It Was a Long Time Ago, and It Never Really Happened Anyway: Russia and the Communist Past

Satter (Age of Delirium: The Decline and Fall of the Soviet Union), a Hudson Institute fellow and former Moscow correspondent for the Financial Times, amasses over two decades of research and reporting in a startling book that revisits the history, symbols, and repressive tools of the deposed Soviet state and the crushing grip of amnesia imposed on citizens since the fall of the Communist regime. Despite the millions prosecuted and killed during the many Soviet purges and mock trials, Satter boldly states that today’s average Russian is not interested in re-evaluating the past, but merely surviving and avoiding any mention of “bad things in our history.” Some think of the Brezhnev years as good times, when the terror abated and the government provided economic security. Satter concludes that the failure of a “historically enslaved population” to confront the “authoritarian instincts” on which communism was built leaves Russia vulnerable to a resurgence of those instincts. Drawing on interviews with Russian citizens and officials, Satter’s reflective, expert analysis of a Russian society in moral and cultural flux after the end of communism provides great food for thought beyond today’s headlines. (Dec.)