Because of Stalin, people view Communism as if it were a satanic cult that alone should make his name erased from all history. more tributes should be given to Vladimir and leon, the true leaders behind the revolution. also, I wish people would restrain themselves from using economic success as to determining if so and so was a good leader...where would it end? Pinochet? franco? hitler? #40?
This is not really true. Look at media from the 1920's & 1930's, before Stalin had a chance to make his name, and they were already very unflattering. The first big hit communism took in the public eye was all the purges durring WWI, including the very publicly debated execution the Romanov family, including the very young Anastasia, who became the rallying point for dislike of the Russian Communists.
conflict is disagreement people having difference of opinions. . or even having opposing sides of a need for resources War is fighting over it Killing over it Rocket River
I'm no fan of gulags, but Stalin industrialized a huge, mostly illiterate country that had just gotten rid of serfdom, overnight. And, as a result of that, the Soviets beat the Nazis, (almost all by themselves). Were it not for Stalin, the Allies would certainly have lost. There is a story an old history prof of mine used to tell: Stalin and FDR are at one of the planning conferences, (Potsdam or Yalta, or something) and FDR is getting on Stalin about human rights abuses in Poland. "What about Poland?" FDR keeps saying. Stalin takes a drag of his cigar and says "What about Mississippi?"
The Russians didn't defeat the Nazis because of anything Stalin did. As with Napoleon, the Russian winter, and the humongous Russian population did it. The Germans were taking out Russian tanks on the order of 10 - 1, but the . The top German ace on the Eastern front had 352 kills! To contrast the #1 American Ace had something like 33. And by not being prepared, Stalin almost had all of his industrialization overrun by the Germans. They only escaped with and rebuilt a fraction of it in the Urals. Finally, the Germans would have thought twice about attacking if Stalin hadn't murdered 99% of the top military men as part of the Great Purges. Stalin won the war in spite of himself. The only thing he had going for him was that no casualty figure was too large for him to accept. I don't really call that leadership.
