Memoirs of Nikita Khrushchev: Statesman, 1953-1964

In the first two volumes, published by Pennsylvania State University Press in 2005 and 2006, respectively, Khrushchev tells the story of his rise to power and his part in the fight against Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union. He also discusses agriculture, the housing problem, and other issues of domestic policy, as well as defense and disarmament. This volume is devoted to international affairs. Khrushchev describes his dealings with foreign statesmen and his state visits to Britain, the United States, France, Scandinavia, India, Afghanistan, Burma, Egypt, and Indonesia.

In the first part, Khrushchev talks about relations between the Soviet Union and the Western powers. Of particular interest is his perspective on the Berlin, U-2, and Cuban missile crises. The second part focuses on the Communist world--above all, the deterioration of relations with China and the tensions in Eastern Europe, including relations with Tito's Yugoslavia, Gomulka's Poland, and the 1956 Soviet intervention in Hungary. In the third part, Khrushchev discusses the search for allies in the Third World.

The Appendixes contain biographies, a bibliography and a chronology, and also the reminiscences of Khrushchev's chief bodyguard about the visit to the United Nations in 1960 at which the famous "shoe-banging" incident occurred--or, perhaps, did not occur.

Sergei Khrushchev is Senior Fellow at the Thomas Watson Jr. Institute for International Studies at Brown University. He is the author ofNikita Khrushchev and Creation of a Superpower (Penn State, 2000).