11 Best Russia & the Former Soviet Union, Political Science Books
Russia & the Former Soviet Union, Political Science is a popular category for many book lovers. Our team at Speechify has curated a list of the top Russia & the Former Soviet Union, Political Science audiobooks everyone must read.
See the top 11 Russia & the Former Soviet Union, Political Science audiobooks below.
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Active Measures
- By: Thomas Rid
- Narrator: Derek Perkins
- Length: 14 hours 45 minutes
- Publisher: Macmillan Audio
- Publish date: April 21, 2020
- Language: English
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4.18(726 ratings)
4.18(726 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0032.99 USDThis revelatory and dramatic history of disinformation traces the rise of secret organized deception operations from the interwar period to contemporary internet troll farms We live in the age of disinformation—of organized deception. SpyThis revelatory and dramatic history of disinformation traces the rise of secret organized deception operations from the interwar period to contemporary internet troll farms
We live in the age of disinformation—of organized deception. Spy agencies pour vast resources into hacking, leaking, and forging data, often with the goal of weakening the very foundation of liberal democracy: trust in facts. Thomas Rid, a renowned expert on technology and national security, was one of the first to sound the alarm. Even before the 2016 election, he warned that Russian military intelligence was “carefully planning and timing a high-stakes political campaign” to disrupt the democratic process. But as crafty as such so-called active measures have become, they are not new.
The story of modern disinformation begins with the clash between communism and capitalism after the Russian Revolution, which would come to define the Cold War. In Active Measures, Rid reveals startling intelligence and security secrets from materials written in more than ten languages across several nations, and from interviews with current and former operatives. He exposes the disturbing yet colorful history of professional, organized lying, revealing for the first time some of the century’s most significant operations–many of them nearly beyond belief. A White Russian ploy backfires and brings down a New York police commissioner; a KGB-engineered, anti-Semitic hate campaign creeps back across the Berlin Wall; the CIA backs a fake publishing empire, run by a former Wehrmacht U-boat commander that produces Germany’s best jazz magazine. Rid tracks the rise of leaking, and shows how spies began to exploit emerging internet culture many years before WikiLeaks. Finally, he sheds new light on the 2016 election, especially the role of the infamous “troll farm” in St. Petersburg as well as a much more harmful attack that unfolded in the shadows.
Active Measures takes the listener on a guided tour deep into a vast hall of mirrors old and new, pointing to a future of engineered polarization, more active and less measured–but also offering the tools to cut through the game of deception.
A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux
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Hitler
- By: Brendan Simms
- Narrator: Leighton Pugh
- Length: 29 hours 17 minutes
- Publisher: Hachette Audio
- Publish date: October 01, 2019
- Language: English
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4.12(227 ratings)
4.12(227 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0026.98 USDFrom a prize-winning historian, the definitive biography of Adolph HitlerHitler offers a deeply learned and radically revisionist biography, arguing that the dictator’s main strategic enemy, from the start of his political career in the 1920s,... Read moreFrom a prize-winning historian, the definitive biography of Adolph HitlerHitler offers a deeply learned and radically revisionist biography, arguing that the dictator’s main strategic enemy, from the start of his political career in the 1920s, was not communism or the Soviet Union, but capitalism and the United States. Whereas most historians have argued that Hitler underestimated the American threat, Simms shows that Hitler embarked on a preemptive war with the United States precisely because he considered it such a potent adversary. The war against the Jews was driven both by his anxiety about combatting the supposed forces of international plutocracy and by a broader desire to maintain the domestic cohesion he thought necessary for survival on the international scene.A powerfully argued and utterly definitive account of a murderous tyrant we thought we understood, Hitler is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the origins and outcomes of the Second World War. -
Someone Is Out to Get Us
- By: Brian Brown
- Narrator: Dan Woren
- Length: 17 hours 20 minutes
- Publisher: Hachette Audio
- Publish date: November 05, 2019
- Language: English
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4.08(82 ratings)
4.08(82 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0025.98 USDFrom UFOs to Dr. Strangelove, LSD experiments to Richard Nixon, author Brian Brown investigates the paranoid, panicked history of the Cold War. In Someone Is Out to Get Us, Brian T. Brown explores the delusions, absurdities, and best-kept secrets ofFrom UFOs to Dr. Strangelove, LSD experiments to Richard Nixon, author Brian Brown investigates the paranoid, panicked history of the Cold War.
In Someone Is Out to Get Us, Brian T. Brown explores the delusions, absurdities, and best-kept secrets of the Cold War, during which the United States fought an enemy of its own making for over forty years — and nearly scared itself to death in the process. The nation chose to fear a chimera, a rotting communist empire that couldn’t even feed itself, only for it to be revealed that what lay behind the Iron Curtain was only a sad Potemkin village.
In fact, one of the greatest threats to our national security may have been our closest ally. The most effective spy cell the Soviets ever had was made up of aristocratic Englishmen schooled at Cambridge. Establishing a communist peril but lacking proof, J. Edgar Hoover became our Big Brother, and Joseph McCarthy went hunting for witches. Richard Nixon stepped into the spotlight as an opportunistic, ruthless Cold Warrior; his criminal cover-up during a dark presidency was exposed by a Deep Throat in a parking garage.
Someone Is Out to Get Us is the true and complete account of a long-misunderstood period of history during which lies, conspiracies, and paranoia led Americans into a state of madness and misunderstanding, too distracted by fictions to realize that the real enemy was looking back at them in the mirror the whole time.
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The Divine Plan
- By: Paul Kengor
- Narrator: Donald Corren
- Length: 6 hours 16 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2020
- Language: English
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4.05(44 ratings)
4.05(44 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0016.95 USDJust six weeks apart in the spring of 1981, Pope John Paul II and President Ronald Reagan took bullets from would-be assassins. Few realized at the time how close both men came to dying. Surviving these near-death experiences created a singular bondJust six weeks apart in the spring of 1981, Pope John Paul II and President Ronald Reagan took bullets from would-be assassins.
Few realized at the time how close both men came to dying.
Surviving these near-death experiences created a singular bond between the pope and the president that historians have failed to appreciate.
When John Paul II and Reagan met only a year later, they confided to each other a shared conviction: that God had spared their lives for a reason. That reason? To defeat Communism. In private, Reagan had a name for this: “The DP”–the Divine Plan.
It has become fashionable to see the collapse of the Soviet empire as inevitable. Hardly.
In this riveting book, bestselling author Paul Kengor and writer-director Robert Orlando show what it took to end the Cold War: leaders who refused to accept that hundreds of millions must suffer under totalitarian Communism.
And no leaders proved more important than the pope and the president.
Two men who seemed to have little in common developed an extraordinary bond–including a spiritual bond between the Catholic pope and Protestant president. And their shared core convictions drove them to confront Communism.
To tell the full story of the dramatic closing act of the Cold War, Kengor and Orlando draw on their exhaustive research and exclusive interviews with more than a dozen experts, including well-known historians Douglas Brinkley; H. W. Brands; Anne Applebaum; Stephen Kotkin; John O’Sullivan; Craig Shirley, the leading biographer of John Paul II; George Weigel; close Reagan advisers Richard V. Allen and James Rosebush; and Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Bishop Robert Barron.
You can’t understand Pope John Paul II and President Ronald Reagan–or how the Cold War came to such a swift and peaceful end–without understanding how much faith they put in the Divine Plan.
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K Blows Top
- By: Peter Carlson
- Narrator: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 10 hours 48 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2009
- Language: English
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4(619 ratings)
4(619 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0020.95 USDKhrushchev’s 1959 trip across America was one of the strangest exercises in international diplomacy ever conducted—“a surreal extravaganza,” as one historian called it. Khrushchev told jokes, threw tantrums, sparked a riot inKhrushchev’s 1959 trip across America was one of the strangest exercises in international diplomacy ever conducted—“a surreal extravaganza,” as one historian called it. Khrushchev told jokes, threw tantrums, sparked a riot in a San Francisco supermarket, wowed the coeds in a home-economics class in Iowa, and ogled Shirley MacLaine as she filmed a dance scene in Can-Can. He befriended and offended a cast of characters including Nelson Rockefeller, Richard Nixon, Eleanor Roosevelt, Elizabeth Taylor, and Marilyn Monroe.
Published for the fiftieth anniversary of the trip, K Blows Top is a work of history that reads like a Vonnegut novel. This cantankerous communist’s road trip took place against the backdrop of the fifties in capitalist America, with the shadow of the hydrogen bomb hanging over his visit like the Sword of Damocles.
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Putinomics
- By: Chris Miller
- Narrator: Traber Burns
- Length: 8 hours 4 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2018
- Language: English
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3.96(211 ratings)
3.96(211 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0016.95 USDWhen Vladimir Putin first took power in 1999, he was a little-known figure ruling a country that was reeling from a decade and a half of crisis. In the years since, he has reestablished Russia as a great power. How did he do it? What principles haveWhen Vladimir Putin first took power in 1999, he was a little-known figure ruling a country that was reeling from a decade and a half of crisis. In the years since, he has reestablished Russia as a great power. How did he do it? What principles have guided Putin’s economic policies? What patterns can be discerned? In this new analysis of Putin’s Russia, Chris Miller examines its economic policy and the tools Russia’s elite have used to achieve its goals. Miller argues that despite Russia’s corruption, cronyism, and overdependence on oil as an economic driver, Putin’s economic strategy has been surprisingly successful.
Explaining the economic policies that underwrote Putin’s two-decades-long rule, Miller shows how, at every juncture, Putinomics has served Putin’s needs by guaranteeing economic stability and supporting his accumulation of power. Even in the face of Western financial sanctions and low oil prices, Putin has never been more relevant on the world stage.
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The Putin Interviews
- By: Oliver Stone
- Narrator: Pete Cross
- Length: 9 hours 45 minutes
- Publisher: Dreamscape Media
- Publish date: June 16, 2017
- Language: English
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3.93(360 ratings)
3.93(360 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0017.99 USDWITH SUBSTANTIAL MATERIAL NOT INCLUDED IN THE DOCUMENTARY Academy Award winner Oliver Stone was able to secure what journalists, news organizations, and even other world leaders have long coveted: extended, unprecedented access to Russian PresidentWITH SUBSTANTIAL MATERIAL NOT INCLUDED IN THE DOCUMENTARY Academy Award winner Oliver Stone was able to secure what journalists, news organizations, and even other world leaders have long coveted: extended, unprecedented access to Russian President Vladimir Putin. The Putin Interviews are culled from more than a dozen interviews with Putin over a two-year span-never before has the Russian leader spoken in such depth or at such length with a Western interviewer. No topics are off limits in the interviews, which first occurred during Stone’s trips to meet with NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden in Moscow and most recently after the election of President Donald Trump. Prodded by Stone, Putin discusses relations between the United States and Russia, allegations of interference in the US election, and Russia’s involvement with conflicts in Syria, Ukraine, and elsewhere across the globe. Putin speaks about his rise to power and details his relationships with Presidents Clinton, George W. Bush, Obama, and Trump. Th
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Putin’s Kleptocracy
- By: Karen Dawisha
- Narrator: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 14 hours 25 minutes
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
- Publish date: January 01, 2014
- Language: English
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3.91(729 ratings)
3.91(729 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0024.99 USDThe raging question in the world today is who is the real Vladimir Putin and what are his intentions. Karen Dawisha’s brilliant Putin’s Kleptocracy provides an answer, describing how Putin got to power, the cabal he brought with him, theThe raging question in the world today is who is the real Vladimir Putin and what are his intentions. Karen Dawisha’s brilliant Putin’s Kleptocracy provides an answer, describing how Putin got to power, the cabal he brought with him, the billions they have looted, and his plan to restore the Greater Russia.
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Russian scholar Dawisha describes and exposes the origins of Putin’s kleptocratic regime. She presents extensive new evidence about the Putin circle’s use of public positions for personal gain even before Putin became president in 2000. She documents the establishment of Bank Rossiya, now sanctioned by the US; the rise of the Ozero cooperative, founded by Putin and others who are now subject to visa bans and asset freezes; the links between Putin, Petromed, and “Putin’s Palace” near Sochi; and the role of security officials from Putin’s KGB days in Leningrad and Dresden, many of whom have maintained their contacts with Russian organized crime.
Putin’s Kleptocracy is the result of years of research into the KGB and the various Russian crime syndicates. Dawisha’s sources include Stasi archives; Russian insiders; investigative journalists in the US, Britain, Germany, Finland, France, and Italy; and Western officials who served in Moscow. Russian journalists wrote part of this story when the Russian media was still free. “Many of them died for this story, and their work has largely been scrubbed from the Internet, and even from Russian libraries,” Dawisha says. “But some of that work remains.” -
The Spy in Moscow Station
- By: Eric Haseltine
- Narrator: Eric Haseltine
- Length: 8 hours 29 minutes
- Publisher: Macmillan Audio
- Publish date: April 30, 2019
- Language: English
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3.8(466 ratings)
3.8(466 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0019.99 USDThis program is read by the author. The thrilling, true story of the race to find a leak in the United States Embassy in Moscow–before more American assets are rounded up and killed. Foreword by Gen. Michael V. Hayden (Retd.), Former DirectorThis program is read by the author.
The thrilling, true story of the race to find a leak in the United States Embassy in Moscow–before more American assets are rounded up and killed.
Foreword by Gen. Michael V. Hayden (Retd.), Former Director of NSA & CIA.
In the late 1970s, the National Security Agency still did not officially exist–those in the know referred to it dryly as the No Such Agency. So why, when NSA engineer Charles Gandy filed for a visa to visit Moscow, did the Russian Foreign Ministry assert with confidence that he was a spy?
Outsmarting honey traps and encroaching deep enough into enemy territory to perform complicated technical investigations, Gandy accomplished his mission in Russia, but discovered more than State and CIA wanted him to know.
Eric Haseltine’s The Spy in Moscow Station tells of a time when–much like today–Russian spycraft had proven itself far beyond the best technology the U.S. had to offer. The perils of American arrogance mixed with bureaucratic infighting left the country unspeakably vulnerable to ultra-sophisticated Russian electronic surveillance and espionage.
This is the true story of unorthodox, underdog intelligence officers who fought an uphill battle against their own government to prove that the KGB had pulled off the most devastating penetration of U.S. national security in history. If you think “The Americans” isn’t riveting enough, you’ll love this toe-curling nonfiction thriller.
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Chechen Jihad
- By: Yossef Bodansky
- Narrator: James Adams
- Length: 18 hours 4 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2007
- Language: English
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3.46(69 ratings)
3.46(69 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0027.95 USDIf you think the next terrorist attacks are coming from the Middle East, think again. One of the world’s most respected experts on radical Islamism returns to alert Americans to the future course of Islamist extremism: the troubled regions ofIf you think the next terrorist attacks are coming from the Middle East, think again. One of the world’s most respected experts on radical Islamism returns to alert Americans to the future course of Islamist extremism: the troubled regions of Chechnya.
Bodansky draws on mountains of previously unseen intelligence from insider sources, offering the most comprehensive and startling portrait of the Chechenization phenomenon and what it means for the United States. As he reveals, the final years of US–Soviet relations left Chechnya as a fertile breeding ground for the mujahedin, and in the past decade a combination of militant native Chechen anti-Americans, anti-Russian agitators, and Middle Eastern jihadis have joined forces to help al Quaeda and the greater Islamist movement pursue its war against the West.
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Zelensky
- By: Andrew L. Urban
- Narrator: Keith Szarabajka
- Length: 4 hours 24 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2022
- Language: English
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3.14(114 ratings)
3.14(114 ratings)Regular Price:Try for $0.0014.95 USDThe first major profile of Ukraine’s courageous President Volodymyr Zelensky Ukraine’s most popular comedic actor was an unlikely president of his country. And now, even more improbably, Volodymyr Zelensky has become the world’sThe first major profile of Ukraine’s courageous President Volodymyr Zelensky
Ukraine’s most popular comedic actor was an unlikely president of his country. And now, even more improbably, Volodymyr Zelensky has become the world’s most celebrated statesman. Who is he? How did he become the international hero of our time?
Zelensky: The Unlikely Ukrainian Hero Who Defied Putin and United the World is a compelling account of this fascinating, enigmatic leader. Covering Zelensky’s childhood, family history, and astonishing transformation from TV celebrity to first Jewish president of Ukraine, this audiobook tells you what you need to know about the newest star of the world stage.
No one has been more surprised by Zelensky’s power to inspire and mobilize his countrymen and the world than Vladimir Putin, who expected Russia’s conquest of its beleaguered neighbor to be the work of an afternoon. Outfoxed and isolated, Putin is not the first person to have underestimated the former comedian with a spine of steel.
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Cliff Weitzman
Cliff Weitzman is a dyslexia advocate and the CEO and founder of Speechify, the #1 text-to-speech app in the world, totaling over 100,000 5-star reviews and ranking first place in the App Store for the News & Magazines category. In 2017, Weitzman was named to the Forbes 30 under 30 list for his work making the internet more accessible to people with learning disabilities. Cliff Weitzman has been featured in EdSurge, Inc., PC Mag, Entrepreneur, Mashable, among other leading outlets.
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