Transcript for:
Stalin's Rise to Power Strategies

Stalin before Stalin Stalin Lessons from AS: Prioritize knowing ur shit but pls you need to have your writing speed on lock, long-term. Max 25 minutes for 10mark, max 45 minutes for 20mark. Do writing exercises to up your speed * For this one, highlight key events (those are what questions will ask you on) * Also highlight elaboration events if you will (used for elaboration/evaluation) * Compile all past year questions in a separate document * Format your full real notes as questions * Consistency is key, its okay if u feel like its a lot now. You just need to look through it regularly. You will get there, just like last sem. <3 Index: 1. How he amassed support outside, and alliances within politburo (1921~1924) Gaining his spot in politburo Rising in the ranks Competing (still legally) with the other members 2. Rise to power (1924~1928) After lenin’s death, having failed to stop him, he took the road to top spot! - removing internal dissenters in both politburo and the whole party while also putting his own ppl in positions - amassing public support through hot-button topics and invoking lenin’s dead ghost (purportedly said he was tired and told stalin to “just off yourself already comrade”) 3. Consolidation of power - His aims PHASE I: ECONOMIC POLICY & SOCIAL POLICY (1928~1941) PHASE II: TERROR (1928~1953) PHASE III: FOREIGN POLICY france, brit and germany (1928~1941) Evaluate based on general social groups: bolshevik/soviets, workers, peasants, women, children, opposition parties (altho opp parties only can be used as a point until 1918, when bolsheviks banned all other parties) Stalin before stalin After lenins death, his actions and decisions became unchallengeable, and all arguments and disputes within the Party were settled by reference to his statements and writings. Soviet Communism became Leninism. After 1924, if a Party member could assume the mantle of Lenin and appear to carry on Lenin’s work, he would establish a formidable claim to power. This is exactly what Stalin began to do. eval: show that lenin’s legacy was so strong that after he died it was impossible to take over without acting as lenin’s spiritual successor. the party would be directionless, they would accept nothing less than another version of lenin. Before the clout (pre-1917) Most historians used to believe that Stalin’s pre-1924 career was unimportant. They accepted the description of him by Nicolai Sukhanov, dating from 1922, as a ‘dull, grey blank’. But nowadays the opposite has been uncovered. Eval: Historian Robert Service has shown that Stalin was very highly regarded by Lenin and played a central organising role in the Bolshevik Party. Before 1917 the Bolshevik Party had been only a few 1000 strong and Lenin had known the great majority of members personally. He had been impressed by Stalin’s organising ability, insensitivity to suffering (oh lord), and willingness to obey orders. He once described him as ‘that wonderful Georgian’, a reference to his work as an agitator among the non-Russian peoples eval.: stalin helped stir up dissent among the national minorities against the tsarist regime, serving as the liaison between bolsheviks and national minorities (at the time bolsheviks were very lax and accepting of national minorities to gain public support). however, later on in the 1920s, while lenin intended to allow the newly recovered republics (made up of national minorities) to become part of the federation and grant them equal status, stalin instead wanted to subordinate them to the russian govt and allow them a degree of autonomy, despite he himself being a georgian. Paints a picture of stalin as someone willing to do whatever he had to do. Imo in the beginning Lenin’s mistake was that he misread that as stalin being obedient, willing to do his bidding. But in actuality it was that stalin was willing to do whatever he had to do to get power for HIMSELF. With Lenin’s backing, Stalin had risen by 1912 to become one of the six members of the Central Committee, the policy-making body of the Bolshevik Party. He had also helped to found the Party’s newspaper, Pravda. Role in October revolution Stalin was loyal to Lenin after the latter’s return to Petrograd in April 1917. Lenin instructed the Bolsheviks to abandon all co- operation with other parties and to devote themselves to preparing for a seizure of power. As a Leninist, Stalin was opposed to the ‘October deserters’, such as Kamenev and Zinoviev. eval.: his attendance at the october revolution was decisive in establishing his position as someone simply carrying out lenin’s bidding. probably cemented lenin’s opinion of him as a follower, not a leader. hence when he started to take his power for himself, maybe that was what pushed lenin into being against stalin’s ascension (by then it was too late tho) Role in civil war, start of rivalry with trotsky During the period of crisis and civil war that accompanied the efforts of the Bolsheviks to consolidate their authority after 1917, Stalin’s non-Russian background proved invaluable. His knowledge of the minority peoples of the old Russian Empire led to his being appointed Commissar for Nationalities. Lenin had believed that Stalin’s toughness well qualified him for this role. eval: As Commissar, Stalin became the ruthless Bolshevik organiser for the whole of the Caucasus region during the Civil War from 1918 to 1920. This led to a number of disputes with Trotsky, the Bolshevik Commissar for War. Superficially the quarrels were about strategy and tactics, but at a deeper level they were a clash of wills. They proved to be the beginning of a deep personal rivalry between Stalin and Trotsky 1921~1924 Background (textbook chapter 3: stalin’s rise to power) Political and economic issues (after 1917 revolution & russian civil war) Economic policy disputes 1. War communism: Pro: bolsheviks who loved war communism (/ consolidating power and stepping on bloodsucking peasantry, / emphasis on heavy industry, / nationalisation of industries, / true communism finally!) Anti: bolsheviks who hated it (forsakes support of workers by treating them like slaves, workers opposition under alexander antonov, “soviets without bolsheviks”, kronstadt uprising) Lenin hoped that by centralizing agriculture and industrialisation, overall productivity would rise and the desperate situation created by the Civil War (widespread famine) would be eased. However, instead war communism interfered with the peasants’ traditional ways caused disruption and resentment, and it intensified the state of the famine. Despite the government’s terror tactics, the desperation was too great and support for the party was haemorrhaging: serious resistance from those who had previously been Bolshevik supporters, the most troubling of these being the Kronstadt rising in 1921 (the base was previously such big bolshevik support source that they were nicknamed “red kronstadt). Whatever the purity of the revolutionary theory behind War Communism, it had clearly failed to deliver the goods. The peasants had not been coerced into producing larger grain stocks. Always pragmatic in his approach, Lenin decided on a U-turn. He judged that, if the peasants could not be forced, they must be persuaded. The stick had not worked, so now was the time for the carrot. At a Party Congress in 1921 he told members that it made no sense for Bolsheviks to pretend that they could pursue an economic policy which took no account of the real situation. He then announced that War Communism was to be replaced with a new Economic Policy, the main features of which were: • central economic control to be relaxed • the requisitioning of grain to be abandoned and replaced by a tax in kind • the peasants to be allowed to keep their food surpluses and sell them for a profit • public markets to be restored • money to be reintroduced as a means of trading. Despite the deep disagreements that were soon to emerge among the Bolsheviks over NEP, the grim economic situation in Russia led the delegates to give unanimous support to Lenin’s proposals when they were first introduced. 2. NEP: As the 1920s progressed, the NEP became increasingly unattractive to party members and they were deeply disturbed by its outward manifestations – the growth of a rich superclass, property dealing, land speculation, gambling and prostitution. These did not have any place in a socialist state. Also, after 1925 serious problems began to emerge: • By 1925–26, industry had recovered to its pre- 1913 levels. Some new impetus was needed to take it on but there was argument about where the resources to do this were going to come from. • There was a high level of unemployment amongst workers. Wages for those in work did not keep pace with the rising prices of consumer goods, always in short supply. So many workers remained relatively poor and many could not get jobs – in the workers’ society! • Food shortages started to reappear. Peasants held on to their produce because they could not buy much for their money (the government enacted unreasonably low price controls on grain). It was against this backdrop that the power struggle took place. It was a question not so much of whether party members supported the NEP – they had only accepted it as a stop-gap measure – but of when and how it should be ended. It was on this point that the two wings of the party diverged. Lenin -> supporter of war communism, bc fulfils communism and establishes a tighter-controlled command economy But at 10th party congress -> ended war communism and introduced NEP instead Pro: lenin (have to dial back the communism post-war, because support for the party was haemorrhaging). As well as bukharin and other righties. Pragmatic response. Anti: trotsky and his lefties. NEP was like taking a step backward from communism. It was a capitalist creation. Its implementation left ppl confused, and some bolsheviks like Trotsky, who wanted to tighten it again and bring back terror in the countryside bc: 1. Would disrupt the classless society they were trying to create (through starving and repressing middle and upper class people), directly contradicts marxism 2. leaving their economic policy loose would affect their consolidated power and cause opponents like mensheviks to try to seize back power. But lenin was like no, we need to do it for now, in order to recover, but it worried him as well. 3. Was alienating workers, the strongest support base for the party, by choosing to empower agricultural workers instead of the average joe industrial worker. Stalin exploited NEP issue by altering his stance on NEP to alienate opponents and switch sides conveniently using NEP as an excuse (as we will soon see) Neutral/undecided: kamenev and zinoviev. Both initially supported it when lenin put it out but in the 1920s they sided with trotsky to oppose it (on paper they were opposing NEP but i dont think they cared at that point, it was just a policy they needed to use to possibly disrupt the kind of crazy power surge stalin was experiencing. Didnt work tho) Ambiguous/dgaf: Stalin. Just another policy he could exploit to alienate his opponents Political disputes 1. Ban on factionalism (1921) In 1921: Ban on Factionalism was introduced, nobody was allowed to go against what the bolshevik party says. Ban creation of other political parties. Introduce repressive measures again Why? Worried about a resurgence of uprisings (like the kronstadt uprisings) Eval: people were used to it because they had gone so long enduring this same thing during the tsarist regime. -> criticism from other 6 leaders (trotsky, tomsky, kamenev, zinoviev, bukharin, rykov): “democratic communism exists. But lenin did not believe in it.now he’s making the party undemocratic.” However despite criticisms this ended up being a good thing for the party, bc in the end the ban was not used on any of the internal bolshevik dissidents but against the other fringe groups or remnants of SRs, mensheviks, kadets etc stalin dgaf about politics. he just took advantage of this by accusing the other guys of being anti-stalin Eval: shows that under lenin, a distinction was made between the methods to be used against opposition from outside the party and those for dealing with disagreements and opposition inside the party. There was a clear understanding that terror should not be used on party comrades. IN CONTRAST during the Great Terror, Stalin unleashed terror inside the party, assassinating many of his colleagues which then engulfed an enormous number of people in the wider society. 2. Permanent revolution versus socialism in one country (1921~1922) In short: Role of comintern -> ties in to external factors that lead to stalin’s rise to power. Prevailing of internal factors -> leads to socialism in one country Prevailing of external factors -> permanent revolution (worldwide) Trotsky’s side believed in ‘Permanent Revolution’. WHY: - Communist revolution in Russia could not really succeed because the Russian working class was too small and the economy underdeveloped; it needed the support of the working class in the more industrialised countries of Europe. - subject the USSR to a continuing revolutionary process that would move society in the direction of socialism. He believed that measures such as compulsory labour units organised along military lines and forcing peasants into collective farms might be necessary to squeeze out old attitudes and create the economic base on which a socialist society could be built. (the conditions of war are just particularly useful) Stalin’s side believed in ‘Socialism in One Country’. WHY: - realist approach. (eval: spiritually emulating lenin, grifting on lenin’s grandeur and influence as another benchmark of russian nationalism. This is what lenin, who consented to the treaty of brest-litovsk for the same reasons, would have wanted). Communists had to accept that the world revolution had not happened and was not likely to take place in the immediate future. - Appeal to nationalism and patriotism (eval: permutability of “patriotism” to serve whatever political purpose needs to be served. Did the white soldiers in the civil war use patriotism as a justification too?) He proposed that the Russians build a socialist state in the USSR without the help of people from outside. Appealing to nationalism and patriotism, he said that they were in a unique position to show the world what socialism meant. They would solve their own problems and create a workers’ society that was vastly superior to the capitalist West. They would be world leaders. It was optimistic as well as patriotic. - Stalin argued that Permanent Revolution was defeatist and showed that Trotsky did not believe in Russia, its people and its mission. eval: again directly attacking trotsky. Dumping on party comrades in public was never something that bolshevik leaders did because it undermined the party. But it was perfect for stalin’s agenda: he didn’t want collective leadership, he wanted a full on dictatorship, and for that he had to completely eliminate opponents. Also eval: given that he’s making these accusations not for trotsky’s eyes but the public’s. So is it a coincidence that his “unpatriotic” “hate your country” claim neatly aligned with trotsky’s jewish identity? With jewish people throughout history constantly being accused of being saboteurs and bad luck charms to the country they live in? Ironic that even though russia had gone through a system overhaul from tsarist to soviet, the people on top still used the same petty methods of “us vs the enemy” propaganda to rally support. Can be seen in the tsar’s WW1 campaign where he urged russians to foster nationalist spirit against the germans, who were characterised as barbarians. - Stalin also wanted socialism in one country bc was also a very flexible doctrine (since it’s so damn long-term and unforeseeable, versus the more short term permanent revolution which revolved around the war effort) because it meant that the leaders of the Communist Party could say what was the best way to achieve socialism at any particular moment in time. NOTE: After 1922: “RUSSIA” ->>> renamed “USSR”. Overall: What parts of stalin’s character caused his success in getting to the top?/ Assess the reasons why Stalin was able to accumulate so much power. 1. Willingness to take up whatever position offered and make it work Before civil war, he was in the people’s commissar for nationalities (controlling and communicating w them). * Unique position of knowledge about their sentiments, useful to rally support later on. * Made inroads in the party, gained lenin’s trust and admiration for the unique role he played During civil war (1919 specifically), liaison between orgburo (had the power to select and allocate Party cadres, grassroots level) and politburo (main bolsheviks). * he could pick the delegates who were sent to the annual party congress where major issues of policy were decided and the Central Committee was chosen. He PACKED the congress with his supporters. This accounts for the hostile reception Trotsky received at conferences from 1924 onwards and the number of delegates who voted the way Stalin wanted. He was also made head of the workers and peasants inspectorate. * could now oversee the work of all govt agencies * Became well known among all levels of govt as well as peasants and workers, rally grassroots support eval: importance of grassroots connections, especially as the party got increasingly bureaucratized. he had connections at the grassroot level which made him more accessible to the public (the workers) than trotsky or kamenev or zinoviev who by comparison seemed far removed from the lower ranks. made it easy for him to rally support. because any promotions/bonuses that would come to them they could thank stalin for it. initially in the beginnings of the soviet party, lenin knew all 1000 of the members. but when he started centralizing it into politburo, the politburo leaders were cut off from the bottom ranks (except stalin ofc). with his administrative involvement, he would come to know the party machinery very very well, understanding dynamics between leading members 1922, appointed general secretary of communist party. * monitor the party’s policy and the party members. * details on politburo insider info to what was discussed and information from other members built personal files on all members of the party. - even greater control of party membership - Could get rid of more radical elements (students & soldiers) who would tend to support trotsky. - able to further his nomenklatura by managing the “Lenin enrolment” of 1923 to “increase proletarian growth of party” 340k membership in 1922, to 600k in 1925 “Proletarian growth” so he could claim he was fulfilling lenin’s wish to democratise, but really, he was just placing young Stalinist ex-peasants from the countryside in powerful positions. Those ppl were usually poorly educated and liked him bc he appealed to their nationalist tendencies. Even for those who weren’t fully stalinist, they would have been eager to worship him bc after all, the govt gave them the job. HE WAS the govt. (eval.: how soviet party structure and ease of jobs when ur a party member was creating a bureaucratic caste in society, this is mentioned in textbook) 02. Able to outvote and outmanoeuvre Even though trotsky had been intellectually superior, stalin had the gift of manipulating the situation + other people’s stances on it How? Using his knowledge of the party Eval.: lenin unknowingly groomed him for this -> all the administrative positions meant that he would understand party mechanics very well. Lenin’s ban on factionalism (1921) -> stalin also exploited this to shut down any and all criticism against himself (claim himself to be a conduit of lenin’s will, he capitalized on lenin’s legacy) Stalin had made his stance against trotsky on the basis of Lenin’s legacy: Trotsky had backed Lenin in 1921, but there were strong rumours that his support had been reluctant and that he regarded NEP as a deviation from true socialism. It was certainly the case that in 1923 Trotsky had led a group of Party members in openly criticising Gosplan for its ‘flagrant radical errors of economic policy’. Stalin could accuse him of being factionalist Eval: triumvirate was a faction in itself but nobody could go against it technically because it was a faction for lenin’s legacy. Kamenev and zinoviev were anti-NEP but they only formed it with stalin because they were anti-trotsky (saw trotsky as a possible dictator) Eval.: lenin’s one person leadership contributed to this as he unknowingly created a non-thinking party. Herd mentality. Soviet communism -> leninism (do whatever tf lenin wanted) nobody made a big enough deal about someone else other than lenin using the ban on factionalism, and some more using it against fellow party members. I think they were all just too brainwashed into being okay with it until too late. Also by remaining politically neutral so he could warp himself based on what was required and desirable Evidence: bro said nothing about NEP until much much later when he could stand on his own feet without kamenev and zinoviev. Later on he completely went back on that, turning the USSR into an industrialized planned economy instead. Stalin’s role/position on permanent revolution/socialism in one country before lenin’s death: No info… no position… he didnt gaf stalin’s position to the rapallo treaty before lenin’s death? No info no position he dgaf. What does this say abt stalin? It says that before 1924 he didnt have many of those strong opinions at all. “Stalin has been the chief instrument in carrying out this overturn. He is gifted with practicality, a strong will, and persistence in carrying out his aims. His political horizon is restricted, his theoretical equipment primitive. His work of compilation, The Foundations of Leninism, in which he made an attempt to pay tribute to the theoretical traditions of the party, is full of sophomoric errors. His ignorance of foreign languages compels him to follow the political life of other countries at second-hand. His mind is stubbornly empirical, and devoid of creative imagination. To the leading group of the party (in the wide circles he was not known at all) he always seemed a man destined to play second and third fiddle. And the fact that to-day he is playing first is not so much a summing-up of the man as it is of this transitional period of political backsliding in the country. Helvetius said it long ago: “Every period has its great men, and if these are lacking, it invents them.” Stalinism is above all else the automatic work of the impersonal apparatus on the decline of the revolution.” - Trotsky dissing the fuck out of Stalin in his book “My Life”. It’s arrogant but i think there must have been some hint of truth in it. Eval: so was it intentional, weaponized incompetence that caused stalin to make himself politically neutral? Or did he just fundamentally not have a good grasp on the theory and chose to shut up so that nobody could tell? He was not like trotsky, an intelligentsia through and through, so how did he rally support? The whole thing was engineered. Eval: He was neutral even towards his own people (the georgians), used to be liaison for national minorities but later he would advocate for the subordination of those nations with only a small degree of autonomy, wanted to centralize and subordinate. Ironically lenin was the more liberal one who wanted to incorporate them into the republic instead. They would have had more rights under lenin than their own guy, stalin. shows stalin’s character Evidence: Polikarp "Budu" Gurgenovich Mdivani was a veteran Georgian Bolshevik and Soviet government official energetically involved in the Russian Revolutions and the Civil War. Early in 1921, Mdivani, along with Stalin and Sergo Ordzhonikidze, played an important role in engineering the Red Army invasion of Georgia which toppled down the local Menshevik-dominated government in favor of the Bolshevik regime. However, with the establishment of the Georgian SSR, Mdivani emerged as one of the leading proponents of the republic's sovereignty from Moscow.(regret?) Then the Georgian affair, where he became chairman of the Georgian Revolutionary Committee (Revkom) and started conflict with Stalin and his gang specifically over their plan to centralize and subordinate Georgia. Stalin accused Mdivani of being a national deviationist and Mdivani accused Stalin of Great Russian chauvinism. Then Stalin used his increasing power to remove Mdivani and other oppositionists to diplomatic posts, until eventually he had him executed. In July he was arrested and tried by the NKVD troika. During the interrogations at the Metekhi prison in Tbilisi, Mdivani repeatedly refused to "confess"[citation needed]. He is quoted to have said to the troika members: "Being shot is not enough punishment for me; I need to be quartered! It was me who brought the 11th Army here [in Tbilisi]; I betrayed my people and helped Stalin and Beria, these degenerates, enslave Georgia and bring Lenin’s party to its knees." 3. Exploiting lenin’s legacy (as an extension of exploiting russian nationalism) Lenin’s own funeral: He tricked Trotsky into not turning up for the funeral giving him the wrong date, severely damaging TROTSKY`S REPUTATION AND POLITICAL PRESTIGE He put himself in charge of the funeral, even giving a speech. Basically setting himself up as Lenin`s protegeé, a spiritual heir basically (yes he def would have wanted me to be here) Also previously mentioned stalin’s “lenin’s enrolment” initiative, interesting name! (eval: GRIFTING, Constant invoking of lenin’s name and legacy, almost spiritual insistence on giving speech at lenin’s funeral, cementing himself as the heir even if just in terms of public perception. Kind of speaks to the gravity of lenin’s legacy on the soviet union, and stalin’s lack of soft power) Proletarians -> not as polished and well educated. Regular people Stalin, using this “proletarian growth” excuse, and his position as general secretary, to vet people’s backgrounds and put his own supporters in power Lenin’s ban on factionalism (1921) -> stalin also exploited this to shut down any and all criticism against himself (claim himself to be a conduit of lenin’s will, he capitalized on lenin’s legacy) (** EXPAND on this) Eval.: this was NOT what lenin would have wanted. First of all the ban on factionalism was never meant to be used against fellow party members. Also, lenin would have wanted a party machinery, plus he was already making moves towards a less bureaucratic and more democratic party system. He just wanted “Party Unity” but thanks to stalin’s use of the Ban, there was no more Party by the end of it. Eval: ongoing trend of russian leaders using russian nationalism as a way to cheaply get public support. But its failed numerous times. Stalin was bringing it back from the dead (it was used a lot in tsarist regime time). What made it different when he did it? Well, he had the strong, fresh memory of lenin in public minds that he could bank on. Versus nicholas II who was invoking long-dead legendary kings like peter the great and catherine the great. It had been so long since then. Lenin was recent, and he had taken a broken country and given it a completely new lease on life. he was a far more powerful symbol to use. 4. Made use of internal dispute over NEP and permanent revolution When introducing NEP in 1921, Lenin had admitted that it was a relaxing of strict socialism, but had emphasised that it was a temporary, stop-gap measure. However, at the time of his death in 1924, the question was already being asked as to how long in fact NEP was meant to last. Was it not becoming a permanent policy? The Party members who were unhappy with it saw its continuation as a betrayal of revolutionary principle. They objected to a policy which, in effect, allowed the peasants to dictate the pace of Soviet Russia’s advance towards full Communism. A serious division had developed between Left Communists and Right Communists. NEP was for the party’s survival but went against communism and socialism Went for a mixed economy, where peasants were given their freedom but collectivisation was still ensured One of the instances that the pragmatic lenin had to put aside political theory for the sake of precedence Trotsky and bukharin (left) protested NEP: believed the government had placed the interests of the Nepmen above those of the Revolution and the Russian people. He urged a return to a much tighter state control of industry and warned that under NEP the revolutionary gains made under War Communism would be lost. Right side supported NEP, but that could also be exploited as a betrayal of marxist thought Caused an unspoken rift in the party Stalin made use of this: Used trotsky’s attitude & ban on factionalism to decry him - Stalin argued that Permanent Revolution was defeatist and showed that Trotsky did not believe in Russia, its people and its mission. eval: again directly attacking trotsky. Dumping on party comrades in public was never something that bolshevik leaders did because it undermined the party. But it was perfect for stalin’s agenda: he didn’t want collective leadership, he wanted a full on dictatorship, and for that he had to completely eliminate opponents. Also eval: given that he’s making these accusations not for trotsky’s eyes but the public’s. So is it a coincidence that his “unpatriotic” “hate your country” claim neatly aligned with trotsky’s jewish identity? With jewish people throughout history constantly being accused of being saboteurs and bad luck charms to the country they live in? Ironic that even though russia had gone through a system overhaul from tsarist to soviet, the people on top still used the same petty methods of “us vs the enemy” propaganda to rally support. Can be seen in the tsar’s WW1 campaign where he urged russians to foster nationalist spirit against the germans, who were characterised as barbarians. Okay, that was summarizing. Now let’s zoom in on stalin’s first true source of opposition that would have actually come as a huge threat: Lenin. Lenin’s testament (1922) What brought it on: 1. Concerns over stalin’s growing influence + bureaucratization of the party, and 2. Stalin’s treatment of lenin’s wife (verbally abused her) Lenin’s testament was legit like a Burn book, each aspect def didnt reflect well on stalin in the whole rat race: i. New USSR constitution -> highlights lenin’s intentions to give nationalities equal status (directly cuts down Stalin’s stance to subordinate nationalities to russian government with only a little bit of autonomy) ii. The need to democratise the party (keep revolutionary element alive, no bureaucracy, stalin wanted to expand the state even more so this directly hit him) Iii. he reviewed each member of the party in terms of suitability as head of party (his successor). Although he did not recommend any one member, for stalin’s review he was quite to the point, he said that stalin holds an enormous amount of power in his hands and that he “wasnt sure if stalin could wield it properly”. In a postscript lenin went even further and said that he recommended the comrades remove stalin from his position as general secretary entirely. eval: lenin’s reasons for disliking stalin were more personal than professional. lenin only felt negatively towards him after stalin insulted his wife. Before this he had a lot of respect for him, calling him “that wonderful georgian”. He wrote the testament as a direct reaction to stalin insulting his wife because that utterly soured his impression of stalin, but it’s likely he previously didnt have any complaints towards stalin’s capabilities as general secretary. Maybe the act of insulting his wife made lenin realize that stalin was not as much of a follower/leninist as he previously assumed he was. -> his wife Krupskaya was supposed to publicize it, she gave Lenin`s secret testament to the CC in May 1924 just before the 13th Party Congress. If read out to the Congress, it would have spelt the end of Stalin`s career. But Zinoviev and Kamenev urged that it should not become general knowledge , probably because - the testament was not very flattering to them either because of their opposition to Lenin in 1917; this was not something they wanted to bring to the Congress`s attention when they hoped to become its leading lights - They thought that Stalin presented no threat to them or the party and they wanted Stalin’s help in defeating Trotsky. (triumvirate) - They thought the testament might help Trotsky’s case. Trotsky remained silent, unwilling to become involved. This was a major mistake on his part and was to cost him dearly later. (eval: in this sense, it was all of their mistakes too) What mistakes did Lenin make before dying that allowed Stalin to seize power in the end? (remember, by the end lenin did NOT want stalin in power anymore) 1. Lenin leaving important issues like NEP and state of revolution unresolved and ambiguous, causing party strife and leaving room for it to be exploited to break up the party 2. Lenin started having strokes but he never appointed anyone as successor/heir evaluation: its unclear whether he had a successor or ideal policy in mind, or if he even planned on choosing one in the first place. because we know that he wanted to democratize the party to keep the pragmatism in the party alive. perhaps he wanted a bit of a power struggle and for one of them to rise to the occasion. keep the revolutionary spirit alive, keep the public support alive, beat the dictatorship allegations. Perhaps he also wanted the party to become more independent and more like an equal vanguard leadership after he died. During the Civil War, the state had become highly centralised, with Lenin taking executive decisions. Now that the situation was more settled, it was thought that a collective leadership would be a more socialist way of running the state. What is clear is that for lenin, the way he lorded over the party as a singular figurehead was supposed to be a one off thing, unique to himself. 3. Lenin’s lack of foresight in appointing Stalin into all these positions and failing to remove him from them in time. plus lenin ended up basically grooming him for his eventual position bc all the administrative positions meant that he would understand party mechanics very well. (better than the average party intelligentsia, probably better than trotsky too), and also gave him easy inroads to gaining grassroots support evaluation: could be because he was unaware of the kind of power stalin wielded in that position but its more likely that he knew full well and allowed it to happen because he believed stalin to be “his guy”, and didnt expect stalin to wield the power for himself and not for the good of the party (turning an administrative position into a political one) 4. Lenin not totally ensuring that the testament would be published, if krupskaya gives the testament to fellow politburo members they might hide it out of vested interest (which they did). She wouldve been better off giving it to the press. He lacked the foresight to arrange for that. Lenin’s death as described by trotsky: https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1925/lenin/13.htm no more opposition from lenin. Bye bye lenin. Now remaining contenders are: internal party people + remaining dissenters from the public 1924~1929 (The rise of stalin) 1924~1929 (THE RISE OF STALIN) Stalin’s approach: constantly trying to maintain a centre ground when it comes to politics (so that he can go to whichever side is favourable) Obstacles (all political bc he obviously has to clinch the top spot first) 1. 🟩 Internal leadership issues in politburo Six contenders for power (“now how do i make everyone look bad except me?”) 2. ✅ Restructuring the party (already done in the background, teehee) stalin’s nomenklatura: stalinists in party positions Using ban on factionalism to great effect (accusations of disrespect 2 lenin’s legacy) 3. 🟩 Amassing public support Over hot-button issues like: - NEP - Permanent revolution vs Socialism in one country, Trotsky v Stalin In summary, after lenin’s death, What did stalin use to rise to power and clinch the top spot? (remember: eliminate politburo contenders, amass public support) 1. Stalin’s positions 2. Ban on factionalism (and other parts of lenin’s legacy) 3. Lenin’s funeral 4. Dispute over NEP + permanent revolution/socialism in one country 5. Lenin’s mistakes (leaving important issues like NEP and state of revolution unresolved, not choosing an heir, not taking care to publish the testament, lack of foresight in putting stalin in important positions) 6. Triumvirate with kamenev and zinoviev against trotsky (for NEP, socialism in one country over permanent revolution) “If the revolution had been in the ascendancy, the delay would have played into the hands of the opposition. But the revolution on the international scale was suffering one defeat after another, and the delay accordingly played into the hands of the national reformism by automatically strengthening the Stalin bureaucracy against me and my political friends. The out-and-out philistine, ignorant, and simply stupid baiting of the theory of permanent revolution grew from just these psychological sources. Gossiping over a bottle of wine or re turning from the ballet, one smug official would say to another: “He can think of nothing but permanent revolution.” The accusations of unsociability, of individualism, of aristocratism, were closely connected with this particular mood. The sentiment of “Not all and always for the revolution, but something for oneself as well,” was translated as “Down with permanent revolution.” The revolt against the exacting theoretical demands of Marxism and the exacting political demands of the revolution gradually assumed, in the eyes of these people, the form of a struggle against “Trotskyism.” Under this banner, the liberation of the philistine in the Bolshevik was proceeding. It was because of this that I lost power, and it was this that determined the form which this loss took.” - Trotsky in his book “My Life”. https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1930/mylife/ch41.htm OR 1. Lenin’s mistakes 2. Trotsky’s mistakes 3. Stalin’s position within the party (ban on factionalism, administrative roles) 4. Triumvirate 5. NEP 6. Permanent revolution V.S socialism in one country. Defeat of trotsky and the left opposition Structure of the soviet government had become so aggressively stalinist (thanks to stalin rigging all the positions to serve him), that this was almost inevitable. Stalin had his triumvirate with K&Z and the Stalin had made his stance against trotsky on the basis of Lenin’s legacy: Trotsky had backed Lenin in 1921, but there were strong rumours that his support had been reluctant and that he regarded NEP as a deviation from true socialism. It was certainly the case that in 1923 Trotsky had led a group of Party members in openly criticising Gosplan for its ‘flagrant radical errors of economic policy’. Stalin could accuse him of being factionalist and disrespecting lenin’s legacy. But NEP still hadnt won most ppl in the party over, so the left opposition (trotskyites) could have still found an opening to getting popular support Unfortunately the events of the 12th and 13th congresses (1923 and 1924) saw to their demise, cemented their (trotsky’s) fate. Trotsky’s failures (specifically in 12th and 13th congresses) 1. Trotsky and his left opposition failed bc kamenev and zinoviev actively blocked the testament 2. Even if the testament had gotten out, trotsky didnt have any concrete alternative to NEP 3. He also didnt have the many administrative party positions that stalin had, that would allow him to advance an alternative like that 4. He also goofily wrote an “Open Letter” to the Central Committee. only proved accusations of factionalism right Eval: trotsky was NOT doomed from the start, all these things were within his control at some point. He also had real potential of countering stalin. The main point was that NEP was ideologically weak and he could have poked holes in it. It didnt always bring prosperity either, as was becoming evident (hey look 1923 even gave him AMMUNITION: the scissors crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scissors_Crisis , with soaring industrial prices, and a famine looming with peasants scared of excessively low prices and back to their typical grain hoarding ways) But he still failed to take the chance before it was too late. Trotsky's failure in propaganda war (stalin nomenklatura efforts) in the 1920s meant that he had no influence over the politburo or the central committee. As expected, all the stalinists at the party congress voted him out of his position as commissar of war. Without it, he was significantly weakened. he rose again to join K and Z in united opposition. The U.O was outvoted by stalinists. In 1927 he rose AGAIN but was shot down again. Eval: overall at this stage, Trotsky’s superiority as a speaker and writer, and his greater intellectual gifts, counted for little when set against Stalin’s grip on the Party machine. If this was in the times before, where popular support from workers meant something, trotsky could have had a case for himself. But the party had gotten so bureaucratized, and the nation was so singleminded that the only support that mattered was from internally. Which trotsky woefully never managed to get. Defeat of the triumvirate (FUCK u too kamenev and zinoviev!) stalin wanted to get rid of zinoviev and kamenev to get himself stronger Exploited the fact that back in the genesis of NEP, Z and K disagreed with the strategy, he would make it look like they were disloyal to lenin. They also were one of the “october deserters” during the october revolution, a fact that lenin passed over but stalin brought it back up to cancel them. This is the point where Z and K and Trot formed a united opposition against NEP, publicly showing up in support of rapid industrialisation, new enforcements on peasants and permanent revolution. But stalin just immediately accused them of being factionalist and used that to oust them. Stalin, rykov and bukharin rigged the place with their supporters and outvoted the 3 jokers Z and K were kicked from their positions and replaced by molotov and kirov (stalinist) Stalin basically had an iron grip on the party machine Defeat of the right (bukharin and rykov) the righties were weak to begin with, overly cautious of being banned and lacked the influence and bombastic ideals that the left (thanks to trotsky) once had. Their plea for a soft line with the peasants also did not accord with the Party’s needs. They were risking at best looking weak and at worst looking like bourgeois peasant sympathisers. The public had already been conditioned to look at them and their policies sideways. Scissors crisis of 1923, induced entirely by a mistake in state intervention under NEP. in the aftermath, bukharin’s continued support of NEP (despite the threat of famine bc of the scissors crisis) made the rights look bad. Randomly Introduced 5 year plan and collectivisation. this went against NEP and what bukharin and rykov and the righties were advocating for (continuing NEP for longer). This decision was probably another piece of opportunism. Having defeated the Left politically, he may then have felt free to adopt their economic policies. In doing so, he conveniently made bukharin and the righties look like deviators and fake marxists because stalin as the only one fulfilling it. Also it was genuinely about that time, because the scissors crisis of 1923 (widening gap ("price scissors") between industrial and agricultural prices) caused by NEP made him realize that using it long-term presented a real problem. So he decided to revert back to what trotsky had been campaigning for (safely, now that trotsky was exiled) They tried to speak up and were immediately bashed and ousted. (eval: what did he do right? he clearly put out all his economic aims and gave them a detailed vision. Was good at pandering to ideological bias) The Right’s only substantial support lay in the trade unions, whose Central Council was chaired by Tomsky, and in the CPSU’s Moscow branch where Nicolai Uglanov was Party secretary. When Stalin realised that these might be a source of opposition he acted quickly and sent Lazar Kaganovich to undertake a purge of the suspect trade unionist. The Right proved incapable of organising resistance to this political blitz. Vyacheslav Molotov, Stalin’s faithful henchman, was dispatched to Moscow where he enlisted the support of the pro-Stalin members to achieve a similar purge of the local Party officials. How was the USSR governed? How did society change? Foreign policies 'Socialism in one country was a powerful appeal to national patriotism. Indisputably it put Russia first.'- E.H Carr, why stalin pressed so hard on socialism in one country, to rally support, just like he used lenin’s legacy to rally support Evaluation: permutability of patriotic values to suit whatever you want to achieve ~~Past year questions!!!!!! (1) 9489/42 May/June 2023 Analyse the view that Stalin’s political skill was the main reason for his rise to power by 1929. How far was Lenin responsible for Stalin’s rise to power? Yes, he was responsible I. Lenin’s lack of planning for his succession in the event of his death Lenin leaving important issues like NEP and state of revolution and successor unresolved and ambiguous causing party strife and leaving room for it to be exploited by stalin, kamenev and zinoviev to break up the party Views on NEP led to infighting and dogpiling from both sides of the party forming of united opposition against NEP Creation of the Triumvirate eval: lenin’s failure to plan wasn’t really his fault given that at the time he had much more pressing issues to deal with -> consolidating power within soviets and ensuring soviet influence over wider society Faced potential political upheaval and increasing friction within the party towards NEP ideology, Lenin had too much on his plate to consider who would be his successor Plus we know that lenin seemed to fundamentally believe and trust in the capacity of all his politburo members (given that they were handpicked and all) It’s also why he only used ban on factionalism on political figures outside his party despite receiving plenty of criticism internally too The fact that he only recommended stalin be removed from his positions in a postscript shows that lenin had no real reason to distrust any one party member until much later, but it just happened to coincide with his sickness getting worse Ii. Lenin started having strokes but he never appointed anyone as successor/heir Evidence: attempted assassination by a left SR, led to a series of strokes and serious decline. Ended up being in a wheelchair. He was conscious enough to write his testament so an heir could have been named and avoid the fate the party eventually went down on. It was the power vacuum created that gave stalin his ammo to assert himself and claim top seat (even though lenin himself wouldnt have endorsed him). evaluation: its unclear whether he had a successor or ideal policy in mind, or if he even planned on choosing one in the first place. because we know that he wanted to democratize the party to keep the pragmatism in the party alive. perhaps he wanted a bit of a power struggle and for one of them to rise to the occasion. keep the revolutionary spirit alive, keep the public support alive, beat the dictatorship allegations. Perhaps he also wanted the party to become more independent and more like an equal vanguard leadership after he died. During the Civil War, the state had become highly centralised, with Lenin taking executive decisions. Now that the situation was more settled, it was thought that a collective leadership would be a more socialist way of running the state. What is clear is that for lenin, the way he lorded over the party as a singular figurehead was supposed to be a once off thing, unique to himself. Evaluation: Majority opinion also gravitated towards collective leadership. That was one of the reasons why the party was not keen on trotsky, because he was so uncommunicative and closed off that he seemed like dictator material and not someone who would comply with collective leadership. iii. Lenin’s lack of foresight in appointing Stalin into all these positions and failing to remove him from them in time. plus lenin ended up basically grooming him for his eventual position bc all the administrative positions meant that he would understand party mechanics very well. (better than the average party intelligentsia, probably better than trotsky too), and also gave him easy inroads to gaining grassroots support eval: importance of grassroots connections, especially as the party got increasingly bureaucratized. he had connections at the grassroot level which made him more accessible to the public (the workers) than trotsky or kamenev or zinoviev who by comparison seemed far removed from the lower ranks. made it easy for him to rally support. because any promotions/bonuses that would come to them they could thank stalin for it. initially in the beginnings of the soviet party, lenin knew all 1000 of the members. but when he started centralizing it into politburo, the politburo leaders were cut off from the bottom ranks (except stalin ofc). So this bureaucratization/being secretive and whatnot of lenin’s was a mistake, unintentionally gave stalin an edge over the other politburo members. However its likely lenin realized this, but too little too late. with his administrative involvement, he would come to know the party machinery very very well, understanding dynamics between leading members evaluation: the symbolic significance of calling lenin’s wife a whore as a revealing reflection of stalin’s lack of respect for lenin himself. Lenin may have been unaware of the kind of power stalin wielded in those positions he was given but its more likely that he knew full well and allowed it to happen because he believed stalin to be “his guy”, and didnt expect stalin to wield the power for himself and not for the good of the party (turning an administrative position into a political one). Stalin was unexpectedly ambitious. Lenin realized this towards the end of his life, with stalin gradually overstepping and climaxing with the lenin’s wife thing. Not lenin’s responsibility I. role of trotsky (his failures) Structure of the soviet government had become so aggressively stalinist (thanks to stalin rigging all the positions to serve him), that this was almost inevitable. But NEP still hadnt won most ppl in the party over so the left opposition (trotskyites) could have still found an opening to getting popular support Unfortunately the events of the 12th and 13th congresses (1923 and 1924) saw to their demise Trotsky’s failures (specifically in 12th and 13th congresses) Personality: * not open to discussions with other members, MOST-LIKELY-TO-BE-A-DICTATOR because so uncommunicative. In an era of divisiveness they needed a leader who would unite them but trotsky was not even acting like that one. * Not taking his opponents seriously enough. He was outvoted as commisar of war and he still came back and tried to pass vote against NEP in the party congress, underestimating how filled with stalinists the congress would be. Also underestimated that he was initially a menshevik and that could be used against him 5. Trotsky and his left opposition failed bc kamenev and zinoviev actively blocked the testament 6. Even if the testament had gotten out, trotsky didnt have any concrete alternative to NEP 7. He also didnt have the many administrative party positions that stalin had, that would allow him to advance an alternative like that 8. He also goofily wrote an “Open Letter” to the Central Committee. only proved accusations of factionalism right Eval: trotsky was not only opposed by party members because of his personality. His tendency to act alone and avoid discussions, as well as his background as military commander during the civil war, caused the party members to be wary of his potential for authoritarianism. + his individual influence over army and workers was stronger than many politburo members were + one of the few that could counter lenin while he was still alive and not face repercussions This possibility that trotsky might become a dictator threatened the favoured collective leadership model And trotsky for his part never bothered righting their negative image of him. Eval: trotsky was NOT doomed from the start, all these things were within his control at some point. He also had real potential to counter stalin. The main point was that NEP was ideologically weak and he could have poked holes in it. It didnt always bring prosperity either, as was becoming evident (hey look 1923 even gave him AMMUNITION: the scissors crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scissors_Crisis , with soaring industrial prices, and a famine looming with peasants scared of excessively low prices and back to their typical grain hoarding ways) But he still failed to take the chance before it was too late. Eval: overall it would still be unfair to put sole blame on either trotsky or lenin because when lenin died and trotsky was ousted, the other politburo members became centrally involved and would have had the means to get rid of stalin if they wanted to Yet they made no moves to curb his increasing power and influence Kamenev and zinoviev are most guilty of this because they spent their time initially throwing full support behind stalin, preventing the testament from coming to light, as stalin purged various members, all on the naive pretense that he would never do the same to them. In doing so and not amassing a support base for themselves, they effectively shackled themselves to stalin and handicapped themselves so that when they finally decided to form the united opposition with a greatly weakened trotsky, it was comically easy for stalin to break them. II. Stalin’s strengths * Ability to exploit lenin’s legacy, lenin’s enrolment 1923, funeral, “october deserters” (eval: (eval: GRIFTING, Constant invoking of lenin’s name and legacy, almost spiritual insistence on giving speech at lenin’s funeral, cementing himself as the heir even if just in terms of public perception. Kind of speaks to the gravity of lenin’s legacy on the soviet union) * Misusing ban on factionalism (Eval.: this was NOT what lenin would have wanted. First of all the ban on factionalism was never meant to be used against fellow party members. Also, lenin would have wanted a party machinery, plus he was already making moves towards a less bureaucratic and more democratic party system. He just wanted “Party Unity” but thanks to stalin’s use of the Ban, there was no more Party by the end of it.) * Used whatever position he was given at the start and made it work in his favour (he even impressed lenin initially, “that wonderful georgian”) eval.: stalin helped stir up dissent among the national minorities against the tsarist regime, serving as the liaison between bolsheviks and national minorities (at the time bolsheviks were very lax and accepting of national minorities to gain public support). however, later on in the 1920s, while lenin intended to allow the newly recovered republics (made up of national minorities) to become part of the federation and grant them equal status, stalin instead wanted to subordinate them to the russian govt and allow them a degree of autonomy, despite he himself being a georgian. Paints a picture of stalin as someone willing to do whatever he had to do. Imo in the beginning Lenin’s mistake was that he misread that as stalin being obedient, willing to do his bidding. But in actuality it was that stalin was willing to do whatever he had to do to get power for HIMSELF. Conclusion: although stalin’s manipulation ultimately brought him the success in the party, a lot of his bases for manipulation were lenin’s previous contentious and ideologically unresolved policies like ban on factionalism and nep. And just at its core stalin wouldnt have gotten in without Lenin’s backing, Stalin had risen by 1912 to become one of the six members of the Central Committee, the policy-making body of the Bolshevik Party. He had also helped to found the Party’s newspaper, Pravda. In that sense lenin was instrumental in stalin’s rise to power. 9389/41 May/June 2019 To what extent was Trotsky responsible for Stalin’s rise to power? Trotsky’s fault 1. Underestimated how the party viewed him Jew menshevik, was against NEP in the beginning, “self arrogance” (lenin’s words) 2. Didnt have the foresight to establish support within the party * not open to discussions with other members, MOST-LIKELY-TO-BE-A-DICTATOR because so uncommunicative. In an era of divisiveness they needed a leader who would unite them but trotsky was not even acting like that one. 3. Not taking his opponents seriously enough. He was outvoted as commisar of war and he still came back and tried to pass vote against NEP in the party congress, underestimating how filled with stalinists the congress would be. Also underestimated that he was initially a menshevik and that could be used against him Lack of proactiveness 4. Trotsky and his left opposition failed bc kamenev and zinoviev actively blocked the testament Even if the testament had gotten out, trotsky didnt have any concrete alternative to NEP 9. He also didnt have the many administrative party positions that stalin had, that would allow him to advance an alternative like that 10. He also goofily wrote an “Open Letter” to the Central Committee. only proved accusations of factionalism right 9389/43 October/November 2019 Analyse the reasons why Trotsky was unable to win the struggle for power with Stalin. [30] ‘Brilliant opportunism rather than careful planning.’ To what extent does this explain Stalin’s rise to power? Brilliant opportunism 1. Making use of the positions given to him (no matter how administrative the position was) to figure out party mechanics 2. Used hot-button topics in his favour Whatever peoples stances were, he would use that against Using ban on factionalism Careful planning 1. Filling the party congress with his supporters (long term effort) 2. Being strategically silent 3. Exploitings lenins legacy (long term curating identity as leninists) How far was Stalin’s rise to power in Russia dependent on his skilful planning? (9389/41 October/November 2018) 9489/41 October/November 2023 ‘It was the failings of Stalin’s rivals that best explain his rise to power by 1929.’ Discuss this view. [30] ‘The main reason for the purges was to remove Stalin’s rivals for power.’ How far do you agree? Analyse the reasons why Trotsky was unable to win the struggle for power with Stalin. 9389/42 October/November 2020 ‘He was underestimated by his opponents.’ How far does this explain his rise to power? How trotsky underestimated him How lenin underestimated him The divisiveness within the party (he just exploited that fact!) Analyse the reasons for Stalin gaining power by 1929. 9489/42 February/March 2022 Analyse the reasons why Stalin had gained control of the Communist Party in the USSR by 1928. [30] Analyse the reasons why Stalin had gained control of the Communist Party in the USSR BY 1928. 9489/43 May/June 2022 Stalin came to power because Lenin failed to plan for his succession. Assess this view. **Analyse the view that Stalin's political skill was the main reason for his rise to power by 1929 9489/42 February/March 2024 ‘The main reason why Stalin was able to seize power by 1928 was the weakness of his opponents.’ Assess this view. 1929~1941 (Consolidation of power) 1929~1941 (CONSOLIDATION OF POWER) STALIN’S AIMS (now that hes in power) 1. build up army w industrial strength 2. get capital through agriculture and collectivisation 3. improve living standards (ehh..), 4. increase his own credentials 5. centralise control 6. move towards a true self sufficient socialist society PHASE ONE. A shift (or rather, a TURN) in economic policies Stalin started out fully supportive of NEP and even when the triumvirate with Zino and Kammy broke apart, and the united opposition declared that it was against NEP and its twisted system of “fake communism”. He stuck with NEP because he claimed it as a symbol of Lenin’s legacy and used the ban on factionalism to basically cancel anyone else who disagreed. 1924~1925: High NEP When NEP was most successful and received the least challenge from the communist party (everyone was enjoying) Currency and state budget had stabilised Private trade flourished, agricultural production recovered (peasants incentivised to sell produce and enjoy the benefits once tax was paid) HOWEVER: bolshevik resentment of “capitalist elements” and “bourgeois specialists” never fully diminished There was still state planning, gosplan (despite being created under war communism) continued to function Eval: The main difference was that unlike the rigid targets later on for collectivisation and the 5 year plans, there were control figures instead. Control figures were used as a guide for investment, but the rigid targets in collectivisation were used not only as economic targets, but also to drive production and provide a political yardstick by which to judge their subjects (judge who is most compliant and reliable) This degree of relative autonomy was arguably NEP’s strength: decentralisation provided each area with an incentive to work out their own success. When they started using the economy as a political tool, taking away autonomy would stifle their economic success. Because both things are mutually exclusive a. Collectivisation Reasons why Stalin turned to collectivisation communism/general reasons 1. more efficient to farm large units of land with machines Tractors and other machinery would be supplied by the state through huge machine and tractor stations (MTS). Experts could help peasants to farm in more modern ways using metal ploughs and fertilisers. -> achieve much higher food production. 2. Mechanised agriculture would require fewer peasants to work the land. This would release labour for the industry 3. Much easier for the state to procure the grain it needed for the cities and for exports. There would be fewer collection points and each farm would have Communist supporters who would know how much had been produced. -> hoarding could not happen anymore 4. Collectivisation was the socialist solution for agriculture. You could not build a socialist state when the majority of the population were private landholders who sold their products on the market. Lenin had hoped the collectives would “wean the peasants off private traders” and integrate into the socialised agricultural sector Collectivisation would socialise the peasantry. They would live in ‘socialist agro towns’: living in apartment blocks instead of wooden huts, leaving their children in crèches, eating in restaurants, and visiting libraries and gymnasiums. They would be bussed out to the fields to work. They would learn to work together co-operatively and to live communally with no more boundaries between mirs. STALIN’S reasons (practical reasons, more relevant to time period) 1. Grain procurement crisis of 1928–29 “Good famine” - shortage in consumer goods (for communist leaders this was touted as good) This shortage encouraged peasants to hold on to their grain and not sell it, incensed by 1. the fact that there were price controls on state produced goods, which encouraged speculators to buy them cheap from the state and resell them to peasants for a profit 2. The government had put price controls on grain to keep them affordable (as much as 25% in 1927) + coupled with poor harvest Created the famine. 2-MILLION-TONNE shortfall in grains purchased by the Soviet Union from neighbouring markets. Stalin claimed the grain had been produced but was being hoarded by "kulaks." Stalin tried to appear as being on the side of the peasants, but it did not help, and the peasants as a whole resented the grain seizures. The peasants did everything they could to protest what they considered unfair seizures. Instead of raising the price, the Politburo adopted an emergency measure to requisition 2.5 million tons of grain Matters were so bad that meat as well as bread had to be rationed in the cities. The cities were hungry. 2. Break peasants stranglehold on the economy in time for his plans for industrialisation and rearmament To “extract” (the term used in secret police directives) “elements” likely to resist the collectivisation of the countryside being undertaken at the same time The economic backwardness and political estrangement of the peasantry, which comprised the vast majority of the population of the Soviet Union, was the Achilles’ heel of Soviet power. The peasant’s support for the Bolshevik revolution, spured on by the 1917 Decree on Land, granting the peasants’ demands for ownership of the land and fulfilling the dreams of rural Russia since the peasant uprisings of the 17th century, was short-lived. They were losing the peasant’s support as early as 1918, as the Bolsheviks desperately needed to collect grain to secure their power and fight the civil war, forced grain collections by armed groups of Red Army soldiers and hastily armed workers’ detachments alienated the same peasant producers who had helped bring down the old tsarist order with their violent rebelliousness. The civil war in the countryside was brutal and lethal. Millions of peasants died in the conflict, many simply caught in between the back and forth of the competing White and Red armies. During lenin’s time, the forced expropriation of grain and attempts to collectivise the countryside led to pitched battles between peasants and the new representatives of Soviet power. Peasant uprisings broke out in Ukraine, in the Tambov region, along the Volga and in Western Siberia. By the beginning of 1921, Lenin and the Bolsheviks had no choice but to retreat to the countryside. Eval: showed stalin that the peasants were a liability to the USSR’s stability. They were disobedient. he would have to do it by force In March 1921, they introduced what was called the New Economic Policy (NEP), which called for a halt to the requisitionning of grain and allowed the peasants to accumulate and trade in grain products. Eval: Many historians consider the NEP period as simply a pause, a “truce” between the first major Bolshevik war against the peasantry (1919-1921) and the second and final one to follow (1929-1933) (Graziosi, 1996). 3. Increase his own credentials, with his newly procured position in the party Concern was growing that despite rapid growth, NEP was not generating enough capital to drive investment Eval: the turn in tide against NEP happened while its previous biggest critics had already been kicked from the government (trotsky, kamenev and zinoviev) 4. Colonize the Urals regions up north that were occupied by the peasantry (inspired by the results of the Urals–Siberian method in 1929, which appeared to have been a successful way of getting grain from the peasants) To “colonise” the vast, inhospitable areas of Siberia, the Northern Region, the Urals and Kazakhstan How was collectivisation carried out? Dekulakisation: https://www.sciencespo.fr/mass-violence-war-massacre-resistance/en/document/dekulakisation-mass-violence.html#:~:text=Dekulakisation%2C%20or%20the%20%E2%80%9Cliquidation%20of,collectivise%20millions%20of%20peasant%20households. Collectivisation was inextricably carried out using dekulakisation. Had to get the private farmers off their land no matter the cost, if not how is the government gonna own the land when the farmers dont wanna sell it to them? 1. Turning kulaks into the scapegoat (eval: as lenin had done) mounted a huge propaganda campaign to extol the advantages of collective farms and to inflame class hatred. This view was clearly expressed by the Bolsheviks when they took power, that peasant society contained “exploitative elements” that were irremediably hostile to the regime and that would sooner or later have to be “liquidated as a class”. In fact, Stalin merely repeated Lenin’s famous diatribes against the “kulaks”: since 1918, “kulaks”, an artificially constructed group, had been subjected to stereotyping and deshumanisation; they had been designated, in the press and propaganda, as “cockroaches”, “blood-suckers”, “vampires”, or just plain “scum”, “vermin” and “garbage” to be cleansed, crushed and liquidated (Colas, 1995). 2. trying to sow discord between poorer and richer peasants In some areas this was effective. Many poorer peasants did denounce their neighbours as kulaks. Sometimes this was an act of revenge for past grievances but, of course, it was to the advantage of the poor peasants to get their hands on their neighbours’ animals and equipment for the new collective. Children were encouraged to inform on their neighbours and even on their parents. One thirteen-year-old girl denounced her mother for stealing grain. But villagers were often unwilling to identify kulaks, many of whom were relatives or friends, people who might have helped them out in difficult times or lent them animals to plough their land. Even if the kulaks were not liked, they were part of a village community in which the ties to fellow peasants were much stronger than those to the Communist state. In some villages, poor peasants wrote letters in support of their richer neighbours. Many local party officials opposed the policy of forced collectivisation, knowing that it was unworkable. They were unwilling to identify as kulaks good farmers who were valuable to the community. They also knew that collectivisation would tear the countryside apart. Eval: shows that stalin’s system of surveillance and propaganda had failed to permeate all levels of society yet. These were people who knew what he was capable of but still protected their people. Meanwhile, richer peasants quickly sold their animals and stopped hiring labourers so that they could slip into the ranks of the middle peasants. 3. Using criminal element in villages The dekulakisation brigades had to meet the required quotas and, if possible, surpass them. This opened the door to all sorts of abuses and settling of old scores. Dekulakisation often became generalised plundering and ravaging (Lewin, 1966). Everyone in the village understood that “kulak” belongings were at the disposal of those willing to come forward and grab them. As noted in many GPU reports, this pushed “the villages’ criminal elements to join a nucleus of young and more or less enthusiastic believers”. According to a GPU report from Smolensk, “the brigades took from the wealthy peasants their winter clothes, their warm underclothes, and above all their shoes. They left the kulaks standing in their underwear and bare feet. They took everything, even old rubber shoes, women’s clothes, tea worth no more than 50 kopeks, water pitchers and pokers (…) They confiscated everything, even the pillows from under the heads of babies, and stew from the family pot, which they smeared on the icons they had smashed” (Fainsod, 1969). Dekulakised properties were usually simply looted or given away at auction: wooden houses were sold for 1 ruble, cows for 20 or 30 kopeks each, a hundredth of their real value. The violence perpetrated by the dekulakisation gangs was horrific. “These people”, noted one GPU report, ”drove the dekulakised naked in the streets, beat them, organized drinking-bouts in their houses, shot over their heads, forced them to dig their own graves, undressed women and searched them, stole valuables, money, etc. (Graziosi, 1996). Eval: the shamelessness of using criminals do your dirty work??? 4. Using young Stalinists So, Stalin enlisted an army of 25,000 urban party activists to help to revolutionise the countryside. After a two-week course, they were sent out in brigades to oversee the collectivisation process, backed by the local police, the OGPU (secret police) and the military. Their task was to root out the kulaks and persuade the middle and poor peasants to sign a register demanding to be collectivised. The land, animals, tools, equipment and buildings would be taken from the kulaks and used as the basis for the new collective farm, the creation of which the activists would then oversee. The so-called ‘Twenty-five Thousanders’ had no real knowledge of how to organise or run a collective farm, but they did know how to wage class warfare. ‘Dekulakisation’ went ahead at full speed. Each region was given a number of kulaks to find and they found them whether they existed or not. The kulaks were divided into three categories: counter-revolutionaries who were to be shot or sent to forced-labour settlements; active opponents of collectivisation who were to be deported to other areas of the Soviet Union, often to Siberia; and those who were expelled from their farms and settled on poor land. Eval: The official policy of “liquidation of the kulaks as a class”, adopted by the Stalinists at the end of 1929, did not, however, imply physical liquidation of all “kulaks”. The great majority of them were to be expropriated and deported, thus fulfilling the second objective of “dekulakisation”: to provide cheap labour for the colonisation and economic development of the country’s inhospitable areas, which were rich in natural resources. Eventually stalin just decided it would be faster to execute them so there was no chance they would rise back up to reclaim their land! 5. Using local party organisations A decree of 1 February 1930 gave local party organisations the power to use ‘necessary measures’ against the kulaks. Whole families and sometimes whole villages were rounded up and deported. The head of the household might be shot and his family put on a train for Siberia or some distant part of Russia. Others would be sent off to the Gulag labour camps or to work in punishment brigades building canals, roads or the new industrial centres. Up to ten million people had been deported to Siberia or labour camps by the end of the collectivisation process. Many local party officials opposed the policy of forced collectivisation, knowing that it was unworkable. They were unwilling to identify as kulaks good farmers who were valuable to the community. They also knew that collectivisation would tear the countryside apart. Eval: The peasants resisted collectivisation bitterly despite the mass deportations. There were riots and armed resistance. One riot lasted for five days and armoured cars had to be brought in to restore order. In many instances’ troops had to be brought in. Peasants burned crops, tools and houses rather than hand them over to the state. Raids were mounted to recapture animals that had already been taken into the collectives. Action by women often proved the most effective form of opposition. Women’s revolts were reported in the press. Kaganovich, a member of the Politburo, recognised that ‘women had played the most advanced role in the reaction against the collective farm’. The women’s protests were carefully organised, with specific goals such as stopping grain requisitioning or retrieving collectivised horses. They reckoned, sometimes correctly, that it would be more difficult for troops to act against all-women protests. The government found their tactics difficult to deal with. Eval: Knowing that further peasant resistance could lead to the collapse of grain production, Stalin backtracked. He wrote an article for Pravda in March 1930 saying that his officials had moved too far too fast. They had, he said, become ‘dizzy with success’. This was probably not far from the truth. Young, ferocious and militant urban activists had got carried away, competing with each other to see who could get the most households into collectives. Ironically, despite the point of the whole process being to centralise power, the central government seemed to have little direct control over what was happening in the provinces. 6. Using man-made famine on peasants that were not kulaks One good example: HOLODOMOR (man made famine) ukraine = breadbasket of the soviet union a distinctly ukrainian culture and national identity thrived there. ukrainian nationalism was strong. the soviet regime decided to crack down on what they saw as an ideological threat to the regime so they cracked down on churches and schools, violently purges priests and intellectuals collectivisation was happening speedily (50% of all peasant farms collectivised by february 1930) eval: since ukrainian national identity was so closely tied to the land, they revered the land for giving them what they needed for life and family. but in the new socialist system the land they farmed on was supposed to just be another capital good for producing grain (like the machinery in a factory.), which the grain would then be sold and distributed equally, “for the greater good of the state”. they were supposed to rely on the state to give them the food (and by extension give them life), not the land. 1931-> stalin deliberately set grain quotas far above grain capacity that farmers could muster (seven million tons and even higher each year) when they didnt meet it, they ransacked every house for grain they set a new law that anyone caught with holding even a handful of grain would be punished On 7 August 1932 “the Law of the Seventh-Eighths”, was passed on the seventh day of the eighth month = 10-year sentence for stealing ‘socialised’ property. This was later changed to the death sentence. Decrees in August and December laid down prison sentences of up to ten years for peasants selling meat and grain before quotas were fulfilled. The peasants argued to the collectors that starvation was inevitable, but they still seized everything edible from them to make up for the quotas, regardless if they had anything for themselves. There were urgent letters written by party members to stalin, pleading for him to change the direction of the policy: “we are once again asking for urgent food relief” says one letter. Although there were recorded instances of people hiding food, this was out of survival. They would often do this by burying it, sometimes even in graveyards. One notable instance was a mother hiding flour under her baby's cradle. When the brigade found it, she cried and beg saying her baby would die of hunger without it. The brigade took it anyway. Stalin falsely denied there even was a famine and prohibited journalists from visiting the collective farms. EVAL: Collectivisation was like a reinstatement of the serfdom and feudal system, only under a different political banner. It was a SECOND SERFDOM. Was it a new system? No not really, not original idea, quite traditional tbh. They were again, tied to land they did not own. They could not leave the farms without the permission of the authorities. Draconian laws would punish them if they stepped out of line. All this grain they produced with their own hands and sweat would be delivered up to the authorities as it was back then, when it was delivered up to their feudal lords. eval.: initially before the oct revolution, lenin came out with april theses that claimed land for everyone + private ownership of land for da peasants. But as soon as civil war came and they needed the resources, he flipped and took back the land under war communism. So stalin rly is not doing anything different. the spring of 1932 In the case of Ukraine, stalin needed them to completely submit, physically and IDEOLOGICALLY. they were the ussr’s biggest liability this need for them to submit compounded the already terrible and cruel effects of collectivisation. when soviet police came to ukraine, they didn’t just confiscate grain, they confiscated anything edible including livestock. farms in ukraine and sometimes entire villages were blacklisted for “withholding grain”, ransacked for grain, and then banned from receiving any food supplies in january 1933, knowing that ukrainians were leaving in search of food, stalin purposely closed their borders, and policed migration from ukrainian villages to cities “this was a targeted extermination of peasantry” they could be seen dead in the streets, laying over, bodies bloated they were so desperate that they caught birds and mice and flesh from dead animals some cannibalised each other What were the effects of collectivisation? (after 1931) 1. Output would fall anyway. most enterprising peasants had been shot or deported, agricultural production disrupted huge number of animals slaughtered – around 25–30 per cent of all the cattle, pigs and sheep in the USSR (mostly eaten by the peasants) One of the main forms of resistance was to slaughter animals and eat or sell the meat rather than hand over the beasts to the kolkhoz. Mikhail Sholokhov described this graphically in his novel Virgin Soil Upturned (1935):‘Kill, it’s not ours any more . . . Kill, they’ll take it for meat anyway . . . Kill, you won’t get meat on the collective farm . . . And they killed. They ate until they could eat no more. Young and old suffered from stomach ache. At dinner-timetables groaned under boiled and roasted meat. At dinner-time everyone had a greasy mouth . . . everyone blinked like an owl, as if drunk from eating Peasants who had been forced into collectives were in no mood to begin the sowing season and the level of resistance was high. The state had collected 22.8 million tons of grain by the end of 1931, enough to feed the cities and to export to finance the industrialisation drive, but this had taken place against a huge drop in grain production, largely caused by the chaos and upheaval of collectivisation. This was partly due to the activists’ lack of farming knowledge and the skills to run collectives properly, but there were other reasons. For instance, there were not enough animals to pull the ploughs (because the peasants had eaten them) and tractors had not arrived in sufficient numbers to fill the gap. To make matters worse, there was a drought over a large area of the USSR during 1931. - At the end of 1934, it was announced that 70 per cent of peasant households were in collectives, rising to 90 per cent in 1936. Individual peasant landholdings were gradually squeezed out. Grain production began to recover slowly but did not exceed pre-collectivisation levels until 1935 (1930 being an exceptional year). Meat production did not pass pre-collectivisation levels until after 1953. Grain procurement continued at a high level throughout the 1930s, whatever the harvest. Eval: The problem was lack of incentive – the peasants had nothing to work for. They were supposed to get a share in the profits of the farm at the end of the year but there never were any profits. They practised a form of passive resistance shown in apathy, neglect and petty insubordination on the newly created kolkhozes. The state could do little about it. On many farms the chairman (usually a Communist) was changed regularly because he could not get the peasants to perform. This made the private plots on collectives very important. It was the only way peasants could earn something for themselves. Peasants could sell their products on the local market. The state did not hinder them because the economy desperately needed food. It has been estimated that these private plots provided 52 per cent of vegetables, 57 per cent of fruit, 70 per cent of meat and 71 per cent of milk as well as butter, honey and wool to Soviet consumers. 2. Stalin backtracked, but then went back to it Stalin called for a return to the voluntary principle and an end to coercion. Given the choice, a huge number of peasants abandoned the new collective farms and went back to farming for themselves. But once the harvest had been gathered in, Stalin restarted the campaign and it was just as vicious as before. Throughout 1931 peasants were forced back into the collectives they had left, so that by the end of the year large areas of the USSR had been collectivised, taking in over 50 per cent of peasant household + killing them and then resettlement program, another form of backtracking 3. The grain was not dealt with properly Thousands of extra officials, backed by detachments of OGPU, were drafted in to root out hidden stocks of grain held by peasants – and root it out they did, in brutal requisitioning gangs (This condemned hundreds of thousands to starvation. Worse than this, Conquest claims that requisitioned grain was left rotting in huge dumps or in railway sidings while starving people could not get access to it. In some areas, groups did make attacks on grain dumps, only to be punished later. Many were shot while others were rounded up and deported to labour camps. 4. Peasants rioted Riots and armed resistance. One riot lasted for five days and v armoured cars had to be brought in to restore order. In many instances’ troops had to be brought in. Peasants burned crops, tools and houses rather than hand them over to the state. Raids were mounted to recapture animals that had already been taken into the collectives. Action by women often proved the most effective form of opposition. Women’s revolts were reported in the press. Kaganovich, a member of the Politburo, recognised that ‘women had played the most advanced role in the reaction against the collective farm’. The women’s protests were carefully organised, with specific goals such as stopping grain requisitioning or retrieving collectivised horses. They reckoned, sometimes correctly, that it would be more difficult for troops to act against all-women protests. The government found their tactics difficult to deal with. 5. Widespread deaths throughout The net result of the government’s policy was the death of millions of peasants in the Ukraine, the north Caucasus, Kazakhstan and other parts of the USSR. In ukraine, at least 3.9 million died, and in Kazakhstan, at least a third of their population died. While other historians do not see the famine as being directly sought by Stalin, most acknowledge that the Communist government was determined to procure grain at any cost. This is borne out by the continued high exports of grain to other countries – 1.73 million tons in 1932 and only slightly less the following year – during the worst period of the famine. So many people died that Stalin had to send a union over for “resettlement”, to rebuild the state of the region and repopulate it. It was a desperate failure. Overall, it was the direct result of the upheaval caused by collectivisation – the purging of the peasants who had the best farming expertise, the poor organisation of the new collective farms, the lack of machinery and fertilisers, the lack of know-how, and the resistance of peasants who slaughtered animals and refused to work hard on the land. This was compounded by government policy which continued to take excessive amounts of grain from the worst-hit areas and export it abroad to pay for industrial equipment. The famine only subsided in may~june 1933, most likely because stalin realized he was killing off large swathes of his own agricultural workforce and losing skilled labour he could not get back. The full knowledge of starvation and famine and yet continuing to do it anyway, and even making it impossible to get food, is what makes this a man-made famine eval: One reason why it is difficult to give exact numbers is that the scale of the famine was largely unacknowledged by the Soviet regime. It did not want to admit that collectivisation had failed to deliver. Was collectivisation a success? (bare bones structure) Politically: yes, subjugated the villages and did not have to bargain with the peasants any more. It had established a system, using local soviets and MTS, of controlling the countryside and making agriculture serve the towns and workers Economically, grain harvests dropped dramatically in the early 1930s when grain was most needed and did not recover to their 1928 level (apart from 1930 which was an exceptional year) until the latter half of the 1930s is a damning indictment. This is an even worse performance when you compare the figures with the last harvest of tsarist Russia in 1913). The Soviet Union also lost a huge proportion of the animal population, a loss from which it did not really recover until after the Second World War. However, although the overall grain harvest declined in the early 1930s, state procurements did not. The state collected the grain it needed to feed the rapidly growing workforce and to sell abroad to pay for industrial equipment. What is more, dispossessed peasants from the overpopulated countryside fled to the towns, so providing labour for the new factories. Collectivisation had succeeded in its main purpose – to provide the resources for industrialisation. ~~Past year questions!!!!!! (2) 9389/41 October/November 2019 To what extent had collectivisation achieved its aims by 1941? 9489/41 May/June 2022 Assess the impact of collectivisation on the people of the Soviet Union. “Russia gained little and lost much.” Assess this view on the results of Stalin’s economic policies. Stalin’s economic policies were based on a five year plan and collectivisation. By “gain little and lost much”, need to measure against stalin’s aims * Build up army * Make a true socialist state * Industrial strength Yes, they gained little and lost much * Built up heavy industry…. But at the cost of consumer goods * Centralised control…. But at the cost of living standards and mass deaths from the man made famine * Unrealistically high targets at the first five year plan placed pressure on the economy * Output did not increase by that much even. Actually output in private farms (kolkhoz) was greater than the output in the sovkhoz (collectivised, state owned land), which disproves the idea that state owned farms would be more productive * Did not get support of peasants, riots * Unskilled workers no proper training was given Gained significantly * Improved transport * Managed to subjugate peasants -> although it was mainly great for stalin, it was good for the state also no other previous leaders were able to do that. * Heavy industry * Foreign expertise and investment * More equipped to face war with hitler * Russia moved towards becoming a true socialist state, furthered what lenin started with war communism, successfully collectivised land * More working in industry, higher employment Conclusion: overall gained in a sense that a socialist state was created that was close to what Lenin envisioned. Peasants had been subjugated like what trotsky had wanted, it was like a smoother-running model of russia like how it was under war communism. However, whether the gain was to stalin or to russia is another thing. The amount of deaths under stalin show a different story that screams more like loss. However it cannot be denied that russia was more stable and ready for war with germany than it had ever been in previous years, and at the time that was the prevailing concern for all levels of society and it was something that pushed them to accept the repression they faced in daily life. In that sense, they did gain. 9389/42 May/June 2018 Motivated more by ideology than by practical considerations. Discuss this view of Stalin’s economic policies. (how much does he contradict his policies) Define marxist thought Stalin’s personal ideology: Socialism in one country Stalin’s economic policies: five year plan, collectivisation, education and healthcare, employment of women Did ideology play a major role in his forming of policies? 1. State owned farms -> dominated the direction in which agriculture would be practiced -> NEP was to raise agricultural output to pre-1918 levels but it was not true socialism so stalin got rid of it (and bukharin) But created so many deaths 2. State owned industry stalin saw the need to develop industry in the need to survive against germany. But forced labour was rampant, living and working standards were not improving 3. Women Used women in the workforce too, trying to build a strong workforce, and then later used women to basically breed the new generation and increase population and workforce, but because of his paranoia he was committing purges and purges and actively killing off the same population he was trying to build up. Eval: measuring all against stalin’s aims. Practical reasons took precedence because the threat was more immediate. plus he knew hitler was going to do the same to him. 9389/43 May/June 2019 To what extent was a desire to increase his own power the reason for Stalin’s collectivisation policy? 9389/43 May/june 2018 “Creating a totalitarian state was much more important to stalin than creating a communist state.” How far do you agree? Define totalitarian Define communist Talk about how both were key facets of stalin’s regime Focus on his policies and the motivations behind them Yes, totalitarian 1. Prevalence of purges 2. Bad working conditions under state owned industry (not really lifting the workers up like marx said to do lmao) 3. Treatment of women, children, youth, church, workers (can this be eval?) 4. Eliminating all political rivals 5. Initial endorsement of NEP is counterproductive to communism 6. Negative propaganda Eval: link to one of his aims, compare to lenin… But also, communist 1. Importance of collectivisation and five year plan 2. Education and healthcare and social welfare 3. Eval: while he prioritised creating a socialist state, he also needed to protect himself (coincides with his own personality as a paranoid freak) And it worked So was his priority totalitarian? Or could you go as far as to say that he needed to be a totalitarian first in order to establish a socialist state? Measure up to his aims. Totalitarianism as a concept is not suggested there. 9489/42 May/June 2021 Assess the reasons for the introduction of Stalin’s first five-year plan in 1928. 9389/41 May/June 2018 How far did Stalin modernise the Soviet economy? 9489/42 February/March 2023 Analyse the extent to which Stalin’s industrialisation policies were successful. 9489/42 O/N 2022 Assess how far the economic conditions of workers improved in the Soviet Union in the period 1928–41. [30] 9489/42 May/June 2024 Assess the extent to which workers benefited from the economic changes in the USSR from 1924 to 41. 9489/43 October/November 2023 Evaluate the impact of industrialisation on the Russian people. 9489/41 May/June 2024 Evaluate the extent to which the Five Year Plans achieved Stalin’s objectives. b. Five-Year Plans Goal: turn soviet heavy industry into a centrally planned, state-run system 1. some level of flexibility with targets Set production and output targets which industrial enterprises had to achieve it set down broad directions and could be changed as they went along + also had shorter one-year or even quarterly plans which set more specific targets for individual enterprises. 2. Not just purely slave driving, they awarded the enterprises Bonuses were paid to enterprises that exceeded their plan target. The party, acting through the government, set the priorities for the plans and the targets for key industries. Eval: Shows that despite being communist, they do not entirely alienate enterprises, evaluate with hitler (similar to hitler’s approach with industry)?? 3. Thought put into the goods itself that they were to produce Stalin and the Supreme Economic Council (Vesenkha) agreed that the majority of investment should go into coal, iron, steel and other heavy industries. Why coal, iron and steel? Because that’s what Western economies produce 1. It seemed to the Stalinists that Western industrial revolutions had been underpinned by the initial development in coal, iron and steel. 2. Coal, iron and steel were also imported from the west before this. Continuing to rely on it would give the west some leverage over them. They were driven by the need to develop the sort of industries that could protect the Soviet Union should it be attacked from the West. 3. Most of all, would provide the power, capital equipment and machine tools that could be used to manufacture other products. The Soviet Union would then be less dependent on the West for these goods and could move towards self-sufficiency or ‘autarky’. 4. Timely, well-planned and prepared for The plans were always declared complete a year ahead of schedule. This denoted the superiority of Soviet planning over the Western capitalist economies which were, at this time, going through the worst throes of the Great Depression. It was also a psychological device to encourage the already hard-pressed workforce to even greater achievements. 5. Huge projects Huge new industrial centres were constructed virtually from nothing, for example at Magnitogorsk in the Urals and Kuznetz in western Siberia. Most of these were located east of the Ural Mountains, a strategic decision to make them less vulnerable to attack from the West. Spectacular projects were conceived to demonstrate the might of the new Soviet industrial machine. The Dnieprostroi Dam in eastern Russia) was, for two years, the world’s largest construction site and it increased Soviet electric power output fivefold when it came on stream. Other projects: Moscow–Volga canal and the prestigious Moscow metro 6. Bringing in foreign expertise many companies sent specialists, engineers and skilled workers to help to erect new factories or exploit new resources. Henry Ford helped the Russians to develop a car industry. Russian engineers were trained by Ford in the USA and it was Ford-designed cars that were produced at the car plant in Gorky. Colonel Hugh Cooper, the engineer in charge of the Dnieprostroi Dam project, A. Ruckseyer, the man behind the huge growth in the asbestos industry at a remote place in the Urals called Asbest. + many others from the west. Eval: The Great Depression convinced many people that capitalism was in its death throes and that the dynamic Soviet Union offered hope for the future of working people However: 1. The targets were backed by law, so failure to meet targets could be treated as a criminal offence. 2. Top-down method of management. The principle of one-person management was established right at the beginning. The director of an industrial enterprise (for example, a large factory or several units of production) was in sole charge and responsible for seeing that the targets were achieved. The trade unions were told not to interfere and to focus on increasing worker productivity. Workers’ control and influence over the factory floor, such as it had ever existed, receded as the plans progressed. Eval: THATS NOT VERY SOCIALIST OF YOU! 3. The party not only laid down basic priorities but interfered in the day-to-day running of enterprises. It had a grip on the economy at all levels. Senior party officials appointed and dismissed planners and senior managers, often for political rather than economic reasons. Eval: shows that underlying it all despite the current economic upheavals under stalin, the ultimate priority to soviet lawmakers would always be political, keeping the fragile equilibrium of the party intact 4. The decision to focus on heavy industry and industrial goods (capital goods) meant that consumer industries producing clothes, shoes and similar products would be downgraded. Soviet citizens were asked to sacrifice their standard of living for longer-term objectives. How’d they treat workers? Wage differentials and incentives To stop workers ‘flitting’ from job to job, wage differentials (i.e. paying some people more than others) were introduced to reward those who stayed put and acquired skills. Managers were allowed to pay bonuses. Other incentives were also used, such as awarding honours to outstanding workers; these were not just moral rewards but could bring perks and privileges such as access to closed shops, better housing and better clothes. Egalitarianism in wages was abandoned as early as 1931. EVAL: TAHTS NOT VERY SOCIALIST OF YOUUUUU Piece work Payment according to the pieces of work completed became common across industry, to try to drive up productivity. Tough measures For absentees: dismissal, eviction from factory-owned homes or loss of various benefits. Causing damage or leaving a job without permission could lead to a prison sentence. The intimidation and terror applied to the bourgeois specialists were also applied to the workers. The degree of control increased during the Second and Third Five-Year Plans. In 1938, labour books were issued, along with internal passports. The labour book gave details of a worker’s labour history, qualifications and any misdemeanours. It was very difficult to survive without one of these. In 1940, absenteeism became a crime, with two offences bringing a prison sentence. Eval: nearing war, shows stalin’s desperation. (not desperate enough to stop purging tho clearly) Forced labour Some labour shortages were solved by using forced labour, especially for the worst jobs in the worst conditions. Around 300,000 prisoners worked on the Baltic–White Sea Canal, many of them kulaks arrested during the collectivisation drive. After April 1930 all criminals sentenced to more than three years were sent to labour camps to provide cheap labour. The government decreed that these camps should be self-supporting. Lumber camps were set up in the forests of the frozen north and the timber produced was exported to help earn money for industrial investment. The number of forced labourers increased when the Great Purges got into full swing in the mid-1930s. Propaganda and encouragement A huge propaganda campaign was mounted to encourage workers to raise their productivity, which was outstandingly low during the First Five-Year Plan . Shock-brigade campaigns (mounting intensive efforts to build structures such as dams) and ‘socialist competition’ tried to raise work norms but they enjoyed only limited success. Probably the most significant propaganda initiative was the Stakhanovite movement. Although this caused some problems in the economy, productivity rates did improve. FIRST 5-YEAR PLAN (October 1928 to December 1932) emphasis on heavy industries – coal, oil, iron and steel, electricity, cement, metals, timber -> 80% of total investment. 1500 enterprises were opened * Electricity – production x3. * Coal and iron – output x2. * Steel production – increased by 1/3 * Engineering industry developed and increased output of machine-tools, turbines, etc. * Huge new industrial complexes were built/being built. * Huge new tractor works in Stalingrad, Kharkov etc (to meet needs of mechanised agriculture.) HOWEVER: very little growth, and even a decline, in consumer industries such as house-building, fertilisers, food processing and woollen textiles Small workshops were squeezed out, partly because of the drive against Nepmen and partly because of shortages of materials and fuel. The lack of skilled workers created major problems. Workers were constantly changing jobs, which created instability. Eval: In reality, many targets were not met. The Great Depression had driven down the price of grain and raw materials, so the USSR could not earn enough from exports to pay for all the machinery it needed. Also, a good deal of investment had to go into agriculture because of the forced collectivisation programme. However, the Soviet economy was kick-started: there was impressive growth in certain sectors of the economy and there were substantial achievements. Eval: THE FIRST FIVE YEAR PLAN AS A PROPAGANDA DEVICE. As the First Five-Year Plan got underway, there was a wave of planning fervour or ‘target mania’. There was a sort of competition between Gosplan and Vesenkha (the Supreme Economic Council), who were bidding each other up with higher targets. The original targets set in the first plan were optimistic, but almost before it was begun targets were revised upwards. In April 1929, two versions of the plan were produced – a ‘basic’ and a much higher ‘optimum’ version. The latter was chosen. This envisaged targets being increased by astonishing amounts, for instance, coal up from 35 to 75 million tons and iron ore from six to nineteen million tons. To many, these seemed hopelessly unachievable. Some historians have suggested that planning was more in the realms of socialist fantasy than rational calculation. In The Russian Revolution 1917–1932 (1994, pages 129–34), Sheila Fitzpatrick talks of this period as one in which the ‘spirit of a Cultural Revolution’ swept people along. Party leaders and members had a millennial vision of a country that would be transformed. They believed that in two or three years they would have a socialist rather than a market economy and money would be abandoned as the main means of rewarding workers. In this sense, the First Five-Year Plan can be seen more as a propaganda device to drive Soviet citizens forward and create a sense of urgency. Setting targets is one thing; detailed planning, which involves the complex co-ordination of different branches of industry over a huge area, is something else. And this sort of detailed planning seemed to be notably absent from the First Five-Year Plan. The party handed out broad directives and priorities and it was left to officials and managers at regional and local levels to work out ways to achieve the production targets they had been set. This was bound to lead to problems. IMPACT: SHORTAGES of materials The high targets placed enormous strain on the economy. Materials of all sorts were in short supply and there was intense competition to get hold of them. At higher levels, powerful people in industrial commissariats pulled strings to make sure that their pet projects got the resources they needed for completion. Materials and workers – shock brigades – were rushed into key industries to do certain jobs, often on the order of a senior party official, despite the fact that this left other areas short and waiting for supplies. At the regional and local levels, factories competed with each other for scarce resources. Bribery and corruption were rife. Managers made illegal deals in their desperation to get the parts or supplies they needed to fulfil their targets. REALISATION that transport system was not equipped to handle this Some were known to hijack lorries and ambush trains to get supplies intended for other plants. Bottlenecks appeared everywhere due to shortages of materials and the inadequacy of the transport system. The railways could not cope with what they were expected to transport: it soon became clear that the planners had not invested enough in track or rolling stock. 1 In some parts of the economy there was underproduction because factories were held up by shortages of materials. In other parts there was overproduction as factories rushed to exceed their targets. 2 There was a great deal of wastage because: 2 a) overproduction created thousands of parts that other industries did not want 2 b) much of the output was sub-standard, such as lorry tyres that lasted for only a few weeks. Bureaucracy/ineffiency few managers or officials were prepared to admit anything was wrong. They did not want to be accused of sabotaging the plans or criticising the party. So mistakes were covered up and problems were left unresolved. It was all buried in the colossal amount of paperwork that flowed around the USSR. All that mattered to managers and officials at different levels was that they could show they had achieved their targets, whether this was real or invented. In fact, there were extravagant claims of over-fulfilment in many areas. This seemed to confirm that the system was working and discouraged others from speaking out about problems. Economic nomenklatura Basically using need to improve economy as an excuse to root out non-loyal ppl Of course, not all the mistakes could be covered up and somebody had to be blamed. Class enemies were ready to hand and Stalin was not slow to use this political tool in the same way as he had in the collectivisation drive. The industrial equivalent of the kulak was the ‘bourgeois specialist’. (old pre-1917 managers, engineers and technical staff who had survived the NEP in important jobs because of their skills and abilities). Now they were identified as saboteurs who were deliberately causing hold-ups, breakdowns and general problems in the supply industries. They were uncovered and imprisoned. Show trials were held to hammer home the point to other managers. Unfortunately, the loss of valuable personnel so quickly caused so many problems that by 1931 the offensive against them was quietly dropped. Eval: stalin willing to potentially hurt economic growth to keep the power steady showed that his priorities lay in political objectives Fall in living standards In the First Five-Year Plan, consumer goods industries, such as textiles, were sacrificed to the needs of heavy industry. Other areas suffered from the closure of small-scale enterprises and workshops. SECOND 5-YEAR PLAN (January 1933 to December 1937) greater emphasis on communications, especially railways to link cities and industrial centres * Heavy industries benefited from plants which had been set up during the first plan and now came on stream. Electricity production expanded rapidly. * By 1937, the USSR was virtually self sufficient in machine-making and metalworking. * Transport and communications grew rapidly. * Chemical industries, such as fertiliser production, were growing. * Metallurgy developed – minerals such as copper, zinc and tin were mined for the first time. HOWEVER: Consumer goods industries were still lagging, although they were showing signs of recovery. There was growth in footwear and food processing – modern bakeries, ice-cream production and meatpacking plants – but not enough. Oil production did not make the expected advances. Eval: There was a feeling in the party that Stalin had overreached himself in the First Five-Year Plan, that targets had been too high. The second plan was more one of consolidation (political). The years 1934–36 were known as the ‘three good years’ since the pressure was not so intense, food rationing was ended and families had more disposable income. IMPACTS: - Investment was ploughed into the railway system, thus increasing enormously the amount of freight it was able to carry - new training schemes that encouraged workers to learn skills and master techniques to tackle the problem of skills shortages. - shortages, waste, and under/over-production continued – but not on the scale of the first plan. - the USSR was almost self-sufficient in the production of machine tools and far less dependent on foreign imports of machinery. The Soviet Union enjoyed the ‘three good years’ of 1934–36 and the achievements by 1937 were impressive. THIRD FIVE-YEAR PLAN (January 1938 to June 1941) Cut short, not a full 5 years because russia joined the WW2 heavy industry was emphasised as the need for armaments became increasingly urgent. * Heavy industry continued to grow, for example, machinery and engineering, but the picture was uneven and some areas did poorly. * Defence and armaments grew rapidly as resources were diverted to them. Weaknesses HOWEVER: Steel output grew insignificantly. Oil production failed to meet targets and led to a fuel crisis. Consumer industries once again took a back seat. Many factories ran short of materials. EVAL: The worse performance of the third plan was partially due to difficulties at the beginning of 1938 due to an exceptionally hard winter and the diversion of materials to the military. However it coincided perfectly with stalin’s great purges (1937~1938). Gosplan was thrown into chaos when the purges created shortages of qualified personnel, such as important managers, engineers and officials, who linked industries and government. The fact that stalin was willing to potentially hurt economic growth as war became inevitable, just for the sake of keeping the power steady shows that his overarching concern would always be political objective IMPACTS: - After 1937, the USSR witnessed an economic slowdown. Although there was a general increase in industrial output during the Third Five-Year Plan, some areas like iron and steel virtually stopped growing. - There was a fuel crisis when the oil industry failed to meet its modest targets. As Europe moved towards war, resources were channelled into the armaments industry and this created shortages elsewhere. - Alec Nove, places much of the blame for this slowdown on the purges that were in full swing in 1936 and 1937 . Nove claims the purges deprived the economy of valuable personnel and paralysed the ability of administrators and party officials to take the initiative and solve problems. - Also, many planners were purged with the result that the planning system was thrown into confusion. Hadn’t even finished writing plans and were killed so the plans had to be published unfinished. - The picture at the end of the Third Five-Year Plan shows planning once more in a confused and even chaotic state, with shortages, waste and bottlenecks as growing features of the economy OVERALL: Comparing before PHASE TWO. Society! a. Religion Role of women, men and church “Religion is the opium of the people, used to justify outcome of the upper classes” - karl marx Lenin let practice whatever religion they wanted (to keep public opinion clean) but in the background he was seizing a lot of orthodox church lands (secularizing them), slowly eroding their power (to comply with the socialist vision, have to be religionless society) Secularized marriage rights as well, prosecuted priests Holy day of sunday (REST day mandated by the lord) was ABOLISHED 40k churches and 25k mosques abolished by 1931 Other communities didnt have it any easier, jewish synagogues were closed down and rabbis were imprisoned/killed Muslims were prevented from wearing traditional dress and this was faced with a lot of backlash but those who resisted were simply killed There were attacks on georgian and armenian churches too B. Women Background: Lenin believed in economic independence: women should be able to have a job outside of the crushing drudgery of looking after a home and family + he regarded the traditional bourgeois marriage as akin to slavery, with the woman the property of her husband and subjugated to his will. It was economic and sexual exploitation. Challenges for the state: 1. Providing services in the stead of traditional women’s roles Freeing women from their domestic role required the large-scale provision of facilities such as canteens, laundries, kindergartens and crèches (the socialisation of domestic services). Still this was a requirement which Lenin understood and supported. But in 1922, the idea of state provision for crèches, kitchens and laundries was costed, it added up to more than the entire national budget. 2. The contradiction of this new equality’s consequences with current economic realities Changes to women’s role in the home also implied a fundamental change in the relationship between men and women. more equality between the sexes + sexual liberation because people would be freer to choose their partners. In that vein, laws were passed immediately to make divorce easier and later, in 1920, to allow abortion on demand.In 1919, the USSR had the highest marriage rate and, by the mid-1920s, the highest divorce rate in Europe, twenty-five times higher than in Britain. HOWEVER this situation did not work in women’s favour: with easy divorce available, women were abandoned when they became pregnant. reports of young men registering more than fifteen short-lived ‘marriages’. at the end of the 1920s, 70% of divorces were initiated by the men and in only 7% by mutual consent. By 1927, 2/3 of marriages in Moscow ended in divorce; across the country the figure was ½. Due to the housing shortage, divorced couples often still lived together and domestic violence and rape were common. Eval: the issue w the govt enacting progressive policies when the public mindset hasnt nearly caught up yet -> more harm than good -> perhaps indicates that although russia operated strictly as a socialist country now under, failed in the sense that the people were not absorbing all those socialist values and still had bourgeois mindsets (evidence: public fears over alexandra kollontai’s sexual emancipation advocation as promoting “sexual immorality” and “creating sluts”, the fact that sexual emancipation itself never caught on, the fact that the zhenotdel was shut down after a while without proper reason) 3. Free love + not enough birth control/lingering poor attitudes towards it -> tons of orphans The reality for many Russian children was not a network of socialist kindergartens but life in gangs that survived by begging, scrounging, stealing and prostitution. Hundreds of thousands had been made orphans by war and civil war. Malcolm Muggeridge, the English journalist and writer, reported seeing orphans ‘going around in packs, barely articulate and recognisably human, with pinched faces, tangled hair and empty eyes. I saw them in Moscow and Leningrad, clustered under bridges, lurking in railway stations, suddenly emerging like a pack of wild monkeys, and scattering and disappearing’ (quoted in R. Pipes, A Concise History of the Russian Revolution, 1995, page 326). Contemporaries estimated that in the 1920s there were between seven and nine million orphans, most of whom were under the age of thirteen. 4. Women’s employment During the First World War, the percentage of women in the urban workforce doubled; by 1917 it was about 47 per cent. After the Civil War, when five million men were discharged from military service, women suffered as men were given preference in jobs. eval: the problems of implementing these initiatives when government equal mentality hadn’t caught up to popular mentalities/perceptions towards women Although women were paid less than men, employers regarded women as more expensive due to the time they took off work because of their home responsibilities. With the growth of urban unemployment during the NEP, women were forced from skilled to unskilled work – still predominantly in textiles and domestic service, and then from work to unemployment and into prostitution and crime. There were all-women gangs of thieves and 39 per cent of proletarian men used prostitutes in the 1920s. Hence the percentage of women in industrial labour by 1929 was practically the same as it had been in 1913. In the 1920s, women in proletarian families worked an eight-hour day outside the home plus an extra five hours in domestic tasks; men did not help with the domestic work. 5. Women in politics Even though it seems contradictory, in 1917, women formed only 10% of the party membership; in 1928, 12.8% (156,000 women). At the party congress in 1918, only five per cent of the voting delegates were women and this percentage went down rather than up in succeeding years. Young, unmarried women had more time to be activists and female membership of the Komsomol (the Young Communist League) was much higher than party membership. Women were up against two problems: Russian male chauvinism and the Marxist dislike of any separatist activity that could be interpreted as weakening the class struggle and proletarian unity. (why the hell are you talking about feminism? You have bigger enemies than men!! We are supposed to be united to fight capitalism!!) Traditional attitudes to women excluded them from party activities. There were even reports of women being attacked or beaten by their husbands for being involvedin party work. In 1919, the party set up a women’s department, Zhenotdel, to make women active defenders of the revolution through propaganda and agitation. However, in practice it focused on practical help such as social services, education and training, and making sure that new laws protecting women in factories were enforced, rather than on Alexandra Kollontai’s more radical ideas about transforming women’s role in society (Zhenotdel was abolished suddenly in 1930 on the grounds that it was no longer necessary. Enthusiasts to the left of Kollontai talked of free love, the abolition of marriage and forcibly removing children from the harmful influence of their parents to be brought up by the state. Kollontai did not, or at least did so with caution. Nevertheless, the pressure of the ‘new morality’ on girls led to ‘liberty, equality and maternity!’ Kollontai was increasingly associated with the corruption of Soviet youth rather than the liberation of Soviet women. There were some experimental communes but only one survived until the end of the 1920s. The fear of the ‘new woman’, prepared to sacrifice family, home and sometimes children for the cause, was widespread. It is easy to overestimate the impact of these new ideas on Russian society in the 1920s. Although the family had been challenged by ‘free’ (unregistered) marriages, postcard divorces and abortion, the social radicalism of the decade can be exaggerated. Soviet law strongly emphasised the mutual responsibility of family members for each other’s financial welfare and, as the state lacked the resources to provide social welfare, the family remained a key institution. There was an increase in promiscuity, but surveys in the 1920s suggest the increase was not as great as young men claimed. The majority held to traditional attitudes towards relationships and a large number dreamt of long-lasting partnerships based on love and marriage. Also, such change as did occur tended to be in the cities and not in the countryside, where the vast majority of the population remained unaffected by the concept of the new woman and freer sexual relations. Stalin’s main new policies Stalin’s first major move came in June 1936 with a decree that reversed much of earlier Bolshevik social policy: 1. unregistered marriages were no longer recognised 2. divorce was made more difficult 3. right to abortion severely restricted 4. the family declared to be the basis of Soviet society 5. homosexuality outlawed. Conscious of both the falling birth rate and of how many Russians were dying in the Great Patriotic War, the authorities introduced measures in July 1944 re-affirming the importance of the family in Communist Russia and giving incentives to women to have large numbers of children: 1. restrictions on divorce tightened still further 2. abortion totally outlawed 3. mothers with more than two children were to be made ‘heroines of the Soviet Union’ 4. taxes increased on parents with fewer than two children 5. the right to inherit family property was re-established - Female exploitation individual cases of women gaining in status and income in Stalin’s time were very much a minority, and were invariably unmarried women or those without children. Married women with children carried a double burden. The great demand for labour that followed from Stalin’s massive industrialisation drive required that women became essential members of the workforce. So, despite the theory about women being granted equality under Communism, in practice their obligations increased. This imposed great strains upon them. During WW2 operation barbarossa (german invasion), the terrible death toll of men at the front + the desperate need to keep the armaments factories running meant that women became indispensable. During the war over half a million women fought in the Soviet armed forces. However, rather than improving the status of women, this left them more vulnerable to mistreatment. Recently opened Soviet records + confessions of Red Army veterans shows that female soldiers were routinely sexually abused, especially by senior officers. The clear conclusion is that for all the Soviet talk of the liberation of women under Stalinism, the evidence suggests that they were increasingly exploited and for all their work both in the home and outside of it, they received no comparable reward. In fact, between 1930 and 1945 women’s pay rates in real terms actually dropped. It is hard to dispute the conclusion of Geoffrey Hosking that ‘the fruits of female emancipation became building blocks of the Stalinist neopatriarchal social system’. C. Workers (instances of support) - Stakhanovites “Cult of productivity” Based on the achievements of Aleksei Stakhanov, a coal miner in the Donbass region, who in Sept 1935 had managed to drill 14 times his allotted quota of coal Resulted in the Soviet govt insisting on more ambitious “work norms”, pushing higher expectations on level of productivity/output per worker These were sometimes very unrealistic Threats from regular workers for setting that unrealistic precedent Favoured by ambitious managers who would be punished also if targets were not met -> however overall productivity did improve alongside fines for absenteeism and introduction of new technology - 25 thousanders enthusiastic Stalinist urban workers, primarily from industrial centers, who were mobilized by the Soviet government to help implement and enforce the collectivization of agriculture during the late 1920s and early 1930s. Help organize collective farms (kolkhozes) + ensure peasants complied with the state's demands. Their role was often aggressive and coercive, tasked with overcoming resistance from peasants who were reluctant to give up their land and join collective farms. This campaign led to widespread upheaval, famine, and significant suffering in the Soviet countryside. Eval: The decree found a broad response among the workers of the country, but they often had to fight resistance from their factories, which needed them to fill production quotas. In her history of the movement, Lynne Viola wrote: The recruitment drive illustrated the sometimes contradictory nature of the first five-year plan revolution, which aimed for the maximum in economic modernization while at the same time insisting that modernization occur within the parameters of the social and political guidelines of the proletarian dictatorship. The factories were required to increase production while releasing their best workers for participation in the numerous mobilizations of skilled workers for promotion in the bureaucracy, the purge of the state administration, enrollment in higher technical education, and work in the countryside. The consequences of these contradictory demands were frequently inconsistency, disorder, and an uneasy balance between different institutional concerns, revealing a side of Soviet politics lacking unity of purpose and divided by differing interests. In the recruitment of the 25,000ers this meant that ultimately the state had to circumvent factory officialdom and, with the aid of the party organs, appeal directly to workers over the head of resistant factory officials for support in the campaign. And the result was that, in spite of the opposition of factory officials and problems in campaign implementation, the recruitment drive was an enormous success. Lantaran itu this disunity between political and economic interests presents itself in many other places: - factory managers would not turn in workers who were critical of the regime because it would result in a fall in output and they themselves would get punished for not meeting targets/quotas - regional authorities wouldn’t turn in kulaks because these individuals were often the most productive farmers. Removing them could lead to a decline in agricultural output, which would negatively affect the economy and lead to food shortages - soviets implemented wage differentials to drive up productivity, at the expense of losing worker solidarity by making them compete against each other - factory managers may have turned a blind eye to minor criticisms or grumblings about the Stakhanovite system or other political initiatives, prioritising the practical need to maintain smooth operations over strict political conformity. Stalin’s response to this dissonance was just to dial up the pressure so this wouldn’t turn into a trend of disobeying orders. D. Youth Komsomol A youth movement which had begun in Lenin’s time but was created as a formal body in 1926 under the direct control of the CPSU - open to those aged between 14 and 28 (a Young Pioneer movement existed for those under 14). - It pledged itself totally to Stalin and the Party (eval: in this regard it paralleled the Hitler Youth in Nazi Germany). - Membership was not compulsory but its attraction to young people was that it offered them the chance of eventual full membership of the CPSU with all the privileges that went with it. - It grew from two million members in 1927 to 10 million in 1940. The idealism of the young was very effectively exploited by Stalin’s regime. Komsomol members were among the most enthusiastic supporters of the Five-Year Plans, as they proved by going off in their thousands to help build the new industrial cities such as Magnitogorsk. Extract from a speech given by a delegate to the Seventh Congress of Soviets in 1935: “Thank you, Stalin. Thank you because I am joyful. Thank you because I am well. Centuries will pass, and the generations still to come will regard us as the happiest of mortals, because we lived in the century of centuries, because we were privileged to see Stalin, our inspired leader. Yes and we regard ourselves as the happiest of mortals because we are the contemporaries of a man who never had an equal in world history. The men of all ages will call on thy name, which is strong, beautiful, wise and marvellous. Thy name is engraven on every factory, every machine, every place on the earth and in the hearts of all men.” E. Propaganda !!!FILL THIS UP FROM TEXTBOOK ~~Past year questions!!!!!! (3) How far did Stalin’s social policies benefit women? [30] (9389/42 October/November 2018) 9489/43 May/June 2023 ‘Stalin’s policies towards women and children improved their lives.’ Discuss. The years 1919~1941 saw limited social change in Russia. How far do you agree? 1919~1924 Lenin 1924~1941 Stalin Women, children, youth, church, workers 1. Lenin’s stance on women (equal rights) 2. Stalin’s stance on women (abortion, role at home, family unit emphasis when men started to struggle getting jobs) Eval: compare to hitler 3. Lenin’s stance on the church (broke it down and killed it) 4. Stalin’s stance on church (also wanted to eliminate it) Eval: commonality, based on marxist thought 5. Lenin’s stance on youth (nothing much at all) 6. Stalin’s stance on youth (yay lenins enrolment) Eval: hitler, importance of future generation 7. Lenin’s stance on children 8. Stalin’s stance on children (new front for propaganda) 9. Lenin’s stance on workers (war communism, high discipline, unemployment was a crime) 10. Stalin’s stance on workers (stakhanovite movement in the five year plan) 11. Economic changes (1919 they had war communism -> NEP -> five year plan -> collectivisation) Eval: Whether it was limited or vast social change didnt matter much because terror was ever present. Autocracy was replaced by nomenklatura which was just as bad. 9389/43 October/November 2020 How far did a social revolution take place under Stalin? To what extent was Stalin’s rule based on popular support? His rule -> totalitarianism Popular support is supposed to be based on his policies, not his personality 1. Popularity of komsomol 2. Collectivisation Fully endorsed by central party Collectivisation was eagerly supported by youths who were looking forward to a better life, shown in five year plan Workers welcomed it eagerly because it seemed to put everyone on an equal playing field He did a lot for women and children as well 3. Women and children - education 4. Anti-nazi policies, nazis hated communists, Socialism in one country -> shows his patriotism HOWEVER 1. Need to talk about the basis of his support and the fact that it was manufactured cult of personality 2. Peasants riots from 1938~1939 against collectivisation, man-made famine brought destruction and misery 3. The great purges, mass terror 4. Stakhanovite movement -> not everyone was supportive because it was hard to reach the quota because not enough resources -> brought about bribery and corruption, muddled the waters of communism Eval: overall, no. based on repression more than popular support. Even the basis of any popular support, the basis of even his rise to power was based on a manufactured cult of personality Measure his repression against his aims. Why would he have needed to repress so much? His aims -> he was preparing russia for war with hitler. The fact that he needed to control the peasants, which had been an obstacle for years and years. It was a means to an end, to bring stability to the country and prevent them from ruin if a direct war with germany occurred. The cult of stalin A particularly useful instrument for the spread of Stalinist propaganda was Komsomol, a youth movement which had begun in Lenin’s time but was created as a formal body in 1926 under the direct control of the CPSU. Among its main features were It was open to those aged between 14 and 28 (a Young Pioneer movement existed for those under 14). • It pledged itself totally to Stalin and the Party (in this regard it paralleled the Hitler Youth in Nazi Germany). • Membership was not compulsory but its attraction to young people was that it offered them the chance of eventual full membership of the CPSU with all the privileges that went with it. • It grew from two million members in 1927 to 10 million in 1940. The idealism of the young was very effectively exploited by Stalin’s regime. Komsomol members were among the most enthusiastic supporters of the Five-Year Plans, as they proved by going off in their thousands to help build the new industrial cities such as Magnitogorsk It was Komsomol who provided the flag-wavers and the cheerleaders and who organised the huge gymnastic displays that were the centrepieces of the massive parades on May Day and Stalin’s birthday. Every political gathering was a study in the advancement of the Stalin cult. The exaggeration and the sycophantic character of it all is clear in the following extract from a speech given by a delegate to the Seventh Congress of Soviets in 1935. Thank you, Stalin. Thank you because I am joyful. Thank you because I am well. Centuries will pass, and the generations still to come will regard us as the happiest of mortals, because we lived in the century of centuries, because we were privileged to see Stalin, our inspired leader. Yes and we regard ourselves as the happiest of mortals because we are the contemporaries of a man who never had an equal in world history. The men of all ages will call on thy name, which is strong, beautiful, wise and marvellous. Thy name is engraven on every factory, every machine, every place on the earth and in the hearts of all men. !How far had stalin achieved his aim of socialism in one country by 1921? Define socialism in one country On one hand, yes Economic self sufficiency and stability Through the five year plan and collectivisation Managed to industrialise russia in that span of time Also managed to achieve centralise control and create a socialist state Also improved living standards using health and education, state could control labour and social policies There was full employment Had a strong army bc of rearmament On the other hand, no “Socialism” supposed to be democracy, equality, representative government In practice, stalin made it a one man show, creates totalitarian system with full economic control not in the hands of the government but in the hands of stalin himself Also private plots actually produced more than the eventual government owned kolkhoz. Created a flourishing black market 😍 The use of nomenklatura shows the debilitation of the government Endemic corruption, cronyism, undermining pure principles of socialism “In one country” supposed to not care about what other countries are doing but stalin after 1929 was lockedddd into foreign policy Assess the importance of the cult of personality to stalin’s control of russia Control of russia -> already rose to power, period of 1929~1941 The word CONTROL -> Full control after he came into power, shows that we are looking at the period after getting rid of other politburo members Define cult of personality? On one hand, importance of cult of personality * Propaganda and education * Use of nomenklatura * Purges * Literature and art, films and movies, general propaganda On the other hand, wouldnt have lasted long if it was just that Other factors. * Popular support from workers (stakhanovite movement) * Collectivisation and 5 year plan (economic control) * Building on lenin’s legacy * Social welfare provided by the state like education and health and women and children and youth Eval: differentiate with lenin with the fact that the lenin kept his stance on women having equal rights throughout times of great hardship and economic backsliding like during the civil war Whereas stalin as soon as there started being a job shortage he changed his policies towards women and started advocating towards * Patriotic policies like socialism in one country and anti-nazi policies * Terror and the great purges using the strength of the army and NKVD to subjugate the population Evaluate based on lenin and hitler Eval: after he got rid of all his political rivals, there were no other alternatives than stalin. Also dont forget russia was always a country that operated based on authoritarian rule. The idea of legitimate opposition was an alien idea in russia and people were used to the idea of dictatorship or authoritarian rule. Even though he was 99% in control, he was able to manage his opposition without a sitch, like how he killed off kirov Conclusion: the importance of stalin’s cult of personality, he was able to embed himself into russian culture to the point of coexisting or even eclipsing lenin’s legacy. I mean people literally prayed to him. He was able to manage any form of blame or catastrophic mistakes (the amount of deaths during famines and the purges but yet faced little resistance) 9489/43 May/June 2021 Assess the extent to which the use of propaganda by Stalin’s regime changed Soviet society. [30] 9489/41 O/N 2022 Evaluate the importance of propaganda in the Soviet Union in the period 1928–41. [30] PHASE THREE. TERRORRRRRRRR. Control. EVALUATE BY COMPARING WITH LENIN. Similar how? Both used for practical purposes, particularly with hard-to-sell economic policies (war commie // five year plans, collectivisation) Extended out into repressing workers (a.k.a the bolsheviks supposed only love and prime demographic) -> lenin didn’t start out that way but during war communism it became the driving force to “productivity”. 1. Ryutin group’s trial -> ryutin published an attack on his policies. Described stalin as “evil genius”, collectivisation is gonna derail the revolution because people in the soviet union just can’t cope with the burden of these policies In the aftermath of publishing this, ryutin’s group was put on public trial and expelled from the party (stalin wanted to just KILL them. But CPSU told him no, you cant do that. Eval for this: 1. stalin was not as in control as he would like to be. 2. Stalin was considered FRINGE with his beliefs, contrary to lenin’s time where lenin himself said the bolshevik followers are more radical than leadership. ) Still this was a key first move to purges. 2. Kirov’s murder Kirov was secretary of leningrad soviet. He was an initial supporter of stalin, his position in govt was a product of nomenklatura under stalin. When kirov was eventually elected under politburo, he became critical of stalin, not happy with stalin’s boundless use of terror. He was openly critical within the party. Kirov also had a strong personality, possible contender to stalin. In the 17th party congress, they decided the secretary position wasnt needed anymore. But still kirov had plenty of supporters, POSSIBLY more than stalin even. So they put kirov on the same position as stalin, both as deputies This probably rocked stalin terribly so kirov was assassinated by stalin’s henchmen (if not planned by stalin himself, he definitely approved it/let it pass. This was confirmed by nikita khruschev long after stalin’s death) 3. Decree of 1st December stalin USED kirov’s murder as justification for the Great Terror, which took place over the next four years (despite knowing full well that. Claimed that kirov’s murder was done by a network of trotskyites, rounded up all the “conspirators” and executed them all in one fell swoop. Also in turn gives NKVD unlimited power to cut down all “enemies of state”. Stalin came to power in 1924. Now 10 yrs later in 1934 he had gained ultimate ideological control 4. Show trials getting rid of the old Bolsheviks The Stalinist leadership used Kirov’s murder as a pretext and justification for the Great Terror, which took place over the next four years. The murder was seen as evidence of a widespread conspiracy against the Soviet state and its leaders. There were enemies everywhere and they needed to be rooted out. Within a few weeks there was an extensive purge of the Leningrad party, Kirov’s power base. Thousands more, many outside the party, were soon accused of being Trotskyites involved in the plot to murder Kirov and other leading Communists. First show trial, Kamenev and Zinoviev were arrested and put on trial in January 1935. Although no direct evidence could be produced against them, they were found guilty and given prison sentences. It seems that few of those close to Stalin were demanding an extension of the terror at this point. But Stalin found out about communications between Trotsky and members of oppositionist groups in the party. He retaliated by sending out a Central Committee circular in June 1936 on the ‘terrorist activities of the Trotskyist counter-revolutionary bloc’. This contained the crucial words ‘the inalienable quality of every Bolshevik under present conditions should be the ability to recognise an enemy of the people no matter how well he may be masked’. This was the sign that old Bolsheviks were going to be ‘unmasked’. Zinoviev and Kamenev were pulled out of prison and in August 1936 were put on trial in the full glare of the public. With them were fourteen others who had previously been members of the oppositionist groups in the party. These show trials were elaborately staged events in which the state prosecutor, Vyshinsky, proved the accused guilty of spying for foreign powers, as well as of being part of a counter-revolutionary bloc involved in Kirov’s murder, with Stalin as the intended next victim. These executions were significant because they were the first executions of people who had belonged to the Central Committee. The line had been crossed and many more executions were to follow. A second show trial took place in January 1937 in which Karl Radek, a well-known Trotskyite, and Pyatakov, a deputy in the Commissariat of Heavy Industry, were the main defendants. Needless to say they confessed and were found guilty. The third and last great show trial was staged in March 1938. It was possibly the most dramatic because it involved Bukharin and he was able to make a more spirited defence of his actions. But in the end, he – along with twenty others, including old Bolsheviks like Rykov as well as the former head of the NKVD, Yagoda – confessed and was sentenced. Most were shot within a few hours, Bukharin and Rykov cursing Stalin as they die. Eval: The idea of a show trial was not new. It was used in 1928 in the Shakhty trial .It was an effective way to create an atmosphere of intimidation, a sense of danger and the feeling that there were enemies, spies and wreckers around. At the time, many accepted that such trials were genuine. So why did these tough and battle-hardened Bolsheviks confess? The most obvious answer is that they were worn down by torture and interrogation and this undoubtedly played a part. It is also clear that they agreed to confess as part of a deal in which their families would be spared. This is true of Bukharin, who wrote a last loving testament to his wife, and probably of Zinoviev and Kamenev. In the event, few of the family members escaped. 6. “Self interest of the members would keep them loyal to him”. Hundreds of thousands of engineers and skilled workers were recruited into the party. This was to foster a greater connection between stalin’s big hand and the people who were directly involved with the 5 year plan. (gotta make sure the smarties are on our side and dont overthrow us wink wink. What better way to do that than to give them a direct (albeit a lower-tier one) stake in our party? That way if they think of overthrowing us it would be self sabotage. 5. Yezhovschina (1937~1938.) Just after the first great show trial had ended in September 1936, Nicolai Yezhov replaced Yagoda as head of the NKVD (secret police). Yagoda was criticised for not finding enemies of the state quickly enough. This was a clear sign from Stalin that he wanted to advance the terror. Yezhov’s goal was to attack people’s needs. Food, specifically. This was enough to deter them from not opposing party. Robert service: “stalin had a quote-unquote gross personality disorder.” Could have been his georgian upbringing, emphasis on honour and status, hence purges were made into a prolonged, everpresent reality under his rule. All police organisations put under NKVD (later known as kgb)-> directly under stalin Had special military court (deal with “serious crimes” intentionally loose definition so that stalin can decide what counts. This was usually counterrevolutionary activity, can be as trivial or as serious as possible. Between 1934 and 1938 300k members were convicted of being enemies of the party Many of those executed were the first generation of revolutionaries who had participated in the revolution and the civil war By destroying these people, stalin removed everyone who knew anything about his rise to power The show trials were particularly important because they finally eliminated rivals like Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, who had been close to both lenin and trotsky The fact that they were convicted of treason allowed stalin to claim that he was the only communist leader to be trusted 6. Purging the party, encouraging surveillance and mutual reporting In the spring of 1937, Stalin made it clear that he thought traitors and spies had infiltrated the party at all levels in every locality encouraged lower-ranking party members to criticise and denounce those in higher positions. This resulted in a flood of accusations. Party members were ‘unmasked’ by colleagues for ‘being part of the Bukharin Right in the 1920s’ or ‘authorising concessions to the peasants in 1925’. more and more party members were dragged in. Some denounced fellow members in order to get their jobs, promotions (in that sense its a form of nomenklatura), or settle old scores, others to deflect criticism from themselves. Denunciations were not directed only from the bottom of the party towards the top. Party secretaries and higher officials were anxious to find the counterrevolutionaries and ‘fascist spies’ in their local party network, if only to show how loyal they were to the regime. So they denounced people below them. 7. Mass terror in society From spring the terror accelerated + spread into wider society Arrests of oppositionists increased dramatically July 1937, the Politburo passed a resolution condemning ‘AntiSoviet Elements’. This was elaborated by Yezhov in NKVD order 00447. He drew up an arrest list of over 250,000 of these ‘elements’(scientists, artists, writers and musicians, as well as managers and administrators) This purge was part of his consolidation of power At local level, nomenklatura, the purge of the managers and politicians, by replacing them with persons more loyal to stalin (but usually less qualified), many held meetings criticizing their managers and humiliating factory bosses The senior rank of soviet industry became scapegoats for economic problems, and were handed to the secret police After the first show trial, 250k russians were “involved in anti-communist conspiracy”. Many ordinary people collaborated with the secret police in rooting out spies and enemies of the government This was to the point where they betrayed friends and neighbours, thereby proving their loyalty to the party In 1937, more than 350k russians were executed and more than 430k russians were sent to prison camps encouraged to denounce saboteurs in the workplace, so the rest of the population did not escape either. In Let History Judge (1972), Roy Medvedev mentions that over 1000 were arrested in a single factory. Conquest contends, in The Great Terror: A Reassessment (1990, page 258), that thousands of peasants, factory workers, shop girls and office clerks were swept up in the purges, although he accepts that the main target was ‘officialdom, the intelligentsia’. Affected the urban and educated population between ages 30~45, in managerial and professional positions, much more than workers and peasants The great terror also discriminated on the basis of nationality (poles, latvians, romanians) Workmates, friends, husbands and wives, sons and daughters – all could find themselves arrested as “accomplices” to the accused. The victims of the terror increased exponentially. EVAL: The historian Chris Ward writes: ‘An avalanche of monstrous charges, nightmarish allegations, incredible scenarios and random arrests overwhelmed swathes of the population while terrified, vindictive or simple-minded apparatchiki [party officials] flung denunciations at all and sundry . . . [for example] Boris Numerov, a distinguished scientist, supposedly organised a ‘‘counter-revolutionary astronomers’ group’’ which engaged in wrecking, espionage and terror’ . Historians were particularly vulnerable and many were accused of leading terrorist groups. One leading Bolshevik mentioned at his trial that ‘arrests had begun among the historians’. EVAL: In practice, anybody could be arrested as an oppositionist. A quota system was applied to geographical areas and to public bodies. It went further than this: in July 1937, the proportion to be shot was fixed at 28 per cent, with the rest being sentenced to up to ten years’ hard labour – and this was before the oppositionists had actually been arrested! EVAL: A huge media campaign was started, encouraging ordinary people to criticise party officials, bureaucrats and managers – to seek out the ‘hidden enemies’. This harnessed popular dissatisfaction with officialdom (a LITERAL PRODUCT OF SOVIET BUREAUCRATIZATION UNDER STALIN, NOW BEING WEAPONIZED BY STALIN HIMSELF) and resulted in a huge number of denunciations and arrests. 8. Purging red army Stalin also used terror against the red army, which he did not trust because majority of the senior officers had been appointed by trotsky. The leaders of the army were tough and difficult to intimidate. Marshall Tukhachevsky was the hero of the Civil War, but during this period he had come into conflict with Stalin. Stalin’s purge of the army started with the secret trial of Tukhachevsky in june 1937 Confessions were obtained through torture, and in the following months, 34k soldiers were purged from the army ukhachevsky and other generals had confessions beaten out of them (Tukhachevsky’s written confession actually had blood stains on it) and were then executed. The NKVD then worked its way through the rest of the armed forces to devastating effect .That EVAL: Stalin should risk wiping out his best commanders when the prospect of war loomed is a powerful indication of how far the terror had gone. Economic consequences Purges in the gosplan eliminated skilled economic planners Purges of local factory managers swept away experienced and competent people It made effective economic management difficult The effects of terror on the gosplan meant that the 3rd five year plan was never published and the managers were forced to work with drafts The donbass region, which accounted for ¾ of russia’s coal production, were not able to maximise their production due to inaccurate information Between 1936~1938, more than a ¼ of those in mines were purged Coal production barely grew between 1936~1940 Stalin called a halt to the terror towards the end of 1938. By this time, Yezhov had been replaced by Beria. Arrests slowed down, although Central Committee members and army officers were purged well into 1939. The purges were destabilising Russian society. Administrative systems were falling apart with key personnel missing and this was having a negative impact on industrial production. Stalin blamed Yezhov and the NKVD for the excesses of the terror, which was probably true. What reasons have been put forward for the terror? In this section we look at Stalin’s personality and motives, and also at other reasons that have been put forward to explain the form the terror took. The vast majority of historians accept Stalin’s responsibility for the terror. He was at the centre of the decision-making process and cannot be absolved. However, some revisionists argue that focusing on Stalin alone has for too long provided simple interpretations when the real story is more complicated. 1. The role played by Stalin A number of historians argue that Stalin’s personality was the driving force behind the terror, and that without him there would have been no Great Terror in the form it took – for example, old Bolsheviks would not have been humiliated and executed. Stalin’s motives No one is suggesting that the purges were just a symptom of a dysfunctional personality. Many historians and commentators like Khrushchev believe that Stalin thought that he was acting in the interests of the party and the revolution. He thought that his removal or the reversal of his policies would be disastrous for the Soviet Union. – Stalin felt threatened by the growing opposition to him in the early 1930s. He reacted to this by eliminating all possible rivals so that no one could form an alternative government. – Stalin was determined to be in a position of absolute power: a) He wanted to bring the party under his total control so that they would carry out his policies and edicts without question. Keeping the party in a constant state of insecurity (who would be arrested or denounced next?) was a way of keeping control. This was particularly true of the nomenklatura around the Central Committee: it allowed Stalin to keep his lieutenants guessing about whom he would adopt as ‘his people’. b) He wanted control of the people; the terror crushed opposition and any critics. – By the late 1930s, Stalin was convinced that there was a good chance of war. He wanted to remove anybody who might oppose his foreign policy. He also did not want to allow anybody to slow down the pace of industrialisation because the Soviet Union would need weapons and armaments to fight the war. It was essential to make the revolution safe from external threats. Other reasons for the terror Revisionist historians and others have suggested a variety of other reasons for the scope of the terror and the way it escalated out of control. These do not exclude Stalin but see him and his lieutenants as reacting to situations, rather than as the protagonists setting everything in motion. They also see the terror as being generated ‘from below’. 2. Problems within the party The central party in Moscow was having real problems controlling the party in the regions and the localities. J. Arch Getty argues that on a local level political administration was marked by sloth and inertia. Also, edicts from the central party sometimes conflicted with other demands. local party often did not want to ‘find’ kulaks because they were valuable men in the community. In industrial towns, local party bosses wanted to reach their production targets and so did not want to purge specialists. Party leaders reacted to this in two ways: – They used coercive tactics, like the show trials, to create an atmosphere in which nobody in the party felt safe and everyone was therefore more likely to obey orders. – They encouraged the lower levels of the party to criticise those higher up. This led to a rush of accusations which got out of control and developed a momentum of their own. 3. Economic difficulties mid-1930s production figures were levelling off + the Five-Year Plans were falling behind schedule. There was a downturn in the Soviet economy after 1936 (technical problems, Stalin’s management of the economy and a bad harvest in that year). The leadership needed to find scapegoats (amongst managers as well as workers) for these economic failures. Eval: Roberta Manning has argued that difficulties were seen as being due to enemy sabotage and wrecking. Stalin wanted to shake up managers and economic administrators, so encouraged criticism from below – attempting to ‘mobilise the masses’. Workers were only too happy to identify managers and officials as the cause of their problems. What started as a genuine groundswell of grassroots criticism of officials then got out of control in the heady, whipped-up atmosphere of the Great Terror. This was tied in with the Stakhanovite campaign of 1936. The motive behind this was not only to encourage workers to be more productive but also to persuade would-be Stakhanovites to put pressure on their managers by demanding tools and materials to raise their production rates. Managers who did not respond were branded as wreckers by the workers. 4. Social instability The chaos of the Five-Year Plans -> a terribly unstable society. Mass urbanisation had created social tension and violence in the overcrowded cities which lacked basic facilities and services. There was a great deal of hostility in the cities and countryside towards the Communist Party and the government was worried about the loss of control in the ‘quicksand society’ (M. Lewin). The government resorted to the terror of the purges to stifle criticism of the leadership, to control people and to keep them working. The campaign encouraging people to criticise officials was intended to deflect criticism and antagonism from the government. 5. The position of the NKVD Some historians argue that the NKVD conducted the terror with such vigour because it was in the interests of the NKVD as an institution. Within the NKVD there were divisions and power struggles. Some units, especially in areas outside Moscow, operated their own fiefdoms, like a mafia, and used the terror to their own advantage. There may also have been a view that any slowdown after the rigours of enforced collectivisation and the First FiveYear Plan might make the NKVD appear less indispensable, but the terror would raise their profile and allow them to become the leading institution in the Soviet system. This is the argument of those who state that the NKVD was responsible for the murder of Kirov 6. The Gulag By condemning vast numbers of people to the Gulag, the terror provided slave labour to carry out dangerous work such as logging and gold-mining in inhospitable regions. Stalin needed the money that these industries earned from foreign exports to buy in Western technology. 7. External threats The prospect of war looked increasingly likely after Hitler became Chancellor of Germany. This increased enormously the pressure to develop an armaments industry based on heavy industry. Therefore an unwilling people, already suffering from the impact of the First Five-Year Plan, had to be pushed to even greater efforts. The terror was a mechanism to do this. Deutscher also sees the threat of war as a spur to Stalin to purge the opposition who might interfere with his war plans. ~~Past year questions!!!!!! (4) (ASK!!!) “By 1939, all this terror and political control effectively gave stalin full unopposed control over russia” How far do you agree? As late as June 1937, Stalin complained that “the centre doesn’t see everything… only a part and the rest is seen in localities. It sends people but doesn’t know these people 100% and you must check up on them Yes, removed opposition and effectively gave stalin full control over russia * Effects of show trials + the great purges -> on stalin’s grasp of society, economy and politics * Effects of nomenklatura + lenin’s enrolment on stalin’s grasp on society, economy and politics * Expansion of NKVD No, did not remove opposition, did not give stalin full control over russia * Peasants riots from 1938~1939 against collectivisation, man-made famine brought destruction and misery Passive resistance (i.e working slowly and listlessly, being rude, eating their own livestock) even from the peasants who did not riot * Inner party resistance to collectivisation and the resulting famine, and also to the 5 year plans * The great purges, mass terror & its continuation of the great purge as far into 1941 * Stakhanovite movement -> not everyone was supportive because it was hard to reach the quota because not enough resources -> brought about bribery and corruption, muddled the waters of communism * Foreign opposition (germany, and allied powers ) + other resistance from national minorities * Needed to purge red army too Eval: did it succeed in strengthening stalin’s hold by 1939? No. this is shown by Stalin’s own directive: he called a halt to the terror towards the end of 1938. By this time, Yezhov had been replaced by Beria. Arrests slowed down, although Central Committee members and army officers were purged well into 1939. The purges were destabilising Russian society. Administrative systems were falling apart with key personnel missing and this was having a negative impact on industrial production. It was economic self sabotage, qualified people were all dead and the third 5 year plan had to be pieced back together. Areas had to be repopulated. Stalin didnt even trust his own system of nomenklatura. Stalin blamed Yezhov and the NKVD for the excesses of the terror, which was probably true. In 1940, a hitman, on Stalin’s orders, murdered Trotsky. Now indeed virtually all of the old Bolsheviks had been wiped out. However, the purges continued in a much-reduced form into the Second World War. ‘The main reason for the purges was to remove Stalin’s rivals for power.’ How far do you agree? [30] (9389/43 October/November 2018) 9489/43 October/November 2022 ‘Stalin’s fear of opposition was the main cause of the Great Terror.’ Discuss this view. 9489/42 October/November 2023 ‘Stalin’s fear of being overthrown was the main reason for the purges.’ Assess this view. 9489/42 February/March 2021 Evaluate the causes of the Great Terror. 1. STALIN’S ROLE I. Personality habitual paranoia)!! As seen in: - his politicking during his rise to power, jumping ship always + how he clinched the top spot all while utilizing lenin’s doctrine, nomenklatura, lenin’s enrolment, populism - handling of the cold war (post post modernist view) Ruthlessness and disloyalty (anything to get ahead)!!! As seen in: Ii. Stalin’s own motives in various earlier trials (consolidation of power) - continuation of lenin’s ban on factionalism, except to very specifically different ends (against own party members) - For Ryutin, published a paper actively criticising stalin, specifically that “collectivisation is gonna derail the revolution because people in the soviet union just can’t cope with the burden of these policies”. Stalin worried that this would turn citizens against him and give strength to opposition Kirov’s murder and the ensuing decree of 10th december Perfect excuse to round up conspirators and “trotskyites” a.k.a anyone who disagreed EVAL: however, cannot necessarily say that stalin must have been acting in self interest. Talk about russia’s past instability, the fallout from previous revolutions, the need for stability after lenin’s passing. Stalin could have completely believed that this was for russia’s own good. 2. Economic difficulties (post 1930s and during 1930s) * Scissors crisis, problems with NEP * Grain procurement crisis in 1928 * Source of forced labour (labour camps) * * Fallout from collectivisation, also the reason for “dizzy with success” Intensive collectivization began during the winter of 1929–30. Stalin called upon the party to “liquidate the kulaks as a class” (December 27, 1929), and the Central Committee resolved that an “enormous majority” of the peasant households should be collectivized by 1933. Harsh measures—including land confiscations, arrests, and deportations to prison camps—were inflicted upon all peasants who resisted collectivization. By March 1930 more than one-half of the peasantry (a larger proportion in the agriculturally rich southwestern region of the Soviet Union) had been forced to join collective farms. But the peasants objected violently to abandoning their private farms. In many cases, before joining the kolkhozy they slaughtered their livestock and destroyed their equipment. The losses, as well as the animosity toward the Soviet regime, became so great that Stalin decided to slow down the collectivization process. On March 2, 1930, he published an article, “Dizzy from Success,” in which he shifted the blame to local officials, whom he characterized as overzealous in their duties. Immediately, many peasants left the kolkhozy. In March 1930 approximately 58 percent of the peasant households had been enrolled in kolkhozy; by June only about 24 percent remained. In the southwestern “black earth” region the figure dropped from 82 percent in March to 18 percent in May. In the fall of 1930 the drive was renewed at a slower pace, but with equal determination. The application of various administrative pressures—including punitive measures—resulted in the recollectivization of one-half of the peasants by 1931. By 1936 the government had collectivized almost all the peasantry. But in the process millions of those who had offered resistance had been deported to prison camps and removed from productive activity in agriculture. Furthermore, the absence of heavy agricultural machinery and of the horses and cattle that the peasants had killed seriously handicapped the new collective farms. Output fell, but the government, nevertheless, extracted the large amounts of agricultural products it needed to acquire the capital for industrial investment. This caused a major famine in the countryside (1932–33) and the deaths of millions of peasants. Despite these great costs, the forced collectivization achieved the final establishment of Soviet power in the countryside. Through collectivization agriculture was integrated with the rest of the state-controlled economy, and the state was supplied with the capital it required to transform the Soviet Union into a major industrial power. 1937 (Finally unassailable) Phase iv stalin’s FOREIGN POLICY (1929~1941) (EXAM PREDICTION!!!!!!!) Ussr and germany base relations - Treaty of rapallo Established by 1922 (during period of lenin) with treaty of rapallo Basically a treaty that looked at compensations for after WW1 and reopened formal diplomatic relations between germans and russians * A secret agreement signed in july 1922 authorized german army to carry out training for russian army * Interestingly enough they were outwardly not on good terms but for the sake of trade i guess they pulled through! - Treaty of berlin 1926 Done during the period of gustav stresemann in weimar republic (wanted to restore germany’s diplomatic position in europe) Reemphasised what was agreed upon in the rapallo treaty Stalin’s era Stalin’s first shift in policy Before 1929: more focused on socialism in one country (advanced industrialisation) but he realised that he needed foreign cooperation for that But by 1929 and onwards: there was a shift into spreading the revolution into china and other parts and added emphasis on foreign policy. Evaluation: why the policy shift? Well, stalin was a genuine believer in the revolution and for his rise to power he needed to demonstrate a great socialist russia. Once he had his grasp on it ofc he would turn towards international power Call it a top-down foreign policy shift Soviets and USA relations Americans opened up embassy in 1934 in moscow. Common enemy was japan Roosevelt-Litvinov pact was finalized Both stalin and USA worried about the rise of japan bc they were invading manchuria at this point The decree was seen as a good step to security against japanese or even german aggression This was mostly happening before hitler came into the picture (1933) Eval: why were they frightened of japanese aggression? It had previously clashed with russia’s own expansionism (russo japanese war, over the control of the manchurian ports). By 1934, both germany and japan had left the league. The league of nations was waiting for USSR to join so that the sphere of influence would shift. Popular Fronts in 1934 Stalin then scrapped the comintern goal of only working with socialist countries and shifted into working with “popular fronts” (the rise of fascist italy & nazi germany led to calls for antifascist solidarity. These beacons of antifascism were called popular fronts. They would set aside political differences and rivalries to provide united actions by liberals and the left.) Under stalin’s orders support for popular fronts became the official policy of the comintern in august 1935. Note: many of stalin’s policies in this period was based on how hitler was behaving at the time. Stalin was slow to respond to hitler’s rise (failed to respond to hitler’s abolishment of KPD, i.e a communist german party, did not take that as a hint that he might be on a warpath against communism) Soviet and France Non-aggression pact with france in 1932 -> became the basis of the franco soviet treaty of mutual assistance in 1935. France was equally scared of german’s aggression. But the weakness of the franco soviet treaty was that it was rather vague in what kind of circumstances it could be activated, and lacked clauses for military cooperation. Europeans agreed that it wouldnt hold up if there was a two-front war on germany. Soviet and Czechoslovakia (and france) There was a soviet-czechoslovakia pact signed And in this one there was a clause specifically that USSR would intervene if czechoslovakia was attacked by a third party (cough cough germany), provided the french stepped in (which they probably would because france had traditional policy in seeking allies in central europe and britain) Yay litanov (as the foreign minister) and yay Stalin (put due pressure on the french communist party to support the pact as well.) Stalin starts reconsidering…. Rearming of rhineland Right after ww1, under the treaty of versailles, germany had to reduce its military capabilities, and france and ____ occupied rhineland This pissed hitler off as a youth When he came in he promised to smash the treaty of versailles In 1936 hitler made german troops storm rhineland and re-arm rhineland (it had previously been sacked for weapons and stuff) France and britain was so scared >< they didnt do anything. As mentioned, Stalin’s NEW approach was collective security and popular fronts But a big screw-over to this was that hitler’s rearming of rhineland. Stalin saw that france did nothing to enforce the TOV, and felt worried about the legitimacy of the pact that they signed together and just Francesco franco launched a nationalist rebellion against the spanish republic (internal civil war) Italy and germany funded the chaos. Britain and france told everyone LETS JUST NOT DO ANYTHING. LETS STAY OUT OF IT. Stalin was like ummmmm wtf but we could allow italy and germany to rise even higher In the end soviet agents were sent in (without the direct permission of the spanish republic government but whatever) If the french and the british had been more involved in this effort, then this soviet reconnaissance would have saved spain from being lost A second shift in policies After that stalin’s policy shifted from sending soviet agents in and foreign intervention -> purposely draggginggggg the war out to slowly kill off the germans and italians. Soviet USSR was built to live through a long war but germany and italy was not. At the same time stalin was worried that rebellion elements would come into germany after soviet intervention in spain. That the agents who served would come back corrupted Hence many agents who served in the spanish civil war were killed On an international level, the sending out of soviet communist agents/secret spies actually worsened the reputation of soviets. So they stopped doing that. Nazi-soviet pact Ribbentrop and Stalin -> stunning bc it was signed by two bitter ideological enemies Hitler was committed to invading poland, wanted to be free to do that In order for him to have that freedom he would have to expect opposition from the british and the french (who were both supporting poland) By doing this soviet-nazi pact, hitler was tying stalin’s hands and making sure he would also get raw materials from russia Poles wanted to prevent the infiltration of communism into prague Hitler and stalin both had the common goal of destroying poland, so naturally stalin thought hitler was on his side Stalin trusted hitler, didnt expect hitler to turn around and attack him He thought he saw hitlers good side when hitler came to poland Was stalin consistent or inconsistent with his foreign policy? On one hand he was working with French for czechoslovakia But he was also working with british at one point (the pact) But he was also working with the germans for Poland Ussr’s relationship with germans went from cooperation -> violent ideological hostility -> a pact -> full on war. Comintern went from popular fronts -> alliance with the west -> diplomatic isolation -> membership of league of nations -> alliances with western powers -> total hostility against the west in august 1939 after munich conference -> 1941 alliance with the west Stalin’s consistent inconsistency. 1930s marks an obsession against defending socialism against capitalism which was “encircling the socialist union”, protecting it against socialist union Sum total, the inconsistency of stalin’s policy was CONSISTENT. It was strategic inconsistency, designed to sway to whatever russia’s goal was. Eval: But would this become too much? Would this weaken the ideological stronghold of the soviets? ~~Past year questions!!!!!! (4) 9489/42 May/June 2022 Assess the aims of Soviet foreign policy in the period 1924–41. 9489/41 May/June 2023 ‘Stalin’s main aim in foreign policy was to defend the Soviet Union from attack.’ Discuss. [30] Overall summary PYQ ~~OVERALL PAST YEAR QUESTIONS 9389/42 May/June 2019 The benefits of Stalin’s rule to the Soviet Union outweighed the harm.’ How far do you agree? 9389/41 October/November 2020 ‘We have created a truly communist state.’ [Stalin in 1940]. Evaluate this claim. 9389/42 October/November 2019 Analyse the reasons why there were so few limitations to Stalin’s power. 9389/41 May/June 2021 Assess the extent to which Stalin was successful in ‘building socialism in one country’. 9489/43 May/June 2024 Assess the reasons for Stalin’s policy of ‘building socialism in one country’.