Saving Stalin: Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin, and the Cost of Allied Victory in Europe

by John Kelly

Overview

During World War II, the Allied leaders banded together, forged a great victory—and created a new and dangerous post-war world.


In the summer of 1941, Harry Hopkins, Franklin Roosevelt's trusted advisor, arrived in Moscow to assess whether the US should send aid to Russia as it had to Britain. Unofficially, he was there to determine whether Josef Stalin—the man who had killed over six million Ukrainians during the 1930s—was worth saving.


In this riveting and sweeping narrative, author John Kelly chronicles the turbulent wartime relationship between the great leaders—Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin—and military commanders of America, Britain, and the Soviet Union. Faced with the greatest challenge of the century, the Allied leaders and their war managers struggled against a common enemy—and each other. The story behind how victory was forged is an epic story, rich in drama, passion and larger-than-life personalities. The Allies eventually triumphed, but at what cost?


Using his trademark character-rich writing style and focusing on unique, unknown, and unexplored aspects of the story, Kelly offers a fresh perspective on the decision-making that changed the course of the war—and the course of history.


Saving Stalin brings to vivid life the epic story of the century's greatest human catastrophe. It is an unforgettable master work in historical narrative.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780306902772
Publisher:	Hachette Books
Publication date:	10/06/2020
Pages:	384
Sales rank:	628,712
Product dimensions:	9.10(w) x 6.20(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

John Kelly is the author of the highly praised bestseller The Great Mortality, about the Black Death of 1348, and the acclaimed The Graves Are Walking, about the Irish famine of the mid-nineteenth century, as well as Never Surrender, his praised previous book about the beginning of World War II. He has written extensively about medicine, history, and psychology. He lives in New York City.

Table of Contents

1 The Day Before the Day of Dead 1

2 Stalin Regains His Nerve 9

3 Saving Stalin 21

4 War Without End 36

5 One Day in December 57

6 The Worst of Times 72

7 The Longest Summer 93

8 We've Got to Feel We Have Victories in Us 115

9 General Determination and General "They Will Beat Us!" 125

10 Turn of the Tide 134

11 Death Stands at Attention 141

12 The End of the Beginning 150

13 The Polish Agony 161

14 Mr. Churchill at Harvard 173

15 Commander in Chief 183

16 The City of a Hundred Promises 188

17 A Walk in the Sun 199

18 "Nice Chap, But No General" 218

19 The Two Faces of War 2.37

20 The Grand Alliance at High Tide 249

21 Apocalypse 270

22 Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas 280

23 Yalta: The Grand Alliance at High Tide 290

24 Never Forgive, Never Forget 299

25 Birthday and Death 306

Acknowledgments 331

Notes 333

Index 359

Editorial Reviews

09/28/2020

Historian Kelly (Never Surrender) offers a solid look at the evolving relationships among FDR, Churchill, and Stalin that led to their cooperation to defeat Germany in WWII. Kelly begins in June 1941, as Hitler violates the 1939 German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact by invading the Soviet Union. After some initial German successes, Stalin’s forces managed to stall the advance, which was hampered, according to Kelly, by the Nazis’ hubristic expectations that the campaign would be over quickly, rendering the need to supply German troops with winter-appropriate clothing and gear superfluous. Kelly details high-level discussions among Allied leaders in Washington, D.C., Moscow, and Yalta, and is particularly good at conveying how victory over Hitler was far from inevitable. He describes numerous instances that could have altered the course of WWII, such as when a navigational error almost brought Churchill’s plane within range of German anti-aircraft guns in January 1942, but ends the book rather abruptly with Stalin’s May 1945 victory speech, offering little insight into the postwar dynamics among the U.S., U.K., and Soviet Union. Occasionally overwrought prose (“soldiers began to grab death by the waist and dance her across the sodden fields just for the thrill of it”) distracts from Kelly’s firm grasp of the history and the personalities involved. The result is an enjoyable but nonessential account of the alliance that won WWII. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

"John Kelly is a master at bringing historical figures to life, and in Saving Stalin he has the most compelling cast of the twentieth century. Of all the evocative details, I'll never forget Stalin scratching out a doodle of wolves roaming the tundra whenever he felt nervous."—David Maraniss, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Good American Family: The Red Scare and My Father

"Earlier John Kelly wrote about the first days of World War II. Now he writes about its end—and about the making of the post-war world. This is narrative history at its finest."—John M. Barry, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Great Influenza

"A well-rendered popular history describing war and great men."—Kirkus Reviews

"A vivid look at the relationship between Allied leaders of Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union... from the author of the highly acclaimed book The Great Mortality, about the Black Death of 1348."—New York Post, selected as one of the Best Books of the Fall

"Historian Kelly offers a solid look at the evolving relationships among FDR, Churchill, and Stalin that led to their cooperation to defeat Germany in WW II,... details the high level discussions among Allied leaders,... and is particularly good at conveying how victory over Hitler was far from inevitable. [Saving Stalin offers] a firm grasp of the histories and personalities involved."—Publishers Weekly

“John Kelly, who has previously written narrative histories of the Black Death, the Irish famine, and the early stages of the Second World War, engagingly revisits the turbulent and often strained relationships between the U.S., Britain, and Soviet Russia in their war against Nazi Germany and her Axis partners in his new book Saving Stalin.”
 —Francis P. Sempa, New York Journal of Books

“This well researched history tracks the course of World War II ... and details the ebb and flow in relations among Stalin, FDR, Churchill and other allies. Saving Stalin offers a thoughtful analysis of the compromises leaders made to win a war. It covers in great detail Operation Overlord, which Stalin had been pushing for and Churchill wanted control over....John Kelly chronicles the turbulent wartime relationship between Britain, America and the Soviet Union with a unique focus on the unknown and unexplored aspects of the story.”—BookReporter

From the Publisher

09/18/2020

Writing a popular history of World War II is a daunting task. Substantial works, such as James L. Stokesbury's A Short History of World War II, which convey new information, original theories, and modern interpretations stand up well against the competition. Unfortunately, this latest work from Kelly (The Great Mortality) focuses on the war in Europe but doesn't consider the global implications and includes numerous errors and jarring statements throughout, some more forgivable than others. The author asserts that German Luftwaffe commander Albert Kesselring evacuated 43,000 troops and 93,000 vehicles from Sicily. Each soldier apparently drove more than one vehicle. The Dukla Pass, part of the Carpathian mountain range, is stated as joining Poland and Slovenia yet Poland shares a border with Slovakia; Slovenia is farther south between Italy and Croatia. Moreover, Kelly writes that slain Nazi soldiers were "assembled in the snowy fields… summoned to Valhalla," the mythological Norse hall of warriors killed in battle, thus glorifying men who perpetrated some of the worst atrocities in history. VERDICT Errors and awkward prose mar a work that could have otherwise been acceptable. Not recommended.—Matthew Wayman, Pennsylvania State Univ. Lib., Schuylkill Haven

Library Journal

2020-08-18
Historical account of the relations between the three Allied leaders during World War II.

Kelly begins on June 22, 1941. Having dismissed repeated warnings from Britain, his spies, and Red Army units along the border, Stalin remained stubbornly loyal to his friendship treaty with Hitler, so that day’s massive German invasion caught the Soviet Union unprepared. After the opening, the author alternates between the fighting and Stalin’s subjects as they tried to get along and manage the various campaigns. Although certainly as evil as Hitler, Stalin may have been less of a megalomaniac. Both micromanaged their armies with terrible consequences, but a year of disaster persuaded Stalin to step back; thereafter, he often took his generals’ advice. Although it was Stalin’s own fault, the Soviet Union bore the brunt of the violence and casualties, and he never let Churchill and Roosevelt forget it. Many Russian historians have argued that the Allies deliberately held back their armies, only jumping in once the Wehrmacht was in full retreat in 1944. The conventional portrait of Roosevelt and Churchill as a harmonious team was only accurate early in the war. By 1943, with America the dominant partner and exasperated at Churchill’s reluctance to support a cross-channel invasion, Roosevelt began calling the shots. A gifted politician, he believed he could deal with Stalin better than the conservative Churchill, and historians give him low marks for the results. In his defense, Kelly points out that ruthlessness is a poor substitute for intellect. With the Red Army on the spot, Stalin had no trouble installing puppet governments throughout Eastern Europe. His goal—protection from a resurgent Germany—proved unnecessary, and the satellites produced only trouble and expense for his already dysfunctional economy. The author relies mostly on secondary sources, but he chooses them well. As a result, this is high-quality history that will disturb only readers who learn about WWII from the History Channel.

A well-rendered popular history describing war and great men.

Kirkus Reviews