Growing Up Communist in the Netherlands and Britain

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elke Weesjes
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Political Movements ◽  
Growing Up ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This book documents communists’ attempts, successful and otherwise, to overcome their isolation and to connect with the major social and political movements of the twentieth century. Communist parties in Britain and the Netherlands emerged from the Second World War expecting to play a significant role in post-war society, due to their domestic anti-fascist activities and to the part played by the Soviet Union in defeating fascism. The Cold War shattered these hopes, and isolated communist parties and their members. By analysing the accounts of communist children, Weesjes highlights their struggle to establish communities and define their identities within the specific cultural, social, and political frameworks of the Cold War period and beyond.

Growing Up Communist in the Netherlands and Britain

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elke Weesjes
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Political Movements ◽  
Growing Up ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This book documents communists' attempts, successful and otherwise, to overcome their isolation and to connect with the major social and political movements of the twentieth century. Communist parties in Britain and the Netherlands emerged from the Second World War expecting to play a significant role in post-war society, due to their domestic anti-fascist activities and to the part played by the Soviet Union in defeating fascism. The Cold War shattered these hopes, and isolated communist parties and their members. By analysing the accounts of communist children, Weesjes highlights their struggle to establish communities and define their identities within the specific cultural, social, and political frameworks of the Cold War period and beyond.

Dutch Communism in Transition: The Unfolding of a National Cold War during Political Reconstruction, 1944–8

2017 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 1042-1062
Author(s):  
Tijn Sinke
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Dutch Politics ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Natural Outcome ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

Within three years after the Second World War, the wartime alliance between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union, and between communist and bourgeois resistance forces, had collapsed. By 1948, Dutch communists found themselves in total isolation. Historians have generally treated this phenomenon in light of the ‘restoration’ of pre-war structures – including anticommunist attitudes – or by interpreting the Cold War as an international phenomenon ‘imposed’ on Dutch society. Neither view pays sufficient attention to the contingency of transition politics and the power struggle that was fought between 1944 and 1948. My project focuses on the Dutch Communist Party’s (CPN) attempt to forge a political breakthrough by forming a front of progressive forces against the ‘reaction’, and on the responses of non-communist political and intellectual actors. Instead of interpreting the 1948 stalemate as a ‘natural’ outcome, this article highlights the combination of historical anticommunism, dynamics of transition politics and strategic solidification that accounts for the emergence of the Dutch Cold War. The reinvention of the rules of Dutch politics during political reconstruction ultimately led to the ruination of the post-war communist breakthrough. This resembles the process going on in other European countries, but with important unique features.

FROM WORLD WAR TO COLD WAR: THE WARTIME ALLIANCE AND POST-WAR TRANSITIONS, 1941–1947

2002 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 211-227 ◽  
Author(s):  
DAVID REYNOLDS
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
World War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Social ◽  
Post War ◽  
The One ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This review examines some of the recent British, American, and Russian scholarship on a series of important international transitions that occurred in the years around 1945. One is the shift of global leadership from Great Britain to the United States, in which, it is argued, the decisive moment was the fall of France in 1940. Another transition is the emergence of a wartime alliance between Britain and America, on the one hand, and the Soviet Union, on the other, followed by its disintegration into the Cold War. Here the opening of Soviet sources during the 1990s has provided new evidence, though not clear answers. To understand both of these transitions, however, it is necessary to move beyond diplomacy and strategy to look at the social, cultural, and economic dimensions of the Second World War. In particular, recent studies of American and Soviet soldiers during and after the conflict re-open the debate about Cold War ideology from the bottom up.

3. Empire, Cold War, and Decolonization, 1945–53

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
John W. Young ◽  
John Kent
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
Formed Part ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This chapter examines decolonization and the changes that took place within the European empires during the early years of the Cold War. Decolonization constituted a crucial element of the new international order after the Second World War and formed part of the broader shift in the global balance of power. The war marked the end of the European-dominated system of nation states and was followed by the decline of the major European powers, with international dominance lying for a quarter of a century with the United States, challenged only by the Soviet Union. The chapter considers the challenges to colonial rule that were evident in both Africa and Asia during the inter-war years. It also discusses the imperialism and the struggles against it that have formed part of a post-war landscape in the Middle East.

scholarly journals SIS, Grigori Tokaev, and the London Controlling Section: New Perspectives on a Cold War Defector and Cold War Deception

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 517-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Huw Dylan
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Early Years ◽  
World War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This article examines British deception during the early years of the Cold War, and how a Soviet defector named Grigori Tokaev contributed to British plans and operations. Tokaev provided valuable insights into the Soviet Union, allowing British intelligence to craft more intricate deception operations, political and military. The manner in which he was used, and the extent to which his idiosyncrasies were tolerated, underline the difficulties the British authorities faced as they attempted to apply the lessons of the Second World War deception to the Cold War environment. The case offers new perspectives on both the relatively under-examined subject of British deception operations against the USSR, and the history of one of the most prominent Cold War defectors.

3. Empire, Cold War, and Decolonization, 1945–53

2020 ◽  
pp. 70-102
Author(s):  
John W. Young ◽  
John Kent
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
Formed Part ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This chapter examines decolonization and the changes that took place within the European empires during the early years of the Cold War. Decolonization constituted a crucial element of the new international order after the Second World War and formed part of the broader shift in the global balance of power. The war marked the end of the European-dominated system of nation states and was followed by the decline of the major European powers, with international dominance lying for a quarter of a century with the United States, challenged only by the Soviet Union. The chapter considers the challenges to colonial rule that were evident in both Africa and Asia during the inter-war years. It also discusses the imperialism and the struggles against it that have formed part of a post-war landscape in the Middle East.

Winston Churchill and the Soviet Union during the Second World War

1987 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 415-436 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Kitchen
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Winston Churchill ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Armed Intervention ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Devil ◽  
Second World

When thinking of Churchill's attitude towards the Soviet Union one automatically thinks of him as the most outspoken of the advocates of armed intervention during the civil war, or as the author of the speech in Fulton, Missouri, which many people regard as the opening salvo in the Cold War. During the war, however, when the Soviet Union became a great ally without whose help the war in Europe could never have been won, his attitude was bound to be quite different. Even before the Germans launched ‘Operation Barbarossa’ thus forcing the Soviets into the Allied camp, Churchill had been thinking of the Russians as possible partners in the struggle against Nazi Germany, for however much he detested the Soviet regime, his passionate determination to destroy Nazism was a far more powerful emotion, and, as he put it, if Hitler were to invade Hell he would promptly sign a pact with the Devil.

Conclusion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenyon Zimmer
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Central Europe ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World ◽  
The U.S

This concluding chapter discusses how the Second World War presented the remnants of the anarchist movement with another seemingly impossible choice between ideology and necessity. Fascism represented all the anarchists despised, and its destruction of the once powerful anarchist movements of Southern and Central Europe only heightened their hatred of it. Anarchists also bore no love for British and French colonialism or the U.S. government, and were sworn enemies of the Soviet Union. Furthermore, as the Allies battled fascism in Europe but left Franco's Spain untouched, the war in the Pacific was steeped in brutality and racism. In such circumstances, no consistent anarchist position existed. Nor did the Cold War that followed leave room for anarchist politics in a world sharply divided between the Soviet-centered Left and anticommunist Right.

scholarly journals The national camp and the concept of a federation during the Second World War

1970 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 256-276
Author(s):  
Dariusz Miszewski
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Central Europe ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Global Level ◽  
World War ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Government ◽  
Post War ◽  
Second World

During the Second World War, the national camp preached the idea of imperialism in Central Europe. Built peacefully, the Polish empire was supposed to protect the independence and security of countries in Central Europe against Germany and the Soviet Union, and thus went by the name of “the Great Poland”. As part of the empire, nation-states were retained. The national camp was opposed to the idea of the federation as promoted by the government-in-exile. The “national camp” saw the idea of federation on the regional, European and global level as obsolete. Post-war international cooperation was based on nation states and their alliances.

J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI, and the Religious Cold War

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dianne Kirby
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Russian Orthodox Church ◽  
Christian Communities ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
American Catholic ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
American Catholic Church

Despite Hoover's efforts to develop an alliance with the American Catholic Church, other Christian communities came under suspicion during the Cold War. This chapter by Dianne Kirby examines the surveillance of communities during the Cold War period that had transatlantic links and supported the continuation of the alliance with the Soviet Union or developed other contacts beyond the Iron Curtain. Her case studies include surveillance of the Russian Orthodox Church in America, which in the course of the war sought to transfer allegiance to the Moscow Patriarchate, a move that was stymied in the post-war period by deteriorating US-Soviet relations and Roman Catholic opposition.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document