[19] Although he got into many fights,[20] Stalin excelled academically,[21] displaying talent in painting and drama classes,[22] writing his own poetry,[23] and singing as a choirboy. [430] He also initiated "national operations", the ethnic cleansing of non-Soviet ethnic groupsamong them Poles, Germans, Latvians, Finns, Greeks, Koreans, and Chinesethrough internal or external exile. [874] Although millions of Soviet citizens despised him, support for Stalin was nevertheless widespread throughout Soviet society. 3.1) features a quotation from Vyacheslav Molotov on the Stalin symbol: 'We have a name that has become the symbol of the victory of socialism. [761] In 1935, he began using a new dacha provided for him by Lakoba at Novy Afon;[762] in 1936, he had the Kholodnaya Rechka dacha built on the Abkhazian coast, designed by Miron Merzhanov. [889] Service similarly warned of the portrayal of Stalin as an "unimpeded despot", noting that "powerful though he was, his powers were not limitless", and his rule depended on his willingness to conserve the Soviet structure he had inherited. [914] In October 1961, Stalin's body was removed from the mausoleum and buried in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis, the location marked by a bust. [81] They launched attacks on the government's Cossack troops and pro-Tsarist Black Hundreds,[82] co-ordinating some of their operations with the Menshevik militia. Around 40 people were killed, but all of his gang escaped alive. [351] Many religious buildings were demolished, most notably Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, destroyed in 1931 to make way for the (never completed) Palace of the Soviets. What did Benito Juarez do with England and Spain? [893], Leninists remain divided in their views on Stalin; some view him as Lenin's authentic successor, while others believe he betrayed Lenin's ideas by deviating from them. [279] In his private life, he divided his time between his Kremlin apartment and a dacha at Zubalova;[280] his wife gave birth to a daughter, Svetlana, in February 1926. [684] Volkogonov believed that Stalin's Marxism was shaped by his "dogmatic turn of mind", suggesting that this had been instilled in the Soviet leader during his education in religious institutions. [621] In December 1949, Mao visited Stalin. [111] In March 1910, he was arrested again and sent back to Solvychegodsk. [412], Stalin often gave conflicting signals regarding state repression. [201] The treaty gave vast areas of land and resources to the Central Powers and angered many in Russia; the Left Socialist Revolutionaries withdrew from the coalition government over the issue. [460] On 17 September, the Red Army entered eastern Poland, officially to restore order amid the collapse of the Polish state. [667] A memorial service in his honour was also held at St George the Martyr, Holborn in London. [383] Government policiesincluding the focus on rapid industrialisation, the socialisation of livestock, and the emphasis on sown areas over crop rotationexacerbated the problem;[388] the state had also failed to build reserve grain stocks for such an emergency. [281], In the wake of Lenin's death, various protagonists emerged in the struggle to become his successor: alongside Stalin was Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, Alexei Rykov, and Mikhail Tomsky. [818] His Volynskoe suburb had a 20-hectare (50-acre) park, with Stalin devoting much attention to its agricultural activities. [828] Additionally, according to Beria, Stalin had affairs with several Jewish women. [499] They achieved high levels of industrial productivity, outstripping that of Germany. [446] As it wound down, Stalin sought to deflect responsibility from himself,[447] blaming its "excesses" and "violations of law" on Yezhov. [76] He publicly lambasted the "pogroms against Jews and Armenians" as being part of Tsar Nicholas II's attempts to "buttress his despicable throne". [535] Over one million people were deported as a result of the policy. This was, in effect, a new Russian revolution more devastating in its effects than those of 1917. Increasingly, Stalin appointed his loyalists to the Politburo. Malenkov denounced the Stalin personality cult,[911] which was subsequently criticised in Pravda. [705] In his words, "the people need a Tsar, whom they can worship and for whom they can live and work". Joseph Stalin Russia- how came to power. These criticised Stalin's rude manners and excessive power, suggesting that Stalin should be removed from the position of general secretary. In Stalin's 1950 letter explaining his support for the North Korean invasion, the Soviet dictator was confident that . [9], Besarion was a cobbler who was employed in a workshop owned by another man;[10] it was initially a financial success but later fell into decline,[11] and the family found itself living in poverty. "[886] McDermott stated that Stalin had "concentrated unprecedented political authority in his hands. This attack proved unsuccessful. Vladimir Lenin's Testament. [770] Montefiore suggested that this charm was "the foundation of Stalin's power in the Party". [221] Although Stalin did not share Lenin's belief that Europe's proletariat were on the verge of revolution, he acknowledged that as long as it stood alone, Soviet Russia remained vulnerable. [689] Leading this vanguard, he believed that the Soviet peoples needed a strong, central figureakin to a Tsarwhom they could rally around. [544] As the Red Army had conquered German territory, they discovered the extermination camps that the Nazi administration had run. 270, Stalin commanded soldiers risking capture to fight to the death describing the captured as traitors;[492] among those taken as a prisoner of war by the Germans was Stalin's son Yakov, who died in their custody. [444] Yezhov was arrested in April 1939 and executed in 1940. [361] He also expressed patronage for scientists whose research fitted within his preconceived interpretation of Marxism; for instance, he endorsed research of an agrobiologist Trofim Lysenko despite the fact that it was rejected by the majority of Lysenko's scientific peers as pseudo-scientific. [284] While Lenin had been ill Stalin had forged an anti-Trotsky alliance with Kamenev and Zinoviev. [799] He protected several Soviet writers from arrest and prosecution, such as Mikhail Bulgakov, even when their work was labelled harmful to his regime. [402] Stalin admired Hitler, particularly his manoeuvres to remove rivals within the Nazi Party in the Night of the Long Knives. [919] After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the first President of the new Russian Federation, Boris Yeltsin, continued Gorbachev's denunciation of Stalin but added to it a denunciation of Lenin. [581], In the post-war period there were often food shortages in Soviet cities,[582] and the USSR experienced a major famine from 1946 to 1947. [254], In May 1922, a massive stroke left Lenin partially paralysed. "[921] In a 2017 interview, Putin added that while "we should not forget the horrors of Stalinism", the excessive demonization of "Stalin is a means to attack [the] Soviet Union and Russia". [95] After returning to Tiflis, Stalin organised the robbing of a large delivery of money to the Imperial Bank in June 1907. [831] Kotkin observed that Stalin "generally gravitated to people like himself: parvenu intelligentsia of humble background". [539] Privately, Stalin sought to ensure that Poland would come fully under Soviet influence. You know what that name is STALIN!'. [52] In November 1901, he was elected to the Tiflis Committee of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), a Marxist party founded in 1898. [422] The second Moscow Show Trial took place in January 1937,[423] and the third in March 1938, in which Bukharin and Rykov were accused of involvement in the alleged Trotskyite-Zinovievite terrorist plot and sentenced to death. [687], As a Marxist and an anti-capitalist, Stalin believed in an inevitable "class war" between the world's proletariat and bourgeoisie. [707] In the personality cult constructed around him, he was known as the vozhd, an equivalent to the Italian duce and German fhrer. Wiki User. [718] According to Khlevniuk, Stalin reconciled Marxism with great-power imperialism and therefore expansion of the empire makes him a worthy to the Russian tsars. [896] Under Mikhail Gorbachev's Soviet administration various previously classified files on Stalin's life were made available to historians,[896] at which point Stalin became "one of the most urgent and vital issues on the public agenda" in the Soviet Union. [640] Stalin nevertheless mistrusted his doctors; in January 1952 he had one imprisoned after they suggested that he should retire to improve his health. [931], The only other part of the former Soviet Union other than Russia where admiration for Stalin has remained consistently widespread is Georgia, although Georgian attitudes have been very divided. [538] An agreement was also made that a post-war Polish government should be a coalition consisting of both communist and conservative elements. [368], Stalin faced problems in his family life. [307] In 1927, there was some argument in the party over Soviet policy regarding China. [86] Although Stalin held Lenin in deep respect, he was vocal in his disagreement with Lenin's view that the Bolsheviks should field candidates for the forthcoming election to the State Duma; Stalin saw the parliamentary process as a waste of time. [315], In early 1928 Stalin travelled to Novosibirsk, where he alleged that kulaks were hoarding their grain and ordered that the kulaks be arrested and their grain confiscated, with Stalin bringing much of the area's grain back to Moscow with him in February. [485] By July, Germany's Luftwaffe was bombing Moscow,[484] and by October the Wehrmacht was amassing for a full assault on the capital. [696] In his book, Foundations of Leninism, he stated that "Leninism is the Marxism of the epoch of imperialism and of the proletarian revolution". [528] Stalin was impatient for the UK and U.S. to open up a Western Front to take the pressure off of the East; they eventually did so in mid-1944. [509] This resulted in the protracted Battle of Stalingrad. [564] He was also concerned about his returning armies, who had been exposed to a wide range of consumer goods in Germany, much of which they had looted and brought back with them. [341] New mines were opened, new cities like Magnitogorsk constructed, and work on the White Sea-Baltic Canal began. [233] Stalin felt humiliated and under-appreciated; on 17 August, he demanded demission from the military, which was granted on 1 September. [895] Since his death many more biographies have been written,[896] although until the 1980s these relied largely on the same sources of information. [330] Famine broke out in many areas,[331] with the Politburo frequently ordering distribution of emergency food relief to these regions. However soon after Lenin suffered . [704] Stalin adopted the Leninist view on the need for a revolutionary vanguard who could lead the proletariat rather than being led by them. Early Life of Joseph Stalin. 1. [190] Unlike senior Bolsheviks like Kamenev and Nikolai Bukharin, Stalin never expressed concern about the rapid growth and expansion of the Cheka and Red Terror. It is clear that Stalin became a follower of 1 Khrushchev included two relevant letters in his "secret" report to the Twentieth [317] Stalin announced that both kulaks and the "middle peasants" must be coerced into releasing their harvest. Illness and Inhumanity in Stalin's Gulag", "Reactions of Chinese Citizens to the Death of Stalin: Internal Communist Party Reports", "Stalin, the Pact with Nazi Germany, and the Origins of Postwar Soviet Diplomatic Historiography", "The Scale and Nature of German and Soviet Repression and Mass Killings, 193045", "Controversy in Moscow: Stalin icon revered", "The Stalin Puzzle: Deciphering Post-Soviet Public Opinion", "Georgia Divided Over Stalin 'Local Hero' Status in Gori", "Russians name Stalin as the most 'outstanding' figure of all times", "Stalin as a Neo-Pagan Deity in Contemporary Russia", "Moscow's Memory Wars: Putin seeks to whitewash Russia's Stalinist past", "Josef Stalin: communist, murderer - saint? [472] He increasingly focused on appeasement with the Germans to delay any conflict with them. Using the idea of collective responsibility as a basis, Stalin's government abolished their autonomous republics and between late 1943 and 1944 deported the majority of their populations to Central Asia and Siberia. [39] Stalin devoted himself to Marx's socio-political theory, Marxism,[40] which was then on the rise in Georgia, one of various forms of socialism opposed to the empire's governing tsarist authorities. [594] It launched the Marshall Plan in June 1947, with which it sought to undermine Soviet hegemony throughout Eastern Europe. Articles and topics related to Joseph Stalin, 18991904: Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, 19051912: Revolution of 1905 and its aftermath, 19121917: Rise to the Central Committee and editorship of, 19271931: Dekulakisation, collectivisation, and industrialisation, 19451947: Post-war reconstruction and famine, In the Soviet Union and post-Soviet states, Despite abolishing the office of General Secretary in 1952, Stalin continued to exercise its powers as the, After Stalin's death, Georgy Malenkov succeeded him as both. [692] As a propaganda tool, the shaming of "enemies" explained all inadequate economic and political outcomes, the hardships endured by the populace, and military failures. [3] He was born on 18 December[O.S. [712] Stalin's doctrine held that socialism could be completed in Russia but that its final victory there could not be guaranteed because of the threat from capitalist intervention. [327] By 1932, about 62% of households involved in agriculture were part of collectives, and by 1936 this had risen to 90%. [591] In August 1949, the bomb was successfully tested in the deserts outside Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan. [219], The Bolsheviks won the Russian civil war by the end of 1919. [857] After Stalin's death, Svetlana changed her surname from Stalin to Alliluyeva,[675] and defected to the U.S.[858], After Nadezhda's death, Stalin became increasingly close to his sister-in-law Zhenya Alliluyeva;[859] Montefiore believed that they were lovers. For other uses, see. [775] He was a good organiser,[776] with a strategic mind,[777] and judged others according to their inner strength, practicality, and cleverness. [534] As the Red Army reconquered the Caucasus and Crimea, various ethnic groups living in the regionthe Kalmyks, Chechens, Ingushi, Karachai, Balkars, and Crimean Tatarswere accused of having collaborated with the Germans. [293] In mid-1926, Kamenev and Zinoviev joined with Trotsky's supporters to form the United Opposition against Stalin;[294] in October they agreed to stop factional activity under threat of expulsion, and later publicly recanted their views under Stalin's command. [215] In September he was returned to the Southern Front. [515] Germany attempted an encirclement attack at Kursk, which was successfully repulsed by the Soviets. 4. [271] During the 13th Party Congress in May 1924, "Lenin's Testament" was read only to the leaders of the provincial delegations. [109] He was eventually sentenced to two years exile in the village of Solvychegodsk, Vologda Province, arriving there in February 1909. [132] In January 1913, Stalin travelled to Vienna,[133] where he researched the 'national question' of how the Bolsheviks should deal with the Russian Empire's national and ethnic minorities. [378] Like its predecessor, this plan was repeatedly amended to meet changing situations; there was for instance an increasing emphasis placed on armament production after Adolf Hitler became German chancellor in 1933. [466] Embarrassed by their inability to defeat the Finns, the Soviets signed an interim peace treaty, in which they received territorial concessions from Finland. [163] This reflected his senior standing in the party at the time.[164]. [393] Grain exports, which were a major means of Soviet payment for machinery, declined heavily. [919] His successor Vladimir Putin did not seek to rehabilitate Stalin but emphasised the celebration of Soviet achievements under Stalin's leadership rather than the Stalinist repressions. That name is Stalin! & # x27 ; s 1950 letter explaining his for. Foundation of Stalin 's rude manners and excessive power, suggesting that should! Particularly his manoeuvres to remove rivals within the Nazi Party in the Party Over Soviet policy China... 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