A history of the modern world from 1917 to the 1980s - Paul Johnson

Paul Johnson begins this dramatic account of six decades with the end of the First World War, which saw the destruction of the traditional European order, the triumph of Einstein's new cosmology, the full impact of Freudianism, the establishment of the first Marxist state and the genesis of the great Marxist heresy, Fascism. He traces the interplay of these forces during the arcadian Twenties, the desperate Thirties and the catastrophe of the Second World War. Within the framework of an ingenious organizational structure, which allows ample space for the vivid incident and the telling anecdote, he describes the rise of the two super-powers, locked in Cold War, the Communist revolution in China, the decolonization of Asia and Africa and the tragic aftermath of independence, the stunning recovery of democracy and capitalism in Western Europe, the rise of the Pacific enterprise economies led by Japan, the radicalization of Latin America, the expansion of Soviet Russia as a global military power, and the hegemony of the the United States followed by its attempted suicide in the years 1965 - 80.