Joseph Stalin

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Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin was one of the biggest mass murderers of the twentieth century. From the purges in the Red Army to forced relocations, Stalin had the blood of millions on his hands. This essay is not going to debate the fact that this was indeed a brutal and power hungry individual, because he was indeed just that. I will on the other hand show you that through his way of governing the Soviet Union, he actually saved mother Russia from the German invasion in World War Two through his cunning and ruthlessness.

Joseph Stalin was a very industrious person and used every means possible to better prepare his country for the coming war that he believed was inevitable. Wether it was diplomatic plotting, economic maneuvering, or just plain brute force, Stalin used every tool in his vast arsenal. The following are some of the more important decisions and methods that Stalin employed. Stalin was forced to consolidate his power through harsh means to better rule the Soviet Union. He ordered the five year plans to industrialize the nation and ordered one of the largest military build up plans ever. Stalin attempted many times to reach a diplomatic solution and ways to delay war with the Axis powers while at the same time trying to guarantee security from the West. Stalin wanted nothing less than to rule the Soviet Union and make her the greatest country in the world and he would stop at nothing to reach those goals. In his quest for leadership Stalin wished to consolidate his power in only himself, thus enabling him to better rule the Soviet Union. Stalin's roots in politics go all the way back to him being expelled from the theological seminary in Tiflis, Georgia in 1899.

This was where Stalin got his first real taste for politics and from that point on his political ambitions grew greater and greater. Stalin soon joined up with the Social Democratic Party and after the party split over ideological differences in 1903, Stalin joined the Bolshevik party under Vladimir Lenin. From 1903 to 1912 Stalin was arrested, and managed to escape, several times. He was exiled to Siberia from 1913 to 1917, returning only after the fall of the Tsar. With the fall of the Tzar and the country in the hands of the revolutionaries Stalin believed it to be the perfect time to come back and renew his political ambitions. Stalin was appointed Commissar of Nationalities ...

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... military industry at the beginning of the war and up-to-date equipment was starting to be delivered to the front.

The movement of the war industry east contributed to the lack of material but proved to be the saving grace of the army in the end. At the end the Soviet war industries were producing some of the best equipment in the world. In the end I do believe that through Stalin's leadership the Soviet Union was saved. Had it been under the leadership of the intended Communist bureaucracy it would have surely fallen. As we have seen in our country even simple matters can take forever to go into effect or get started under a bureaucracy. In that highly volatile and dangerous time period only an iron fisted rule could bring about change fast enough to due any good. True in the short term peoples right were trampled upon and millions died from famine, purges, and the war itself but in the end hundred's of millions were saved.

Bibliography

Robert Conquest, The Great Terror, (Toronto: Macmillan and Co. Ltd, 1968), p.123.

Alexander Werth, Russia at War, (London: Barrie and Rockcliff, 1964), p.19.

Isaac Deutscher, Stalin, (New York: Oxford University Pres, Inc 1967.

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