--- product_id: 48454838 title: "Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine" price: "€ 47.91" currency: EUR in_stock: true reviews_count: 10 url: https://www.desertcart.gr/products/48454838-red-famine-stalins-war-on-ukraine store_origin: GR region: Greece --- # Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine **Price:** € 47.91 **Availability:** ✅ In Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine - **How much does it cost?** € 47.91 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.gr](https://www.desertcart.gr/products/48454838-red-famine-stalins-war-on-ukraine) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine : Applebaum, Anne: desertcart.co.uk: Books Review: Well researched, well written, a must read - Such an important book. A must read for anyone trying to understand Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Review: Another brilliant expose of Stalin's butchery - Once again Anne Applebaum has provided a well researched, authoritative book on the horrors of the Soviet Union. If anyone still feels that there was any merit in the ghastly construct that destroyed so moany lives, let them read this and the superb "Gulag" by the same author. I found this a slightly more difficult read than "Gulag" but once it gets into its stride you become transfixed by the horror and the waste. It is now abundantly clear that Stalin set out to destroy any opposition to the Soviet state, and, more importantly, his reputation and that a few million Ukrainians would not stand in his way. Stalin was determined to collectivise farms, and he was closely identified with what would shortly prove to be a disastrous policy. It soon became very clear that collectivisation was leading to a decrease in productivity, but Stalin could not be wrong. He also wished to stamp out any nationalist feelings in the Ukrainian population. Hatred of the peasant amongst the party cadres sent to ensure that they were not hiding food meant that whilst some food was confiscated, small amounts, which would have allowed the family to survive for a while were deliberately spoiled before the eyes of the starving owners. The consequences of the famine meant that ethnic Russians were sent to farm in Ukraine to replace the dead. This has repurcussions now, and the epilogue makes quite clear that Russia is behind attempts to save ethnic Russians from Ukrainian "Nazis" by invading modern Ukraine. This is an excellent and important book, and should be read by anyone who has any lingering sympathy for the dreadful experiment that was communism. ## Technical Specifications | Specification | Value | |---------------|-------| | ASIN | 0241003806 | | Best Sellers Rank | 881,030 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) 3,056 in History (Books) 24,616 in Social Sciences (Books) | | Customer reviews | 4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars (2,073) | | Dimensions | 16.2 x 3.6 x 24 cm | | Edition | 1st | | ISBN-10 | 9780241003800 | | ISBN-13 | 978-0241003800 | | Item weight | 957 g | | Language | English | | Print length | 512 pages | | Publication date | 7 Sept. 2017 | | Publisher | Allen Lane | ## Images ![Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91VyARpKClL.jpg) ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Well researched, well written, a must read *by C***S on 28 May 2025* Such an important book. A must read for anyone trying to understand Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Another brilliant expose of Stalin's butchery *by M***S on 29 September 2017* Once again Anne Applebaum has provided a well researched, authoritative book on the horrors of the Soviet Union. If anyone still feels that there was any merit in the ghastly construct that destroyed so moany lives, let them read this and the superb "Gulag" by the same author. I found this a slightly more difficult read than "Gulag" but once it gets into its stride you become transfixed by the horror and the waste. It is now abundantly clear that Stalin set out to destroy any opposition to the Soviet state, and, more importantly, his reputation and that a few million Ukrainians would not stand in his way. Stalin was determined to collectivise farms, and he was closely identified with what would shortly prove to be a disastrous policy. It soon became very clear that collectivisation was leading to a decrease in productivity, but Stalin could not be wrong. He also wished to stamp out any nationalist feelings in the Ukrainian population. Hatred of the peasant amongst the party cadres sent to ensure that they were not hiding food meant that whilst some food was confiscated, small amounts, which would have allowed the family to survive for a while were deliberately spoiled before the eyes of the starving owners. The consequences of the famine meant that ethnic Russians were sent to farm in Ukraine to replace the dead. This has repurcussions now, and the epilogue makes quite clear that Russia is behind attempts to save ethnic Russians from Ukrainian "Nazis" by invading modern Ukraine. This is an excellent and important book, and should be read by anyone who has any lingering sympathy for the dreadful experiment that was communism. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ The Politics of Famine in Soviet- and post-Soviet-Ukraine *by B***D on 28 August 2021* While aware in a general way that ghastly things happened in Ukraine during the Stalin era (to the extent that Wehrmacht troops were greeted as liberators in 1941), my first encounter with the term "Holodomor" came in a quiet back road off Acton High Street in west London, when I encountered a memorial outside a church used by a Ukrainian congregation. Applebaum's book sets out to tell the story of that long-overlooked episode of mass murder and trace its reverberations into the present day confrontation between Putin's Russia and an independent Ukraine. This involves going wider than the narrow tale of dekulakisation, collectivisation and, ultimately, mass starvation in the Ukrainian countryside in the early 1930's. The whole Soviet Union underwent the first two processes without (quite) tipping into massive starvation (though she concedes this needs more examination-recent scholarship suggests that Kazakhstan's experience was as horrendous). Her argument is that, in effect, whatever screws were turned on the countryside elsewhere were given extra twists in Ukraine to break its national identity and that the destruction of the Ukrainian peasantry was paralleled by the destruction of the Ukrainian cultural elites- even ones who saw themselves as loyal Communists. Stalin and his closest associates, on this telling, were obsessed with a fear of "losing" Ukraine after their experiences in the post-Revolutionary civil war when the region collapsed into chaos and Reds, Whites, Nationalists of various kinds, peasant Anarchists led by Makhno and outside powers like Poland fought for power. If the New Economic Policy represented a fragile compromise with the peasantry, Soviet Ukrainianisation in the same period was a fragile and deceptive compromise with the carriers of national identity. Both were consciously destroyed by Stalin in an assertion of central, Moscow-based power- and grain delivery targets were deliberately set at completely unrealistic levels to justify stealing even seed corn from the peasantry. Although on one level the horrendous consequences (just under 4 million deaths from starvation on the most recent estimates) were an open secret in Soviet society, they were nevertheless covered up both domestically (by shooting those who had undertaken the 1937 census and discovered the massive population shortfall) and internationally (by a largely servile foreign press corps). Overall her account carries conviction. The understandable focus on Ukraine leads one to wonder whether there is a slight loss of perspective at times- was Ukraine really at the very top of Stalin's agenda every day and its fate the driving factor in all Soviet policy, as is implied? Some aspects of the aftermath of the famine are somewhat under-examined. Ironically one of these is just what long term effects it had on agriculture in Ukraine; was collectivisation there an even worse disaster than elsewhere? How did survivors and perpetrators coexist in the Ukrainian countryside afterwards given that the gangs looting food from Ukrainian peasants were overwhelmingly composed of Ukrainian peasants- in many cases this was very much neighbours turning on each other? On the cultural side, how far did the undoubted achievements of the brief period of Ukrainianisation survive- for instance, is the spelling of modern literary Ukrainian derived from the attempt to create a standardised written language then? When dealing with the cover up for international consumption, the story is a bit centred on a limited number of mostly Anglophone figures (including, in fairness, the Welsh journalist who managed to report the truth and was largely disowned as a result). It's revealing that the only authentic photographs of the famine came from an Austrian engineer with links to the Catholic church while some of the sharpest and best informed diplomatic reports were filed by consuls appointed by Mussolini's Italy. Overall though the book does put the horrors of the Holodomor into a proper long term perspective. --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.gr/products/48454838-red-famine-stalins-war-on-ukraine](https://www.desertcart.gr/products/48454838-red-famine-stalins-war-on-ukraine) --- *Product available on Desertcart Greece* *Store origin: GR* *Last updated: 2026-05-09*