In the foreword, Brian Holmes, a professor, mentions how this book is a critique of how oversimplified the events were. The American and British educated people faced a similar critique. He mentioned the way to avoid an approach based on nationalism is to be presented with multiple perspectives.
The introduction points out there is no one “right” perspective and a lot of the other perspectives have a lot of anti-Russian bias. The way this narrative is told provides a lot of details through descriptions of what happened. There was a lot of information left out about campaigns in 1944 because they favored the Soviet Union. They try to form a logical coherent narrative. Most of the edits from the original come from changing the order to limit needless repetition.
This is a book that teaches the history so the language used is going to be catered towards the general public. The book also emphasizes the Great Patriotic War, which was a cataclysmic event in the history of the Soviet Union. This deeply affected the citizens who lived through it and created generational trauma. This was pasted down and led to the distrust of the West.
In the discussion we got the chance to think about when moments in history become history. The talking points of WWII are starting to change because the people talking about it were those who never experienced it directly. Those who did are well into their 90s and are dying off.
