A new episode of Revolutions Podcast is out: 10.88- The Moscow Directive: To Moscow!

As usual, there is a lot of diverse topics in this episode: The uneasy alliance between the Black Army and the Red Army, the beginnings of the feud between Trotsky and Stalin, the situation in the Ukraine, Anti-Semitism, and the continuing strategic blunderings of the White Army.

It's all the stuff about the Ukraine, of course, that jumps out at the listener.  

Last week Mike tweeted: "Just posted Ep. 10.87--Anarchy in Ukraine. I swear I'm not doing this on purpose, it's just that history and current events are almost always basically the same thing."  But I think he might have spoken too soon.  This episode has even more analysis on the fraught relationship between the larger Russian Empire and the smaller Ukraine.

Or as someone said in the comments for this week: "Is it not crazy that you’re releasing these episodes just as Russia is launching new offensives into Ukraine. The universe, am I right?"

...and speaking of comments, the comments are back up and running now.  

For several months, the comments had been turned off.  No one knows why.  But I thought it was unfortunate, because the relationship between Mike Duncan and his commenters, and how Mike often picked up corrections from the comments, was always part of the dynamic of these podcasts (as I mentioned in my review of The History of Rome).  But the comments section got turned back on again a few weeks ago, so we're back to listeners offering their corrections in the comments.

One guy thinks Mike is exaggerating how out of touch the Whites were with the Ukranians.  It's an interesting comment, but I'm certainly not an expert so I can't weigh in either way.

(Another commenter is hosting a transcript of this episode on his website.  I'm not exactly sure what his angle is in doing this, but it's a useful resource nonetheless.)

This episode also talks about the anti-Semitism which Mike Duncan claims affected all ideologies at this point in history--which circles back to a similar point Mike Duncan made when talking about the anti-Semitism in the Marx/Bakunin feud way back in the first episodes of the series on the Russian Revolution.