Anti Communism In Twentieth Century America

Author : Larry Ceplair
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Page : 385 pages
File Size : 41,7 Mb
Release : 2011-10-05
Category : History
ISBN : 9781440800481

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Anti-Communism in Twentieth-Century America by Larry Ceplair Pdf

This compelling, critical analysis of anti-communism illustrates the variety of anti-Communist styles and agendas, thereby making a persuasive case that the "threat" of domestic communism in Cold War America was vastly overblown. In the United States today, communism is an ideology or political movement that barely registers in the consciousness of our nation. Yet merely half a century ago, "communist" was a buzzword that every citizen in our nation was aware of—a term that connoted "traitor" and almost certainly a characterization that most Americans were afraid of. Anti-Communism in Twentieth-Century America: A Critical History provides a panoramic perspective of the types of anti-communists in the United States between 1919 and the collapse of the Soviet Union. It explains the causes and exceptional nature of anti-communism in the United States, and divides it into eight discrete categories. This title then thoroughly examines the words and deeds of the various anti-Communists in each of these categories during the three "Red Scares" in the past century. The work concludes with an unapologetic assessment of domestic anti-communism. This book allows readers to more fully comprehend what the anti-communists meant with their rhetoric, and grasp their impact on the United States during the 20th century and beyond—for example, how anti-communism has reappeared as anti-terrorism.

Author : Cyndy Hendershot
Publisher : McFarland
Page : 184 pages
File Size : 45,5 Mb
Release : 2015-10-03
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9780786483693

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Anti-Communism and Popular Culture in Mid-Century America by Cyndy Hendershot Pdf

Not long after the Allied victories in Europe and Japan, America's attention turned from world war to cold war. The perceived threat of communism had a definite and significant impact on all levels of American popular culture, from government propaganda films like Red Nightmare in Time magazine to Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle. This work examines representations of anti-communist sentiment in American popular culture from the early fifties through the mid-sixties. The discussion covers television programs, films, novels, journalism, maps, memoirs, and other works that presented anti-communist ideology to millions of Americans and influenced their thinking about these controversial issues. It also points out the different strands of anti-communist rhetoric, such as liberal and countersubversive ones, that dominated popular culture in different media, and tells a much more complicated story about producers' and consumers' ideas about communism through close study of the cultural artifacts of the Cold War. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.

Author : Ted Morgan
Publisher : Random House
Page : 704 pages
File Size : 43,8 Mb
Release : 2020-04-14
Category : History
ISBN : 9780307766014

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Reds by Ted Morgan Pdf

In this landmark work, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Ted Morgan examines the McCarthyite strain in American politics, from its origins in the period that followed the Bolshevik Revolution to the present. Morgan argues that Senator Joseph McCarthy did not emerge in a vacuum—he was, rather, the most prominent in a long line of men who exploited the issue of Communism for political advantage. In 1918, America invaded Russia in an attempt at regime change. Meanwhile, on the home front, the first of many congressional investigations of Communism was conducted. Anarchist bombs exploded from coast to coast, leading to the political repression of the Red Scare. Soviet subversion and espionage in the United States began in 1920, under the cover of a trade mission. Franklin Delano Roosevelt granted the Soviets diplomatic recognition in 1933, which gave them an opportunity to expand their spy networks by using their embassy and consulates as espionage hubs. Simultaneously, the American Communist Party provided a recruitment pool for homegrown spies. Martin Dies, Jr., the first congressman to make his name as a Red hunter, developed solid information on Communist subversion through his Un-American Activities Committee. However, its hearings were marred by partisan attacks on the New Deal, presaging McCarthy. The most pervasive period of Soviet espionage came during World War II, when Russia, as an ally of the United States, received military equipment financed under the policy of lend-lease. It was then that highly placed spies operated inside the U.S. government and in America’s nuclear facilities. Thanks to the Venona transcripts of KGB cable traffic, we now have a detailed account of wartime Soviet espionage, down to the marital problems of Soviet spies and the KGB’s abject efforts to capture deserting Soviet seamen on American soil. During the Truman years, Soviet espionage was in disarray following the defections of Elizabeth Bentley and Igor Gouzenko. The American Communist Party was much diminished by a number of measures, including its expulsion from the labor unions, the prosecution of its leaders under the Smith Act, and the weeding out, under Truman’s loyalty program, of subversives in government. As Morgan persuasively establishes, by the time McCarthy exploited the Red issue in 1950, the battle against Communists had been all but won by the Truman administration. In this bold narrative history, Ted Morgan analyzes the paradoxical culture of fear that seized a nation at the height of its power. Using Joseph McCarthy’s previously unavailable private papers and recently released transcripts of closed hearings of McCarthy’s investigations subcommittee, Morgan provides many new insights into the notorious Red hunter’s methods and motives. Full of drama and intrigue, finely etched portraits, and political revelations, Reds brings to life a critical period in American history that has profound relevance to our own time.

Author : Professor Robert Justin Goldstein
Publisher : Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
Page : 381 pages
File Size : 43,9 Mb
Release : 2014-06-28
Category : History
ISBN : 9781472413789

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Little 'Red Scares' by Professor Robert Justin Goldstein Pdf

Anti-communism has long been a potent force in American politics, capable of gripping both government and popular attention. Nowhere is this more evident that the two great 'red scares' of 1919-20 and 1946-54; the latter generally - if somewhat inaccurately - termed McCarthyism. The interlude between these two major scares has tended to garner less attention, but as this volume makes clear, the lingering effects of 1919-20 and the gathering storm-clouds of 'McCarthyism' were clearly visible throughout the 20s and 30s, even if in a more low-key way. Indeed, the period between the two great red scares was marked by frequent instances of political repression, often justified on anti-communist grounds, at local, state and federal levels. Yet these events have been curiously neglected in the history of American political repression and anti-communism, perhaps because much of the material deals with events scattered in time and space which never reached the intensity of the two great scares. By focusing on this twenty-five year 'interim' period, the essays in this collection bridge the gap between the two high-profile 'red scares' thus offering a much more contextualised and fluid narrative for American anti-communism. In so doing the rationale and motivations for the 'red scares' can be seen as part of an evolving political landscape, rather than as isolated bouts of hysteria exploding onto - and then vanishing from - the political scene. Instead, a much more nuanced appreciation of the conflicting interests and fears of government, politicians, organised labour, free-speech advocates, employers, and the press is offered, which will be of interest to anyone wishing to better understand the political history of modern America.

Author : James Trapani,Dr Drew Cottle
Publisher : Vij Books India Pvt Ltd
Page : 315 pages
File Size : 47,9 Mb
Release : 2020-08-01
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9789389620375

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Pretext by James Trapani,Dr Drew Cottle Pdf

The spectre of 'Communism' was used to justify the expansion of American global leadership throughout the twentieth century. Nowhere was this more evident than in their 'backyard' of Latin America. The fear and hysteria created by the perceived communist menace justified the demonization of democratic reformers, the mischaracterization of political unrest, the overthrow of democratic regimes, the prolonged support of military dictatorships and the continued political and economic subservience of much of Latin America to the USA throughout the era of the Cold War and beyond. 'Pretext: Anti-Communism in Latin America' examines the origins of this hysteria from 1930-1965. It suggests that the academic focus on the rise and fall of communism has distracted analysis from the non-communist reformers who fought for democracy, social justice, and independent economic development. This timely reinterpretation of the origins of the Cold War in Latin America seeks to explain the continuing power imbalance between the US and the Latin American republics.

Author : Jennifer Luff
Publisher : Univ of North Carolina Press
Page : 304 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2012-05-21
Category : History
ISBN : 9780807869895

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Commonsense Anticommunism by Jennifer Luff Pdf

Between the Great War and Pearl Harbor, conservative labor leaders declared themselves America's "first line of defense" against Communism. In this surprising account, Jennifer Luff shows how the American Federation of Labor fanned popular anticommunism but defended Communists' civil liberties in the aftermath of the 1919 Red Scare. The AFL's "commonsense anticommunism," she argues, steered a middle course between the American Legion and the ACLU, helping to check campaigns for federal sedition laws. But in the 1930s, frustration with the New Deal order led labor conservatives to redbait the Roosevelt administration and liberal unionists and abandon their reluctant civil libertarianism for red scare politics. That frustration contributed to the legal architecture of federal anticommunism that culminated with the McCarthyist fervor of the 1950s. Relying on untapped archival sources, Luff reveals how labor conservatives and the emerging civil liberties movement debated the proper role of the state in policing radicals and grappled with the challenges to the existing political order posed by Communist organizers. Surprising conclusions about familiar figures, like J. Edgar Hoover, and unfamiliar episodes, like a German plot to disrupt American munitions manufacture, make Luff's story a fresh retelling of the interwar years.

Author : Christian Gerlach,Clemens Six
Publisher : Springer Nature
Page : 588 pages
File Size : 48,8 Mb
Release : 2020-12-07
Category : History
ISBN : 9783030549633

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The Palgrave Handbook of Anti-Communist Persecutions by Christian Gerlach,Clemens Six Pdf

This handbook explores anti-communism as an overarching phenomenon of twentieth-century global history, showing how anti-communist policies and practices transformed societies around the world. It advances research on anti-communism by looking beyond ideologies and propaganda to uncover how these ideas were put into practice. Case studies examine the role of states and non-state actors in anti-communist persecutions, and cover a range of topics, including social crises, capitalist accumulation and dispossession, political clientelism and warfare. Through its comparative perspective, the handbook reveals striking similarities between different cases from various world regions and highlights the numerous long-term consequences of anti-communism that exceeded by far the struggle against communism in a narrow sense. Contributing to the growing body of work on the social history of mass violence, this volume is an essential resource for students and scholars interested to understand how twentieth-century anti-communist persecutions have shaped societies around the world today. Chapter 7 is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

Author : Richard Gid Powers
Publisher : Yale University Press
Page : 598 pages
File Size : 40,6 Mb
Release : 1998-01-01
Category : History
ISBN : 0300074700

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Not Without Honor by Richard Gid Powers Pdf

The American anticommunist movement has been viewed as a product of right-wing hysteria that deeply scarred our society and institutions. This book restores the struggle against communism to its historic place in American life. Richard Gid Powers shows that McCarthyism, red-baiting, and black-listing were only one aspect of this struggle and that the movement was in fact composed of a wide range of Americans--Jews, Protestants, blacks, Catholics, Socialists, union leaders, businessmen, and conservatives--whose ideas and political initiatives were rooted not in ignorance and fear but in real knowledge and experience of the Communist system. "Not Without Power is superbly written and richly detailed. Perceptive and thoughtful, it is an impressively thorough and valuable book."--David J. Garrow "One of the contributions of [Powers's] provocative narrative history is to bring to life certain segments of anti-Communist opinion that have largely been forgotten."--Sean Wilentz, New York Times Book Review "[Powers] makes extensive use of primary sources and uncovers much that is new. He vividly recreates the complex relationships within and between several ethnic and radical communities within the United States, including their firsthand and often disillusioning experience with communism. . . . The depth and range of his work add a great deal to knowledge."--Journal of American History "A valuable, well-executed study and summation of a vast topic, one whose various threads the author has woven into a rich tapestry."--Richard M. Fried, Reviews in American History

Author : Kyle Burke
Publisher : UNC Press Books
Page : 364 pages
File Size : 46,6 Mb
Release : 2018-04-13
Category : History
ISBN : 9781469640747

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Revolutionaries for the Right by Kyle Burke Pdf

Freedom fighters. Guerrilla warriors. Soldiers of fortune. The many civil wars and rebellions against communist governments drew heavily from this cast of characters. Yet from Nicaragua to Afghanistan, Vietnam to Angola, Cuba to the Congo, the connections between these anticommunist groups have remained hazy and their coordination obscure. Yet as Kyle Burke reveals, these conflicts were the product of a rising movement that sought paramilitary action against communism worldwide. Tacking between the United States and many other countries, Burke offers an international history not only of the paramilitaries who started and waged small wars in the second half of the twentieth century but of conservatism in the Cold War era. From the start of the Cold War, Burke shows, leading U.S. conservatives and their allies abroad dreamed of an international anticommunist revolution. They pinned their hopes to armed men, freedom fighters who could unravel communist states from within. And so they fashioned a global network of activists and state officials, guerrillas and mercenaries, ex-spies and ex-soldiers to sponsor paramilitary campaigns in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Blurring the line between state-sanctioned and vigilante violence, this armed crusade helped radicalize right-wing groups in the United States while also generating new forms of privatized warfare abroad.

Author : Ross Smith
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 47 pages
File Size : 45,5 Mb
Release : 2005
Category : Anti-communist movements
ISBN : 1875585680

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Reds Under the Bed by Ross Smith Pdf

Author : Regin Schmidt
Publisher : Museum Tusculanum Press
Page : 396 pages
File Size : 44,8 Mb
Release : 2000
Category : History
ISBN : 8772895810

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Red Scare by Regin Schmidt Pdf

The anticommunist crusade of the Federal Bureau of Investigation did not start with the Cold War. Based on research in the early files of the FBI's predecessor, the Bureau of Investigation, the author describes how the federal security officials played a decisive role in bringing about the first anticommunist hysteria in the US, the Red Scare in 1919 to 1920. The Bureau's political role, it is argued, originated in the attempt by the modern federal state during the early decades of the 20th century to regulate and control any organised opposition to the political, economic and social order.

Author : Karen Zeinert
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 132 pages
File Size : 41,8 Mb
Release : 1998
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN : 0894909878

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McCarthy and the Fear of Communism in American History by Karen Zeinert Pdf

Karen Zeinert follows the rise and fall of McCarthyism and anti-Communist hysteria from its roots in American-Russian relations of the early twentieth century, through the Bolshevik Revolution and the American reaction, the witch hunt atmosphere of the Cold War. She shows how the fearful climate of the post-World War II years helped sustain the anti-Communist movement, despite its often awful tactics. The book also examines how the age of McCarthy finally came to an end as the perceived threat of communism began to fade with the decline of the Soviet Union.

Author : Ronald Lora,William Henry Longton
Publisher : Greenwood
Page : 752 pages
File Size : 40,5 Mb
Release : 1999-10-30
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : UOM:39015048511532

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The Conservative Press in Twentieth-Century America by Ronald Lora,William Henry Longton Pdf

Including representative journals for the 20th and late 19th centuries, this book profiles the most significant conservative journals of the past century. From the rise of industrial capitalism, when laissez-faire conservatives praised bountiful America, to the end of the Cold War, these journals have covered a variety of topics from differing, sometimes even contradictory, points of view. Yet they speak to the richness and comprehensiveness of the conservative press in America. Together they provide a focused history of conservative thought in 20th Century America. Along with the companion volume on the 18th and 19th Centuries, the book provides a valuable resource for students of the conservative press in America. Covering a variety of disparate journals, the volume arranges them both chronologically and in sections reflecting the themes covered. Politics, individualism, isolationism, anti-Communism, the New Right, neoconservatism, and public policy are featured in four of the sections, while journals examining the issues of religious conservatism appear in sections devoted to Orthodox Protestant and Catholic journals. Yet another section focuses on journals dealing with literary and cultural topics. The remaining sections examine libertarianism, traditionalist perspectives, and extreme right-wing publications. Each section is unified with an introductory essay exploring the connecting themes and issues.

Author : Massimo Salvadori
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 246 pages
File Size : 54,8 Mb
Release : 1963
Category : Communism
ISBN : UOM:39015050575854

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The Rise of Modern Communism by Massimo Salvadori Pdf

Author : Vladimir Tismaneanu
Publisher : University of California Press
Page : 334 pages
File Size : 47,8 Mb
Release : 2014-03-14
Category : History
ISBN : 9780520282209

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The Devil in History by Vladimir Tismaneanu Pdf

The Devil in History is a provocative analysis of the relationship between communism and fascism. Reflecting the author’s personal experiences within communist totalitarianism, this is a book about political passions, radicalism, utopian ideals, and their catastrophic consequences in the twentieth century’s experiments in social engineering. Vladimir Tismaneanu brilliantly compares communism and fascism as competing, sometimes overlapping, and occasionally strikingly similar systems of political totalitarianism. He examines the inherent ideological appeal of these radical, revolutionary political movements, the visions of salvation and revolution they pursued, the value and types of charisma of leaders within these political movements, the place of violence within these systems, and their legacies in contemporary politics. The author discusses thinkers who have shaped contemporary understanding of totalitarian movements—people such as Hannah Arendt, Raymond Aron, Isaiah Berlin, Albert Camus, François Furet, Tony Judt, Ian Kershaw, Leszek Kolakowski, Richard Pipes, and Robert C. Tucker. As much a theoretical analysis of the practical philosophies of Marxism-Leninism and Fascism as it is a political biography of particular figures, this book deals with the incarnation of diabolically nihilistic principles of human subjugation and conditioning in the name of presumably pure and purifying goals. Ultimately, the author claims that no ideological commitment, no matter how absorbing, should ever prevail over the sanctity of human life. He comes to the conclusion that no party, movement, or leader holds the right to dictate to the followers to renounce their critical faculties and to embrace a pseudo-miraculous, a mystically self-centered, delusional vision of mandatory happiness.