchism.

He's absolutely right, Agora. Read, and you will learn to appreciate communism in all its glories. Start with this one:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/02/BlackBook.gif
"Are deaths from a famine caused by the stupidity and incompetence of the regime (such deaths account for more than half of Courtois's 100 million) to be equated with the deliberate gassing of Jews? Courtois's arithmetic is too simple. A huge number of the fatalities attributed here to Communist regimes fall into a kind of catchall category called "excess deaths": premature demises, over and above the expected mortality rate of the population, that resulted directly or indirectly from government policy. Those executed, exiled to Siberia, or forced into gulag camps where nutrition and living conditions were poor could fall into this category. But so could many others, and "excess deaths" are not the same as intentional deaths....It would be more polemical than accurate to equate famine deaths, victims of police terror, and deaths in Nazi gas chambers with the plight of Russians unable to buy food and health care today. One could place many of the century's deaths in any of several categories, according to the political point one wanted to make. Should we blame premature deaths in Russia today on the legacy of communism or on the failed policies of reformers? For how many deaths under Stalin should we blame communism? Stalin's personal paranoia? Backwardness or ignorance? We might do better to try to understand these grisly statistics in their contexts, rather than positing large polemical categories and then filling them up with bodies. Good history is about balanced interpretation and is usually more complicated than categorisation or blame.
"

Getty

Now go away.

[Robert]

Go away? So you guys really don't tolerate opposing views, eh? Not even on the opposing ideologies forum? Interesting that you show up here.

p.s. Read the book yourself, don't let another communist tells you what it said. Would you listen to a review of Das Kapital written by Bill Gates?

[Cmde. Slavyanski]

Originally posted by Robert the [email protected] 20, 2007 01:44 am

You're really ignorant about Marxism and leftist anarchism.

He's absolutely right, Agora. Read, and you will learn to appreciate communism in all its glories. Start with this one:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/02/BlackBook.gif
Why don't you suggest books that are accurate? Any capitalist with a knowledge of history ought to know better than try to attack Communists over body counts. We the Black Book of Communism even remotely true, a Black Book of Capitalism would crush your feet if you dropped it.

[Cmde. Slavyanski]

Take Beevor with a grain of salt, that's all I can say. I have read two of his works, Stalingrad and the Berlin.