Hitler, Stalin and the Idea of Judeo-Bolshevism

Judeo-Bolshevism was the Nazi conspiracy theory that Jews secretly controlled the Soviet Union and communism. In this lecture, Philip Decker traces the origins and evolution of this antisemitic myth, examines how it shifted during the Nazi-Soviet Pact, and explores how it ultimately became a central ideological justification for the Holocaust and Nazi mass murder in the Soviet Union.

RSVP here.

Stalin and German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop shake hands after the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in the Kremlin, August 23, 1939. Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H27337 / CC-BY-SA 3.0 DE.

Philip Decker is a historian of twentieth-century Germany, the Soviet Union, fascism, communism, and European international relations. He will receive his Ph.D. in History from Princeton University in 2026 and is currently an Ernest May Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. His research examines the intersection of ideology, culture, diplomacy, and power, and his work has appeared in leading journals, including The English Historical Review, German Studies Review, and Oxford German Studies.