Stalin, was he a man or a man or monster? The answer to this question depends entirely on how you look at it. On one hand, Stalin did an amazing job of bringing Russia up to speed with the rest of the world, improving industry and modernising Russia at an amazing rate using the five-year plans. On the other hand he was single handily responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in the purges, labour camps, show trials etc. But this was on face value; Stalin had done a lot of good for the country, but along with it a lot of bad. In the following coursework I hope to use the evidence I have to lay out all the wrongs against all the rights that Stalin did, and find out whether Stalin really was the monster everyone thinks he was.Study sources A, B and C.
Do these sources give similar or different impressions of Stalin? Explain your answer with references to the sources.Source A is clearly against Stalin. It is a French cartoon of him showing off piles of skulls saying, "Welcome to the USSR pyramids." Stalin is shown to be proud of what he has accomplished, comparing the deaths he had caused to some of the most famous, amazing architecture in the world. He was proud of the deaths he caused, similarly in source B he is shown to be proud of the dam that he organised. In source B he is wearing white, as if representing purity and kindness.
He is pictured as a relaxed man talking with workers, at the opening of a hydroelectric power station. This source was an official Soviet painting, obviously supporting Stalin and trying to make him look like he cares and listens to his people.Stalin wanted the image of being a caring man, willing to listen to what people wanted when in fact he was none of that. Both source A and B are very unreliable, both drawings by amazingly biased people. Source C on the other hand is a photo, showing Stalin shaking the hands of the wives of army officers.
On face value this looks like Stalin was genuinely congratulating the Russian womenfolk on supporting the countries army. But if you think about it, Stalin knew there were cameras and he knew he was in the public eye, therefore would have been playing the nice guy and using the army officer's wives as the perfect photo opportunity.Both sources A and B support Stalin, B being more reliable and unbiased, and source A being a biased foreigner's view of Stalin. All three sources show Stalin as a very proud man, source A sarcastically showing Stalin showing off piles of skulls. Source B shows him quite arrogant, standing as if he is lapping up every bit of respect he gets. Although Stalin's intentions of building up the country were good, he knew the consequences.
He was so wrapped up in his absolute power that he felt he was "higher" than the people he put to death, and he became detached from the real world until people were just objects to him. I don't believe that Stalin would have killed so many people if he had realised how bad it was and how much suffering they went through. Saying that, I think that Stalin also had paranoia as he killed and exiled everyone close to him, anyone who could have been competition was killed.Study Source D. Does this source provide any useful evidence about Stalin? Explain your answer.
Source D was written as a speech by Stalin in 1945 about his experiences in exile. He appears to remember what happened in great detail knowing peoples exact words even though it had happened about 30 years previously. The amount of detail he seems to remember seems very unlikely, and I think he was trying to make himself seem like the loving, caring man that he wanted people to see him as. This source is very unreliable because Stalin was very consciousness of his image and the way people viewed him, and he knew that he needed the support of people and that image was the way to get it.He used clever tactics to get support, for instance he said how uncaring the attitude of people in exile was, and said how he totally disagreed, making him seem much better than other people, then he compared these uncaring people to other leaders, his rivals and his enemies.
He said "Why should we be concerned about men? We can always make another man." I think Stalin believed this and was using it because he wanted to say what he thought to see how people reacted to it, without them thinking he was evil, but basically putting the idea in their heads for them to think about.Stalin proved that he was far more interested in making industry better than keeping people alive, so in truth, Stalin would represent the men "hurrying away to water the mare" whereas the people of Russia were Stalin in Stalin's story. Stalin reversed the roles to gain support of people.I don't think this source provides any useful information other than showing what a two faced man Stalin was, not only was he causing the deaths of millions of people he was also getting support from those same people. He was making them think he was a good man and the other leaders were to blame, this giving him reason to exile them too.
He ordered the deaths of anyone who said a bad word about him; anyone he didn't like was tortured into admitting crimes they never committed.
