McCarthy's List That Never Existed

On February 9, 1950, Senator Joseph McCarthy stood at a podium in Wheeling, West Virginia and told the audience he had a list. 205 communists in the State Department. Known to the Secretary of State. Still working and shaping American policy. The number changed every time he said it. The list was never produced. And it didn’t matter — because the accusation was the punishment. Part 2 of The Continuum’s Red Scare series covers the Second Red Scare and McCarthyism with a deliberately skeptical eye. We take seriously what was real — the Soviet espionage, the Venona decrypts, the Rosenbergs, Alger Hiss — and then ask the question most histories don’t: if the genuine threat was real, why did the response destroy thousands of people who had nothing to do with Soviet espionage? The answer is that the Red Scare was never primarily about communism. It was about power. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rejil.substack.com