There is No Justification for the Terror in the U.S.S.R. in the 1930's

There is No Justification for the Terror in the U.S.S.R. in the 1930's I agree more with the statement ‘There can be no justification

for the “terror” in the USSR in the 1930’s. It was motivated

purely by Stalin’s lust for power.’ However, I can understand why

one could say that terror was essential for the survival of the

new communist state or Soviet Union. Stalin used terror to force

the USSR to industrialise quickly, which enabled them to ward off

the threat from fascism and develop into a world power.

Source I, written by Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987 a few years before

communism fell in Russia, appears to be relatively balanced. It does

not accuse Stalin of using ‘terror’ methods, however is does not

overly praise him either. ‘Yes industrialisation… was indispensable..’

saying that Stalin needed to industrialise in the 1930’s to combat the

increasing threat of fascism. However, I believe that although

industrialisation was indispensable it could have occurred without the

use of “terror.” Gorbachev seems to make the point, though, that with

the benefit of hindsight, we can be critical of the way Stalin went

about the rapid industrialisation but, I think at the time, the threat

of fascism, being left behind industrially and preserving the new

communist state was a major concern to Stalin. Gorbachev also

mentioned that the tactics were contradictory to the principles of

socialism, which was a negative. Source I is a reasonably reliable

source because Gorbachev is the leader of Russia, at the time of the

writing, and therefore would h...

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...use it is Khruschev, the Russian leader in 1971 who has the

benefit of hindsight and is more powerful than he was in Source J and

probably feels more able to criticise Stalin openly. This view is

confirmed by Source D where you see people in court, facing Stalin as

the judge, happily confessing to crimes when they know they face death

with the executioner in the background.

It is hard to justify the horrible terror tactics that Stalin used in

the early days of the communist ‘revolution’ in Russia. As Gorbachev

mentions, the end result or industrialisation was critical not only to

enable the Russians to ward off the Nazis but to quickly bring the

country into the 20th century but the terror tactics were contrary to

the socialist principles and the hindsight even the Russian leaders

believed they were not necessary.