The man who converted the Soviet Union from a backward country into a world superpower at incredible human cost. Stalin was born into a chaotic household in a poor village in Georgia. Stalin had a mildly deformed arm and was permanently scarred from a childhood bout with smallpox.
As a result, he felt he had been treated unfairly by life and developed a strong, idealised desire for greatness and respect, along with a shrewd streak of calculating cold-heartedness towards those who had maligned him. The more he learned, the more he felt inferior to and suspicious of educated intellectuals.
Stalin’s mother had sent him to a seminary in Tiflis (now Tbilisi), the capital of Georgia, so that he could become a priest. However, the young man became engrossed in the city’s vibrant revolutionary circles rather than completing his studies.
Stalin was never a fiery intellectual polemicist or orator like Lenin or Trotsky. Instead, he focused on the day-to-day nitty-gritty of revolutionary activity. Such as helping to organise workers, distributing illegal literature, and robbing trains to support the cause. All while Lenin and his bookish friends wrote clever articles about the plight of the Russian working class. Lenin found Stalin’s obnoxious behaviour on occasion, but he appreciated his commitment and appointed him to several low-level positions in the new Soviet administration following the Revolution.
Joseph Stalin, a Soviet statesman, ruled the Soviet Union as its leader. During World War II (1939–45), he commanded his country’s forces alongside those of the United States and Great Britain. For nearly thirty years, Stalin stood at the helm of communism as the dictator of Russia.
Who is Joseph Stalin?
Georgian: Ioseb Dzhugashvili; born: December 18 (December 6 Old Style), 1878, Gori, Georgia, Russian Empire; known as Stalin [see Note to Researchers] —died March 5, 1953 in Moscow, Russia, U.S.S.R.), secretary-general of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (1922-53) and premier of the Soviet state (1941-53), who for a quarter of a century dominated the Soviet Union dictatorially and turned it into a significant world force.
Joseph Stalin, the Soviet dictator, held arguably more sway over world politics in the twenty-five years before his death than any other anyone in human history. Stalin industrialised the USSR, forced collectivization of agriculture, strengthened his position by relentless police brutality. Aided in Germany’s defeat in 1941–45, and expanded Soviet rule to include a belt of eastern European republics.
He was the mastermind behind Soviet tyranny, a talented but phenomenally brutal organiser who somehow managed to usher the Soviet Union into the nuclear era while destroying the last vestiges of personal freedom and economic prosperity.
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When Was Joseph Stalin Born?
Stalin’s birthplace, the Georgian town of Gori, was a diverse metropolis with populations of Georgians, Azeris, Armenians, Russians, and Jews at the time it was a part of the Russian Empire.
On December 18 (O.S. December 6) 1878 he was born, and on December 29 he was christened.
Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili’s [d] diminutive nickname was “Soso,” after his given name. Besarion Jughashvili and Ekaterine Geladze were his parents. Their only child who made it past infancy was him.
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Family of Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin’s first wife, Ekaterina Svanidze, lost her whole family in 1907, just four years after their wedding. Stalin reportedly declared at her funeral that he had lost all sympathy for human beings with her passing. He had a “stony heart,” but she was the only one who could soften it. All the good things in his life revolved on her existence. Yakov Dzhugashvili, their son, was someone Stalin did not get along with in latter life.
Yakov Stalin, Stalin’s son, allegedly committed suicide by shooting himself as a result of his abusive upbringing. Even so, he managed to pull through it all. During World War II, Yakov participated in the Red Army and was eventually taken prisoner by the Germans.
Stalin allegedly declined the offer, saying, “A lieutenant is not worth a general,” when presented with the idea of exchanging him for Fieldmarshal Paulus. Others claim that in response to this offer, he said, “I have no son,”. And that Yakov was later mistakenly electrocuted in a German prison.
His second wife, Nadezhda Alliluyeva-Stalina, passed away in 1932; she may have shot herself following an argument with Stalin. Leaving a note that was “partially personal, partly political,” as reported by their daughter.
World War II
Stalin sided with Adolf Hitler and Germany at the outset of World War II. Hitler despised Stalin, though, and the Germans launched a sneak attack on the Soviet Union in 1941. Stalin joined forces with Britain and the United States to combat the Germans. Numerous lives were lost on both sides of the conflict, but the Germans eventually succumbed to defeat.
Stalin installed puppet regimes in the Eastern European countries that the Soviet Union had “freed” from Nazi occupation after World War II. The Soviet Union controlled these governments. This sparked hostilities between the two global superpowers at the time, the Soviet Union and the United States.
Interesting Facts About Joseph Stalin
- He forged his own birth certificate by rewriting his name and the year he was born
- Joseph Stalin was born Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili, but he adopted the Russian name Joseph (meaning “steel”) because he saw himself as a formidable individual.
- Stalin’s criminal career and frequent incarceration and exile were direct results of his involvement in subversive political activity and his friendship with Bolsheviks.
- The global controversy caused by his daughter. In 1967, after the death of her father, Svetlana Alliluyeva fled to the United States, where she eventually became a naturalised citizen.
- He was responsible for establishing the Gulag, a prison camp where slaves were forced to work
- Stalin built labour camps where individuals were forced to live and work in deplorable conditions until they died as a means of consolidating power in his regime.
- When he was an adolescent, he decided to teach himself Russian. Since he originally spoke Russian with a thick Georgian accent, it took him some time to fully assimilate into Russian society.
Conclusion
Russia’s history has been defined by strong leaders, from Ivan the Terrible through Peter the Great. Joseph Stalin, however, is the only world leader whose legacy can be said to be truly eternal. He had such an impact that the name “Stalinism” was coined to describe his political philosophy.
