Russian annexation of Crimea and the subsequent air campaign over Syria took the world by surprise. The capabilities and efficiency of Moscow’s armed forces during both operations signalled to the world that Russia was back in business as a significant military actor on the international stage.

In this cutting-edge study, Bettina Renz provides an in-depth and comprehensive analysis of Russia’s military revival under Putin’s leadership. Whilst the West must adjust to the reality of a modernised and increasingly powerful Russian military, she argues that the renaissance of Russian military might and its implications for the balance of global power can only be fully understood within a wider historical context.

Assessing developments in Russian Great Power thinking, military capabilities, Russian strategic thought and views on the use of force throughout the post-Soviet era, the book shows that, rather than signifying a sudden Russian military resurgence, recent developments are consistent with longstanding trends in Russian military strategy and foreign policy.

«Saruna, kas neļauj aizmigt»: Jānis MiezītisSaruna, kas neļauj aizmigtLasot grāmatu ik pa brīdim nākas ieturēt pauzes, lai apdomātu izlasīto.Grāmatā tiek aprakstīts viss būtiskais cilvēka dzīvē - brīvība un ticība, politika un demokrātija, labais un sliktais, patiesība un meli. Doma ievirzās tieši uz tiesību brīvību un demokrātiju…Rīga: Vieda, 2002. 143 lpp

Книга специалиста в области геополитики и мировой энергетики Эллен Уолд посвящена истории Саудовской Аравии с начала XX века, когда Абдель-Азиз из рода Саудитов начал борьбу за объединение Аравийского полуострова, и до настоящего времени, когда Королевство стало одним из важнейших участников глобального энергетического рынка. Главные герои этой историко-политической саги — королевская семья аль-Сауд и самая прибыльная в истории нефтяного бизнеса компания Aramco. Читателя ждет захватывающее погружение в мир, где тесно переплелись религия и террор, бизнес и семейные распри, восточная мудрость и западные ценности, борьба за нефть и передел мирового энергетического рынка.

Džims MarssSazvērestība triljonu vērtībāKāpēc mūsdienās rodas banku krīzes, izplatās dažādas slimības un cilvēki kļūst par zombijiemNo angļu valodas tulkojusi Velga ViganteLietusdārzsAmerikas ekonomika ir sagrauta, tauta dzīvo bailēs un nedrošībā par nākotni… Vai mūsdienu krīzi radījusi neliela sazvērnieku grupa?Vai tā ieplānota pirms simt gadiem un soli pa solim slepeni realizēta?Turklāt apzināti virzīta uz visas pasaules pakļaušanu?Šīs grāmatas pamatos likti lieli un smagi jautājumi. Džims Marss dēvē amerikāņus par zombiju nāciju, kuras pārstāvji vairs nespēj domāt, lemt un rīkoties. Liela daļa grāmatas atklāj, kā šādu nāciju var radīt. Blēdīgi banku darījumi, deģenerējoša pārtika un ūdens, zāļu un vakcīnu izmantošana, notrulinoša izglītība ir daudz līdzekļu un paņēmienu, kas palīdz cilvēkus pārvērst būtnēs, kuras var vienkārši izmantot.Tikpat plaši un pamatīgi autors parāda, kā zombijus kontrolēt. Vajadzīgi paklausīgi mediji, ar mūsdienu tehniskajām ierīcēm aprīkota ierēdņu armija, jāveido policejiska valsts.Grāmatai tomēr ir arī gaišā puse: tajā iezīmēts ceļš, kā zombijus atbrīvot. Atgriešanās pie pamatvērtībām izglītībā, katra cilvēka rūpes par savu veselību, atbildīga un gudra attieksme pret vēlēšanām, arī nevardarbīga nepakļaušanās vai tad tas ir kas neiespējams?Milzums faktu, citātu, personvārdu šajā darbā cieši saausti ar autora pārliecību par sava skatījuma pareizību.Vai tā patiešām ir vai tikai varētu būt? Lasītāja prātam ir dota lieliska iespēja vērtēt un spriest. Lasītājam ir laime nebūt zombijam.Žurnālists Džims Marss (1943) savus plaši pazīstamos rakstus un grāmatas galvenokārt veltījis dažādām sazvērestībām.Šādā aspektā viņam ir savs viedoklis par Džona Kenedija slepkavību, citplanētiešiem, 11. septembra notikumiem, slepenām biedrībām utt.Jim MarrsMĀRA GARJĀŅA makets un vāka dizainsNoskanējis grāmatu un  failu izveidojis Imants Ločmelis imantslochmelis@inbox.lvVelga Vīgante, tulkojums no ang[u valodas, 2014 © Apgāds “Lietusdārzs”, 2014PateicībasAutors vēlas izteikt pateicību tiem daudzajiem cilvēkiem, kuri iedro­šināja un sniedza atbalstu šīs grāmatas tapšanā. īpaši sirsnīgs paldies Maritai Ganai (Maritha Gan), Tomasam Rufneram (Thomas Rnffner) un Nikam Redfernam (Nick Redfern), kā arī Denijam Goldšteinam Danny Goldstein) un Henrijam Ferisam (Henry Ferris) no apgāda HarperCollins Publishers par apzinīgo rediģēšanu un, protams, manai bezgala pacietīgajai sievai Kerolai. Pagodinājumu un pateicību pelnījuši arī visi tie cilvēki no visas pasaules, kas milzum daudz laika un pūļu veltījuši patiesības izzināšanai.Visaptverošas krāpšanas apstākļos patiesības atklāšana kļūst par revolucionāru darbību.Džordžs Orvels

In 1947, Ayn Rand wrote a pamphlet for the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, entitled “Screen Guide for Americans,” based on her personal impressions of the American film industry. Rand cited examples of popular and critically acclaimed films which in her view contained hidden Communist or “Collectivist” messages that had not been recognized as such, even by conservatives. Examples included “The Best Years of Our Lives” (because it portrayed businessmen negatively, and suggested that bankers should give veterans collateral-free loans) and “A Song to Remember” (because it implied that Chopin sacrificed himself for a patriotic cause rather than devoting himself to his music).

The writing career of John Berger — poet, storyteller, playwright, and essayist — has yielded some of the most original and compelling examinations of art and life of the past half century. In this essential volume, Geoff Dyer has brought together a rich selection of many of Berger’s seminal essays.Berger’s insights make it impossible to look at a painting, watch a film, or even visit a zoo in quite the same way again. The vast range of subjects he addresses, the lean beauty of his prose, and the keenness of his anger against injustice move us to view the world with a new lens of awareness. Whether he is discussing the singleminded intensity of Picasso’s Guernica, the parallel violence and alienation in the art of Francis Bacon and Walt Disney, or the enigmatic silence of his own mother, what binds these pieces throughout is the depth and fury of Berger’s passion, challenging us to participate, to protest, and above all, to see.

On 17 July 2014, Malaysian Airlines MH17 was shot out of the sky above Ukraine. Aboard were 298 people, 38 of whom were Australians. No one survived.Subsequently it was shown that the airliner was almost certainly hit by a Buk surface-to-air missile fired by Ukrainian separatists aided by the Russian military. The debris from the plane’s disintegration mid-air was spread over 50 square kilometres, but for weeks rescue teams and investigators were denied access. The Russians have refused to take any responsibility for the deaths.This is the story of some of the people who boarded that fatal flight and the conflict below them that was doomed to destroy their lives and the happiness of the people they left behind. The fullest account yet published, it is also the story of a continuing clamour for justice. Unsettling, compelling and revealing, Shot Down will provoke both outrage that this criminal act could have happened and deep sadness for the lives lost.‘A compelling account of one of the most appalling aviation atrocities of our time.’JIM EAMES, author of Courage in the Skies

How should the West deal with Putin’s Russia? For the U.S. and some European powers the answer is obvious: isolate Russia with punishing economic sanctions, remove it from global institutions such as the G8, and arm the nations directly threatened by Putin. In short, return to the Cold War doctrine that froze Soviet aggression in Europe and helped bring about the collapse of communist Russia.

Others argue that such a policy is a dead end. Putin’s Russia has legitimate grievances against Western and NATO powers meddling in its sphere of influence. Instead of further antagonizing Putin and risking a dangerous escalation of the current conflict, the U.S. and Europe should seek common cause with Russia to address shared threats, from the Middle East to Asia to combatting terrorism.

In the fifteenth semi-annual Munk Debate, acclaimed academic Stephen F. Cohen and veteran journalist and bestselling author Vladimir Pozner square off against internationally renowned expert on Russian history Anne Applebaum and Russian-born political dissident Garry Kasparov to debate the future of the West’s relationship with Russia.

Since the outbreak of the Ukraine crisis, there has been much talk of a new Cold War between the West and Russia. Under Putin’s authoritarian leadership, Moscow is widely seen as volatile, belligerent and bent on using military force to get its way.

In this incisive analysis, top Russian foreign and security policy analyst Dmitri Trenin explains why the Cold War analogy is misleading. Relations between the West and Russia are certainly bad and dangerous but – he argues – they are bad and dangerous in new ways; crucial differences which make the current rivalry between Russia, the EU and the US all the more fluid and unpredictable. Unpacking the dynamics of this increasingly strained relationship, Trenin makes a compelling case for handling Russia with pragmatism and care rather than simply giving into fear.

In America, 2.3 million people—a population about the size of Houston’s, the country’s fourth-largest city—live behind bars. Sick Justice explores the economic, social, and political forces that hijacked the criminal justice system to create this bizarre situation. Presenting frightening true stories of (sometimes wrongfully) incarcerated individuals, Ivan G. Goldman exposes the inept bureaucracies of America’s prisons and shows the real reasons that disproportionate numbers of minorities, the poor, and the mentally ill end up there.

Goldman dissects the widespread phenomenon of jailing for profit, the outsized power of prison guards’ unions, California’s exceptionally rigid three-strikes law, the ineffective and never-ending war on drugs, the closing of mental health institutions across the country, and other blunders and avaricious practices that have brought us to this point.

Sick Justice tells a big, gripping story that’s long overdue. By illuminating the system’s brutality and greed and the prisoners’ gratuitous suffering, the book aims to be a catalyst for reform, complementing the work of the Innocence Project and mirroring the effects of Michael Harrington’s The Other America: Poverty in the United States (1962), which became the driving force behind the war on poverty.

Anyone wishing to understand the past, present and future of nuclear weapons should read this fine book before saying a word on the subject.RICHARD PERLE, Resident Fellow, American Enterprise Institute and Assistant Secretary of Defense, 1981–1987Sleepwalking with the Bomb shows how we can forestall nuclear catastrophe. It offers familiar faces, cases and places to illustrate how the civilized world can face the most pressing nuclear dangers. Drawing from both history and current events, John Wohlstetter assembles in one place an integrated, coherent and concise picture that explains how best to avoid the “apocalyptic trinity”—suicide, genocide and surrender—in confronting emerging nuclear threats.

Josifs StaļinsSociālisma ekonomiskas problēmas PSR savienībāEkonomiskas diskusijasLatvijas Valsts Izdevniecība Rīga 1953И. Сталин dalībniekiemЭкономические проблемы социализма в СССРГосполитиздат. 1952 PIEZĪMESНа латышском языкеimantslochmelis@inbox.lv

Ļeņins. Sociālisms un karš. (1915)...lai saliedētu starptautiskās sociāldemokrātijas kreisos elementus uz revolucionāru pozīciju pamata, Ļeņins darīja visu, lai līdz konferences sasaukšanai darbs būtu iespiests. Šā darba uzdevums bija iepazīstināt kreisos sociālistus ar boļševiku partijas pozīciju attiecībā pret karu; Ļeņins to nosauca par «komentāriem mūsu partijas rezolūcijām, t. i., to populāru paskaidrojumu».

Коллективная монография представляет собой первое планомерное академическое исследование феномена Soft Power, интерес к которому вспыхнул с особой силой в последнее пятилетие. Авторы – специалисты в области политологии и международных отношений, семиотики и языкознания – излагают собственные взгляды на проблему «мягкой силы» и знакомят с представлениями, сложившимися по этому поводу в своих областях. Ряд работ содержит попытки применения нового понятия к описанию политических процессов в ряде стран.Книга представляет интерес не только для исследователей, преподавателей и студентов целого ряда общественных дисциплин, но и для практиков-политконсультантов, специалистов по PR, журналистов, сотрудников госструктур.2-е издание, стереотипное.

Since he was a small boy, Mosab Hassan Yousef has had an inside view of the deadly terrorist group Hamas. The oldest son of Sheikh Hassan Yousef, a founding member of Hamas and its most popular leader, young Mosab assisted his father for years in his political activities while being groomed to assume his legacy, politics, status… and power. But everything changed when Mosab turned away from terror and violence, and embraced instead the teachings of another famous Middle East leader.In Son of Hamas, Mosab Yousef—now called “Joseph”—reveals new information about the world’s most dangerous terrorist organization and unveils the truth about his own role, his agonizing separation from family and homeland, the dangerous decision to make his newfound faith public, and his belief that the Christian mandate to “love your enemies” is the only way to peace in the Middle East.Review“Son of Hamas, written by Mosab Hassan Yousef and journalist Ron Brackin, is… a must-read book and one can only hope it becomes the basis of a major Hollywood motion picture.”—Joel RosenbergAmazon“…a fascinating book. I couldn’t put it down.”Sean Hannity — Fox News’ Hannity“…a book more incendiary than any roadside IED…”—GQ Magazine"…intriguingly detailed…”—Newsweek“…one of the most extraordinary spy stories in history…”David Asman, America’s Nightly Scoreboard, Fox Business Network“…a Le Carréesque thriller wrapped in a spiritual coming-of-age story…”(Matthew Kaminski)“…reads with the page-turning ease of a great thriller.”(Claudia Rosett)

Stalin: The Enduring Legacy considers the ‘Man of Steel’ in a manner that will outrage dogmatists of both Left and Right.

Stalinist Russia is reassessed as a state that transcended Marxism, and proceeded on a nationalist and imperial path rather than as the citadel of ‘world revolution’. Stalin reversed many early Bolshevik policies re-instituting, for example, the traditional family. He abolished the Communist International, championed ‘realism’ in the arts and rejected post-1945 US plans for a ‘new world order’. Despite so-called ‘de-Stalinization’ after his death, the Soviet bloc continued to oppose globalism, as does Putin’s Russia.

Stalin: The Enduring Legacy, examines the anti-Marxist character of Stalinism, the legitimacy of the Moscow Trials against the ‘Old Bolsheviks’, the origins of the Cold War, the development of Trotskyism as a tool of US foreign policy, the question of Stalin’s murder, and the relevance of Russia to the future of world power politics.

‘Dr. Bolton’s book Stalin: The Enduring Legacy is a major contribution to the proper understanding of Russian, as well as American, politics and society in the twentieth century. It brushes aside the anti-Stalinist biases of the Trotskyist American chroniclers of this historical period to reveal the unquestionable integrity of Stalin as a nationalist leader. At the same time, it highlights the vital differences between the Russian national character rooted in the soil and history of Russia, and its opposite, the rootless Jewish cosmopolitanism that Trotskyist Marxism sought to impose on the Russians – as well as on the rest of the world’. – Dr Alexander Jacob

A chilling, skillfully delineated account based on newly released Russian documentation that reveals Stalin’s true motives—and the extent of his enduring commitment to expanding the Soviet empire—during the years in which he seemingly collaborated with Roosevelt, Churchill, and the capitalist West.At the Big Three conferences of World War II, Stalin persuasively played the role of a great world leader. Even astute observers like George F. Kennan concluded that the United States and Great Britain should view Stalin as a modern-day tsarist-like figure whose primary concerns lay in international strategy and power politics, not in ideology. Now Robert Gellately uses recently uncovered documents to make clear that, in fact, the dictator was an unwavering revolutionary merely biding his time, determined as ever to establish Communist regimes across Europe and beyond, and that his actions during these years (and the poorly calculated Western responses) set in motion what would eventually become the Cold War. Gellately takes us behind the scenes. We see the dictator disguising his political ambitions and prioritizing the future of Communism, even as he pursued the war against Hitler. Along the way, the ascetic dictator’s Machiavellian moves and bouts of irrationality kept the Western leaders on their toes, in a world that became more dangerous and divided year by year. Exciting, deeply engaging, and shrewdly perceptive, Stalin’s Curse is an unprecedented revelation of the sinister machinations of the Soviet dictator.

Josifs Staļins Par ĻeņinuSaturs:Ļeņins kā KKP organizators un vadonisSakarā ar Ļeņina nāviPar ĻeņinuNo sarunas ar pirmo amerikas strādnieku delegācijuNo sarunas ar vācu rakstnieku Emīlu LudviguRuna pirms vēlēšanām Maskavas pilsētas Staļina vēlēšanu apgabala vēlētāju sapulcēRuna augstskolu darbinieku pieņemšanā KremlīLatvijas Valsts Izdevniecība  Rīgā 1947«Darba balss»  e-grāmatu izdevniecība № 350 Rīga, 2015