Bloody White Baron The Extraordinary Story of the Russian Nobleman Who Became the Last Khan of Mongolia

In the history of the modern world, there have been few characters more sadistic, sinister, and deeply demented as Baron Ungern-Sternberg. An anti-Semitic fanatic with a penchant for Eastern mysticism and a hatred of communists, Baron Ungern-Sternberg took over Mongolia in 1920 with a ragtag force of White Russians, Siberians, Japanese, and native Mongolians. While tormenting friend and foe alike, he dreamed of assembling a horse-borne army with which he would retake communist controlled Moscow.

In this epic saga that ranges from Austria to the Mongolian Steppe, historian and travel writer James Palmer has brought to light the gripping life story of a madman whose actions fore shadowed the most grotesque excesses of the twentieth century.

"James Palmer's account of [Baron Ungern-Sternberg's] brutal and ill-starred life is elegant, waspish and evocative." Economist

"This is an epic biography (ranging from WWI battles, to the Civil War, to Manchuria) told in an easy style that infects the reader with curiosity, peeling back myths to reveal the strange and twisted man that was Ungern-Sternberg." Russian Life

"Palmer effectively evokes both the enormous scope and the small absurdities of war." Simon Sebag-Montefiore, Bookforum

"This story, like most of the other personal stories in Palmer's extraordinary book, is not here by accident: he uses it to give the reader some hint of what originally intrigued him, horrified him, and drew him to write about one of the bloodiest chapters in the history of Mongolia." Anne Applebaum, New York Review of Books (read the entire )

In the history of the modern world, there have been few characters more sinister, sadistic, and deeply demented than Baron Ungern-Sternberg. An anti-Semitic fanatic whose penchant for Eastern mysticism and hatred of communists foreshadowed the Nazi scourge that would soon overtake Europe, Ungern- Sternberg conquered Mongolia in 1919 with a ragtag force of White Russians, Siberians, Japanese, and native Mongolians. In The Bloody White Baron, historian and travel writer James Palmer vividly re-creates Ungern-Sternberg's spiral into ever-darker obsessions, while also providing a rare look at the religion and culture of the unfortunate Mongolians he briefly ruled.

James Palmer has traveled extensively in East and Central Asia. In 2003 he won The Spectators Shiva Naipaul Memorial Prize for travel writing. He has worked with Daoist and Buddhist groups in China and Mongolia on environment issues. He lives in Beijing.