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Russia and the Arabs : behind the scenes in the Middle East from the Cold War to the present / Yevgeny Primakov ; translated from the Russian by Paul Gould.

Title: Russia and the Arabs : behind the scenes in the Middle East from the Cold War to the present / Yevgeny Primakov ; translated from the Russian by Paul Gould.
Author: Primakov, E. M. (Evgeniĭ Maksimovich)
Publication: New York : Basic Books, c2009.

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Request for On-site Use Request Scan Not available - Please for assistance.	Text	Request in advance	DS63.1 .P772513 2009	Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Gould, Paul

Description

x, 418 p.; 25 cm.

Summary

"In Russia and the Arabs, Americans are given a look at Cold War and now post-Cold War relationships in the Middle East through the eyes and roles of Yevgeny Primakov - Russia's Kissinger in every sense of that name. '[The Middle East] is a region I have followed for half a century as a journalist, academic and politician - as a correspondent for Pravda; as deputy director (and later director) of the Institute of World Economy and International Relations at the USSR Academy of Science; at the Academy's Institute of Oriental Studies; as head of the SVR (Russia's foreign intelligence service); as Russian foreign minister, as Russian prime minister and as a deputy in the Duma, Russia's parliament.' Russia and the Arabs is as much a history of the Middle East as a memoir, when Primakov recounts his and the Soviet/Russian roles in the Arab world. He begins with Nasser's Egypt of the early 1950s, and the period in which the USSR gained its first toehold in the Middle East. Primakov emphasizes that despite Arab nationalism - regional identities and politics always trumped pan-Arab ones - and professed revolutionary, even socialist aims, the new regimes sought accommodation with the U.S. and kept their new ally, and primary source of weapons, the USSR at some distance. After Egypt, Primakov turns to examine Lebanon from the Civil War of 1975 to 2005 and the Hariri assassination, to the emergence of Arafat as Palestinian leader, and then to an appraisal of the USSR's overall relationship with and qualified support for Israel - there are now some one million recent Russian emigrants there. In the final chapters, Primakov narrates Russia's frustrated ties with Saddam Hussein, and judges Saddam Hussein to have suffered self-delusion in misreading the U.S., his new supporter during the Iran-Iraq war. This is especially interesting, not the least that Primakov was Putin's envoy to Iraq. Here, too, there is suggestion of Primakov's conspiratorial view of events. The Kurds, Israeli nuclear capabilities, and the future of the Middle East including the consequences of the Iraq War, Iran's growing power and nuclear potential, Hamas, Lebanon and religious divisions are all analyzed in the end."--Review by Gene R. Garthwaite in http://www.historybookclub.com.

Uniform Title

Konfident︠s︡ialʹno. English

Alternative Title

Konfident︠s︡ialʹno.

Subject

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Processing Action (note)

committed to retain

Contents

The nationalist revolutionaries -- A failed chance for Arab-Israeli relations -- The inevitable confrontation with the west -- National interests take precedence over Arab unity -- The Soviet Union and the Arab world: a difficult path to closer ties -- The lost cause of Communism -- America steps forward -- The beginning and end of the six-day war -- USA: tactics in the new Middle East -- Hidden pressures behind the Yom Kippur War of 1973 -- The making of the Israel-Egypt peace treaty -- Lebanon in the eye of a storm -- A return to a harder line -- The Arafat phenomenon -- The Soviet Union and Israel -- The phenomenon that was Saddam Hussein -- The sage of the Kurds -- A nuclear shadow over the Arab-Israeli conflict -- The future of the Middle East.

ISBN

9780465004751 (alk. paper)
046500475X (alk. paper)

LCCN

^^2009014923

OCLC

191926067
SCSB-12421216

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library