William Henry Chamberlin

For the Mormon philosopher, see William Henry Chamberlin (philosopher).

William Henry Chamberlin
Born	(1897-02-17)February 17, 1897 Brooklyn, New York
Died	September 12, 1969(1969-09-12) (aged 72) St. Moritz, Switzerland
Occupation	Author Journalist
Nationality	American

William Henry Chamberlin (February 17, 1897 – September 12, 1969) was an American historian and journalist. He was the author of several books about the Cold War, communism, and foreign policy, including The Russian Revolution 1917-1921 (1935), which was written in Russia between 1922 and 1934 while he was the Moscow correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor.

He had communist views until he lived in the Soviet Union, when he gradually turned anticommunist. He predicted that intervention in World War II would help communism in Europe and in Asia, which led him to be a non-interventionist.

Early life and education

Chamberlin was born in Brooklyn and educated in Pennsylvania schools and later at Haverford College. At 25, he moved to Greenwich Village and was deeply affected by the cultural bohemianism and Bolshevik politics there. He worked for Heywood Broun, the book editor of the New York Tribune. He also published under the pseudonym of A.C. Freeman and was a socialist pacifist who supported communism in the Soviet Union.

Communism

Chamberlin arrived in the Soviet Union as a young man and soon found work with the Christian Science Monitor for which he would work until 1940. He also acted as Moscow correspondent for the Manchester Guardian. He was initially a Marxist and a support of the communist revolution. During his stay, he changed to being a critic. His first book, Soviet Russia, published in 1930, detailed the policies of the New Economic Policy and was on the whole supportive of the changes brought by the Russian Revolution.

He met his Ukrainian-born wife, Sonya, in the United States, where she and her family had immigrated, visited Ukraine and the North Caucasus in 1932 and 1933. They witnessed the Holodomor famines, which were produced by forced collectivization.

Turn to anticommunism

After leaving the Soviet Union, Chamberlin went to Germany and his experiences with Nazism further convinced him of the dangers of collectivism and absolutism in general. He became more convinced of the importance of individual rights and of the value of the US Bill of Rights. He was posted by the Monitor to East Asia, and he wrote Japan Over Asia, which was based on what he learned there about Japanese militarism. He was transferred to France.

After returning to the US, he continued to write both scholarly books and more popular articles. His The Confessions of an Individualist was an autobiography that was published in 1940, shortly before his collaboration with Russian Review, which was to last until his death from a stroke 28 years later.

Chamberlin believed that the British Empire and the United States should stay out of World War II to prevent communism from spreading in either Europe or Asia since he viewed Germany and Japan as valuable barriers.

Books

• Soviet Russia: A Living Record and a History. Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1930. Revised second edition, 1931.
• The Soviet Planned Economic Order. Boston: World Peace Foundation, 1931.
• Russia's Iron Age. Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1934.
• The Russian Revolution 1917-1921 In two volumes. New York: Macmillan, 1935.
• Collectivism: A False Utopia. New York: Macmillan, 1937.
• Japan Over Asia. London: Duckworth, 1938.
• The Confessions of an Individualist. New York: Macmillan, 1940.
• The World's Iron Age. New York: Macmillan Company, 1941.
• Canada, Today and Tomorrow. Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1942.
• The Russian Enigma. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1943.
• The Ukraine: A Submerged Nation. New York: Macmillan, 1944.
• America: Partner in World Rule. New York: Vanguard Press, 1945.
• World Order or Chaos. New York: Vanguard Press, 1946.
• Blueprint for World Conquest. Washington, DC: Human Events, 1946.
• The European Cockpit. New York: Macmillan, 1947.
• Soviet Communism: The Record of Aggression. New York: Catholic Information Society, n.d. [c. 1947].
• Stalin's Worldwide Fifth Column. New York: Catholic Information Society, n.d. [c. 1947].
• America's Second Crusade. Chicago: Henry Regnery Co., 1950.
• The Evolution of a Conservative. Chicago: Regney, 1959.
• Appeasement: Road to War. New York: Rolton House, 1962.
• The German Phoenix. (1965).
• Beyond Containment. Chicago: Regnery, 1983.

Later life

Chamberlin died on September 12, 1969--nine months after his wife's death. He died from a stroke while in St. Moritz, Switzerland.

Sources

• William Henry Chamberlin Archive at Marxists.org
• Mohrenschild, D. von, "William Henry Chamberlin 1897-1969" [obituary] Russian Review, Vol. 29, No. 1 (Jan., 1970), pp. 1–5
• Guide to the William Henry Chamberlin papers at Providence College

External links

• Works by or about William Henry Chamberlin at the Internet Archive