The Soviet Union under Stalin

1
The Soviet Union under Stalin

• Creating the New Soviet Man

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Timeline of Early Soviet History

• Russia governed by Czar until 1917 autocratic
  political system feudal economy.
• Country faced heavy military losses in WWI
  increasing popular unrest.
• Moderates lead revolution in May 1917 Czar
  deposed imprisoned.
• Bolshevik Revolution in Nov. 1917 Czar and his
  family murdered Russia withdrew from the war
  moderates other dissidents in exile.

3
Bolshevik Revolution

• V. I. Lenin was head of Bolshevik Communist party
  government from 1917 to his death
• in 1924.
• Josef Stalin a
• top administrator in
• Bolshevik Party

4
Lenins alteration of Marxism

• Marx wrote that communist revolution could only
  occur in advanced industrial capitalist system.
  Russia in 1917 a feudal economy.
• How could revolution occur there?
• Lenin reframed Marxism.
• Called Marxism-Leninism.

5
Bolshevik Revolution

• Lenin sanctioned brutal tactics to seize power
  (e.g., salami tactics), but not a totalitarian
  system because no cult of the leader or total
  control of society.
• Lenin died in 1924 power struggle between right
  left wings of party.
• Stalin a nationalist on the right seized
  power.

6
Joseph Stalin

• Head of both the Communist party and Soviet
  government from 1924 to 1953.
• Most interested in power and not ideology.
• By 1928, established himself as absolute
  dictator.
• Increasingly paranoid.

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• 1. cult of the leader the all-knowing and
  all-seeing Father of the People.

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• 2. radical ideology
• Marxism-Leninism the driving rationale for
  Stalins power grab. But Stalin altered the
  ideology to serve his personal nationalist
  ambitions.
• Stalinism refers to a brand of communism that is
  both extremely repressive and nationalistic.

9
Stalins totalitarian elements

• Stalin intertwined his own myth with the
  revolutionary struggle. One current gallery
  exhibit about Stalin notes
• Only a few photographs of Stalin exist from his
  youth and the early revolutionary period. A past
  was created for Stalin through works of art. He
  was often cut and pasted into photographs to
  create an artificial history which placed him at
  the forefront of events.

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• 3. organization
• Soviet communist party effectively used to
  solidify Stalins power and to spy on potential
  rivals.
• 4. control of all information
• TASS news service.

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• 5. mass mobilization
• 6. secret police KGB

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• 7. central control of all other organizations.
  Stalins first goal to turn Russia other Soviet
  republics into advanced industrial economy.
  Heavily centralized command economy. Called a
  5-year plan.
• Peasants resisted killings exile.
• Severe agricultural losses famine.
• After a decade, millions dead.

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• Soviet art extolling
• the noble worker,
• the new socialist
• man.

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• 8. Violence Terror. Brutality on massive
  scale. Targets political opponents party
  rivals.

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• Political purges from 1934 to 1936 were called
  the Great Terror.
• Show trials, with coerced confessions and summary
  executions, from 1936 to 1938.
• During his rule, one million direct killings 12
  million deaths in Soviet prisons slave labor
  camps.

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Stalins totalitarian elements

• Gulag, Soviet era slave labor camp for
  dissidents, former capitalists, non-cooperative
  peasants party rivals.