Chernobyl, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and truth in fiction
A review of Chernobyl, written by Craig Mazin and directed by Johan Renck, a 2019 mini-series in five parts on HBO/Sky. In an early scene of Chernobyl, a young pregnant […]
Category Archives: Ukraine
Ukraine’s “History Wars” and the political descendants of Stalin and Walter Duranty
A friend has drawn my attention to a criticism of my review of the film Mr Jones. (See here for the review – this post will make more sense if […]
The Holodomor in Ukraine and the obfuscations of “Mr Jones”
Few countries in the world suffered more than Ukraine in the twentieth century. One of the nations of the Soviet Union favoured with fertile soils and bountiful agriculture, geography made […]
The agony of Ukraine: Anatoli Kuznetsov’s Babi Yar
One of the many incredible things about the book Babi Yar, by Anatoli Kuznetsov, is that it exists at all – that its writer survived the experiences he describes, that […]
Chinese Bolsheviks in the Russian revolution – and an old slander that echoes down the generations
A friend who is of Ukrainian ancestry, and who supports the right of Ukraine to be free from the boot of Russian militarism, as I do, recently shared with me […]
Facebook slanders and threats – an echo of politics in Ukraine
Having fought under the banner of communism for my entire adult life, I must say that it is not often that I get branded as an apologist for fascism. But […]
The tragedy in Odessa
The tragedy in Odessa and the inexorable logic towards fratricidal war in Ukraine – a discussion Reprinted below is a statement entitled “No-one wants to die” by Ilya Budraitskis, published in […]
Trotsky and Ukrainian independence
“The Ukrainian question, which many governments and many “socialists” and even “communists” have tried to forget or to relegate to the deep strongbox of history, has once again been placed […]
A communist at large 