The Documentary Podcast: Archive 2010 - Useful Idiots

“That’s what my role was. I was taken around and shown things as a useful idiot.”
– Doris Lessing
In this two part series, the BBC takes a look at the intellectuals - or Lenin's ‘useful idiots’ - who have praised tyrants, and rewritten history. How was it that so many supposedly intelligent people were manipulated by dictators over the 20th Century into saying good things about bad regimes?

Published on Wednesday, 4th August 2010.

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We are not the BBC, we only list available podcasts. To find out more about the programme including episodes available on BBC iPlayer, go to the The Documentary Podcast: Archive 2010 webpage.