Winterland, Meadows, B+

                     "Anya Yurievna Pertova has been accepted to the Metallurgist School for Sport for artistic gymnastics." Thus, life in 1973 Siberia turns on a dime for 8 year old Anya. She succeeds in the Soviet sport system, but pays a steep price. She is sternly pushed by coaches because without her success, the coaches are left behind. She endures torn ligaments for which there are shots, but never rest. She is withdrawn from school, and is seldom home, causing her to hardly ever see her dad or the kindly grandmother type upstairs in her building. Shots and more shots delay puberty in the quest to compete with the Romanians. And there is success - an individual bronze and the team gold at the 1980 Olympics. But the terrors of the system are never far away.  The grandmotherly Vera had survived ten years in the camps and thinks often about the hell she lived through. Vera's father was shot, her husband failed to survive the Gulag and her son died of starvation. Anya's father, Yuri, a young Kosmonol, moved to the far north in Norilsk, worked in a copper mine and  was an invalid in his 50's. Her mother Elena, a dancer for the Bolshoi, became so disillusioned with life above the Arctic Circle that she meandered off into the taiga and was never seen again. This is a very good book.

Beyond Glory: Joe Louis vs. Max Schmeling and a World on the Brink, Margolick - B+

                      On June 22, 1938 over a hundred million people around the world tuned in t their radios to the fight at Yankee Stadium between the young twenty-four year old 'Brown Bomber' and the older German who had throttled him two years before. There were more visitors in the city than there had been at anytime since the 1924 Democratic convention. Two thousand Germans also traveled to America for the bout. Joe Louis was the most popular black man America had ever seen. Max Schmeling received a telegram the morning of the match wishing him success from Adolph Hitler. 

                     Schmeling, born in Cologne in 1905, won the heavyweight title in NY in 1930 by defeating Jack Sharkey. However, he won on a foul and the rules were changed to prevent it from happening again. He lost to Sharkey a year later. He regularly fought in the US and Europe in the 30's. His career was perennially up and down, winning big ones and losing easy ones. No matter how well he fought though, he was Germany's and the Chancellor's hero. Louis was born in Alabama in 1914. His family moved to Detroit when he was 12. He won the Golden Gloves in 1933, and a year later, the national title in Chicago. His trainers taught him how to fight and most importantly, how to act. No Black man would ever achieve the title if he acted as brazenly as Jack Johnson had decades earlier. He became an immediate contender because he consistently knocked out his opponents. His first 'big' fight was in June, 1935 at Yankeee Stadium, where he took on 6'7" Primo Carnera, whom he pounded for six rounds before a TKO was called. Joe was one of the most popular people in America, even meeting FDR at the White House. A preacher in Detroit said he had done more for his race than anyone since Lincoln. Later that summer, he devastated Max Baer in four rounds. Louis dramatically increased the popularity and profitability of boxing. He himself made $400,000 in 1935 and rode in his own Pullman car.

                    The first bout with Schmeling was in June, 1936. Louis was the consensus pick to hand Schmeling his head in an early round. The Stadium was not full, many surmised because Jewish fans boycotted the event. It was, however, a global phenomenon wired around the world and heard on American radio by 60 million. Many thought Louis wasn't ready and looked ill at ease that night. Schmeling had a plan. He had observed that Louis dropped his left and that a right cross might be able to hurt him. Louis won the early rounds and Schmeling's left eye was closed by the 3rd round. In the 4th, Louis was knocked down by a right cross for the first time in his career. All of a sudden, the presumptive champ was wobbly and glassy-eyed. He was now a punching bag barely defending himself. Schmeling sent him to the canvas in the 12th. It was over. Louis couldn't get up. In Germany, the nation cheered for their Maxe.  Berlin ordered him home on the Hindenburg. Many, many whites, including members of the US Congress cheered the defeat of a man of color. Black America was in shock and despondent.

                    Next up for Schmeling was the champ, James 'Cinderella Man' Braddock, and Louis would fightJack Sharkey. Sharkey lasted only three rounds. Braddock-Schmeling was postponed because Braddock had injured his hand. Talk of boycotting Schmeling because of his connections to the Reich bubbled up in the boxing world. That played right into the hands of those who wished for the big money payday of Louis and Braddock. A brouhaha ensued, involving Schemeling in NY on the day the fight was originally scheduled, litigation in the federal courts, and an offer by Berlin to host the fight, all to no avail. Braddock and Louis were scheduled for Chicago at Comiskey Park. It was the first time the challenger was favored against the defending champ. Braddock floored Louis in the second, before the tide turned. In the sixth, Louis knocked Braddock out. It took twenty minutes for Braddock to come to.  The twenty-three year old was the new champ. 

                  The Louis-Schmeling rematch was scheduled for June in NY. Both fighters fought a few easy tune-ups and prepared vigorously for the bout. On June 22nd, they weighed in at the Garden and headed to their respective hotels to rest. The fight was scheduled for 10 P.M. Hardly anyone in Germany had gone to bed. Virtually all activity in the US stopped as people huddled around their  radios. When the introductions were made by the ring announcer, Schmeling received the bigger hand. The bell rang at 10:08. Within 20 seconds, Louis had Schmeling on the ropes. At the minute mark, Louis had hit Schmeling more than he had in the first five rounds two years earlier. Schmeling screamed out in pain. At 90 seconds, the challenger was on his knees. Twice he got up and the referee stopped the count. The ref called the fight in the third minute with Schmeling bleeding from the mouth and on his hands and knees. Black America exploded in joy. Half a million people took to the streets of Harlem. Around the world, Jews joined in the celebration.  Communists too were ecstatic. Schmeling was stretchered out of the hospital two weeks later and quietly returned to Germany.

                     Joe Louis defended his title for the next few years against what the sportswriters called the 'bum of the month club.' Only Billy Conn wasn't a pushover. After Pearl Harbor, he joined the Army. Schmeling was still treated like a hero in Germany, but after the authorities saw the tape of the match, they quietly pushed him into retirement. When the war began, he was drafted into the Wehrmacht and became a paratrooper. He was part of the successful invasion of Crete. He was injured and spent a few years performing public relations duties before his 1943 discharge. After the war, he fought a ten round match at 43 and finally retired after the loss. As for Louis, the post-war years saw him in financial trouble. "A soft touch for flashy new clothes, pretty women, people in need, buddies promising him a good time, investors with dubious schemes, he long lived well beyond even his considerable means..." He fought and beat Conn once and Jersey Joe Wolcott twice in an attempt to pay off debts estimated at $350,000. He retired with a 61-1 record in 1949. Two comebacks led to humiliating losses to Ezzard Charles and Rocky Marciano. Schmeling wrangled a distributorship for Coca-Cola in northern Germany and eventually became a very wealthy man. Joe Louis did not do as well. He was a wrestler and slipped into mental illness. He worked as a greeter in Las Vegas, where he died in 1981. Schmeling, Germany's sportsman of the century died in 2005.

                  Thanks to my brother, Will, for recommending this superb book. The author extensively quotes newspapers, announcers, and public figures, all of whom were extraordinarily racist. Joe Louis was compared to King Kong, called Massa Louis, a pickaninny, a sambo, a primeval savage, and a negro with a fuzzy noggin. In addition to being constantly called the n-word by newspapers around the country, one ex-champ said that as a Black he "had no understanding for the honor and dignity of being world champion." Another newsman said he "was a healthy negro boy with the usual streak of laziness."For providing such detail of our racist past, this book could be banned in Florida.

                     

                      

No Way down: Life and Death on K2, Bowley - B+

                      On August 1, 2008, twenty-nine individuals from eight different teams began the ascent to the summit of K-2. Only 17 would survive. The 4th camp from which they departed was only 2,000 feet from the top of the second highest mountain in the world. It was the "mountaineers mountain, 522 miles further north, colder, steeper, and deadlier than Everest." 

                     "The Karakoram range is part of the western Himalayas and extends from the watershed between the Indian subcontinent and the deserts of Central Asia." On August 1, the climbers were going very slowly up the Bottleneck, and it was evident to many in the camp that they were not going to make it up and down. After the Bottleneck, climbers had to cross the Traverse and then climb the overhanging glacier known as a Serac. The first casualty at 10:30 was a Serb who had fallen about 700 feet to his death. His colleagues stopped, turned, and started to take his body down. A Sherpa who was helping but suffering from altitude sickness fell to his death during the descent. At 3pm, only one climber was on the Serac, and he was urging the rest to quicken their pace. Once on the Serac, the climbing was easier, only 30 degrees steep but with deeper snow. The sole Basque, the only one not part of a national team, reached the summit. At 5:30, two Norwegians reached the summit. A handful of South Koreans and Dutchmen  joined them. More and more climbers achieved the summit.  The Sherpas encouraged them to leave. The last group to depart were the Dutch at 8 pm. 

                   The first safely down was the sole Basque climber. While the four Norwegians were descending the Traverse, there was a violent shaking of the ice and one of them fell to his death. His wife, the only European woman on the mountain and one of the summiteers, screamed his name as she looked for him in the darkness. At 10:30, one of the men on the Traverse radioed Camp Four that the ice slide had severed the ropes, and they were going to have to descend without them. At 1 am, the most senior Frenchman quietly fell to his death. At 3 am, an Italian and two members of the Dutch team halted, waited and began to descend when light appeared on the horizon. However, morning brought a whiteout to the mountain. As they descended, they saw three men, a Sherpa and two Koreans hanging from ropes, alive, but barely. One member of the Dutch team, an Irishman, was killed in an avalanche. A second avalanche took the lives of the Sherpa and two South Koreans who had survived the night hanging in their ropes.

                    The survivors at Camp Four had to descend in order to survive. At 26,000 feet, the camp was dangerously high and they had been there for days.  There would eventually be eleven dead, but at the Base Camp there was still uncertainty about who was alive and who was dead. By Saturday, there was only one person alive on the mountain, a Dutchman who had called Holland and told his wife he couldn't see and didn't know where he was. The Dutch were able to ascertain his location with the help of the satellite phone company and sent two men after him. But he would have to survive another night on the mountain. He was rescued on Sunday morning. Those in need of medical help were helicoptered out of the valley. The names of the dead were entered on the memorial at the Base Camp. Thanks to Marcella for her continual editing, and for recommending this excellent book.

                    The Dead - Dren Mandir- Serbia, Jahan Baig - Nepal, Rolf Bae - Norway, Hughes d'Aubardede - France, Karim Meherban - Nepal, Gerard McDonnell - Ireland, Jumik and Pasang Bhote - Nepal, Park Kyeong-hyo, Kim Hyo-gyeong and Hwang Dong jin - South Korea.

Murder Book, Perry - B

                      Harry Duncan, a private investigator in Chicago, gets a call from the US Attorney, an old friend. The US Attorney asks him to undertake a reconnaissance of a county in southern Indiana where, she fears, organized crime is making a push. Harry is immediately thrown into the middle of multiple efforts to intimidate the locals with the goal of buying them out for pennies on the dollar. Harry creatively thwarts the bad guys and helps bring them to justice. None of the efforts the criminals are making make any sense because there is just not that much money to be made in Ash County. Eventually, it comes out that the area is rich in rare earth minerals and it's not just local criminals, but a big company in on the evildoing.

Retracing The Iron Curtain: A 3,000 Mile Journey Through The End And Afterlife Of The Cold War, Phillips - B+

                     This "is the story of how the continent of Europe gained and lost an Iron Curtain, and of how it learned but then seemingly forgot important lessons about openness and liberty." The British author and Russian scholar took this four month  journey in 2019.

                     The trip begins at Kirkenes in Finnmark on the Barents Sea at the Norwegian-Russian border. In WWII, the Germans occupied the town before they were expelled by the Soviets in 1944. In 1968, the USSR threatened the peace with NATO with menacing military exercises. Today, it is a tranquil border crossing, although the Russian side is home to much of the nuclear powered submarine fleet. And, the local newspaper/website critical of Russian policy is prohibited in Russia.

                     Porkkala, Finland is on the Gulf of Finland just west of Helsinki and north of Tallinn, Estonia. At that point, the Gulf is only 40 kms. wide and quite shallow. Fearing a maritime barrier, the Soviets occupied  Porkkola under a 50 year lease right after WWII. Using German POWs, the Soviets constructed a major naval base. Soon after Stalin's death, the USSR returned the city in exchange for a 20 year promise from Finland to not join NATO or ally with the US. 

                    When traveling east from Helsinki, Vyborg is the first city on the Russian side. It had been Finn, but was annexed by the USSR in 1944. It is one of the nicer cities in Russia, and is a place where older people reminisce about the Soviet Union, and even about Stalin. Reviving the cult of the dictator is part of Putin's domestic policy. 

                     In Riga and Liepaja, Latvia, memories are pre- and post- the freedom that came in the early 1990's. For many older people , particularly the Russian minority, life back then was pretty good. For ethnic Latvians, who remember their people being deported to Siberia, their right to fish in the Baltic being taken away, and their boats burned, there is nothing but disdain for the past. The younger Russians are bilingual, and at ease in a democracy.

                     Sweden was neutral, had no border with the USSR, but it was extremely anxious about the Soviets, particularly when it came to its large island in the Baltic, Gotland. Strategists referred to the 'Gotland Gambit,' in which the USSR would seize the island as a bargaining chip. "How to make Gotland unattractive to would be Soviet invaders was an issue that constantly concerned Stockholm." The coastline was restricted and the island was heavily fortified. The only incident was a 1961 defection by a small fishing boat captain.

                    To the west, the Germans on the Danish island of Bornholm surrendered to the Soviets in 1945 after a heavy bombardment and significant fighting. Their occupation was benign but they appeared to be in no rush on them part of the Soviets to leave. Fortunately, they departed in the spring of 1946. Its proximity to Poland and E. Germany made it an attractive destination to seek asylum. The most famous case was a Polish pilot who landed a MIG-15 on the island. NATO set up one of its most important listening posts on Bornholm.

                   Rugen is a small island off the German coast. A five mile long partially completed cement barracks was started by the Germans, and completed by the E. Germans after the war. It was used as a holiday retreat for retired military personnel. Germany was unique in that it was the only country divided by the Iron Curtain. The largest checkpoint between the two Germanys was in the north at Helmstedt-Marienborn, where both autos and passenger trains were subjected to communist paranoia at its worst. Of course, the wall in Berlin was the most prominent and was well known the world over. From 1961-1989, West Berlin was a backwater,"a seedbed for fringe lifestyles." It was a place with high tolerances for alternative living, heavy pot use, and uniquely, the only place in the country where men were exempt from military service. On the other side, there "was the monolithic official culture the GDR imposed."  Two of America's most famous speeches were made at the Wall by Presidents Kennedy and Reagan. Its breaching on Nov. 9, 1989 was one of the signal moments of the century.

                 In 1951 Czechia, at the border town of Aps a few hundred yards from Bavaria, a passenger train crashed through the barrier bringing a handful of families to freedom. Czechoslovakia was unique in the communist world, as it had never been part of the Russian Empire, and did not have occupying Soviet troops until 1968. Bratislava, Slovakia was the closest city behind the curtain to the free world, only three kms. from Austria. Just outside the city is a vast missile complex built in the 1970's.

                  An hour west of Bratislava on the Danube is Vienna. It was occupied by the Soviets prior to the the four party occupation that lasted for a decade. Notwithstanding Berlin and its tensions, the shared occupation worked in Vienna, likely because there was less emotion among the occupiers than in Berlin, home of the Reich. The occupation ended in 1955 because Khrushchev wished to limit overseas spending and withdrew Soviet troops in exchange for neutrality.

                   Sopron, Hungary was the site of the August 1989 Pan-European Picnic. As ties were loosening around Europe, the plan was to cut the barbed wire separating Austria and Hungary. Six hundred E. Germans appeared and rushed the border in the largest escape of the Cold War.

                  Gorizia, Italy and Gorica, Slovenia are one city, divided by the Iron Curtain for decades. The division went through the city's train station and cemetery. Since Yugoslavia was not as beholden to the USSR, the border was only loosely enforced, allowing people on either side to travel freely back and forth. Trieste, just 45 kms. to the south is the city with which Churchill rhetorically concluded the Iron Curtain in his famous speech in 1946. "From Stettin in the Baltic, to Trieste in the Adriatic..." was not accurate geographically, but oratorically was  brilliant. The city's port was the Austro-Hungarian Empire's window to the Adriatic and still feels more Austrian than Italian. Isolated on a rocky coast, Trieste and its surrounding countryside were declared a Free City at war's end. It didn't work, and the city wound up in Italy and much of the countryside in Yugoslavia.

                 The Corfu Channel separates Albania from Greece.  In 1946, Albanian mines sunk two British ships. From the Greek side, the CIA and MI-6 repeatedly failed in their attempts to unsettle the Hoxha regime.

                 Azerbaijan is 2500 kms. from Greece. As the USSR was falling apart, Azeris and Armenians began fighting in the southwest Caucasus. With so much going on, Gorbachev freed the autonomous region of Nakhchivan, the first piece of the empire to depart. A brief bus ride brings one to the Turkish border where Azerbaijan, Armenia, Iran and Turkey come together, and this story ends.

                 The author's primary conclusion is that there was a surprising amount of 'Ostalgie,' warm remembrances by many of the communist past. Stability and equality, which for many along the border is not readily available, are the attractions. Ever since I read 'Balkan Ghosts' by Kaplan three decades ago, I've enjoyed these rambling travelogues.

                 

                      

Independence Square, Smith - B

                     Forty-two years after 'Gorky Park,' Arkady Renko is still at it. He's asked to look into a murder on Moscow's streets at the same time a local crook asks him to find his daughter, Karina. The missing daughter's friend, Elena, and Renko head off to Kyiv when a few clues about Karina and the murdered victim point there. While there, a dissident who both women had worked with in Moscow is assassinated and the next day, the local head of the Crimean Tatars is murdered in Kyiv. Elena and Arkady go to Sevastopol in Crimea where the matter comes to a conclusion. It's Russia and the conclusion is corrupt and utterly wrong, but it is what one expects. As always, and still after all these years, a fun read.

Red Winter, Cameron -B

                      This is the latest in the Jack Ryan series. It is set in late 1984, a few months after the defection of the 'Red October.' Jack is the CIA liaison in London when Adm. Greer asks him to undertake some dangerous field work in East Berlin.  A Stasi colonel sets in motion a possible defection by dropping a computer disc in the handbag of a young Foreign Service officer. The disc states that there is a mole in the Berlin office and the defection must be handled by officers not from Germany. Mary Pat Foley, Jack, and John Clark undertake the effort and pull it off. It's always fun to return to Berlin and the Cold War, the city and era for great spy novels.

The Island, McKinty - B+

                     This a fabulous page turning thriller involving a family of four from Seattle off to Melbourne for the dad to speak at a medical conference. They take a day trip to an offshore island, inadvertently run over a local, and all of a sudden are captured by the lawless occupants of Dutch Island, the O'Neill family. There's no cell service, and it appears as if there are no civil or police authorities either. It's the American family versus the feral locals. Fortunately, Heather was trained by her dad, a US Army sniper, and she gives the O'Neills a run for their money. There's absolutely no redeeming intellectual material here - just a blast.

Confronting Saddam Hussein: George W. Bush And The Invasion Of Iraq, Leffler - B

                      "However tempting it is to level criticism at President Bush and his advisers - and we most definitely should - we need to recognize, collectively, that the exercise of prudence and the judicious use of power have not, historically, been among our finest qualities as Americans."  

                       Hussein was born into abject poverty in 1937; unwanted by his mother,  and his father unknown. He grew up to be a street fighting thug and sadistic bully. In his early 20's, he was imprisoned for murder. He was a bodyguard for the leader of the Ba'ath party. When the party ascended to power, he became an aide to the president. He was extremely ambitious, led the nationalization of the nation's oil industry, negotiated development deals with many countries, began the modernization of Iraq, and took over in 1978. He had dozens of the party's leaders executed. Two years later, he started an eight year war against Iran. The cost in lives and treasure were immense. He used chemical weapons against the Iranians and afterwards, against the Iraqi Kurds. He developed WMD and invaded Kuwait in 1990. The US led coalition destroyed Iraq's army in days and freed Kuwait. His continued rule of Iraq achieved infrequently seen before levels of violence, caprice, and suffering. His was a totalitarian reign of terror. 

                     When Bush was running for the presidency, he was tutored on foreign affairs by a team assembled by Condoleezza Rice. The group espoused a "militant, hegemonic and missionary role for the United States." The new administration did not adopt any policies on al Qaeda, and wished to only further isolate Hussein. On Sept. 10th, Sec. Rumsfeld made a speech at the Pentagon stating that there was an adversary that posed a significant threat to America - the Pentagon bureaucracy. The following day proved him wrong. Bush's response was "angry yet calm; determined yet dignified; empathetic yet vengeful; reassuring and inspiring." The administration felt that they had missed it and were responsible for the failure to protect the country. There was a palpable fear that another attack would come any day. They resolved that it would never happen again. 

             Bush called our response a Global War On Terror. The administration enhanced cooperation among all of our intelligence agencies and made real progress on the ground in Afghanistan. From the very beginning, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz wanted to attack Iraq. Bush had no interest. Hussein made the mistake of voicing his support for the 9/11 attack, and soon people began to discuss the risks he posed because it was believed he had WMD. "Bush struggled to define his priorities  - inspections, disarmament, containment, regime change." Slowly, the administration moved toward regime change in Iraq as a major goal in the GWOT. A  lengthy visit to Iraq by a highly placed al Qaeda operative fanned the flames of anxiety over the spread of WMD. The hawks ratcheted up the public condemnations of Hussein. On Sept. 12, 2002, Bush spoke at the UN and asked for a resolution mandating Iraq stop supporting terrorism and remove its WMDs. "The speech was met with stony silence." The Security Council eventually demanded a reinitiating of inspections. Inspections began anew and the UN did not find any weapons of mass destruction, but were frustrated with Iraq's foot dragging and lack of cooperation. With troops in the Mideast and warm weather coming, Bush decided to go to war in March. In Iraq, "Saddam Hussein still hoped to outmenouvre the inspectors, and outfox the Bush Administration."

                 On March 19th, Bush announced that the war had begun. The administration had very specific and concrete plans for fighting and winning the war. What it did not have was a plan for what to do after they won. On April 9th, US Marines pulled down the Hussein statue in downtown Baghdad. DOD and State could not agree on what should happen and the result was pure uncontrollable chaos. The man the US put in charge on the ground, Paul Bremer, exacerbated matters by ignoring and running roughshod over the locals. Extensive looting, civil unrest, if not civil war ran rampant across the country. The security situation was so bad that the UN withdrew its people in August. "Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld bears much of the responsibility. He oversaw the war planning. He scrutinized the combat phase of the mission...but showed scant interest in the stability operations...""President Bush stood atop the morass of postwar planning, and did little to uplift it."

                The US forces diligently searched for, but never found, any weapons of mass destruction. Our rationale to start the war was grounded on a false premise. Our occupation of the country was an unmitigated disaster. The genesis of the war was 9/11 and the fact that the administration lived in overwhelming fear of a repeat that would destroy the Bush presidency, and further damage American democracy. That fear, and Bush's hatred of Hussein, are the reasons the US invaded Iraq. "For the US, the geopolitical, psychological, and domestic costs of the intervention persist and reverberate...The conflict besmirched America's reputation and heightened anti-Americanism...Rather than enhancing the spread of liberty, the president and his advisers left office witnessing the worldwide recession of freedom."

               "We need to ponder what happens when there is too much fear, too much power, too much hubris - and insufficient prudence."

                

City Of Dreams, Winslow - B+

                      This is the fabulous sequel to last year's 'City On Fire.'  Danny Ryan is on the run with his dying dad, two-year old son and no money.  He works odd jobs in the San Diego area, but hightails it to his mothers house in Las Vegas when he senses someone from Providence looking for him. With help from his mother's contacts he makes a deal with the DEA. He raids a cartel safe house in Nevada and liberates a fortune in cash which he splits with the DEA, and his slate is wiped clean. He winds up dallying in Hollywood, but the notoriety is too much for his friends in high places and he moves on. He hopes to start something new  in Las Vegas, which I assume is where the 3rd leg of this trilogy continues. This author never misses a beat.

Moscow Exile, Lawton - C

                     We pick up the Joe Wilderness series where it left off the last time, on the Bridge of Spies (the Glienicke Bridge) in Cold War Berlin. Joe is shot and off to Moscow in a botched transfer. The story traces the very long career of an English woman, Charlotte, who did well in the US and worked for Moscow Centre. Our side knows that Charlie worked for her and spends a great many years trying to figure out just who was Charlie's handler. As it turns out, Joe had set up the bridge snafu on purpose to get to Moscow and find out from the long defected Charlie who he had reported to. All in all, way too beyond an acceptable degree of convoluted.