Translated by Cynthia Klohr After crushing the Polish Uprising in 1863–1864,Russia established a new system of administration and control. Imperial Russian Rule in the Kingdom of Poland, 1864–1915 investigates in detail the imperial bureaucracy’s highly variable relationship with Polish society over the next half century. It portrays the personnel and policies of Russian domination and describes the numerous layers of conflict and cooperation between the Tsarist officialdom and the local population. Presenting case studies of both modes of conflict and cooperation, Malte Rolf replaces the old, unambiguous “freedom-loving Poles vs. oppressive Russians” narrative with a more nuanced account and does justice to the complexity and diversity of encounters among Poles, Jews, and Russians in this contested geopolitical space. At the same time, he highlights the process of “provincializing the center,” the process by which the erosion of imperial rule in the Polish Kingdom facilitated the demise of the Romanov dynasty itself.

This comparative study harks back to the revolutionary year of 1989 and asks two critical questions about the resulting reconfiguration of Europe in the aftermath of the collapse of communism: Why did Central and East European states display such divergent outcomes of their socio-political transitions? Why did three of those states—Poland, Bulgaria, and Russia—differ so starkly in terms of the pace and extent of their integration into Europe? Rumena Filipova argues that Poland’s, Bulgaria’s, and Russia’s dominating conceptions of national identity have principally shaped these countries’ foreign policy behavior after 1989. Such an explanation of these three nations’ diverging degrees of Europeanization stands in contrast to institutionalist-rationalist, interest-based accounts of democratic transition and international integration in post-communist Europe. She thereby makes a case for the need to include ideational factors into the study of International Relations and demonstrates that identities are not easily malleable and may not be as fluid as often assumed. She proposes a theoretical “middle-ground” argument that calls for “qualified post-positivism” as an integrated perspective that combines positivist and post-positivist orientations in the study of IR.

"This book represents the most sophisticated historiographical approach to understanding nation-building. Patrice Dabrowski demonstrates tremendous erudition... making brilliant use of contemporary newspapers and journals, as well as archival material." -- Larry Wolff, Boston College, author of Inventing Eastern Europe Patrice M. Dabrowski investigates the nation-building activities of Poles during the decades preceding World War I, when the stateless Poles were minorities within the empires of Russia, Germany, and Austria-Hungary. Could Poles maintain a sense of national identity, or would they become Germans, Austrians, or Russians? Dabrowski demonstrates that Poles availed themselves of the ability to celebrate anniversaries of past deeds and personages to strengthen their nation from within, providing a ground for a national discourse capable of unifying Poles across political boundaries and social and cultural differences. Public commemorations such as the jubilee of the writer Jozef Kraszewski, the bicentennial of the Relief of Vienna, and the return to Poland of the remains of the poet Adam Mickiewicz are reconstructed here in vivid detail.

Hundreds of German-speaking film professionals took refuge in Hollywood during the 1930s and 1940s, making a lasting contribution to American cinema. Hailing from Austria, Hungary, Poland, Russia, and the Ukraine, as well as Germany, and including Ernst Lubitsch, Fred Zinnemann, Billy Wilder, and Fritz Lang, these multicultural, multilingual writers and directors betrayed distinct cultural sensibilities in their art. Gerd Gemünden focuses on Edgar G. Ulmer’s The Black Cat (1934), William Dieterle’s The Life of Emile Zola (1937), Ernst Lubitsch’s To Be or Not to Be (1942), Bertold Brecht and Fritz Lang’s Hangmen Also Die (1943), Fred Zinneman’s Act of Violence (1948), and Peter Lorre’s Der Verlorene (1951), engaging with issues of realism, auteurism, and genre while tracing the relationship between film and history, Hollywood politics and censorship, and exile and (re)migration.

Poland was in ruins after World War I. The fighting front had rolled through some areas more than seven different times, and the result was the almost complete destruction of the roads, railways, bridges, water systems, and power plants. The government was based mainly on civil servants of Polish descent who remained on the job after the fall of Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary. Even after Poland regained her independence in 1918, the borders were not yet defined and the nation was vulnerable to continued threats from Germany and Russia. This work presents the story of the Kosciuszko Squadron, a small group of American flyers that formed without the support of the State Department and the American Expeditionary Force in Europe, to defend Poland from the Bolshevik armies and to prevent the communist revolution in Russia from uniting with a Germany frustrated by provisions of the Treaty of Versaille. The book covers the events leading up to the formation of the squadron and the first efforts to enlist American military help for Poland in 1918. It explores why that small group of Americans felt compelled to fight for Poland and what they knew about who and what they were fighting for and against, and discusses the people, events, and issues that figured prominently in the war. The Squadron was named, of course, in honor of Tadeusz Kosciuszko, who famously came from Poland in 1776 to join the Colonial forces fighting the War of Independence from Britain.

Although southern Poland and western Ukraine are not often thought of in terms of decisive battles in World War I, the impulses that precipitated the battle for Galicia in August 1914—and the unprecedented carnage that resulted—effectively doomed the Austro-Hungarian Empire just six weeks into the war. In Fall of the Double Eagle, John R. Schindler explains how Austria-Hungary, despite military weakness and the foreseeable ill consequences, consciously chose war in that fateful summer of 1914. Through close examination of the Austro-Hungarian military, especially its elite general staff, Schindler shows how even a war that Vienna would likely lose appeared preferable to the “foul peace” the senior generals loathed. After Serbia outgunned the polyglot empire in a humiliating defeat, and the offensive into Russian Poland ended in the massacre of more than four hundred thousand Austro-Hungarians in just three weeks, the empire never recovered. While Austria-Hungary’s ultimate defeat and dissolution were postponed until the autumn of 1918, the late summer of 1914 on the plains and hills of Galicia sealed its fate.

WINNER OF THE SOCIETY FOR MILITARY HISTORY'S DISTINGUISHED BOOK AWARD 2021 SHORTLISTED FOR THE GILDER LEHRMAN PRIZE FOR MILITARY HISTORY AND THE BRITISH ARMY MILITARY BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD A BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2019, AND FINANCIAL TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020 'A masterpiece. It deserves to become a classic of military history' Lawrence James, The Times From the prize-winning author of Ring of Steel, a gripping history of the First World War's longest and most terrible siege In the autumn of 1914 Europe was at war. The battling powers had already suffered casualties on a scale previously unimaginable. On both the Western and Eastern fronts elaborate war plans lay in ruins and had been discarded in favour of desperate improvisation. In the West this resulted in the remorseless world of the trenches; in the East all eyes were focused on the old, beleaguered Austro-Hungarian fortress of Przemysl. The siege that unfolded at Przemysl was the longest of the whole war. In the defence of the fortress and the struggle to relieve it Austria-Hungary suffered some 800,000 casualties. Almost unknown in the West, this was one of the great turning points of the conflict. If the Russians had broken through they could have invaded Central Europe, but by the time the fortress fell their strength was so sapped they could go no further. Alexander Watson, prize-winning author of Ring of Steel, has written one of the great epics of the First World War. Comparable to Stalingrad in 1942-3, Przemysl shaped the course of Europe's future. Neither Russians nor Austro-Hungarians ever recovered militarily from their disasters. Using a huge range of sources, Watson brilliantly recreates a world of long-gone empires, broken armies and a cut-off community sliding into chaos. The siege was central to the war itself, but also a chilling harbinger of what would engulf the entire region in the coming decades, as nationalism, anti-semitism and an exterminatory fury took hold. 'If you read one military history book this year, make it Alexander Watson's The Fortress' Tony Barber, Financial Times