History's Greatest Heist

History's Greatest Heist: The Looting of Russia by the Bolsheviks by Sean McMeekin, Yale University Press, 2008.

Bolshevik Looting

When the Bolsheviks took control of Russia, they needed money, which they obtained by repudiating foreign debt, looting safe deposit boxes, nationalizing of the property of the Russian Orthodox Church, and stealing Tsarist gold and jewelry.

Western Culpability

The Bolsheviks sold much of their loot abroad. Western Europe made a half-hearted attempt to prevent them from doing so. Another sin of the Western Europeans was selling arms to the Bolsheviks. The West also sold railroad engines and cars to the Bolsheviks. If the West had not fenced the Bolsheviks’ stolen loot, and had not sold them military supplies that the Red Army needed to fight the White Russians, then perhaps the Bolshevik coup would have failed.