Ask the Scholar
Document scope · 1 page
Scholar
Ask about this object, its catalog metadata, its source description, or the page inventory.
For page-specific OCR and visual context, open one of the page chats.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
183390662
label
Memorandum from George F. Kennan to Secretary of State Dean Acheson
core
doc
dtoType
document
citationUrl
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
183390662
contentType
document
title
Memorandum from George F. Kennan to Secretary of State Dean Acheson
citationUrl
collections
Dean Acheson Papers
Secretary of State Files
thumbnailUrl
largeImageUrl
imageCount
1
hasImages
yes
source
import
hasTranscription
no
Source extras
naId
183390662
levelOfDescription
item
productionDates
day
8
logicalDate
1949-07-08
month
7
year
1949
recordType
description
ocrSource
nara-archive
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
46fbbe6fbb9a412d
ocrText
1024-a
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
THE UNDER SECRETARY
S/P
Xerry relained
in privile papers
July 8, 1949
Mr. Secretary:
The British, who are the real worshippers of
success, have an over-powering yen to make success
respectable, and thus to find explanations in terms
of human progress for a phenomenon--namely present-
day Stalinism- which is actually understandable only
in terms of power.
Whoever, peering from the comfortable distance
of the bourgeois-liberal world, views Stalin as just
another successful political leader pushing his people
firmly but roughly along the approved path of history,
has failed to grasp the cataclysmic horror of modern
totalitarianism.
If Stalin has been successful in anything, it is
in proving that man's degradation can be just as effec-
tively 11 'organized" as his dignity; that contempt for
the human individual can be made an acceptable and
practicable basis for government; and that-wwether
or not it is possible to create a Heaven on earth-
it is definitely possible and even profitable to create
a Purgatory and a Hell.
ARCHIVES 'NATIONAL RECORDS AMO
deorge F. Kennan
Attachment:
Review, THE DIALECTICS
OF STALINISM, from
The Times Literary
Supplement.