With the end of the Cold War, Europe is more united and freer from the danger of a major war than at any time in modern history. A historically unprecedented and highly desirable European security order is in place. The Dawn of Peace in Europe describes this new "common security order", assesses the alternatives to it, and analyzes the conditions necessary for its continuation. The Dawn of Peace in Europe emphasizes the inescapable truth that the future of this new order depends on Russia and the United States. Mandelbaum assesses how the wrenching transition taking place within Russia might affect its policies toward the arms treaties and toward its neighbors. Finally, he evaluates the durability of the American commitment to an active role in Europe.

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand on June 28, 1914 by a Serbian nationalist has set off a crisis in Europe. Since the Congress of Vienna in 1815, peace had largely prevailed among the Great Powers, preserved through international conferences and a delicate balance of power. Now, however, interlocking alliances are threatening to plunge Europe into war, as Austria-Hungry is threatening war against Serbia. Germany is allied with Austria-Hungary, while Russia views itself as the protector of Serbia. Britain is torn between fear of a German victory and a Russian one. France supports Russia but also needs Britain on its side. Can war be avoided one more time? Europe on the Brink plunges students into the July Crisis as representatives of the European powers. What choices will they make?

The presentation of Europe's immediate historical past has quite dramatically changed. Conventional depictions of occupation and collaboration in World War II, of wartime resistance and post-war renewal, provided the familiar backdrop against which the chronicle of post-war Europe has mostly been told. Within these often ritualistic presentations, it was possible to conceal the fact that not only were the majority of people in Hitler's Europe not resistance fighters but millions actively co-operated with and many millions more rather easily accommodated to Nazi rule. Moreover, after the war, those who judged former collaborators were sometimes themselves former collaborators. Many people became innocent victims of retribution, while others--among them notorious war criminals--escaped punishment. Nonetheless, the process of retribution was not useless but rather a historically unique effort to purify the continent of the many sins Europeans had committed. This book sheds light on the collective amnesia that overtook European governments and peoples regarding their own responsibility for war crimes and crimes against humanity--an amnesia that has only recently begun to dissipate as a result of often painful searching across the continent. In inspiring essays, a group of internationally renowned scholars unravels the moral and political choices facing European governments in the war's aftermath: how to punish the guilty, how to decide who was guilty of what, how to convert often unspeakable and conflicted war experiences and memories into serviceable, even uplifting accounts of national history. In short, these scholars explore how the drama of the immediate past was (and was not) successfully "overcome." Through their comparative and transnational emphasis, they also illuminate the division between eastern and western Europe, locating its origins both in the war and in post-war domestic and international affairs. Here, as in their discussion of collaborators' trials, the authors lay bare the roots of the many unresolved and painful memories clouding present-day Europe. Contributors are Brad Abrams, Martin Conway, Sarah Farmer, Luc Huyse, László Karsai, Mark Mazower, and Peter Romijn, as well as the editors. Taken separately, their essays are significant contributions to the contemporary history of several European countries. Taken together, they represent an original and pathbreaking account of a formative moment in the shaping of Europe at the dawn of a new millennium.

A bold, eye-opening account of the coming integration of Europe and Asia Weaving together history, diplomacy, and vivid personal narratives from his overland journey across Eurasia from Baku to Samarkand, Vladivostok to Beijing, Bruno Maçães provides a fascinating portrait of the shifting borderlands between Europe and Asia, tracking the economic integration of the two continents into a new supercontinent: Eurasia. As Maçães demonstrates, glimpses of the coming Eurasianism are already visible in China’s bold infrastructure project reopening the historic Silk Road, in the success of cities like Hong Kong and Singapore, in Turkey’s increasing global role, and in shifting U.S. foreign policy toward Europe and Asia. This insightful and clarifying book argues that the artificial separation of the world’s largest island cannot hold.

Winner of the 2018 American Academy of Diplomacy Douglas Dillon Award Shortlisted for the 2018 Duff Cooper Prize in Literary Nonfiction “[A] brilliant book…by far the best study yet” (Paul Kennedy, The Wall Street Journal) of the gripping history behind the Marshall Plan and its long-lasting influence on our world. In the wake of World War II, with Britain’s empire collapsing and Stalin’s on the rise, US officials under new Secretary of State George C. Marshall set out to reconstruct western Europe as a bulwark against communist authoritarianism. Their massive, costly, and ambitious undertaking would confront Europeans and Americans alike with a vision at odds with their history and self-conceptions. In the process, they would drive the creation of NATO, the European Union, and a Western identity that continue to shape world events. Benn Steil’s “thoroughly researched and well-written account” (USA TODAY) tells the story behind the birth of the Cold War, told with verve, insight, and resonance for today. Focusing on the critical years 1947 to 1949, Benn Steil’s gripping narrative takes us through the seminal episodes marking the collapse of postwar US-Soviet relations—the Prague coup, the Berlin blockade, and the division of Germany. In each case, Stalin’s determination to crush the Marshall Plan and undermine American power in Europe is vividly portrayed. Bringing to bear fascinating new material from American, Russian, German, and other European archives, Steil’s account will forever change how we see the Marshall Plan. “Trenchant and timely…an ambitious, deeply researched narrative that…provides a fresh perspective on the coming Cold War” (The New York Times Book Review), The Marshall Plan is a polished and masterly work of historical narrative. An instant classic of Cold War literature, it “is a gripping, complex, and critically important story that is told with clarity and precision” (The Christian Science Monitor).