I'm a little behind on my history for this character. Everybody talks bad about him, but what comes to me for me is the Russia that during World War 2 that took more casuallties than ANY other nation in the world (an unfathable amount) but kept on comming. They pushed the Nazis all the way back to Berlin and they were the big force that really defeated Hitler. They had Berlin surrounded when he commited suicide. The Russians as an ally were one of the biggest reasons the Allied Powers were able to defeat the Nazis. And Joseph Stalin was the Leader and Commander of the Russians during that time.

That's what I think about. But I know very little on Stalin the man. So what was so bad about Stalin?

Not a GD discussion, moved to World History.

Stalin did kill more of his own people than any other leader....

I'm a little behind on my history for this character. Everybody talks bad about him, but what comes to me for me is the Russia that during World War 2 that took more casuallties than ANY other nation in the world (an unfathable amount) but kept on comming. They pushed the Nazis all the way back to Berlin and they were the big force that really defeated Hitler. They had Berlin surrounded when he commited suicide. The Russians as an ally were one of the biggest reasons the Allied Powers were able to defeat the Nazis. And Joseph Stalin was the Leader and Commander of the Russians during that time.

That's what I think about. But I know very little on Stalin the man. So what was so bad about Stalin?

World War II killed, let's see, about 10,000,000 - 20,000,000 Soviet citizens IIRC.

But under Stalin's rule, up to 50,000,000 of his own people were murdered, executed, worked to death or delibrately starved. Millions of others were forcibly deported, jailed, beaten or exiled.

He also (directly or indirectly) imposed dictatorial rule on Eastern Europe, Mongolia, Tannu Tuva and North Korea (not China though, he initially sided with Chiang Kai Shek), bring misery to millions more. He in part helped began the Cold War, 40 years of arms race, wars, conflicts and tension. He was paranoid, trusted no body else and extremely brutal in his methods.

So what was so bad about Stalin.

He might have killed his own people, but it decreased corruption so swiftly in the USSR, and if the Tsars were in charge during WW2, they would never defeat Hitler, and Tvorsky (Srry if I misspell) would never have made USSR so powerful as much as Stalin did, sure Stalin might have killed alot of people, but he brought USSR to its....Golden Age =]

I usually hear about 30,000,000 deaths, most of them having nothing to do with corruption.

He might have killed his own people, but it decreased corruption so swiftly in the USSR, and if the Tsars were in charge during WW2, they would never defeat Hitler, and Tvorsky (Srry if I misspell) would never have made USSR so powerful as much as Stalin did, sure Stalin might have killed alot of people, but he brought USSR to its....Golden Age =]

Starving people, brainwashed civilians, war. Ah, golden age!

Reduce corruption, it might have initially, but Stalin's action ultimately concentrated power in his own hands, that is he had absolute power. Power, of course, corrupts...

btw Stalin wasn't personally responsible for the defeat of the Nazis. It was largely due to his commanders. When the invasion started he disappeared from view for a week leaving a vacuum in the command and allowing large amounts of land to be taken. In fact by killing his officers in the Red Army he might have made things worse.

Starving people, brainwashed civilians, war. Ah, golden age!

Reduce corruption, it might have initially, but Stalin's action ultimately concentrated power in his own hands, that is he had absolute power. Power, of course, corrupts...

btw Stalin wasn't personally responsible for the defeat of the Nazis. It was largely due to his commanders. When the invasion started he disappeared from view for a week leaving a vacuum in the command and allowing large amounts of land to be taken. In fact by killing his officers in the Red Army he might have made things worse.

Stalin... The Bastard.

When Hitler betrayed him I would love to see Stalin's face. Priceless.

I'm a little behind on my history for this character. Everybody talks bad about him, but what comes to me for me is the Russia that during World War 2 that took more casuallties than ANY other nation in the world (an unfathable amount) but kept on comming. They pushed the Nazis all the way back to Berlin and they were the big force that really defeated Hitler. They had Berlin surrounded when he commited suicide. The Russians as an ally were one of the biggest reasons the Allied Powers were able to defeat the Nazis. And Joseph Stalin was the Leader and Commander of the Russians during that time.

That's what I think about. But I know very little on Stalin the man. So what was so bad about Stalin?

How is sacraficing thousands of lives on a war the sign of a good leader? You don't see Bush recieving any medals. What about the thousands that died of famine because of his failed policy of collectivism. How about the many he executed that opposed him or criticized him in anyway. Even the later Soviet leaders attacked his views. Just because we had a common enemy, doesn't mean he was our ally and he damn well doesn't need to be praised.

Oh yeah, he also tried to kill the Jews, luckily the Bastard had the decency to die.

That bastard is at the worst level oof politicians on one step with Mao, Hitler, Pol Pot and perhaps Genghis Khan. I hope they all burn in hell now.

Adler

That bastard is at the worst level oof politicians on one step with Mao, Hitler, Pol Pot and perhaps Genghis Khan. I hope they all burn in hell now.

Adler

Ah, Genghis wasn't so bad... I dont recall him really doing anything too terrible.

Hell, you could call Peter The Great terrible for torturing the Streltsky ( I beleive thats the correct spelling) even torturing them himself, thats a rumor but I believe its true. But I support what Peter did to those traitors.

Genghis Khan was a great leader for his time, Stalin was incompotent, it was his fault that the USSR suffered so badly perhaps the only useful thing he did was industrializing the USSR but even that came at the cost of millions.

Genghis Khan was a great leader for his time, Stalin was incompotent, it was his fault that the USSR suffered so badly perhaps the only useful thing he did was industrializing the USSR but even that came at the cost of millions.

Russia as a long history of exploiting its vast manpower for its industrialization... But god damnit Stalin you went to far!!!

I think its wrong to morally judge anceint rulers like Genghis Khan to today's standards. We're in diffrent times, what we call horrible these days may have equalled magnificant back then.

How is sacraficing thousands of lives on a war the sign of a good leader? You don't see Bush recieving any medals. What about the milions that died of famine because of his failed policy of collectivism. How about the many he executed that opposed him or criticized him in anyway. Even the later Soviet leaders attacked his views. Just because we had a common enemy, doesn't mean he was our ally and he damn well doesn't need to be praised.
Search for Ukrainian Famine to see the extent of this crime. http://www.ibiblio.org/expo/soviet.exhibit/famine.html ,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor

The death toll from the 1932-33 famine in Ukraine has been estimated between six million and seven million.

Nevertheless even if his propositions where catastrophic and Brutal it was the only way that would lead to the industrialization of Soviet Union. A Criminal and one of the most despicable human being he remains though.

Exactly. Take Alexander or Caser for insantace. They killed hundreds of thousands, wiped out entire nations of people's, and enslaved thousands, but they are looked upon as great leaders and conquerors because thats what everyone did back then and it was no diffrent in Genghis Khan's time. It is only with the advent of humanist ideals that things have changed.

Exactly. Take Alexander or Caser for insantace. They killed hundreds of thousands, wiped out entire nations of people's, and enslaved thousands, but they are looked upon as great leaders and conquerors because thats what everyone did back then and it was no diffrent in Genghis Khan's time. It is only with the advent of humanist ideals that things have changed.

I see it this way. People like Genghis Khan, Timur, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, etc the great conquerers of history, they kill thousands or millions of people during their careers. But they're honoured because they did it in wartime and against people of other countries. War legitimised their actions. People like Stalin, Hitler, Mao, etc however are branded as monsters because they did it to their own people, although its really murder all the same whether in wartime or peacetime. It's one of the great irony of history. This sort of thing still happens even after humanist ideals became prevelent and will probably always happen in the future.

When Hitler betrayed him I would love to see Stalin's face. Priceless.

Stalin's Folly by Constantine Pleshakov might interest you, then. It tries to go into Stalin's motivations and reactions to the Barbarossa invasion in the first few days.

But under Stalin's rule, up to 50,000,000 of his own people were murdered, executed, worked to death or delibrately starved. Millions of others were forcibly deported, jailed, beaten or exiled.
Now, I'm as die-hard opponent of Bolshevism and Stalin as you can get, but the 50 million number is completely unreasonable. It only entered the mainstream because during Soviet rule it was completely impossible to give anything more then conjecture.
But now it seems completely unfeesable. The Population of the Soviet Union was 164 million in 1937, meaning to combine 50 million of his own people, with 30 million in the war, we are looking at one half of the Soviet Union killed off. This would be a number completely unparalleled in history. Now, at the end of the Second World war, the Soviet Union was still able to field 20 million soldiers. China compartively fielded 5 million soldiers at this time. So out of a population reduced by half, to 80 million people, we now add on twenty million people who are not involved in raising crops, running factories, or basically being part of the nation in any functional way. This would mean basically the end of anything that could be described as Russian society. We'd still have excess cities in Russia to this day from this. The real number is much closer to 20 million.

Stalin... The Bastard.

When Hitler betrayed him I would love to see Stalin's face. Priceless.

i know right :lol:

Soviet Union should win battle againist nazist much easier without Stalin.
it was the only way that would lead to the industrialization of Soviet Union.
We cant know what autocracy should bring. Its 30 years, in 30 years should make be many things. They should take German reparations, have Finland, Poland and other countries which were rich by Russian conditions

if the Tsars were in charge during WW2, they would never defeat Hitler
Why, because tsars werent murdering their best generals?

I usually hear about 30,000,000 deaths, most of them having nothing to do with corruption.
I read somewhere that he only killed 13,000,000 people
Genghis Khan was practically a Barbarian, but he is aight
Why, because tsars werent murdering their best generals?
The Tsars werent able to motivate their own people w/ the nessescary amount of propaganda, in fact, The Soviets created Propaganda (From which I watched on Google Video) AND Havent u seen India in late last year, The General Dude BSed the Leader completely, if that happened to Stalin, then USSR would fall easily when Hitler Came...

And to all you people sayin **** bout Stalin, well he didnt have a better choice back then, about 20,000 bosheviks were in USSR and was tryin to stop Stalin, for that he HAD to kill them and anyone that could they might possibly recruit, times were harder back then
AND the Government Stalin Made practically took out Terrorism, but after the fall of the wall, and even right now, there are a great deal of terrorists in Russia, In Fact, Terrorism AS WE KNOW IT came right after USSR fell

Like I said, I know very very little about Joseph Stalin. Tha'ts why I started this thread because I want to learn. The only thing I know is the accomplishments of the Russians as a people. From reading about him here, It's also ironic that there was a revolution to get rid of the Tsars because of their opresson on the middle and low class with how they used them half like slaves, yet Stalin came in did just the same maybe on a worse scale.

I respect the Russians as a civilization for their acheivements, (doesn't mean I liked them) so maybe my lack of knowlege of their leadership is contradictory with what I do know about the people's accomplishemts. And there just seems to be so many of them from reading their history. It's like THEIR people should be called the Immortals rather than Persia because you kill one and more just take their place. Sounds like no matter how many die they just get back up and continue strait toward their goal with more people. That shows resiliance and determination in a civilization's people.

Thank you for all the replies every one! I'm learning alot from you! :)

By the way does any one know of a good read online to Stalin's history from the 2 world wars and beyond?

AND the Government Stalin Made practically took out Terrorism, but after the fall of the wall, and even right now, there are a great deal of terrorists in Russia, In Fact, Terrorism AS WE KNOW IT came right after USSR fell

You're right. The USSR falling was responsible for the Lockerbie bombing, the Beiruit bombing, and Iran taking over and holding hostage all those embassy people in 1979.

I read somewhere that he only killed 13,000,000 people

Thirteen million people never warrants an only.

And to all you people sayin **** bout Stalin, well he didnt have a better choice back then, about 20,000 bosheviks were in USSR and was tryin to stop Stalin, for that he HAD to kill them and anyone that could they might possibly recruit, times were harder back then

Is this referring to the purges? Because your '20,000' people was responded to with the deaths of hundreds of thousands. I would hardly say it had to be done.

Soviet Union should win battle againist nazist much easier without Stalin.
Joe did kill most of his good leaders. could the tzar have moved the production behind the mountains and "inspired" the defense of Stalingrad as well? debatable.

The Tsars werent able to motivate their own people w/ the nessescary amount of propaganda, in fact, The Soviets created Propaganda
This propaganda maybe hadnt so much effect when Germans should count thousands of volunteers from Ukraine, Baltic states or Kavkaz.

Joe did kill most of his good leaders. could the tzar have moved the production behind the mountains and "inspired" the defense of Stalingrad as well? debatable.
If tzar had power, the invasion should never be. It was Soviet Union which gave independence to Poles, Finns and Baltics, there was their economical power.
Moving production was in large states logic, it was made as well in China.
Stalin ignored every signs of danger from fascists.
Stalin blindness made road to Stalingrad battle. It was miracle that Germans should moved so far as they did and only thanks one man.
Of course I cant tell alternative history what should some another Igor or Ivan made. But I am sure that 80 of 100 will handle better with it.

The Tsars werent able to motivate their own people w/ the nessescary amount of propaganda, in fact, The Soviets created Propaganda
This propaganda maybe hadnt so much effect when Germans should count thousands of volunteers from Ukraine, Baltic states or Kavkaz.

Joe did kill most of his good leaders. could the tzar have moved the production behind the mountains and "inspired" the defense of Stalingrad as well? debatable.
If tzar had power, the invasion should never be. It was Soviet Union which gave independence to Poles, Finns and Baltics, there was their economical power.
Moving production was in large states logic, it was made as well in China.
Stalin ignored every signs of danger from fascists.
Stalin blindness made road to Stalingrad battle. It was miracle that Germans should moved so far as they did and only thanks one man.
Of course I cant tell alternative history what should some another Igor or Ivan made. But I am sure that 80 of 100 will handle better with it.


What Tsar ? you are forgetting something. If it wasn't comrade Stalin it would be comrade Trotsky or someone else in charge.

I think he means if Russia hadn't gone through a revolution a few decades before. But then again, as I implied in my last post, I don't see how the 2 different governments would really be any different. Both governments/leaderships seemed to have done the same things to their people and to their neighbors.

The Tsars werent able to motivate their own people w/ the nessescary amount of propaganda, in fact, The Soviets created Propaganda (From which I watched on Google Video) AND Havent u seen India in late last year, The General Dude BSed the Leader completely, if that happened to Stalin, then USSR would fall easily when Hitler Came...
Gee, if Stalin was so well loved, how come the idea of fighting for an invading foreign army intent on the destruction of their people sounded like a better idea than serving Stalin for over One Million People. For an idea of that, that means 1 in 34 Soviet citizens who served in the war, served on the German side.

I read somewhere that he only killed 13,000,000 people.
First of all, thats like saying hitler only killed 5.8 million Jews, it doesnt make him any better. Second of all the numbers vary, but 13 million is generally considered wrong.
And to all you people sayin **** bout Stalin, well he didnt have a better choice back then, about 20,000 bosheviks were in USSR and was tryin to stop Stalin, for that he HAD to kill them and anyone that could they might possibly recruit, times were harder back then
. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. To the Highest Degree. Every other leader in the world, including Adolf Hitler did not have as wide scale executions for political reason. Times were harder yes, because monsters like Stalin existed. Again, every other leader in the world got by without death on this scale. As for those who were "tryin to stop Stalin", most of them were executed because of a supposed plot of secretly collaborating with the Nazis. There has been a scrap of evidence offered by either the Soviets or the Germans on this supposedly vast conspiracy, and believe me, if their was anything resembling colaboration of the General Staff of the Soviet Union with the Nazis, it would have been examined from every possible angle, because it would re-write the History But none of the millions of researchers on the war have found any contacts the General Staff had.
AND the Government Stalin Made practically took out Terrorism, but after the fall of the wall, and even right now, there are a great deal of terrorists in Russia, In Fact, Terrorism AS WE KNOW IT came right after USSR fell
Thrown onto the bombing of Beirut, the Hostages in Iran, and the Lockerbie bombing, don't forget the Basques, the IRA, Entebbe airport, the PLO, Algeria, and the Red Brigades. Thats just what I can name off the top of my head.

What Tsar ? you are forgetting something. If it wasn't comrade Stalin it would be comrade Trotsky or someone else in charge.

I was replying on previous post.

Alpha Killer II, do you really believe that BS? Such an argumentation can be used for every other crime in history. Anyway why should there be so many Soviet people wanting to stop him? I mean 13 millions being killed by him can't be all in a plot against him! Otherwise he would have been dead. No, he was a bad leader like Hitler and Mao and Pol Pot. They all belong to a certain class of gansters. Who was the worst is debatable but as being such bad as*es it is not very relevant.

Adler

*SRRY BOUT TYPOS!!!* nvm bout the 13,000,000, it was ONLY in world war 2 (Sorry, I was readin Alamac) and I also had typo @ the # of bosheviks, its APPROXAMATELY 200,000, but still, anyone of them could be a possible conspirator

Alpha Killer II, twice now you have suggested that thousands of Bolsheviks were trying to kill Stalin. Stalin was a Bolshevik, at least during the days before & immediately after the 1917 revolution. Get a new almanac.

Alpha Killer, was this kid a possible cospirator?
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f4/Holodomor2.jpg/180px-Holodomor2.jpg

Now, I'm as die-hard opponent of Bolshevism and Stalin as you can get, but the 50 million number is completely unreasonable. It only entered the mainstream because during Soviet rule it was completely impossible to give anything more then conjecture.
But now it seems completely unfeesable. The Population of the Soviet Union was 164 million in 1937, meaning to combine 50 million of his own people, with 30 million in the war, we are looking at one half of the Soviet Union killed off. This would be a number completely unparalleled in history. Now, at the end of the Second World war, the Soviet Union was still able to field 20 million soldiers. China compartively fielded 5 million soldiers at this time. So out of a population reduced by half, to 80 million people, we now add on twenty million people who are not involved in raising crops, running factories, or basically being part of the nation in any functional way. This would mean basically the end of anything that could be described as Russian society. We'd still have excess cities in Russia to this day from this. The real number is much closer to 20 million.
The high estimates tend to factor in the compounded effect of a demographic increase in population that never occurred. So it's not just a figure of people killed, but of people killed and of those never born as a consequence.

Very clever point! Though, unless it was a result of those killed having been pregnant or expecting children, I really wouldn't consider people not expanding their families a big issue. I mean the human race is already overpopulating the earth as it is and most wildlife don't have much of a habitat to live in, thus we see the numbers have ALOT of species declining in the endangered list.

(I would hate to see Tigers, Cheetahs, Pandas, Lions, etc. and all those cool exotic animals wiped out.)

Wow, where did that come from? :D

(And yes, I do know that you were refferring to how they got their estimate of that number. Sorry, I'm tired.)

That bastard is at the worst level oof politicians on one step with Mao, Hitler, Pol Pot and perhaps Genghis Khan. I hope they all burn in hell now.

Adler

Kill one man, and you are the murderer; slaughter a million, and you are the conquerer...

Kill one man, and you are the murderer; slaughter a million, and you are the conquerer...

Hmm it sounds a little as our thread man: The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistics.

RED ALERT QUOTE!!
"When you kill one... it is a tragedy. When you kill ten million? It is a statistic. They call me Killer, but I live only to serve the People. And the People's history will judge me; where the Romans failed, I will succeed! Russia's borders will stretch from coast to coast! For a united Russia is our destiny. Those lands were taken away by corrupt Czarist diplomats and criminal military officers - they were the enemies of the People!"

But then again, as I implied in my last post, I don't see how the 2 different governments would really be any different. Both governments/leaderships seemed to have done the same things to their people and to their neighbors.You hit that right on the nosie! If there was ever a book better detailing how the Bolsheviks became that which they set out to destroy, read no further than George Orwell's Animal Farm.

Stalin's Folly by Constantine Pleshakov might interest you, then. It tries to go into Stalin's motivations and reactions to the Barbarossa invasion in the first few days.
What reaction? I understand that at the beginning of the Operation, Stalin didn't even think the Germans were really invading. He actually went so far as to order the frontline troops not to engage the Germans. Thank God they disobeyed.

And as for the actual fighting... true, the Red Army practiced the policy of 'deserters will be shot', but what really carried them forward was their own determination. The event was called "The Great Patriotic War", when the Soviet Union no longer fought for Stalin, but for victory over the Germans.
Napoleon Bonaparte sums this up best: "A man will not have himself killed for a half-pence a day or a petty distinction. You must speak to the soul in order to electrify him." For Russians, there is nothing more electrifying than the Motherland.

...its APPROXAMATELY 200,000, but still, anyone of them could be a possible conspiratorSee, that's exactly the sort of paranoid thinking that led Stalin to orchestrate his infamous purges.

Well, estimations about the deaths because of Stalin are between 20 and 40 millions within about 30 years. No one can seriously say all of them were death enemies by Stalin! Also here we do have a figure including the real victims and no statistical ones. However they are still estimations as the real figure is unknown.

Adler

What reaction? I understand that at the beginning of the Operation, Stalin didn't even think the Germans were really invading. He actually went so far as to order the frontline troops not to engage the Germans. Thank God they disobeyed.

Effectively one of total shock. He had given orders that the Soviet troops were to defend themselves, but not to provoke the Germans. When the Germans did invade, the bulk of the Soviet commanders were confused over what to do (would shooting back 'provoke' the enemy?) for fear of being shot (legacy of the purges). Even when some form of strategy was worked out in Moscow, it was little help as most communication lines had been severed.

Stalin was essentially worried that this was some sort of German rouse to frighten him into surrendering parts of the Ukraine and western Russia, not an actual invasion. I believe he even opened the possibility of offering these to Hitler in the early weeks of Barbarossa.

Ah yes... That I can understand. In any event, I think we can agree that Stalin did not treat the opening days of the invasion as seriously as he should have.

This thread has given me much more understanding. I admire the resolve of the russian people but I do NOT like Stalin from what I have learned.

And as for the actual fighting... true, the Red Army practiced the policy of 'deserters will be shot', but what really carried them forward was their own determination. The event was called "The Great Patriotic War", when the Soviet Union no longer fought for Stalin, but for victory over the Germans.


Aren't you mixing up the post-war propaganda to make the end justify the means? Deserters were not only shot, their families were also sent to prison camps.

For all interested in Stalin's era, I recommend reading the stories of dissidents, intellectuals and writers to get a bit different picture for example of the Great Patriotic War. The biograph of Alexander Solzhenitsyn and his "The Gulag Archipelago" is a good starting point, although a bit on the heavy side but you can also get a briefing in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Solzhenitsyn). See also the article about The Great Purge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_purge) for the information about Stalin's actions before WW2.

In my opinion, it was a clever political move from Stalin to turn the attention of the people from internal problems to outside world by WW2, but as this already was a well known fact before his time, I can't give him much credit of anything.

By the way does any one know of a good read online to Stalin's history from the 2 world wars and beyond?

Access to History: Bolshevik and Stalinist Russia 1917-1956 (or whenever it was Stalin died)

Comprehensive, and it will give you a real look at what Stalin did to Russia.

He died in 1953.

Stalin should be removed from civ4 and any mumbling about adding Hitler should be met with brutal mockery. These were not great leaders, merely historically significant pieces-o-crap.

Ecofarm, I can only agree.

Adler

His smoke stack industries were ineficent also, they had to be dismantled after he died, so even his industrial legecy is questionable.

Stalin should be removed from civ4 and any mumbling about adding Hitler should be met with brutal mockery. These were not great leaders, merely historically significant pieces-o-crap.

Lets not go so far...

I actually like hunting old Stalin down, retaking Russia for the good of the people and then applying my new communist methods.

Ya can be Stalin or you can kill him. And I like killing him.