Joseph Stalin Politics - Research Paper Example

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was a soviet politician and Bolshevik revolutionary. He held the of first General Secretary of theCommunist Party of the Soviet Unions Central Committee, which made him the most powerful political figure in the USSR. Born 20 December (December 6 by the old style) 1878 in Gori in the Tiflis Governorate of the Russian empire, Stalin was of Georgian descent. At birth, his name was Ioseb Besarionisdze Jughashvili. His father, Besarion Jughashvili was a cobbler. (Service 13) The Jughashvili family lived an ordinary life, but at one point Joseph’s father turned to alcoholism. This ruined his business; he also became violent and abusive with his wife and son. (17, 18) The financial situation of the family grew worse. Because of this, the family was forced to move at least nine times in the first ten years of Stalin’s life. Joseph grew up in a town where violence and crime were rampant, and he participated in fights with other children. (26) Stalin’s mother, Ketevan, was really keen on giving her son a good education so she sent him to the Gori Theological School. There he was forced to learn Russian, according to the policy set by Tsar Alexander III. (Kuromiya 3, 4) Stalin was an excellent student; he became a good choir singer and started to write poetry. At 16, he was awarded a scholarship to the Orthodox seminary of Tiflix. (Service 32) There he became an atheist and read some revolutionary literature by Marx. Before the final exams the School has abruptly raised fees for studying, which forced Stalin to drop out as he was not able to meet the payments. (41-42) He became a Marxist revolutionary. For that he was persecuted, arrested, even exiled to Siberia. Yet he always escaped and continued his work underground. He organized strikes, protests, was spreading propaganda, etc. He quickly gained popularity with the Bolsheviks and was personally working together with Lenin, the communist leader and ideologist. (24) During the Bolshevik’s seize of power in 1917 Stalin’s involvement was not of any significance. (Kuromiya 34) However, he quickly raised ranks in the Communist party and was assigned to the position of general secretary of the Communist Party in 1922. (54) This title was not considered high-ranking, but it gave him the opportunity to build a base of support. In 1924, after the death of Lenin, Stalin announced himself his official heir. He managed to outmaneuver other party leaders in the fight for the top political seat of the USSR. (Service 3) In effect, by the late 20’s he became the dictator of the Soviet Union. Stalin implemented a system of forced collectivization and industrialization of agriculture. Millions of people had to pay for it with their very lives. He also created a new program of rapid industrialization and as the result economy reached colossal increases in the productivity, albeit at a great cost. The Great Terror started in the 1930’s when Stalin decided to “purge the party of enemies of the people”; thousands of suspected citizens were executed and millions exiled to slave labor camps, of which the whole network, known as gulag, was created. These overwhelming persecutions resulted in substantial destruction of the country’s structure and severely weakened the army, so that even though warnings were given, Stalin was caught off guard when Hitler attacked in June 1941. At this point, he lost the trust of a large part of the population, but he quickly regained it and fought to victory. The number of casualties, though, was incredibly large; however Stalin did not pay much consideration to that fact. (“Joseph Stalin” BBC history) Joseph Stalin died of a stroke on 5 March 1953. After World War II at the dawn of the nuclear age the leader of the USSR became increasingly paranoid, which most likely was the cause of his death. ( Radzinsky 566-567) Besides playing a key role in the development of his country, Stalin’s contribution to world history is great as well. On the onset of the WWII Stalin was forced to eliminate leading military officials. Many people would categorize this as a wrong move, however, everyone eliminated was a Trotskyite – the political opposition. If Trotskyite officials and propagandists were allowed to remain, hypothetically, another civil war would have broken out in Russia. This would have made Russia weak, and brought it to the point where it could not contribute to the war. Fortunately for USSR and Allied powers Stalin prevented it. His brilliant economic policies played a key role in providing needed supply of weaponry and provision during the war. Prior to the war USSR had a 5 year increase of 200% economically, which completely shattered international economical records, gave the country a head start in the war preparation, and put USSR on the map as a superpower. Without Stalin, the allies would have lost the war. (Radzinsky) Another historical contribution is the discovery and development of the laws of socialist society, the deepening of the knowledge and works of the socialist theory, finalizing and finding the answers to many questions of the state, the driving forces, labor, classes, nations in socialism and communism etc. He determined the two classes of socialist society – the workers and the peasants. The “intelligentsia” was considered a social status, but not a separate class. Equal rights were implemented in all classes. (“The Contribution of J.V. Stalin to Marxism-Leninism”) It is pretty obvious, that the nonexistence of this persona would have had a great impact on history. Firstly, under rule of Stalin USSR, the country Lenin created was strengthened and became one of the dominant world powers. Secondly, the Allied powers would most likely have lost in World War II. This would lead to many consequences, which is hard to even start imagining: World Nazism domination, anti-Semitism and ethnic genocide would become common; the war would drag on for much longer etc. Thirdly, the world governments gained invaluable knowledge about the inner workings and intricacies of socialism. This new system turned out to be a very extremist society. If Stalin had not forced it at that time, nowadays former countries of the Soviet Union could still be experiencing socialism as a new thing. Today, the views on Joseph Stalin are still very contradicting. Some say he was a hero, if it was not for him, Nazism would have become the world power, the world gained first-hand knowledge about socialism, etc. On the other hand, some call him a tyrant, who killed thousands of peoples, and ruined lives of millions; his reign associated with the regime of constant terror. In my opinion, the truth lies somewhere in the middle. Indeed, the causalities of Stalin’s forced famine and genocide in various regions still haunt those who have seen it and lived to tell the tale. But if nothing more, Stalin’s regime and his role in that time period will serve as invaluable experience and a warning for many generations to come. Works Cited: “Joseph Stalin”. BBC History. Bbc.co.uk. n.d. Web. 3 May 2011. Kuromiya, Hiroaki “Stalin.Profiles in power” 2005. Pearson Education. Print. Mitin, M.B, Kammari,M.D, and Aleksandrov, G.F. “The Contribution of J.V. Stalin to Marxism-Leninism”. The Seventieth Anniversary of Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, IzvestiaAkademiiNauk SSSR, SeriaIstorii i Filosofii, Tom VII, IzdatelstvoAkademiiNauk SSSR, Moscow, 1950, pp. 3-30. revolutionarydemocracy.org Web. 3 May 2011 (URL: http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/rdv4n1/stalin70.htm) Montefiore, Simon Sebag “Young Stalin”, 2008. Vintage Books. Print. Radzinsky, Edvard. “Stalin: The First In-Depth Biography Based on Explosive New Documents from Russias Secret Archives”. 1997. Anchor Books. Print Service, Robert “Stalin: a biography”. 2005. Harvard University Press. Print. Read More