Stalin's Launch of the Great Terror Essays

The Russian’s loss in the Russo-Japanese war was the another way that they got the public to turn against the provisional government and strengthen the communist revolt. The revolt got stronger and stronger until the Bolsheviks finally revolted and took down the Russian Provisional Government. Because of this, civil war erupted all over the country. At the end of this war, in 1920, the Bolsheviks set up the USSR, or Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, under control of Vladimir Lenin. When Lenin died, Stalin aggressively worked his way up until he was the leader of the USSR. In his control, Stalin set up a “5 year plan” to advance the Russian economy from just farming to also having industry. In this plan, he would also advance the military and “cleanse the country of villains” or those he saw as villains. To “cleanse the country”, Stalin would have unfair trials that would have many on trial at once. These were called his “Show Trials”. The majority, if not all, of these people were found guilty and sent for execution. They were executed all at once, and the executions were called the Purges. To advance the Russian economy, Stalin would work the farmers to death… literally. When the farmers revolted, Stalin stopped sending them food and even more died from starvation. On the last of the purges, 16 men were put on trial and accused of acts of terrorism towards Stalin and the Soviet government. Two of them were Stalin’s allies after Lenin’s death, Zinovyev and

"I believe in one thing only, the power of human will" said Stalin once. He certainly did have cause to believe in the power of a human's will as he experienced it in himself firsthand, having had extraordinary willpower and perseverance (He didn't call himself "Man of Steel" for nothing, folks), rising up from the lowly station of alcoholic's son in Georgia to one of the biggest monsters in human history, supposedly killing more than Hitler. Exactly how did he do this? Why? And how did his corruption reach such extents as to do all this for power?

The red terror started, as a result form an assassination attempt on Lenin from Fanni Kaplin in August 1918. From Lenin’s hospital bed he told the Cheka ‘prepare for terror’. There was no government that could argue against the work of the Cheka, they arrested and executed 800 people in St. Petersburg in 1918, the Cheka explained that they were ‘enemies of the state’ ‘enemies of the revolution’. The red terror lasted from September 1918 to October 1918. Lenin supported the Cheka and argued on their behalf. They were also supported by Gregory Zinoviev. War communism is were the Bolsheviks took control over the factories, mines, workshops and railways.The Bolsheviks took over the banks, private trade was not allowed, workers were forced to work in factories. The red army needed supplies to fight against the White army. The Bolsheviks were communists and they wanted to take control of industry and food production in Russia.

By imprisoning and executing members that opposed his views and were potential threats to his position, Stalin was able to keep control over the USSR by using fear. Hence, this raised up a new ruling elite that he found to be more dependable, as no one dared challenge him for fear of their life.

Once eliminating Trotsky, Stalin’s idea of, “socialism in our country,” inevitably meant that Russia needed strength. The productions in the USSR had almost reached pre-war levels by the mid-1920s, but the population of Russia had also increased by 20 million people. No matter, Stalin assured that maximum efforts and resources would be given to the expansion and strengthening of Russia herself rather than an effort to start a revolution elsewhere. This is explained in his famous 1931 speech, gaining power for himself. The people had nowhere else to turn to and needed a leader. Stalin was there and knew what to do to make the people interested in his ideas, thus acquired their trust and control. From these ideas, he created his first

During the second half of the 1920s, Joseph Stalin set the stage for gaining absolute power by employing police repression against opposition elements within the Communist Party. The machinery of coercion had previously been used only against opponents of Bolshevism, not against party members themselves. The first victims were Politburo members Leon Trotskii, Grigorii Zinov'ev, and Lev Kamenev, who were defeated and expelled from the party in late 1927. Stalin then turned against Nikolai Bukharin, who was denounced as a "right opposition," for opposing his policy of forced collectivization and rapid

The media also expresses that the imprisonment of the spies is the right thing to do. "Up with the banner of Bolshevik vigilance, as we are taught by the genius of the leader of the peoples, comrade Stalin! Let us root out all saboteurs, secret and open, and all those in sympathy with them"(83) As Sofia Petrovna reads the Timofeyev editorial, her boss, Timofeyev, is accusing Sofia for being a saboteur because she had sympathy for Natasha being fired, another so called saboteur. Stalin and his mass media propaganda persuade Timofeyev into taking part in the terror, resulting Timoteyev's belief that what Stalin is doing is the best for the Russian country. The terror stopped revolutions from forming because whatever groups Stalin didn't agree with he could simply arrest the members of that group. In Timofeyev's editorial Sofia is siding with a Natasha, Natasha is thought to be a revolutionary, because Natasha wasn't said to be loyal to the communist regime, and therefore Sofia is accused of siding with a sabotager or revolutionary.

This brutal campaign to eradicate the state of perceived enemies began in the summer of 1936, when Lev Kamenev, Grigorii Zinoviev, and fourteen others were convicted of organizing a “Trotskyite-Zinovievite terrorist center” and the group was blamed by the state for Sergei Kirov’s assassination in December 1934. This was soon followed by the purge of prominent leaders in the revolution such as Nikolai Bukharin. Others who were executed were: new party members, high ranking military officials, party secretaries, and other officials. However, even poor Soviet citizens who had nothing to do with plotting against the government were searched and arrested by the NKVD. In particular, those citizens who were previously accused of being counter-revolutionary were the main targets of the

As well as pragmatic reforms, the Bolsheviks also used terror in order to consolidate their power from 1917-1924. In December 1917, the Bolsheviks created a new secret police institution (the Cheka) to provide security, encourage class warfare and bring the army under tighter control. An attempt on Lenin’s life in August 1918 saw the Cheka take harsh reprisals against all suspected enemies in what became known as the ‘Red Terror’. The middle class, former nobility and the clergy were key targets. During the Civil War, the Kadet party was outlawed and its leaders arrested. Russia had become a one-party state. The Cheka also killed the Tsar and his family to prevent them being used as a symbolic rallying point for counter-revolution. Despite compromising Communist ideology, these ruthless measures were successful in suppressing internal opposition and thus consolidating Bolshevik power.

""As known as there is no one can save from criticism? Stalin was actually super self-conscious about the way he looked, having a shorter left arm and mark. So, Stalin was responsible for the death of at least 20 million people. He said it himself: “One death is a tragedy, one million is a statistic,” and Stalin sure left one. But in another side, his policies greatly improved the industry in Russia. He forced people for collectivism on the people, and many Russians considered collectivism as a bad thing, but it helped the Russian economy and industry too much. Stalin and most party leaders supported the NEP, believing it necessary to strengthen the Soviet Union and protect the revolution"."

The NKVD was relentless on seeking and punishing those who threatened the stability of the Soviet Union, per the direction and management of Stalin. While the majority of the NKVD activity included ordinary police work and public safety, there were also secret assassinations and political cover ups done by the secret police department. In a book written by Richard Pipes in 2001, he gave the statistics that, “...during 1937 and 1938, the NKVD detained 1,548,366 victims, of whom 681,692 were shot”. These shocking numbers were only addressing the arrests and deaths by the NKVD, which in the grand amount of total atrocities of the USSR during the Cold War. All of these deaths and arrests separated families and loved ones and created a country divided in fear and

Driven by oppression and exploitation of the working classes, he was totally dedicated to the cause, even ending friendships that obstructed the movement’s progress. He masterminded the Bolshevik takeover of power in Russia in 1917, known as the October Revolution.

Stalin used fear as a motivator and the Great Terror was no different. Stalin wanted to cleanse the system of certain groups of people like the kulaks and had no reservations about using his position to do this by whatever means necessary. In his article, “Objectives of the Great Terror,” Khlevnyuk discusses the causes and process that were used during

A purge was the systematic elimination of opponents by Stalin, The assassination of Kirov allowed Stalin to use it as an excuse to begin the purges. In 1932, Kirov had helped to defeat Stalin on an important issue concerning Mikhail Riutin, who had circulated a document that was

Joseph Stalin's Leadership Through World War Two Stalin (1927-1953) led the Soviet State through the challenges of World War II. Although the war was a terrible drain on the already impoverished and exhausted society, it resulted, paradoxically in strengthening the Soviet dictatorship.