{{Short description|Russian-American historian (born 1956)}} {{family name hatnote|Georgievich|Felshtinsky|lang=Eastern Slavic}} {{Expand Russian|topic=bio|date=January 2019}} {{Use dmy dates|date=November 2020}} {{Infobox person | name = Yuri Felshtinsky | native_name = Юрий Фельштинский | native_name_lang = ru | image = Yuri Felshtinsky.jpg | caption = | birth_name = | birth_date = {{birth date and age|df=yes|1956|9|7}} | birth_place = [[Moscow]], [[Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic|RSFSR]], Soviet Union | nationality = | citizenship = {{hlist|Russia|United States}} | occupation = {{hlist|Historian|Writer}} | spouse = | children = | education = [[Moscow State Pedagogical University]]<br />[[Brandeis University]]<br />[[Rutgers University]] | signature = | parents = | years_active = | known_for = | notable_works = {{hlist|The Bolsheviks and the Left SRs|Towards a History of Our Isolation|The Failure of the World Revolution|[[Blowing up Russia]]|The Age of Assassins}} | website = }} '''Yuri Georgievich Felshtinsky''' ({{langx|ru|Юрий Георгиевич Фельштинский}}, born 7 September 1956) is a [[Russian American]] [[historian]]. Felshtinsky has authored a number of books on [[Russian history]], including ''The Bolsheviks and the Left SRs'' (Paris, 1985), ''Towards a History of Our Isolation'' (London, 1988; Moscow, 1991), ''The Failure of the World Revolution'' (London, 1991; Moscow, 1992), ''[[Blowing up Russia]]'' (with [[Alexander Litvinenko]]), and ''The Age of Assassins'' (with [[Vladimir Pribylovsky]]).<ref>{{cite news| url=http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article3503559.ece| title=The Age of Assassins: the Rise and Rise of Vladimir Putin by Yuri Felshtinsky and Vladimir Pribylovsky| first=Oleg| last=Gordievsky| author-link=Oleg Gordievsky| work=[[The Times]]| date=7 March 2008| location=London| access-date=8 March 2008| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080313140832/http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article3503559.ece| archive-date=13 March 2008| url-status=dead}}</ref>
==Education== Felshtinsky's parents died when he was 17 years of age. He began studying history in 1974 at [[Moscow State Pedagogical University]]. A couple of years later, he decided to emigrate from the [[Soviet Union]] to Israel, travelling first to [[Vienna]].<ref>Yuri Felshtinsky writes: "Я выбрал эмиграцию и сумел уехать (что в те годы было не банально). Я уехал по так называемой "израильской визе", хотя в Израиль даже не заехал, а уже в Вене декларировал американским властям свое желание жить в США, куда прибыл в апреле 1978 года. Никого из близких у меня в США не было. Уезжал я один. Родители мои умерли когда мне было 17 лет." From ''ШАГ ВПЕРЕД, ДВА ШАГА НАЗАД ИЛИ НОВЕЙШАЯ ИСТОРИЯ РОССИИИ'', retrieved from the website of the author: [https://web.archive.org/web/20110925205917/http://www.felshtinsky.com/books/inter/inter4.doc felshtinsky.com], accessed 8 March 2015.</ref> But instead of going from Vienna to Israel, he went further to the United States, where he arrived in April 1978 and there subsequently continued his studies. He graduated from [[Brandeis University]] and earned his [[PhD]] in [[history]] from [[Rutgers University]]. In 1993, he returned to Moscow and defended his [[Doctor of Science]] thesis at the Institute of Russian History of the [[Russian Academy of Sciences]], becoming the first non-Russian citizen to earn a doctorate from a Russian university.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.felshtinsky.com/?page_id=23 |script-title=ru: Биография |trans-title=Biography |publisher=Yuri Felshtinsky |access-date=3 March 2015 |language=ru |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150223020057/http://www.felshtinsky.com/?page_id=23 |archive-date=23 February 2015 |url-status=dead }}</ref>
==Career== Felshtinsky has published a number of books on the history of the [[Communist]] movement. In one of those books, ''Leaders the Mobsters'',<ref>{{cite book| script-title=ru:Вожди в законе| trans-title=Leaders the mobsters| url=http://www.lib.ru/POLITOLOG/felshtinskij.txt| format=Text online| language=ru| publisher=Terra| location=Moscow| year=1999| access-date=8 February 2008| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080214211031/http://www.lib.ru/POLITOLOG/felshtinskij.txt| archive-date=14 February 2008| url-status=live}}</ref> he described the [[Bolshevik]] party as a [[Mafia]]-like organization where "almost no one died by a natural cause". According to Felshtinsky, the list of assassinations includes poisoning of [[Vladimir Lenin]], [[Felix Dzerzhinsky]], and [[Maksim Gorky]] by [[Genrikh Yagoda]] on orders from [[Joseph Stalin]], murders of [[Mikhail Frunze]], [[Vyacheslav Menzhinsky]], and [[Leon Trotsky]], and the poisoning of Stalin by associates of [[Lavrentiy Beria]].
In 1998, Felshtinsky traveled back to Moscow in order to study the politics of contemporary Russia. At that time, he became acquainted with [[Alexander Litvinenko]], a lieutenant colonel of the [[Federal Security Service]] (FSB). In 2000, Felshtinsky and Litvinenko began working on ''[[Blowing Up Russia]]'', a book that describes the gradual appropriation of power in Russia by the security apparatus and details the FSB's involvement in a series of terrorist acts that took place between 1994 and 1999. In August 2001, several chapters from ''Blowing Up Russia'' were published in a special edition of the newspaper ''Novaya Gazeta''. In 2002, the book became the basis for a documentary film, ''Blowing Up Russia'' (also known as ''[[Assassination of Russia]]''). Both the book and the documentary were officially banned in Russia for "divulging state secrets". Until 2006, Felshtinsky continued working with Litvinenko on gathering additional materials documenting the FSB's involvement in the apartment house bombings of September 1999.<ref name="poison">{{cite news| url=http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/22/europe/poison.php| title=Britain accuses Russian in murder of Litvinenko| date=22 May 2007| access-date=7 March 2009| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071010113215/http://iht.com/articles/2007/05/22/europe/poison.php| archive-date=10 October 2007| url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="23poison">{{cite news| url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/23/world/europe/23poison.html| title=Russian Is Accused of Poisoning Ex-K.G.B. Agent| date=23 May 2007| work=The New York Times| first1=Alan| last1=Cowell| access-date=9 February 2017| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170129232634/http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/23/world/europe/23poison.html| archive-date=29 January 2017| url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="var1243238">{{cite web| url=http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/features/display.var.1243238.0.0.php| title=Yuri's quest to uncover the truth lives on| date=7 March 2007}}{{dead link|date=January 2018 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> According to the authors, the bombings were committed by the [[Federal Security Service|Russian Federal Security Service]] (FSB), as a [[false flag]] operation intended to justify the [[Second Chechen War]].
In November 2006 Litvinenko died in London of [[acute radiation syndrome]], three weeks after being poisoned with [[Polonium|polonium-210]]. (See [[Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko]]). In 2007 investigator [[Mikhail Trepashkin]] said that, according to his FSB sources, "everyone who was involved in the publication of the book ''[[Blowing Up Russia]]'' will be killed," and that three FSB agents had made a trip to [[Boston]] to prepare the assassination of Felshtinsky.<ref>{{cite news| url=http://www.svobodanews.ru/Transcript/2007/12/01/20071201143422327.html| title=Interview with Mikhail Trepashkin| publisher=[[Radio Liberty]]| date=1 December 2007| language=ru| quote=все, кто причастен к выпуску книги «ФСБ взрывает Россию», будут уничтожены, и что выехала в Штаты группа из трех человек, сотрудников федеральной службы безопасности ... по месту жительства Фельштинского в город Бостон.| access-date=22 February 2008| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080307024135/http://www.svobodanews.ru/Transcript/2007/12/01/20071201143422327.html| archive-date=7 March 2008| url-status=live}}</ref> After the 2013 death of exiled oligarch [[Boris Berezovsky (businessman)|Boris Berezovsky]], who sponsored the book, Felshtinsky suggested that Berezovsky was killed by Putinites.<ref>[https://www.ft.com/content/0879bee0-94ac-11e2-9487-00144feabdc0 Questions remain over death of Berezovsky] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130523062516/http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0879bee0-94ac-11e2-9487-00144feabdc0.html#axzz30r47r8Fo |date=23 May 2013 }}. ''[[The Financial Times]]''. 24 March 2013.</ref>
He released a book in 2007 entitled "Blowing Up Russia: The Secret Plot", whose thesis was on [[Vladimir Putin]]'s violent methods.<ref name="cspan07">{{cite news |title=Blowing Up Russia: The Secret Plot |url=https://www.c-span.org/program/public-affairs-event/blowing-up-russia-the-secret-plot/180056 |publisher=C-SPAN |date=16 August 2007}}</ref>
In September 2019 he opined that defector [[Oleg Smolenkov]] would be in danger of assassination by the Russian state for as long as he lived.<ref name="nw19">{{cite news |title=CIA Spy Extracted from Russia is in Danger for Rest of His Life |date=12 September 2019 |url=https://www.newsweek.com/russian-spy-felshtinsky-smolenkov-putin-1458929}}</ref>
===After the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine=== He returned to prominence as a consequence of the [[Russian invasion of Ukraine]], although in January 2022 he thought the decision would be a suicidal one for Russia.<ref name="ctv22">{{cite news |title=Ukraine invasion a 'suicidal' decision, would be end of Putin's regime: Historian |date=22 January 2022 |url=https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/article/ukraine-invasion-a-suicidal-decision-would-be-end-of-putins-regime-historian/}}</ref> In April 2022 he was interviewed by [[Ali Velshi]] on Russia's state of censorship.<ref name="msnbc22">{{cite news |title=#VelshiBannedBookClub: Sometimes books are banned because of the words, the idea, or the author. In this case it's all 3 |url=https://www.msnbc.com/ali-velshi/watch/-velshibannedbookclub-sometimes-books-are-banned-because-of-the-words-the-idea-or-the-author-in-this-case-it-s-all-3-137429573804}}</ref> In July 2022 he thought that now was "our September 1939 moment",<ref name="dt22a">{{cite news |last1=Felshtinsky |first1=Yuri |title=Russia's invasion is our September 1939 moment |work=The Telegraph |date=15 July 2022 |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/0/russias-invasion-september-1939-moment/}}</ref> and he was interviewed by [[Steven Edginton]] on the same topic.<ref name="dt22b">{{cite news |title=Ukraine: Russia's invasion is the start of the Third World War |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MFMFsxNuFQ |agency=The Telegraph |publisher=YouTube |date=15 July 2022}}</ref> In October 2022 he alleged that Putin wants a combined Russian-Belarusian-Ukrainian army to invade [[Moldova]] and the [[Balkans]].<ref name="ver22">{{cite news |title=Yuri Felshtinsky: Putin wanted a Russian-Ukrainian-Belarusian army that he could use to conquer Baltic States and the Republic of Moldova |url=https://www.veridica.ro/en/interviews/yuri-felshtinsky-putin-wanted-a-russian-ukrainian-belarusian-army-that-he-could-use-to-conquer-baltic-states-and-the-republic-of-moldova |publisher=Veridica.ro |date=6 October 2022}}</ref> His November 2022 book, ''Ukraine, the first battle of the third world war?'' was launched at the [[Rafael del Pino]] foundation.<ref name="frdp2">{{cite news | title=Conferencia Magistral de Yuri Felshtinsky. English version | date=8 November 2022 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rF8tAkqfjs}}</ref><ref name="frdp1">{{cite news |title=Yuri Felshtinsky Keynote Lecture - Fundación Rafael del Pino |url=https://frdelpino.es/en_gb/conference/lecture-magisterial-face-to-face-yuri-felshtinsky/}}</ref> In February 2023 he opined Ukraine this year has created the most combat-ready army in Europe.<ref name="od23">{{cite news |title=Yuri Felshtinsky: Ukraine this year has created the most combat-ready army in Europe |url=https://odessa-journal.com/yuri-felshtinsky-ukraine-this-year-has-created-the-most-combat-ready-army-in-europe#google_vignette |date=27 February 2023}}</ref>
In January 2023 he opined in an interview with a Georgian newspaper that "The West needs to understand the only way to end this war is to win it."<ref name="gt23">{{cite news |title=Felshtinsky: "The West needs to understand the only way to end this war is to win it" |url=https://georgiatoday.ge/felshtinsky-the-west-needs-to-understand-the-only-way-to-end-this-war-is-to-win-it/ |publisher=Georgia Today |date=27 January 2023}}</ref> He was interviewed by ''[[Times Radio]]'' in April 2024 on the same subject.<ref name="tr24a">{{cite news | title=How Ukraine halted Putin's Stalinist ambitions | Dr Yuri Felshtinsky | date=4 April 2024 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=780TfXJzaVY}}</ref>
In the wake of the summer 2023 [[Prigozhin mutiny]] he opined that [[Sergey Naryshkin]] and [[Nikolai Patrushev]] were acting in the shadows to propel the convict toward his fate.<ref name="jt23">{{cite news |title=The Anatomy of Prigozhin's Mutiny and the Future of Russia's Mercenary Industry (Part Two) |url=https://jamestown.org/program/the-anatomy-of-prigozhins-mutiny-and-the-future-of-russias-mercenary-industry-part-two/}}</ref>
He was interviewed by an Australian newspaper about how Russia's secret service took control of the country's top office, in 2023 to promote his most recent book ''From Red Terror to Terrorist State''.<ref name="abc23">{{cite news |title=From Red Terror to Terrorist State |url=https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-11-20/how-russian-secret-service-took-control-of-presidency/103052176 |date=19 November 2023}}</ref> And he opined in September 2023 to ''[[Le Monde]]'' that "Nothing will change in Russia until the security services are dismantled".<ref name="lem23">{{cite news |title=Yuri Felshtinsky: 'Nothing will change in Russia until the security services are dismantled' |date=3 September 2023 |url=https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/09/03/yuri-felshtinsky-nothing-will-change-in-russia-until-the-security-services-are-dismantled_6122181_4.html}}</ref>
In the run-up to the [[2024 US presidential election]] Felshtinsky, in an interview with an Estonian newspaper, bemoaned the fact that Trump would influence events in Ukraine negatively, were he to become president.<ref name="ptee24">{{cite news |title=YURI FELSHTINSKY ⟩ Trump would cut aid to Ukraine already in November |url=https://news.postimees.ee/8121106/yuri-felshtinsky-trump-would-cut-aid-to-ukraine-already-in-november |date=24 October 2024}}</ref> The week of [[Donald Trump]]'s second inauguration and consequent strangulation of military aid to Ukraine, Felshtinsky opined that "the idea that the fate of Ukraine is decided by Trump and Putin is reminiscent of what happened in [[Munich Agreement|Munich in 1938]]", and denounced the "appeasement policy" of the US president.<ref name="elm25">{{cite news |title=Yuri Felshtinsky: "The idea that the fate of Ukraine is decided by Trump and Putin is reminiscent of what happened in Munich in 1938" |date=17 February 2025 |url=https://www.mundoamerica.com/news/2025/02/17/67b31699e85ecee21c8b4578.html}}</ref>
He was interviewed by ''[[Times Radio]]'' on 16 August 2025, one day after the [[2025 Trump-Putin summit]] in Alaska, and thought it might lead to war with [[NATO]].<ref name="tr25a">{{cite news | title=Why Trump's Alaska meeting could lead Putin to war with NATO |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWBciJiO2kM}}</ref>
==List of selected publications== *''The legal foundations of the immigration and emigration policy of the USSR, 1917 - 1927'' ([[Glasgow]], 1982) [https://web.archive.org/web/20070630030257/http://www.felshtinsky.com/books/stat/205.doc] *''The [[Bolsheviks]] and the [[Left Socialist-Revolutionaries|Left SRS]]'' ([[Paris]], 1985) *''[[Leon Trotsky|Trotsky]]'s Notebooks, 1933–1935. Writings on [[Vladimir Lenin|Lenin]], [[Dialectics]], and [[Evolutionism]].'' ([[New York City|New York]], 1986) [https://web.archive.org/web/20171024194559/http://www.felshtinsky.com/books/256.doc] *''Towards a History of Our Isolation'' ([[London]], 1988; Moscow, 1991) *''Conversations with [[Nikolai Bukharin|Bukharin]]'' (Moscow, 1993) *''[[Vladimir Lenin|Lenin]], [[Leon Trotsky|Trotsky]], [[Joseph Stalin|Stalin]] and the [[Left Opposition]] in the USSR, 1918 - 1928'' (Paris, 1990) *''The Failure of [[World Revolution]]'' (London, 1991; Moscow, 1992) *''Big Bosses'' (Moscow, 1999) [https://web.archive.org/web/20070630030242/http://www.felshtinsky.com/books/stat/204.doc] *{{cite book|title=[[Blowing up Russia: Terror from within|Blowing up Russia]]|first1=Yuri|last1=Felshtinsky|first2=Alexander|last2=Litvinenko|author-link2=Alexander Litvinenko|others=translated from Russian by Geoffrey Andrews and Co.|publisher=Gibson Square Books|location=London|year=2007|isbn=978-1-903933-95-4}} *{{cite book|first1=Yuri|last1=Felshtinsky|first2=Vladimir|last2=Pribylovsky|author-link2=Vladimir Pribylovsky|title=The Age of Assassins. The Rise and Rise of Vladimir Putin|publisher=Gibson Square Books|location=London|year=2008|isbn=978-1-906142-07-0}} *{{cite book|first1=Vladimir|last1=Pribylovsky|author-link=Vladimir Pribylovsky|first2=Yuri|last2=Felshtinsky|title=The Operation Successor. A political portrait of Vladimir Putin|url=http://www.lib.ru/HISTORY/FELSHTINSKY/naslednik.txt|format=Text online|language=ru}} *{{cite book|title=Leaders the mobsters|url=http://www.lib.ru/POLITOLOG/felshtinskij.txt|format=Text online|language=ru}} *with [[Vladimir Pribylovsky]], ''The Corporation. Russia and the KGB in the Age of President Putin'', {{ISBN|1-59403-246-7}}, Encounter Books; 25 February 2009, [https://web.archive.org/web/20120225041103/http://www.encounterbooks.com/books/thecorporation/ description]. *{{cite book|first=Yuri|last=Felshtinsky|title=Lenin and His Comrades: The Bolsheviks Take Over Russia 1917-1924|publisher=Enigma Books|location=New York|isbn=978-1-929631-95-7 |date=26 October 2010}} [https://web.archive.org/web/20110404122904/http://www.enigmabooks.com/store/catalog/moreinfo.php?id=294 description]. *[[Boris Gulko]], Yuri Felshtinsky, Vladimir Popov, [[Viktor Kortschnoi]], ''The KGB Plays Chess: The Soviet Secret Police and the Fight for the World Chess Crown.'' Russell Enterprises, Inc. 2011, {{ISBN|1-888690-75-5}}. *Yuri Felshtinsky and M. Stanchev. ''World War III. Battle for Ukraine'', Our Format (Ukraine), 2015. (Фельштинский Ю., Станчев М. Третья мировая. Битва за Украину. — К.: Наш формат, 2015), ISBN 978-966-97425-9-9. *Yuri Felshtinsky, Vladimir Popov, ''From Red Terror to Mafia State: Russia's State Security in the Struggle for World Domination'' Encounter Books, 2022, {{ISBN|1-641772-55-7}} *Yuri Felshtinsky and M. Stanchev, ''Blowing up Ukraine: The Return of Russian Terror and the Threat of World War III'', Gibson Square Books Ltd, 2022, {{ISBN|1-783341-91-2}}
==Interviews== *{{cite news|url=http://www.svobodanews.ru/Transcript/2007/11/03/20071103113907657.html|title=Interview with experts...|publisher=[[Radio Liberty]]|date=3 November 2007|language=ru|archive-date=2 February 2009|access-date=4 November 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090202003806/http://svobodanews.ru/Transcript/2007/11/03/20071103113907657.html|url-status=dead}} *{{cite news|url=https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/sunday_am/6329409.stm|title=The Litvinenko affair|date=4 February 2007|first=Andrew|last=Marr|author-link=Andrew Marr|agency=[[BBC News]] | access-date=31 December 2009}}
==References== {{reflist|30em}}
==External links== *{{Official website|https://twitter.com/YFelshtinsky}} *{{C-SPAN|1025464}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Felshtinsky}} [[Category:20th-century Russian historians]] [[Category:1956 births]] [[Category:Writers from Moscow]] [[Category:Living people]] [[Category:21st-century American historians]] [[Category:American male non-fiction writers]] [[Category:Historians of Russia]] [[Category:Russian political scientists]] [[Category:Russian political writers]] [[Category:Stalinism-era scholars and writers]] [[Category:Writers about Russia]] [[Category:Writers about the Soviet Union]] [[Category:Rutgers University alumni]] [[Category:Brandeis University alumni]] [[Category:Soviet emigrants to the United States]] [[Category:21st-century American male writers]] [[Category:People listed in Russia as foreign agents]]