Was the West aware of the Soviet gulag system?

Comments ( 4 )

1. Don't Believe The Hype says

   Actually, the right answer is when the Atheist Grinches in the USSR finally made themselves public they also told the world of the gulag system.

   Reply

2. Captain Smartass says

   They did know, but they probably didn’t want to do anything in case Russia retaliated.

   Reply

3. Derek says

   Of course they knew. But what were they going to do? United Nations Veto’s meant that nothing ever happened when the subject was brought up. Like Russia again today and the mess in Syria. One Veto and nothing happens.

   Reply

4. Bilbo says

   Yes thanks to Alexander Solzhenitsyn – most of his work appeared in the west in the 1960’s although much is older (Ivan Denisovitch is from 1950)

   A Storm in the Mountains
   One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
   An Incident at Krechetovka Station
   Matryona’s Place
   For the Good of the Cause
   The First Circle
   Cancer Ward
   The Prisoner and the Camp Hooker or The Tenderfoot and the Tart.
   August 1914 (1971). The beginning of a history of the birth of the USSR in an historical novel. The novel centers on the disastrous loss in the Battle of Tannenberg in August 1914, and the ineptitude of the military leadership. Other works, similarly titled, follow the story: see The Red Wheel (overall title).
   The Gulag Archipelago (three volumes) (1973–1978), not a memoir, but a history of the entire process of developing and administering a police state in the Soviet Union.

   Reply