Brian Crozier: The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire

Listening Notes on “What They Say”

In his long career, Brian Crozier wrote a number of books but The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire serves as a basis from which those interested in Soviet imperialism can begin their journey of discovery. I also found it to be riveting to read owing to Crozier’s journalistic style and honesty.

This reading:

Chapter 1—Lenin Seizes His Moment

(March-December 1917)

Who is Brian Crozier?

Brian Rossiter Crozier was a talented linguist, musician and painter, an international activist, journalist, spy, author, and intelligence and security studies expert.

He was the founder of London’s Institute for the Study of Conflict, working as lead Sovietologist, who was claimed to be the KGB’s “number one enemy”.

He wrote biographies of Franco, de Gaulle, and Chinag Kai-shek. In 1996 he was a Distinguished Fellow of the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace at Stanford University.

For further insight into Crozier’s life and stellar career, please read:

• The Indepedent, “Brian Crozier: Intelligence and security expert who fought communism and founded his own spy network” (2012)

• The Guardian, “Brian Crozier Obituary” (2012)

• The Telegraph, “Brian Crozier” (2012)

• The Times, “Brian Crozier” (2012)

The Rise and Fall of the Soviet Empire

“For more than 80 years, the Soviet Empire cast an ever-lengthening shadow across the face of the world. Lenin's ruthless legacy consumed Eastern Europe and toppled governments on virtually every continent. Yet at the moment when the Empire appeared to have reached its zenith, it collapsed like a house of cards.”