Peace In Their Time

The 1920s became a legendary time in America as the consumer economy took center stage, and a dizzying array of goods heralded a new era in how people lived their lives. What was less legendary about the era was the dependence of consumers on credit, and the short-sightedness of the country's elites.    Bibliography for this episode:    Miller, Nathan New World Coming: The 1920s and the Making of...

Despite winning WWI and showing off its power to the rest of the world, the United States limped into 1920. Exhausted by a year of violence at home, a crippling recession, and runaway inflation, voter turned to the Republicans. And Republicans turned to a man that would symbolize the modest aspirations of the age, Warren G. Harding. Despite not lasting long, he'd set the tone for the rest of the d...

The immediate aftermath of WWI would unleash one of the most harrowing years in America's history. The economic recession that immediately followed the end of the war helped spark violence and persecutions that rocked the country into 1920.    Bibliography for this episode:    McWhirter, Cameron Red Summer: The Summer of 1919 and the Awakening of Black America St. Martin's Press 2011 Krugler, Davi...

By 1914 the United States was rich and confident, but also wise enough to stay out of WWI. The problem is though fights of that size have a tendency to drag nations into them, and America found itself involved after numerous German missteps. It would be a new situation for the country, as President Wilson assumed effective political leadership of the Entente, setting a vision for the post-war that...

It's overview time once again and today I introduce the United States. It's main contribution to the failures of peace in the interwar period stem from its refusal to get entangled in European affairs. Which was a reluctance that had to do with internal conditions within the nation, and will be the focus of the first part of this series.    Bibliography for this episode:    LaFeber, Walter The Cam...

The horrors of modern war shocked sensibilities enough that by the 1920s there were active efforts to outlaw war entirely. The idea's proponents would face obstacles from disinterested governments and even conflicts among each other. But by decade's end the world had come together in agreement with their principals.    Bibliography for this episode:    Hathaway, Oona A. and Scott J. Shapiro The In...

In contrast to the Genoa Conference failing because it tried to do too much, the Locarno Treaties had much more success due to keeping its ambitions manageable. And those ambitions were to guarantee peace in Western Europe, as opposed to the world. Still, diplomacy being what it was in the 20s, there was still plenty keeping the Great Powers from achieving something that could last.    Bibliograph...

Bringing the focus back to European affairs, there was a lot of unfinished business left after the 1919 Paris Peace Conference. And that business seemed intractable, leading the British Prime Minister David Lloyd George to call a new conference to solve all the continent's woes. Its failure would signal the end of overblown meetings on the Paris model, as well as set the stage for the Ruhr crisis...

A big point of contention during the 1920s was disarmament. The world public didn't want a repeat of WWI, and maintaining huge militaries was seen as a wasteful expense in times of economic crisis. And for once, the Great Powers of the world did something about it, meeting in Washington, DC to hash out an agreement to scale back navy sizes.    Bibliography for this episode:    Goldstein, Erik The...

Today we start covering the broader international initiatives that attempted to consolidate the Versailles system after WWI. The one that carried the most promise in the imagination of the world's public, if not the world's leaders, was the League of Nations. A precursor to the United Nations, it would try what had never been done before: Create an independent international body that would mediate...

Today is our conclusion to this season's miniseries on the Soviet Union. The final years of the 20s saw the USSR slip into paranoia over fears of foreign invasion and subversion at home. It would be the perfect conditions for Stalin to move against his enemies in the Communist leadership, which is to say everyone that didn't swear blind loyalty to him.   Bibliography for this episode:    Kotkin, S...

We've finally reached the last episodes of the Soviet Union during the 1920s. It was a decade of possibility, but the rise of Stalin to undisputed power meant the era wouldn't last forever. His consolidation of power was a years-long process, and would play out over countless congresses and backroom maneuverings.    Bibliography for this episode:    Kotkin, Stephen Stalin: Paradoxes of Power 1878-...

The years leading up to WWI were tough on Stalin, whatever luck he or the Bolsheviks had before and during the 1905 Revolution had run out. He personally was mostly stuck in exile, managing to escape every so often, but all too quickly caught and returned. The Tsarist regime though was chronically self-defeating, and the Revolution that would be his salvation was not long in coming.    Bibliograph...

Party business got serious after the 1905 Revolution, as the regime struck back against its enemies and the Socialists turned to every source of support they could. Stalin possessed organizational skills and a lack of scruples, so he began a hybrid life of politics and crime that got him noticed by both Lenin and the authorities.    Bibliography for this episode:    Montefiore, Simon Sebag Young S...

Having been kicked out of the seminary, young Stalin embarked on the life of a professional revolutionary in earnest. Agitation, a refusal to play nice with older party leaders, and mysterious oil refinery explosions all became his calling cards.    Bibliography for this episode:    Montefiore, Simon Sebag Young Stalin Vintage Books 2007 Kotkin, Stephen Stalin: Paradoxes of Power 1878-1928 Penguin...

The biography episodes return as today I cover the early life of Joseph Stalin. Born into a conquest of the Russian Empire, young Stalin was not the most likely candidate to become a world leader. But the crucible of living under the Tsarist boot and his own violent homelife shaped him into the revolutionary that he would become.    Bibliography for this episode:    Montefiore, Simon Sebag Young S...

Today we turn back to the adventures of the Soviet Union's secret police in 1920s. They'd spend most of the decade picking off White exiles and trying to build spy networks abroad. But as the decade starting winding down, they increasingly fell under the influence of Stalin, who preferred looking inward for his enemies. 

While the Soviet Union struggled internally, it did not neglect trying to continue the Revolution abroad. Attempting to rally the troops, the idea of a workers International was rebooted as the Comintern. It would be the home away from home for many Communists and during the first decade of its existence push numerous uprisings aimed at toppling Capitalism. Not with a lot of success, but their eff...

Peacetime in the Soviet Union created an opportunity for social experimentation. The old order was gone, the Communist Party wasn't yet the juggernaut of state power it would become, and change seemed to be the order of the day.    Bibliography for this episode:    Hosking, Geoffrey Russia and the Russians: A History The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press 2001 Figes, Orlando A People’s Trag...

The first peacetime order of business in the new USSR was to re-build the economy. And to do that, they had to liberalize and turn towards a kind of state capitalism that was dubbed the New Economic Policy, the NEP. It wasn't perfect, and the new imbalances it created started conflicts in the Communist Party.    Bibliography for this episode:    Hosking, Geoffrey Russia and the Russians: A History...

One-hundred episodes! And to celebrate, here is a completely normal weekly episode. The Soviet Union wasn't built in a day, in fact it took five years for the Bolshevik leaders to finally hammer out the details as to the new nation. And that only happened after Lenin and Joseph Stalin clashed over the question of state power, a clash that was only settled by Lenin's declining health.    Bibliograp...

The consequences of winning the Civil War at any cost came back to haunt the Bolsheviks, as it turned out the "any cost" meant millions of people starving to death in a gigantic famine. Agriculture was in ruins throughout Russia, and only the intervention of an unlikely ally prevented the problem from being worse.    Bibliography for this episode:    Hosking, Geoffrey Russia and the Russians: A Hi...

Just because the Civil War was over didn't the misery ended. With the Whites gone, all the non-Bolsheviks who had been tolerating Lenin's government and its excesses decided it was time to turn against it. Revolt and revolution spread across the country yet again, threatening to end the Communist regime right after all its military victories.    Just as the Russian Civil War appeared to be winding...

Just as the Russian Civil War appeared to be winding down, a reborn Poland decided to make a play for some open land and invaded Soviet Russia. While the ensuing war would be an opportunity for the Bolsheviks to march on Europe, getting past the Poles proved easier said than done.    Bibliography for this episode:    Hosking, Geoffrey Russia and the Russians: A History The Belknap Press of Harvard...

During the Civil War, threats to the Revolution weren't just coming from the battlefield. The Bolsheviks very quickly realized that internal enemies in areas they controlled were a danger, and built-up their version of the secret police, the Cheka, to counter those enemies. They got out of hand.    Bibliography for this episode:    Hosking, Geoffrey Russia and the Russians: A History The Belknap P...