Just prior to the Covid-19 medical emergency and lockdown, I embarked on the delivery of a module on the role of conspiracy theory in history, and recently had the opportunity to run the module again. The course sought to address the very difficult question of why so many people appear to believe that ‘secret’ forces are at work in the world and allow themselves to be seduced and conned by the claim that there is no such thing as ‘accident’ in history. One of the conspiracy theorists I covered on the module was the former footballer and Green activist David Icke, author of books such as And th ..read more

Some brief exploration of the extent to which crude and racist historical revisionism has moved from the margins into the cultural mainstream of society can be a truly shocking experience. It is no exaggeration to say that conspiracy theory and its ugly child Holocaust Denial have taken on industrial-scale proportions in the early 21st Century. What many people still don’t seem to appreciate is the degree to which British conspiracists played a key role in this, beginning to sow the seeds almost immediately after the end of the War in 1945. Indeed, the early origins of the extremist attempt to ..read more

Although studies of Otto Skorzeny, said to be Hitler’s ‘favourite commando’, tended to be limited and were often of highly questionable quality for much of the post-war period, this situation appears to have changed in more recent years. Some qualitatively better research material has become available and, thus, serious historians of Nazi Germany have becoming increasingly interested in demythologizing and unpacking Skorzeny’s career and reputation. One such contribution to the growing historiography came in 2018, with Stuart Smith’s Otto Skorzeny: The Devil’s Disciple (Osprey publishers). Au ..read more

If anybody still entertains any doubts about the extremely worrying authoritarian ambitions of former U.S. president Donald Trump, then it is important to consider what he said on the evening of Friday, 8th March, 2024. Holding a meeting and concert at his luxury residence at Mar-a-Lago, where he played host to the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (pictured), Trump was full of praise for his guest: ‘There’s nobody that’s better, smarter or a better leader than Viktor Orban… He’s a non-controversial figure because he says, “This is the way it’s going to be”, and that’s the end of it… He’s ..read more

Historians will have much to write about when they look back on current political affairs in America, and analysis of the rightwing brand of ‘populist’ politics will be a major aspect of this. When it comes to his desperate desire to move back into the White House, the former U.S. President Donald Trump has made some dangerously deluded claims, including that he is a ‘victim’ of ‘fake news’ put out by his political opponents. He has attacked the MSM (mainstream media) in particular, arguing that it is ‘liberal’ and ‘socialist’ and out to ‘get’ him through ‘political persecution’. Trump has als ..read more

There has inevitably been much speculation in the last two years about the ideological sources that have possibly influenced President Vladimir Putin’s brutal war against Ukraine and his seeming desire to reconstruct a pre-1989 Soviet Union, or even a mythologized version of an older Russian empire. One source of inspiration for Putin has undoubtedly been the ‘Greater Russia’ ideas of Aleksandr Dugin. However, I suspect that another, perhaps more indirect, influence on Putin was the late Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the ultra-nationalist politician who died of Covid-19 on 6th April, 2022, aged 75. Pu ..read more

What was life like for the many individuals who found themselves being held as wartime prisoners or internees? This is certainly a growing area of research for historians and, I suspect, is also of great interest to anybody who has a fascination with family, social or general military history. I paid a visit to a new exhibition, Great Escapes, which has just opened at the National Archives (TNA), Kew, in south-west London, and runs from 2nd February to 21st July, 2024. The exhibition is subtitled ‘Remarkable Second World War Captives’, and is devoted to three main categories of captive held i ..read more

A recent television drama series about the life of Kim Philby, the British Intelligence officer who engaged in treachery, attracted good reviews and enthusiastic viewers when it was screened, but contained few surprises for historians of the secret state. The production, A Spy Among Friends, first shown in 2022 and aired again since then, was based on the bestselling book of the same name by the newspaper journalist and respected historian Ben Macintyre, and stared Guy Pearce as Philby. Interest in Philby’s life and career remains as lively as ever, and Macintyre’s book contained all the class ..read more

We were very sad to learn of the passing of Zigi Shipper, aged 93, in 2023. He came to Kingston University to deliver a talk on his experiences of the Holocaust and it was a truly moving experience for all who came to listen. As a tribute, and to help commemorate the 2024 Holocaust Memorial Day (27th January), we republish this blog first published here on 18th March, 2015. Why do people hate? This was one of the central questions asked by Holocaust survivor Zigi Shipper when he spoke to students and staff at Kingston University about his early childhood in Poland and experiences of the Nazi ..read more

When historians dig deeply, many towns and cities often have at least some notorious skeletons in their historical cupboards, individuals who represent the darker side of the past, usually people who current-day citizens would rather forget. In March, 1925, a number of local and regional newspapers in Britain gave some coverage to the racist claims of a boot manufacturer in Northampton, who had claimed that the British Empire was ‘in danger’ from Jews. These claims were also given some publicity by national newspapers, of the kind that Northampton’s inhabitants would rather had not appeared ..read more