I Chose Justice

By: Victor Kravchenko

Sign Up Now! Already a Member? Log In
You must be logged into Bookshare to access this title. Learn about membership options, or view our freely available titles.

Synopsis: Originally published in 1950, I Chose Justice details Soviet defector Victor Kravchenko's "trial of the century" in France.When the French Communist weekly Les Lettres Françaises launched an attack on Kravchenko's character by alleging that his 1946 memoir I Chose Freedom had been concocted by the Mensheviks & the U.S. Intelligence Service, Kravchenko filed a lawsuit for libel in a French court.The resultant lengthy trial in 1949 featured hundreds of witnesses, with the Soviet Union flying in Kravchenko's former colleagues to denounce him, accusing him of being a traitor, a draft dodger, and an embezzler. Even Kravchenko's ex-wife was summonsed to appear for the defence.Kravchenko's lawyers presented witnesses who had survived the Soviet prison camp system, including Margarete Buber-Neumann, the widow of German Communist Heinz Neumann, who had been shot during the Great Purge. As a survivor of both Soviet and Nazi concentration camps, her testimony corroborated Kravchenko's allegations concerning the essential similarities between the two dictatorships.A fascinating account.