This remarkable dictionary continues and enlarges the Historical Dictionary of United States-Russian/Soviet Relations (Saul, 2008) (RR 2010/16) and other books about American-Russian/Soviet relations by Professor Norman E. Saul, a specialist in this subject. It covers centuries of Russian history through a chronology, an extensive bibliography, an introductory essay and several hundred cross-referenced dictionary entries on key persons, places, events, institutions and organizations. It goes further back in history than the previous dictionary, and covers more of the important figures who built the Russian empire and, over the centuries, contributed to its expansion and growing influence. Small wonder then, that it contains so many articles about wars and annexations, peace treaties and pacts, as well as biographies of key diplomats, spies, defectors and cultural figures.
Every researcher interested in Russian/Soviet-American relations will find much useful material here. The dictionary is particularly strong on diplomatic relations between US and the Russian empire (USSR-Russian Federation), espionage, trade, institutions and cultural exchanges. It gives a good overview of the expansion of Muscovy to become a Great Power via annexations (including the Crimean annexation in 2014 by the Russian Federation) and clever choosing of “right moments” to act to increase territories and influence. The Introduction (pp. 1-10) will raise some eyebrows by its description of Russian history and musing about the question “Is there yet a Russian national destiny to be fulfilled?” (p. 10). “National destiny” is mentioned a few times; I really would like to see a definition of it. It should be mentioned that articles about the Russian far-right figures Alexander Dugin and Alexander Prokhanov are included, and the chapter The End of the Cold War and Beyond (leading to an extensive and very useful bibliography) ends: “Perhaps the best insight into the future of Russia can be found in the works of Alexander Dugin, unfortunately at this time of writing not available in any Western language, which adds to the mystery”.
Surprisingly, the period of the Cold War omits a very important article about the military liaison missions (due to reciprocal agreements between the US, UK, France and USSR, abbreviated as USMLM for the US mission, BRIXMIS for the UK, FMLM for the French and SOXMIS for the Soviet) and their role in containing the tensions during 1946-1990. Other important omissions are the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty) as well as the Budapest Memorandum of 1994. Even in the short biography of Yeltsin, the two first Presidents of an independent Ukraine, Kravchuk and Kuchma, did not get a mention in this dictionary, despite its length of 500 pages.
I am afraid that researchers into the history of the Baltic States, Belarus and Ukraine will be disappointed by the articles about these countries: there are numerous misspellings (the surname of the famous hetman of Ukraine is spelled as Khemelnytsky three times), omissions and controversial explanations. Instead of the widely-used term “Holodomor” to describe the Ukrainian famine of 1932-1933 the author uses “Ukrainian holocaust” or “holocaust”, and gives the wrong dates (1931-1932). He also offers explanations like this: “Outside relief did not come to other serious famines, most notably the one in the early 1930s due to the cruel collectivization policy of the First Five Year plan, coupled with a natural drought. In this one, Ukraine suffered most, and because of government neglect, the famine reached the level of a ‘holocaust’ (p. 122)”. I note that the book was published in 2015.
It is impossible to put everything in one book, but, in my humble opinion, the dictionary would benefit greatly from more thoroughly edited articles about the neighbours of the Russian empire/USSR/Russian Federation. Although, as the author says in the Introduction to the Bibliography, “the Soviet Union was virtually an obsession with many Western scholars” (p. 417), even in dealing with this period they concentrated mainly on Russia and paid too little attention to so-called “non-Russian entities”. Some prominent British historians of the USSR, such as Archie Brown, Harold Shukman and Robert Service, are mentioned only in the bibliography. As a result of such neglect, some articles have some strange descriptions; for example, the article Belarus on page 46 speaks of “Belarus being absorbed into interwar Poland”, while, in fact, the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic (spelt as Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic in Wikipedia) was one of four founding members of the USSR (in 1922) (easy to check such a basic fact), and only a small part (known as Western Belarus) became part of “interwar Poland”.
Articles about famous figures of Russian culture (literature, ballet, opera) whom the author admires very much, seeing in them the proof of “Russian superiority in the artistic world” (article about Peter Karl Fabergé, p. 121), however interesting, do not add something which could not be found in dozens of other encyclopedias, except by underlining once more the importance of culture for the promotion of any country. In this way, the Russian empire/USSR benefited even from its dissidents – expelled, defected or imprisoned.
The extensive Chronology (from 862 until October 2014) was quite understandably left until the last day before going to print. It might explain the strange information about the meeting which never happened between Putin and “Porshenko” (typo) in Moscow in October 2014 “in an attempt to resolve the crisis in Eastern Ukraine” (p. xxxv).
This new dictionary is very welcome, and will be consulted by students and researchers worldwide. It should serve as a useful aid to anyone trying to understand all the zigzags of Russian/Soviet foreign policy, and wishing to find out more about its main actors through the centuries.
