Key players and regional dynamics in Eurasia

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Paul R. Josephson

In 1958 construction began on Akademgorodok, a scientific utopian community modeled after Francis Bacon's vision of a "New Atlantis." The city, carved out of a Siberian forest, 2,500 miles east of Moscow, was formed by Soviet scientists with the full support of Nikita Khrushchev. They believed that their rational science, liberated from ideological and economic constraints, would help their country surpass the West in all fields. In a lively history of this city, itself a symbol of de-Stalinization, Paul Josephson offers the most complete analysis available of the reasons behind the successes and failures of Soviet science - from advances in nuclear physics to politically induced setbacks in research on recombinant DNA.

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Stasys Knezys and Romanas Sedlickas

"In this carefully researched and extensively documented study, Stasys Knezys and Romanas Sedlickas examine the Chechen war from a military viewpoint. As they evenhandedly depict the strengths and weaknesses of both the Russians and Chechens, the authors consider how and why Russia, with one of the world's largest armies, failed to subdue the Chechens, and how the Chechens fought among themselves, yet also fought off the Russian Goliath.". "Military analysts and historians, political scientists, and Eastern European scholars will find The War in Chechnya an illuminating analysis of the military operations there and a valuable source of information for further studies."--BOOK JACKET.

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Mary E. Hull

Examines the contributions of soldiers, government officials, free blacks, abolitionists, women, and children to the Union cause during the Civil War.

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Francis Pike

"As the major geopolitical power bloc, Asia - with 4 billion people, two-thirds of the world's population, a huge land-mass and the fastest-growing economies - has shifted the global political balance. "Empires at War" gives a dramatic narrative account of how 'Modern Asia' came into being. Ranging over the whole of Asia, from Japan to Pakistan, the modern history of this important region is placed in the context of the struggle between America and the Soviet Union. Francis Pike shows that America's domination of post-war Asia was a continuation of a 100-year competition for power in the region. He also argues cogently that, contrary to the largely 'Western-centric' viewpoint, Asian nations were not simply the passive and biddable entities of the superpowers, but had a political development which was both separate and unique, with a dynamic that was largely independent of the superpower conflict. And, in conclusion, the book traces the unwinding of American influence and the end of its Empire - a crucial development in international history which is already having repercussions throughout the world."--Bloomsbury publishing.