Eastern Europe 1740-1985 by Robin Okey

Eastern Europe 1740-1985: Feudalism to Communism

There are two versions of this book. The original covers up to 1980 while the version I read goes up to 1985. Both of these dates are before the fall of the Iron Curtain. Before reading this book I had a few ideas about how Eastern Europe had developed, but they were mostly based on assumptions. While reading this book I found most of the assumptions were incorrect. The first chapter gives an overview of Eastern Europe before 1740 (I still don't consider myself an expert on the pre-1740 time period) and the rest of the book covers the time period in the title: 1740-1985.

Eastern Europe started out similar to Western Europe under the feudal system. It was located between Russia and Germany; however, Germany was not yet the powerful centralized state it became under Bismark. For most of this time period (1740-1918) Eastern Europe was split up between great powers. At first it was divided between Turkey, the Hapsburgs, and Poland. Later Poland fell and was partitioned between Prussia and Russia. Following the First World War many of these nations gained independence, but their governments did not fair too well. It seems to be Okey's belief, these governments were already tottering before the Russians and Germans invaded. Today this twenty year period between the world wars is often assumed to be the natural order of things, but it really is not or at least hadn't been for a number of generations. From the revised perspective the cold war does not appear to have been a particularly bad time for Eastern Europe: most nations had their own state although Czechoslovakia (Czechs and Slavs) and Yugoslavia (all the Balkan nations) contained several different peoples. The countries were largely autonomous and seem to be doing compared to pre-World War I history.

A question that often comes up is why Eastern Europe fell behind Western Europe. The first reason seems to be that the nobility in Eastern Europe realized the threat of the tradesmen to their governmental dominance in time to crush their competition. In Western Europe this did not appear to happen, by the time the nobles realized that the growing middle class wanted more political power, they were unable to suppress them. After the nobles reestablished their control, towns in Eastern Europe began to shrink again. I am unclear about why the difference occurred maybe it was because Eastern Europe was controlled by large foreign empires: Habsburgs, Ottomans, and Russians while Western Europe was controlled by home grown dynasties.

In some ways it seems that Eastern Europe has always been playing catch up with the West. Its intellectuals sat in Paris Cafes. It was late joining the enlightenment and never really seems to have caught on to the idea. Still, the idea that they were completely behind everyone else is incorrect. Wages were higher in Western Europe than Eastern Europe during the period from 1850-1914, but Eastern Europeans were still earning more money than Russians and presumably Turks. The earning differential and outsourcing (yes this happened back then) which occurred because of it raised the standard of living of the East Europeans although many of them were still serfs. The Eastern Europeans experienced the problems of many today: there will always be someone with more capital (earning more than you) pushing from above and someone working for less money (with a lower standard of living) pushing from below.

In the period leading up to the first World War, the governing empires were forced to spend more and more energy playing different factions off against each other and suppressing nationalistic feelings. Bismark, the unifier of Germany, made a point of avoiding involvement in the Balkans [advice America would do well to follow today]. During the First World War the Eastern European nations did not rise up to fight for independence. Afterward the region was split up into different countries based upon the haggling of the German, French, and British government. Except for the Czechs, all of these countries drifted from democracy into fascism or communism. The Czechs were the most politically stable of all the countries both before and after the First World War which explains why they are the most prosperous former Soviet Bloc country today.

Following the Second World War, the countries were each liberated again although they quickly moved under communism. Most of the prewar national leadership was eliminated either through being voted out, dying in the war, or execution. Romania and Poland both avoided the show trials which happened in all other countries (it never pays to be the second place dictator). Although all countries were under the sway of the Soviet Union, they each resisted in their own way. Ceauşescu in Romania and Tito in Yugoslavia were able to gain a certain degree of autonomy although they were not very kind (read brutal) to their own people. Polish, Hungarian and other citizens fought and protested but suffered for this at the hands of soldiers.

As the soviet period continued, the Eastern German governments gradually took more and more capitalist ideas. The population moved into the cities and their diets included more meat and sugar and less bread and potatoes. When writing this book, Okey was unsure whether the countries would continue to liberalize or revert to hardcore communism. Thankfully, the former took place.

After reading this book, I am more optimistic about the future of Eastern Europe but more uncertain about the future of mankind. Eastern Europe is happily on a long term upward trend. Unfortunately, I now have a better understanding of how rare and fleeting liberty is in this world.

The Modern Diet Review by John Barban

The Modern Diet Review

I downloaded The Modern Diet Review by John Barban from The Fitness Black Book. The free download source is also located on The Fitness Black Book's website. The author, John Barban, maintains a blog where you can read more of his work. In his summary of the book Rusty Moore of TFBB says that Barban has worked successfully for some time in the fitness industry, a strike against him in my mind.

Barban breaks modern diets down into seven types: four of which can work, two of which are bad, and one is not yet evaluated. First, I will discuss John Barban's conclusion and then critique his description of each diet.

Barban says that all diets boil down to calories in minus calories out. He says that less processed foods can provide the most satisfaction [read nutrition?] per calorie, but this is a minor factor in comparison to your calorie deficit.

There are no such thing as ‘good’ foods and ‘bad’ foods. There is just food and how much of it you choose to eat.
Finding a diet style that helps you eat less total food without going insane is the key to lasting weight loss.

I completely disagree with this. I believe food quality and nutrition is the number one factor in health and consequently weight loss. The volume of food/calories is of secondary importance and the amount needed depends on food quality. While I agree with many of the things Barban says in this report, I cannot agree with his conclusion. I would encourage you to read this report, but take it with a grain of salt.

Diet categories

• Low fat (potentially good)
• Low carbohydrate (potentially good)
• Intermittent fasting (potentially good)
• Balanced nutrient ratios (potentially good)
• Cleansing/Detox (bad)
• Blood type (bad)
• Paleo (unknown)

Based upon Barban's findings low carbohydrate and low carbohydrate diets work but very poorly. They work by lowering the caloric intake and neither of them show significant weight loss after a year; however, low carb diets do show weight loss after three months and so are an improvement over low fat diets. I think both of these diets are starvation diets which only work as long as you are short of food through willpower or scarcity. Barban follows the standard party line that most fats are bad (saturated and trans) and that only unsaturated fats are good. I think this is incorrect based upon the lessons I have learned from the Weston A. Price Foundation and Eat Fat and Grow Slim. Animal fats are an essential part of your diet (although olive and coconut oil can replace them to a certain extent) and very healthy. You cannot eat too many of these healthy animal fats.

The intermittent fasting diet has been shown to work over the course of a year. I follow a combination of the Warrior Diet (a version of intermittent fasting) and Weston Price Foundation guidelines, so this is where I have the most experience. Barban approves of this method saying that intermittent fasting has been shown to maintain weight loss over the course of a year proving its effectiveness. He attributes this to calorie cutting because people will often skip another meal or day of food when they notice they are gaining weight. I disagree with him about intermittent fasting only working because of calorie deprivation. Ori Hofmekler has shown that metabolism increases with intermittent fasting so that you will lose weight even if your caloric intake remains constant.

John Barban's favorite is the balanced nutrient type diet because it trains you to eat a balanced diet (read: count calories/read nutrition labels) and prevents the need to eliminate any dietary group from your diet. Low fat and low carb diets fail because a dieter cannot give up eating foods he loves. This diet allows a reduction in calories without eliminating any foods. If you believe diets boil down to a calories in versus calories out equation, this is the best diet for you. I think this diet has potential but I would not favor it over intermittent fasting.

Cleansing and detox diets differ in that the former attempts to clean your intestinal tract while the latter tries to clean toxins from your body. Barban says that both of these lack scientific evidence and do not make sense logically. The intestinal tract can be viewed in videos and apparently most people do not have any intestinal buildup. I have not looked into this matter, so I will not comment on it. John then says that the concept of toxins is vaguely defined and that your body detoxes itself naturally and there is nothing you can do to aid the process. While I have not investigated detox diets, I disagree with Barban's conclusions. The liver and kidneys can obviously detoxify faster if they are healthy. They are filters and might need to get cleaned and rested from time to time. I don't know what a "toxin" is either but we get plenty of toxic substances that build up in our body like mercury in a Great Lakes fish. There is plenty of anecdotal evidence that foods and drinks such as beet kvass can speed the rate of detoxification, but I am unsure if any scientific studies have investigated this.

John Barban calls the blood type diet an interesting idea with no basis in fact. People all over the world have different blood types and different diets and are healthy. Barban is probably correct about blood types, but I would guess that there is a genetic component to what makes a diet successful. On the whole, I would agree with Barban that the blood type diet does not work although I have not studied the matter thoroughly.

No studies have been conducted on the paleo diet, so Barban does not give a recommendation on this diet. He does say that the paleo diet seems to be a combination of the intermittent fasting and balanced nutrient diets.

White Devil by Steven Brumwell

White Devil: A True Story of War, Savagery And Vengeance in Colonial America

I finished reading White Devil by Stephen Brumsell a while ago, but it was very interesting so I read through my notes in order to review it. I have already made one post from this book about Robert Rogers getting scurvy on my primary blog. White Devil tells the story of Robert Roger's raid on St. Francis during the French and Indian War. Although the focus is on one particular battle, Brumwell tells the story within the context of the war as a whole.

While there are a vast number of lessons that can be drawn from this book, the interactions between and differences among the interacting cultures was the most interesting to me. In a way it hearkens back to a hierarchy of cultures I have proposed earlier. The groups discussed will be

1. French and English gentry and officers
2. Town dwellers in the new and old world
3. English farmers
4. French and English woodsmen
5. Native Americans
   

1. French and English gentry and officers

English and French officers and political leaders were at the top of the social ladder. In general they held everyone else in disdain and demanded unquestioning submission from military subordinates. Penalties in the British army were severe; I do not know about the French army. This led the officers to try and replace the independent frontiersmen with more controllable regulars as scouts and skirmishers. Today these officers are are stereotyped as being stupid and having bad tactics (see the movie The Last of the Mohicans as an example). This was sometimes the case as with Thomas Gage who did not perform well during either the French and Indian War or the American Revolution, but he was an exception not the rule. A few examples of skilled leaders who died leading their men are Wolfe, de Montcalm, and Howe. These men were not familiar with the American wilderness having grown up in Europe, but this lack of experience does not mean the lacked in intellect. In any case, it is undisputed that this caste controlled the grand strategy and strategic levels of the war.

1. Town dwellers in the New and Old World

These men formed the backbone of the armies. They were not the best fighters in world history, but modern opinion does not give them enough credit. These people did not live out on the frontier and most of them had spent their entire lives living in urban areas. They were not a warrior caste raised from the cradle to handle a gun and they were not skilled woodsmen; however, they went into battle with arguably the most hardened tribal warriors in the world and the best light infantrymen of all time. American soldiers face similar tribal warriors in Afghanistan today, but the modern Americans have a vast technological superiority. The English line troops had only muskets and so were on a technological parity with their opponents. These men fought realizing that they would most likely be tortured to death if captured. I do not think many from this group served in the ranger units, but their bravery cannot be questioned.

3. British farmers

I don't think Brumwell really distinguishes between the farmers and city dwellers in his book, but I think there is a difference. This category of men were farmers from America or recently conquered highlanders from Scotland. These men had a more martial spirit and were physically stronger than the city folk, but they did not have experience in the back woods. As the British began to field regular light infantry units in hopes of replacing the rangers, this category of men volunteered to fill the ranks. They learned their skills from Robert Rogers and went out on long ranging trips away from the safety of the army. Many of these men met their deaths during these excursions, but the fact that they reached the point of being able to battle the natives on close to equal terms is a wonder in itself. The Highlanders were brought to the colonies by the English for two reasons: first, to kill them off so they would not rebel again and second, because they were a tribal people they might be better able to deal with the natives. This did not turn out to be the case because the highlands were not a dense forest; the Scots were no good in the woods (without training).

French and English woodsmen

These men grew up on the frontier. They were in many ways as the same as the Native Americans, but there were some differences. First, I don't think they ever attained parity in wilderness fighting with the natives. The English at least did not have the cultural background of the Natives and came down with scurvy, a nutritional disease the Indians knew how to avoid. The English officers hated their rangers because of they were rebellious, but knew the officers could not do without them. Like the Indians, there were not many of these frontiersmen. It was impossible to replace casualties and my guess is that most of this class was just about exterminated during the war. The French were friendly with the Native Americans and traded with them as opposed to the British frontiersmen who were their enemies and usually trying to take their land. Consequently, the French woodsmen often went out to fight as one war party with the Natives.

Native Americans

The Native Americans drew upon a much smaller population base than England and France. They were impressed by the bravery of the European soldiers who made frontal assaults while taking lots of casualties, but the Indians would not risk their lives in this manner themselves. Each native death was a tragedy for the small Indian populations, so they quickly broke from contact whenever they were on the losing side of a fight. Even in such British victories as the Battle of Bushy Run, the British suffered more casualties than the Indians. One thing that the Indians could not do was empathize with their white opponents. They depopulated the Colonial countryside killing women and children without remorse, yet they are angry to this day that the English soldiers attacked their women and children at St. Francis. What was an weekly occurrence (having houses torched and families slaughtered) for the Colonists, was a once in a war happening for the Indians. The natives also tortured their captives to death frequently, so our modern image of the noble savage is not entirely true. Their fighting and wilderness skills were second to none. They often defeated vastly superior numbers of European soldiers and the main reason the raid on St. Francis was successful was that most of the Native warriors were gone. The native warriors of the Eastern North America may have been the best light infantry warriors in the history of the world.