Russia today is haunted by deeds that have been unexamined and words that have been left unsaid. A serious attempt to understand the meaning of the communist experience has not been undertaken and millions of victims of Soviet communism are all but forgotten.

In this book, David Satter, a former Moscow correspondent and long-time writer on Russia and the Soviet Union, presents a striking new interpretation of Russia's great historical tragedy, locating its source in Russia's failure fully to appreciate the value of the individual in comparison with the objectives of the state. Satter explores the moral and spiritual crisis of Russian society. He shows how it is possible for a government to deny the inherent value of its citizens and for the population to agree, and why so many Russians actually mourn the passing of the Soviet regime that denied them fundamental rights. Through a wide-ranging consideration of attitudes toward the living and the dead, the past and the present, the state and the individual, Satter arrives at a distinctive and important new way of understanding the Russian experience.

David Satter is senior fellow, Hudson Institute, and fellow, Foreign Policy Institute of Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. He was Moscow correspondent for the Financial Times from 1976 to 1982, then a special correspondent on Soviet affairs for the Wall Street Journal. His previous books Age of Delirium: The Decline and Fall of the Soviet Union and Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State are both available from Yale University Press. He lives in Washington, D.C..

"This book, its title deliberately inviting a loud shout of ‘No!’ is more vehement that his previous studies of post-Soviet Russia, but just as impeccably argued."—Donald Rayfield, Literary Review

"Satter casts fascinating light on the (comparatively cheerful) way in which repression was endured by the citizens of the USSR... An informed and insightful essay – with disturbing implications."—Michael Kerrigan, The Scotsman

"Splendidly researched and engagingly written, this book offers invaluable vignettes of various reactions to the still unprecedented remembrance of the totalitarian times… Satter’s book is not only an excellent report of the unsettling status of memory and moral justice in contemporary Russia, but also an effort to support the beleaguered activists of the ‘Memorial’ society, who refuse to endorse the official policies of forgetfulness…. A truly illuminating guide." Vladimir Tismaneanu, International Affairs