Comment by kapitza | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kapitza | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Do you like (((books)))?

If so, the best source on early Western support for the Bolsheviks is Antony (((Sutton))), from the (((Hoover Institution))). Not a perfect writer but generally trustworthy:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antony_C._Sutton

Sutton, by the way, writes (this is true): "There is no concrete evidence that Jews were involved in the Bolshevik Revolution because they were Jewish."

See also the lives of Raymond Robins and William Boyce Thompson, who I guess don't get much attention from the tinfoil hats on account of not being (((Jews))):

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Robins

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Boyce_Thompson

Robins, really the main American Bolshevik booster, wrote an autobiography of sorts. It's hilariously disingenuous but worth reading anyway, and it's free.

It must be nice living in this world where official truth always === truth. I officially apologize as an Anglo-American for all those sleek smug copies of the Economist we export. Make sure you don't read too many (((books))) tho, it can cause you all kinds of real-life problems!

Your reply deflects from the parent's statement. Sure, a lot of westerners supported the Bolsheviks, but that doesn't mean Jacob Schiff was one of them.

> It must be nice living in this world where official truth always === truth. I officially apologize as an Anglo-American for all those sleek smug copies of the Economist we export. Make sure you don't read too many (((books))) tho, it can cause you all kinds of real-life problems!

It must be nice living in this world where smug secret truth always === truth. I officially apologize as an Anglo-American for all those sleek smug "I know better than you sheeple" opinions we export. Make sure you don't read too many (((books))) tho, it can cause you all kinds of real-life problems!

My word, no!

When you go trawling in the swamp of uncanonical information, you actually have to perform the filtering work yourself. If you're not interested in judging sources yourself, by all means stick to the Economist! It's not that bad.

Yes, Schiff's role is relatively minor. But that's also a far cry from "nothing to see here, move along, the October Revolution is purely a product of the legitimate revolutionary aspirations of the Russian workers and peasants."

Unless you're actually concerned with whether the problem is the Jooze, or this one guy Schiff, or whatever, the larger and broader point that the Bolsheviks had strong support from influential East Coast circles is basically correct and extremely relevant. It's easy to use a small factual error to disguise this broader and more interesting truth.

When you're filtering water from a swamp, the fact that the swamp has moose turds in it shouldn't bother you that much. Of course it has moose turds. It's a swamp. That's why you brought your filter. I do wish there was a better source of water, but there really isn't.

The Russian Revolution is a remarkable event in history because almost everyone who has written about it since WWII has followed what's essentially the mainstream American or Soviet lines (which are not at all that different). You simply can't get out of this box without going into the swamp. Harvard University Press is not publishing any Czarist accounts of 1917 by Czarist history professors.

If you're going to write this comment, you should apologize to the commenter who you made fun of with your (((books))) from the (((Hoover Institution))) snark, because you've just agreed with them. Meanwhile, (((conspiracy theories))) are a real thing, while a general belief that the Hoover Institution is anti-Semitic is neither in evidence on this thread nor, really, a thing at all.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com