Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin is still considered to be an extremely controversial nature. Opinions about its significance for the country were divided into two camps. Someone is ready to put the leader on a pedestal again, saying: "Stalin is not enough for you," and someone supports the words of M. S. Gorbachev: "Stalin is a man covered in blood." However, no one is indifferent. So what did this man do and did not do for Russia in the almost 30-year history of his leadership? We will consider the pros and cons of Stalin's rule in history in the most important events of 1924-1953.

Collectivization

"Land to the peasants, power to the people" is the main slogan of the communists. Everything should be common, and the earth is no exception. The kulaks as a class had to be eliminated and collective farms created to provide Soviet citizens with everything they needed. Collectivization is one of the stages on the way to industrialization.

The civil war and the revolution greatly undermined the work of the peasants. As a result, 1927 was a low-yielding year. This angered Stalin, because in the USSR there can be no shortage of anything. As a result, it was decided to start mass collectivization, that is, to make all agriculture collective. What did it lead to?

Pros and cons of Stalin's rule during the years of collectivization 1928-1937.

• The liquidation of the kulaks as a class. About 15 million people were exiled to Siberia, shot and evicted from their homes.
• The terrible famine of 1932-1933, the cities took the entire harvest of the peasants, as a result, according to various estimates, from 5 to 10 million people died from starvation, mainly children.
• In agriculture, the private sector was completely destroyed.
• Collectivization created the conditions for industrialization. The state received funds for the development of industry.
• The livestock population fell by 50%.
• Grain production fell by 3%.
• 93% of peasant farms were transferred to collective farms.
• Agricultural production is completely subordinated to the state.
• The mass exodus of peasants to the city.

Constitution of 1936

The main idea of ​​the constitution is freedom. The adopted constitution said that the state belongs to the workers and peasants. Councils and teams have been created. The united communist party must protect the worker. And everything would be fine, but now everything, absolutely everything within the state, belongs to the state, including the person.

Repression

Speaking of Stalin's rule, one cannot but mention the repressions. Until now, many justify his actions. Political crimes are the main reason for repression, or rather the reason. The political crime was expressed not only in deeds, but also in words, in a look, in relatives abroad, in expressing an opinion that was different from the ideology of communism. Fear acquired such proportions that for many years after Stalin's death it was terrible to pronounce his name.

We will consider the pros and cons of Stalin's rule below.

• Formation of a cult of personality.
• Manipulation of society by means of fear.
• Formation of a certain social consciousness.
• About 5 million people were convicted for political reasons.
• About 800 thousand people were sentenced to capital punishment.
• About 6.5 million people were expelled from Russia.
• There was practically no corruption in Russia.

in 2007, President V. V. Putin will say this:

We all know well that 1937 is considered the peak of repression, but it (this year 1937) was well prepared by previous years of cruelty. Suffice it to recall the executions of hostages during the Civil War, the destruction of entire estates, the clergy, the dispossession of the peasantry, the destruction of the Cossacks. Such tragedies have been repeated in the history of mankind more than once. And this always happened when ideals, attractive at first glance, but empty in reality, were placed above the main value - the value of human life, above human rights and freedoms. For our country, this is a special tragedy. Because the scale is enormous. After all, hundreds of thousands, millions of people were exterminated, exiled to camps, shot, tortured to death. Moreover, these are, as a rule, people with their own opinion. These are people who are not afraid to express it. These are the most efficient people. This is the color of the nation. And, of course, we still feel this tragedy for many years. Much needs to be done to ensure that this is never forgotten.

• The prisoners constituted a free labor force, at the expense of the victims of the labor of the repressed, such objects were created as: the White Sea-Baltic Canal, the Volga-Don Canal, the Nizhny Tagil Metallurgical Enterprise, about ten hydroelectric power stations, the Kola Railway, the Northern Railway, highways, etc.
• A number of Russian cities were built by Gulag prisoners: Komsomolsk-on-Amur, Vorkuta, Ukhta, Pechora, Nakhodka, Volzhsky and others.
• The prisoners also contributed to agriculture.
• Migration of thousands of Russian citizens, the best minds, the intelligentsia, the creative elite.

The Great Patriotic War

The pros and cons of Stalin's rule during the Second World War are very blurred. On the one hand, Stalin won the war, but on the other hand, the war was won by the people under the leadership of great commanders. You can argue endlessly. The whole country worked for the good of the front. Russia breathed in one big organism. The economy, industry, agriculture, transport, factories, culture - everything worked together in order to win the war. People rallied in one common grief. All these structures worked very clearly and harmoniously, and in this there is undoubtedly Russia entered the war, being "backward" in industrial terms in relation to Germany, and emerged from the war as a strong military power.

Russia lost 27 million people in the war, Germany - 7 million people. It turns out that for every German soldier, there are 4 Soviet soldiers killed. This is the price of victory. Russia was not ready for war, and this is a fact. Repressions of generals and officers, ignoring by Stalin of warnings about an attack from both intelligence officers and Churchill. As a result, in the first days of the war, hundreds of thousands of soldiers were taken prisoner and all Soviet aviation was destroyed! Can we assume that Russia won the war thanks to Stalin? Or is it despite his mistakes?

In the post-war period, totalitarianism reached its apogee. Control was established over all spheres of society. Repression after the war also continued. Fear shrouded the country until the death of the leader.

Industrialization

Already in 1947, the industry was completely restored, and after 10 years, economic well-being increased almost 2 times. None of the countries that suffered in the war, by this time even reached the pre-war level. Russia has become a great military power.

Pros and cons of the reign of Joseph Stalin:

• Under Stalin, more than 1,500 major industrial facilities, plants and factories were built. These are DneproGES, Uralmash, KhTZ, GAZ, ZIS, plants in Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk, Norilsk and Stalingrad.
• Nuclear missiles were created. Although there are still disputes about the role of Stalin in this area.
• For the benefit of industrialization, a lot of agricultural resources were thrown, which noticeably made life harder for the peasants.

After Stalin

Joseph Stalin died at the age of 73. The cause of death is still a mystery. Someone says that Khrushchev and his associates poisoned him, someone is inclined to believe that it was a heart attack. In any case, it is Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev who becomes the first secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. Over the 11 years of his leadership, Russia has already had other ups and downs.

Pros and cons of the rule of Stalin and Khrushchev in comparison:

• Stalin built socialism, Khrushchev destroyed it.
• Stalin staked on industrialization, Khrushchev on agriculture.
• Khrushchev destroyed the personality cult of Stalin, freed many innocent citizens from exile, but did not stop the repressions.

The pros and cons of Stalin's rule are still disputed by historians, society and witnesses of those years. The contradictory personality of the leader also makes his achievements contradictory. Now a lot of literature has been written and a lot of documentaries have been shot, but these are all theoretical disputes. It is impossible to prove the correctness of either side.

Results

The era of Stalin is unique. For 30 years, the country has experienced civil war, famine, repression, the terrible Great Patriotic War, post-war reconstruction. It is not for nothing that the people say "Khrushchev's thaw", and under Stalin they said "Hammer and sickle, death and hunger." After Stalin's death, fear slowly began to disappear from people. The pros and cons of Stalin's rule cannot be summarized briefly. Joseph Dzhugashvili had too much of a role in history.

The results of Stalin's rule, the pros and cons:

• The country's resources were national, free medicine, education, recreation, housing, cultural pastime (theaters, museums).
• Great educational reform, many schools and institutes built.
• Scientific progress, nuclear and missile areas of development.
• Victory in the Second World War and the rapid economic recovery of the country.
• Industry development, industrialization.
• The population decreased during the years of the civil war, revolution, famine, repression and the Second World War.
• The blind, undeniable ideology is still alive in the minds of the Soviet generation, its scale was so great.

The great era of Stalin is over, and everyone perceives the results of his leadership in different ways.

Introduction

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (Dzhugashvili) - (December 6, 1878 (according to the official version, December 9 (21), 1879), Gori, Tiflis province, Russian Empire - March 5, 1953, Volynskoye, Kuntsevsky district, Moscow region, RSFSR, USSR) - Russian revolutionary, Soviet political, state, military and party leader. Figure of the international communist and workers' movement, theorist and propagandist of Marxism-Leninism [~ 1], the actual leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics since the late 1920s. until his death in 1953 Stalin USSR industrialization war science

The era of Stalin is a period in the history of the USSR, when I.V. Stalin.

Stalin's period in power is marked by:

• On the one hand: forced industrialization of the country, massive labor and front-line heroism, victory in the Great Patriotic War, the transformation of the USSR into a superpower with significant scientific, industrial and military potential, an unprecedented increase in the geopolitical influence of the Soviet Union in the world, the establishment of pro-Soviet communist regimes in Eastern Europe and a number of countries in Southeast Asia;
• On the other hand: the establishment of a totalitarian dictatorial regime, mass repressions, sometimes directed against entire social strata and ethnic groups (for example, the deportation of Crimean Tatars, Chechens and Ingush, Balkars, Kalmyks, Koreans), forced collectivization, which led at an early stage to a sharp decline in rural economy and famine of 1932-1933, numerous human losses (as a result of wars, deportations, German occupation, famine and repression), the division of the world community into two warring camps and the beginning of the Cold War.

The Stalin era ended with the death of Stalin, but the consequences of his rule for Russia and other countries that were previously part of the USSR have not been eliminated in the 21st century (see, for example, the Problem of ownership of the southern Kuril Islands).

According to Trotsky's point of view, outlined in The Revolution Betrayed: What is the USSR and where is it going?, Stalin's Soviet Union was a deformed workers' state.

An analysis of the decisions of the Politburo shows that their main goal was to maximize the difference between output and consumption, which required mass coercion. The emergence of excess in the economy has led to the struggle of various administrative and regional interests for influence on the process of preparation and execution of political decisions. The competition of these interests partly smoothed out the destructive consequences of hypercentralization.

From the beginning of the 1930s, the collectivization of agriculture was carried out-- unification of all peasant farms into centralized collective farms. To a large extent, the elimination of property rights to land was a consequence of the solution of the "class question". In addition, according to the then prevailing economic views, large collective farms could work more efficiently due to the use of technology and the division of labor. Kulaks without trial or investigation were imprisoned in labor camps or exiled to remote regions of Siberia and the Far East.

Kulaks were imprisoned in labor camps or exiled to remote regions of Siberia and the Far East ( see Law on the Protection of the Property of State Enterprises, Collective Farms and Cooperatives and the Strengthening of Public Property).

Real wheat prices in foreign markets fell from $5-6 per bushel to less than $1.

Collectivization led to a decline in agriculture: according to official data, gross grain harvests fell from 733.3 million centners in 1928 to 696.7 million centners in 1931-32. The grain yield in 1932 was 5.7 centners per hectare against 8.2 centners per hectare in 1913. Gross agricultural output in 1928 was 124% compared to 1913, in 1929 - 121%, in 1930 - 117% , in 1931 - 114%, in 1932 - 107%, in 1933 - 101% Livestock production in 1933 was 65% of the 1913 level. But at the expense of the peasants, the collection of marketable grain, which was so necessary for the country for industrialization, increased by 20%.

Stalin's policy of industrialization of the USSR required more funds and equipment, obtained from the export of wheat and other goods abroad. Larger plans were set for the collective farms to hand over their agricultural products to the state. mass famine of 1932-33, according to historians who?, were the result of these grain procurement campaigns. The average standard of living of the population in rural areas until the death of Stalin did not reach the figures of 1929 (according to the USA).

Industrialization, which, due to obvious necessity, began with the creation of the basic branches of heavy industry, could not yet provide the market with the goods needed for the countryside. The supply of the city through the normal exchange of goods was disrupted, the tax in kind was replaced in 1924 with cash. A vicious circle arose: in order to restore the balance, it was necessary to accelerate industrialization, for this it was necessary to increase the influx of food, export products and labor from the countryside, and for this it was necessary to increase the production of bread, increase its marketability, create in the countryside a need for heavy industry products (machines ). The situation was complicated by the destruction during the revolution of the basis of commodity production of bread in pre-revolutionary Russia - large landlord farms, and a project was needed to create something to replace them.

This vicious circle could only be broken through a radical modernization of agriculture. Theoretically, there were three ways to do this. One is a new variant of the "Stolypin reform": support for the growing kulak, redistribution in its favor of the resources of the bulk of the middle peasants' farms, stratification of the village into big farmers and the proletariat. The second path is the liquidation of the centers of capitalist economy (the kulaks) and the formation of large mechanized collective farms. The third way - the gradual development of individual peasant farms with their cooperation at a "natural" pace - turned out to be too slow according to all calculations. After the disruption of grain procurements in 1927, when extraordinary measures had to be taken (fixed prices, market closures, and even repressions), and the even more catastrophic grain procurement campaign of 1928-1929. The issue had to be resolved urgently. Extraordinary measures during procurement in 1929, already perceived as something completely abnormal, caused about 1,300 riots. The way to create farming through the stratification of the peasantry was incompatible with the Soviet project for ideological reasons. A course was taken for collectivization. This also meant the liquidation of the kulaks.

The second cardinal question is the choice of the method of industrialization. The discussion about this was difficult and long, and its outcome predetermined the nature of the state and society. Not having, unlike Russia at the beginning of the century, foreign loans as an important source of funds, the USSR could only industrialize at the expense of internal resources. An influential group (member of the Politburo N. I. Bukharin, chairman of the Council of People's Commissars A. I. Rykov and chairman of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions M. P. Tomsky) defended the "sparing" option of gradual accumulation of funds through the continuation of the NEP. L. D. Trotsky is a forced version. JV Stalin at first stood on Bukharin's point of view, but after Trotsky's exclusion from the Central Committee of the party at the end of 1927, he changed his position to a diametrically opposite one. This led to a decisive victory for the proponents of forced industrialization.

The question of how much these achievements contributed to the victory in the Great Patriotic War remains a matter of debate. In Soviet times, the point of view was accepted that industrialization and pre-war rearmament played a decisive role.

For the years 1928-1940, according to CIA estimates, the average annual growth of the gross national product in the USSR was 6.1%, which was inferior to Japan, was comparable to the corresponding indicator in Germany and was significantly higher than the growth in the most developed capitalist countries experiencing the Great Depression. ". As a result of industrialization, in terms of industrial production, the USSR came out on top in Europe and second in the world, overtaking England, Germany, France and second only to the United States. The share of the USSR in world industrial production reached almost 10%. A particularly sharp leap was achieved in the development of metallurgy, power engineering, machine tool building, and the chemical industry. In fact, a number of new industries emerged: aluminum, aviation, automotive, bearings, tractor and tank building. One of the most important results of industrialization was the overcoming of technical backwardness and the assertion of the economic independence of the USSR.

As a result of the collectivization policy pursued by Stalin, which led to a decline in agriculture, the standard of living of the vast majority of rural residents dropped sharply, and malnutrition swept the entire territory of the USSR. In 1932, a mass famine broke out in the grain-producing regions of Ukraine, the North Caucasus, the Lower and Middle Volga, the Southern Urals, Western Siberia and Kazakhstan, which claimed the lives of 4 to 11 million people in two years. Despite the famine, the country's leadership continued to sell grain for export.

However, then the decline in agriculture was overcome. In 1935, the card system for providing the population with food was abolished, grain harvest in 1940 amounted to 95.6 million tons (against 86 million tons in 1913), raw cotton - 2.24 million tons 1913).

Despite rapid urbanization beginning in 1928, by the end of Stalin's life, the majority of the population still lived in rural areas, remote from large industrial centers. On the other hand, one of the results of industrialization was the formation of a party and labor elite. The average standard of living in the country underwent significant fluctuations (especially associated with the first five-year plan and the war), but in 1938 and 1952 it was higher or almost the same as in 1928.

Cards for bread, cereals and pasta were abolished from January 1, 1935, and for other (including non-food) goods from January 1, 1936. This was accompanied by an increase in wages in the industrial sector and an even greater increase in state ration prices for all types of goods. Commenting on the cancellation of the cards, Stalin uttered the catchphrase that later became: "Life has become better, life has become more fun."

Overall, per capita consumption rose by 22% between 1928 and 1938. Cards were re-introduced in July 1941. After the war and the famine (drought) of 1946, they were abolished in 1947, although many goods remained in short supply, in particular, in 1947 there was again a famine. In addition, on the eve of the abolition of cards, prices for rations were raised. The restoration of the economy allowed in 1948-1953. lower prices repeatedly. Price cuts significantly increased the standard of living of the Soviet people. In 1952, the cost of bread was 39% of the price of the end of 1947, milk - 72%, meat - 42%, sugar - 49%, butter - 37%. As noted at the 19th Congress of the CPSU, at the same time the price of bread rose by 28% in the USA, by 90% in England, in France - more than twice; the cost of meat in the US increased by 26%, in England - by 35%, in France - by 88%. If in 1948 real wages were on average 20% below the pre-war level, then in 1952 they already exceeded the pre-war level by 25%.

The plan for the war with Finland provided for the deployment of hostilities in three directions. The first of them was on the Karelian Isthmus, where it was supposed to lead a direct breakthrough of the Finnish defense line (which during the war was called the "Mannerheim Line") in the direction of Vyborg, and north of Lake Ladoga

The second direction was central Karelia, adjacent to that part of Finland, where its latitudinal extent was the smallest. It was supposed here, in the Suomussalmi-Raate Region, to cut the country's territory in two and enter the city of Oulu on the coast of the Gulf of Bothnia. The selected and well-equipped 44th division was intended for the parade in the city.

Finally, in order to prevent counterattacks and a possible landing of troops from the western allies of Finland from the side of the Barents Sea, it was planned to conduct military operations in Lapland.

The main direction was considered to be the direction to Vyborg - between Vuoksa and the coast of the Gulf of Finland. Here, after successfully breaking through the line of defense (or bypassing the line from the north), the Red Army got the opportunity to wage war on a territory convenient for the operation of tanks, which did not have serious long-term fortifications. Under such conditions, a significant advantage in manpower and an overwhelming advantage in technology could manifest itself in the most complete way. It was supposed, after breaking through the fortifications, to carry out an offensive on Helsinki and achieve a complete cessation of resistance. In parallel, the actions of the Baltic Fleet and access to the border of Norway in the Arctic were planned.

The Western powers are sending military missions to the USSR to negotiate a military alliance. However, the negotiations are unsuccessful and come to a standstill, despite the proposal of the USSR on April 17, 1939 to create a united front of mutual assistance between Great Britain, France and the USSR. According to Churchill, “an obstacle to the conclusion of ... an agreement was the horror that ... the border states experienced before Soviet help in the form of Soviet armies ... Poland, Romania, Finland and the three Baltic states did not know what they were more afraid of - German aggression or Russian salvation ... even now [in 1948] there can be no doubt that Britain and France should have accepted Russia's proposal and proclaimed a tripartite alliance.

By that time, the threat of isolation of the USSR had become even more real. The negotiations with Britain and France that began in 1939 were sluggish and clearly reached a dead end. It became known that back in June the Minister of Foreign Trade of England made a proposal to the representatives of Germany on the settlement of economic and political relations. Moreover, during the secret negotiations that were held in London, the delimitation of spheres of influence between England and Germany, plans to capture new and exploit existing world markets, including the “markets” of Russia, China and a number of other countries, were discussed.

Faced with the threat of almost complete foreign policy isolation in May 1939, Joseph Stalin replaces People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Maxim Litvinov with Vyacheslav Molotov. According to Churchill, "Russia's security required a completely different foreign policy, and it was necessary to find a new spokesman for it." Although Molotov, even before that, being the chairman of the government, had been conducting all negotiations with Germany since 1939, in the West this circumstance, as well as the course pursued by the new people's commissar, is perceived as a turn of the USSR towards Germany.

In August 1939, the Non-Aggression Treaty between the USSR and Germany was signed in Moscow, as well as secret annexes to it. The Soviet leadership becomes aware of the upcoming German invasion of Poland, Stalin approves the division of Poland between the USSR and Germany approximately along the Curzon line - the border between Russia and Poland, which was proposed when establishing new dividing lines following the results of the First World War. In the event of a German-Polish war, the Soviet Union should include the territories of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus, which became part of Poland as a result of the Soviet-Polish war of 1920; Latvia and Estonia, which were part of Russia until 1917, are also included in the sphere of Soviet interests.

• On September 1, 1939, Germany staged a provocation and invaded Poland. In connection with the obligations assumed, war on Germany is declared by Great Britain (and some of its dominions) and France. The Second World War begins. September 17 Soviet troops enter Polish territory.
• On September 28, the USSR and Germany sign the German-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Border. In accordance with the secret appendix to it, the border of spheres of influence has been changed - Germany received the eastern part of the Warsaw and Lublin voivodeships of former Poland, and Lithuania was included in the sphere of influence of the USSR (with the exception of a small district with a center in the city of Suwalki).

Later, already during the Second World War (during 1939 - the first half of 1941), Germany withdraws France from the war, occupies Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg, Denmark, Norway, Yugoslavia, together with Italy - Greece, organizes submarine and air war with Great Britain, sends an expeditionary force to North Africa, mobilizes Finland, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria among its allies, and on June 22, 1941 begins the invasion of the USSR.

On June 22, 1941, at 4:00 a.m., Reich Foreign Minister Ribbentrop handed the Soviet Ambassador in Berlin Dekanozov a note declaring war and three annexes to it: against Germany and National Socialism", "Report of the German Foreign Ministry on the Propaganda and Political Agitation of the Soviet Government", "Report of the High Command of the German Army to the German Government on the Concentration of Soviet Troops against Germany". In the early morning of June 22, 1941, after artillery and aviation training, German troops crossed the border of the USSR. After that, at 5:30 am, German Ambassador to the USSR V. Schulenburg appeared before the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR V. M. Molotov and made a statement, the content of which was that the Soviet government was pursuing a subversive policy in Germany and in the occupied countries, pursued a foreign policy directed against Germany, and "concentrated all its troops on the German border in full combat readiness." The statement ended with the following words: "The Führer therefore ordered the German armed forces to confront this threat with all the means at their disposal." Along with the note, he handed over a set of documents identical to those that Ribbentrop had handed to Dekanozov. On the same day, Italy and Romania declared war on the USSR; Slovakia -- 23 June.

On the same day, the Romanian and German troops crossed the Prut, and also tried to force the Danube, but the Soviet troops did not let them do this and even captured bridgeheads on Romanian territory. However, in July - September 1941, Romanian troops, with the support of German troops, occupied all of Bessarabia, Bukovina and the interfluve of the Dniester and the Southern Bug (for more details, see: Border battles in Moldova, Romania in World War II).

On June 22, at 12 noon, Molotov made an official address to the citizens of the USSR on the radio, announcing the German attack on the USSR and announcing the start of a Patriotic War.

In accordance with the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of June 22, 1941, from June 23, the mobilization of 14 ages (born 1905-1918) in 14 military districts out of 17 was announced. In the other three districts - Transbaikal, Central Asian and Far Eastern - - mobilization was announced a month later by a special decision of the government in a covert way as "large training camps".

On June 23, the Headquarters of the High Command was created (since August 8, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command). On June 30, the State Defense Committee (GKO) was created. Since June, the people's militia began to form. JV Stalin on August 8 became the Supreme Commander-in-Chief.

Finland did not allow the Germans to strike directly from their territory, and the German units in Petsamo and Salla were forced to refrain from crossing the border. There were episodic skirmishes between Soviet and Finnish border guards, but in general, a calm situation remained on the Soviet-Finnish border. However, starting on 22 June, German Luftwaffe bombers began using Finnish airfields as a refueling base before returning to Germany. On June 23, Molotov summoned the Finnish ambassador to him. Molotov demanded from Finland a clear definition of its position in relation to the USSR, but the Finnish ambassador refrained from commenting on Finland's actions. On June 24, the Commander-in-Chief of the German Ground Forces sent an instruction to the representative of the German command at the headquarters of the Finnish army, which stated that Finland should prepare for the start of the operation east of Lake Ladoga. In the early morning of June 25, the Soviet command decided to launch a massive air strike on 18 Finnish airfields using about 460 aircraft. On June 25, in response to the large-scale air raids of the USSR on the cities of Southern and Central Finland, including Helsinki and Turku, as well as the fire of Soviet infantry and artillery on the state border, Finland announced that it was again at war with the USSR. During July - August 1941, the Finnish army, in the course of a series of operations, occupied all the territories that had ceded to the USSR following the results of the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940.

Hungary did not immediately take part in the attack on the USSR, and Hitler did not demand direct assistance from Hungary. However, the Hungarian ruling circles urged the need for Hungary to enter the war in order to prevent Hitler from resolving the territorial dispute over Transylvania in favor of Romania. On June 26, 1941, the Soviet Air Force allegedly bombed Kosice, but there is an opinion that it was a German provocation that gave Hungary a casus belli (formal reason) to enter the war. Hungary declared war on the USSR on June 27, 1941. On July 1, 1941, at the direction of Germany, the Hungarian Carpathian Group of Forces attacked the Soviet 12th Army. Attached to the 17th German Army, the Carpathian group advanced far into the southern part of the USSR. In the autumn of 1941, the so-called Blue Division of Spanish volunteers also began hostilities on the side of Germany.

On August 10, the State Defense Committee issued a decree on the mobilization of those liable for military service born in 1890-1904 and conscripts born in 1922-1923 in the territory of the Kirovograd, Nikolaev, Dnepropetrovsk regions and areas west of Lyudinovo - Bryansk - Sevsk, Oryol region. On August 15, this mobilization was extended to the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, on August 20 to the Zaporozhye region, on September 8 to a number of districts of the Oryol and Kursk regions, and on October 16 to Moscow and the Moscow region. In general, by the end of 1941, over 14 million people were mobilized.

Meanwhile, German troops seized the strategic initiative and air supremacy and inflicted defeats on the Soviet troops in border battles.

Based on incorrect data on the losses of the Wehrmacht during the winter offensive of the Red Army, the Supreme Command of the USSR in the summer-autumn campaign of 1942 set an impossible task for the troops: to completely defeat the enemy and liberate the entire territory of the country. The main military events took place in the southwestern direction: the defeat of the Crimean Front, the catastrophe in the Kharkov operation (May 12 - 25), the Voronezh-Voroshilovgrad strategic defensive operation (June 28 - July 24), the Stalingrad strategic defensive operation (July 17 - November 18), North Caucasian strategic defensive operation (July 25 - December 31). The enemy advanced 500-650 km, went to the Volga, took possession of part of the passes of the Main Caucasian Range.

A number of major operations took place in the central direction: the Rzhev-Sychev operation (July 30 - August 23), which merged with the counterattack of the troops of the Western Front in the Sukhinichi, Kozelsk region (August 22 - 29), a total of 228,232 people were lost; as well as in the northwestern direction: the Luban offensive operation (January 7 - April 30), merged with the operation to withdraw the 2nd shock army from the encirclement (May 13 - July 10), which was surrounded as a result of the first operation; total losses -- 403,118 people .

For the German army, the situation also began to take a menacing turn: although its losses continued to be significantly lower than the Soviet ones, the weaker German war economy did not allow the replacement of lost aircraft and tanks at the same speed as the opposite side did, and the extremely inefficient use of manpower in the army did not allow to replenish the divisions operating in the East to the required extent, which led to the transition of a number of divisions to a six-battalion staff (from a nine-battalion one); the personnel of combat companies in the Stalingrad direction was reduced to 27 people (out of 180 in the state). In addition, as a result of operations in the South of Russia, the already very long eastern front of the Germans was significantly lengthened, and the German units themselves were no longer enough to create the necessary defensive densities. Significant sections of the front were occupied by the troops of Germany's allies - the Romanian 3rd and the emerging 4th armies, the 8th Italian and 2nd Hungarian armies. It was these armies that turned out to be the Wehrmacht's Achilles' heel in the autumn-winter campaign that followed soon after.

On July 3, 1941, Stalin addressed the people with the slogan “Everything for the front! Everything for the victory!”; By the summer of 1942 (in less than 1 year), the transfer of the USSR economy to a military footing was completed.

With the outbreak of war in the USSR, a mass evacuation of the population, productive forces, institutions and material resources began. A significant number of enterprises were evacuated to the eastern regions of the country (about 2,600 in the second half of 1941 alone), and 2.3 million head of cattle were taken out. In the first half of 1942, 10 thousand aircraft, 11 thousand tanks, 54 thousand guns were produced. In the second half of the year, their output increased by more than 1.5 times. In total, in 1942, the USSR produced small arms of all types (excluding revolvers and pistols) - 5.91 million units, guns and mortars of all types and calibers (excluding aviation, naval and tank / self-propelled guns) - 287.0 thousand pieces, tanks and self-propelled guns of all types - 24.5 thousand pieces, aircraft of all types - 25.4 thousand pieces, including combat aircraft - 21.7 thousand pieces. A significant amount of military equipment was also received under Lend-Lease.

As a result of agreements between the USSR, Great Britain and the USA in 1941-1942, the core of the anti-Hitler coalition was formed.

The Yalta Conference of the leaders of the USA, USSR and Great Britain was of great historical significance. It was one of the largest international wartime conferences, an important milestone in the cooperation of the powers of the anti-Hitler coalition in waging war against a common enemy. The adoption of agreed decisions at the conference once again showed the possibility of cooperation between states with different social systems. It was one of the last conferences of the pre-atomic era.

The bipolar world created in Yalta and the division of Europe into East and west survived for more than 40 years, until the end of the 1980s.

On the occasion of the 24th anniversary of the creation of the Red Army, Joseph Stalin points out the inadmissibility of comparing the German people with the regime of Nazi Germany:

“It can be said with all certainty that this war will lead either to fragmentation or to the complete destruction of the Hitlerite clique. Ridiculous are the attempts to identify the entire German people and the German state with this clique. The experience of history says that the Hitlers come and go, but the German people, and the German state, remain. The strength of the Red Army lies in the fact that it does not know racial hatred, which is the source of Germany's weakness ... All freedom-loving peoples oppose National Socialist Germany ... We are at war with a German soldier not because he is German, but because he fulfills an order to enslave our people"

At the same time, human losses did not end with the war, in which they amounted to about 27 million. Only the famine of 1946-1947 claimed the lives of from 0.8 to two million people.

In the shortest possible time, the national economy, transport, housing stock, and destroyed settlements in the former occupied territory were restored.

The state security agencies with harsh measures suppressed the nationalist movements that were actively manifesting themselves in the territory of the Baltic States, Western Ukraine.

Entire scientific areas, such as genetics and cybernetics, were declared bourgeois and banned, which slowed down the development of these areas of science in the USSR for decades. According to historians, many scientists, for example, academician Nikolai Vavilov and other most influential anti-Lysenkoists, were repressed with the direct participation of Stalin.

The first Soviet computer M-1 was built in May-August 1948, but computers continued to be created further, despite the persecution of cybernetics. The Russian genetic school, which was considered one of the best in the world, was completely destroyed. Under Stalin, government support was given to areas that were sharply condemned in the post-Stalin era (in particular, the so-called "Lysenkoism" in biology).

The development of Soviet natural sciences (except biology) and technology under Stalin can be described as a takeoff. The established network of fundamental and applied research institutes, design bureaus and university laboratories, as well as prison camp design bureaus, covered the entire front of research. Such names as the physicists Kurchatov, Landau, Tamm, the mathematician Keldysh, the creator of space technology Korolev, the aircraft designer Tupolev are known all over the world. In the post-war period, based on the obvious military needs, the greatest attention was paid to nuclear physics.

According to Yu.A., who communicated with Stalin, Zhdanov, “the decision to build Moscow State University was supplemented by a set of measures to improve all universities, primarily in cities affected by the war. Universities were given large buildings in Minsk, Voronezh, Kharkov. Universities of a number of Union republics began to actively create and develop.

History of Russia from ancient times to the end of the 20th century Nikolaev Igor Mikhailovich

Culture of the Stalin era (1928–1953)

From the end of the 20s, the dictatorship of Stalin was established in the country, who, having got rid of the opposition and curtailed the NEP, began to implement Lenin's plan for building socialism - "industrialization, collectivization and cultural revolution." In the process of these transformations, many traditions of Russian culture were destroyed. State control over culture assumed a total character. New structures were added to the existing ones that carried out unification in the cultural sphere (the All-Union Committee for Higher Education, the Committee for the Arts, the All-Union Committee for Radio Broadcasting, etc.). During the years of the first five-year plans, funding for education and culture was carried out according to the residual principle. Budget subsidies were primarily received by those branches of science, the results of research in which brought practical benefits in the shortest possible time. The congresses and conferences of the intelligentsia that existed in the 1920s gradually disappeared. In 1933 the Academy of Sciences of the USSR was subordinated to the government. The content of the social sciences was completely determined by the guidelines of the "Short Course in the History of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks" published in 1938. All the main questions of culture were decided personally by Stalin and the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. When scientists defended a position that was not similar to the "general line of the party", they were subjected to repression. Thus, prominent Russian economists N.D. Kondratiev and A.V. Chayanov for daring to insist on continuing the New Economic Policy.

Education . In 1931, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks adopted another resolution "On universal compulsory primary education" for children aged 8-10. By 1934, 28,300 schools were operating in the RSFSR, 98% of children were enrolled in studies. By 1939, the literacy rate for the population of all ages had risen to 89%. Soviet statistics included in this percentage all those who knew how to sign and read in syllables. Along with schools of the second stage, where it was possible to get a secondary education, factory schools (FZU) and schools for peasant youth (ShKM) were created. Uniform textbooks were issued for all subjects. A wide network of evening schools, circles and courses operated in the country.

In the field of higher education, the destruction of the pre-revolutionary intelligentsia continued, in the literal sense of the word. After the Shakhty case, the cases of the Industrial and Peasant parties, the Allied Bureau of the Mensheviks, tens of thousands of specialists in all branches of knowledge were shot or perished in the camps. Their places were taken by young, politically savvy "nominees" who underwent accelerated training. The system of such training began to take shape in the 1930s. The total number of engineering, technical, agricultural, medical and pedagogical universities in the RSFSR increased from 90 in 1928 to 481 in 1940. Financing of some universities was transferred to the branch people's commissariats.

During the years of collectivization, the Orthodox Church was finally destroyed. Tens of thousands of churches in the villages and villages of Russia were destroyed or turned into clubs and warehouses. Many priests ended up in camps. Those who remained at large were taken under control by the NKVD.

Art culture . By the mid-1930s, most creative workers not only accepted the new social system, but also actively praised it in their works. In order to facilitate the control of party bodies over the activities of the creative intelligentsia, in 1925 the process of merging small associations was initiated. For example, the Federation of Soviet Writers included VAPP, Kuznitsa, Pereval, LEF, and others. In 1932, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks decided to create a single writers' organization, naturally, under party control. Similar alliances were later created in other areas of art. In 1934, at the First Congress of Soviet Writers, "socialist realism" was proclaimed the main method of creating creative works. Guided by this method, writers, artists, filmmakers, in fact, had to address only the topics indicated by the party and show not what was in reality, but what should ideally exist. The leading themes of the literature of the 1930s were revolution, collectivization, industrialization and the fight against "enemies of the people". The most notable works of this time were the novels “The Life of Klim Samgin” by M. Gorky, “Quiet Flows the Don” by M.A. Sholokhova, “How the steel was tempered” by N.A. Ostrovsky, published in mass editions. The works of A.A. Akhmatova, B.L. Pasternak, M.A. Bulgakov, M.M. Zoshchenko, I. Il'f and E. Petrova, included in the classical heritage of Russian literature, had a much smaller volume of distribution.

Since the end of the 1920s, Soviet dramaturgy has firmly established itself in the repertoire of theaters (“A Man with a Gun” by N.F. Pogodin, “Optimistic Tragedy” by V.V. Vishnevsky, etc.). Particular attention on the part of party organs and Stalin personally, who watched all the films produced, was given to cinema. New cinematographic universities were opened, mass construction of cinemas was carried out, and traveling screenings were organized. In 1931, the first Soviet sound film "Start in Life" appeared. The musical life of the country is associated with the names of S.S. Prokofiev, D.D. Shostakovich, A.I. Khachaturian, T.N. Khrennikova, I.O. Dunayevsky. Large ensembles were created - the Big State Symphony Orchestra, philharmonic orchestras. In 1932 the Union of Composers of the USSR was formed. In the same year, republican unions of artists and the Union of Soviet Architects were created. Within these unions there was a constant struggle against some "ism" in art. So, in 1935-1937. a campaign was held to “overcome formalism and naturalism”, during which persons objectionable to the leadership were purged from the ranks of creative organizations. During the above campaign, composer D.D. Shostakovich, artist A.V. Lentulov, film director S.M. Eisenstein, poet B.L. Pasternak and others. During the years of the "great terror" more than 600 Soviet writers were repressed, among them B.A. Pilnyak, O.E. Mandelstam. The writers who remained at large were forced to hide the manuscripts of their works (the novel The Master and Margarita by M.A. Bulgakov was published only in 1966, and The Requiem by A.A. Akhmatova - in 1987). The cultural heritage of the past was also subjected to "cleansing". In the 1930s, the Sukharev Tower, the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, the Miracle Monastery, the Red Gate and many other architectural monuments were destroyed in Moscow.

The Great Patriotic War brought great changes to the state ideology. They were reflected in the attitude of the Stalinist government towards culture. The Soviet people, having risen to defend their homeland, experienced an unprecedented upsurge of patriotic feelings that pushed the postulates of Marxism-Leninism into the background. These conditions led to a weakening of the ideological pressure on the creative intelligentsia. The main requirement of censorship was the obligatory patriotic sounding of works of art. In connection with the increase in defense spending, funding for culture has sharply decreased. In the first months of the war, a mass evacuation of academic and research institutes, large book collections, museum collections, and film studio equipment was carried out. The leadership of creative unions moved to remote areas of the country. During the war years, the subject of scientific research took on an even more functional character - the main goal was to meet the needs of the front. Scientists were required to develop modern military equipment, to ensure the discovery of new minerals. In 1941, the Commission for the Mobilization of the Resources of the Urals, Western Siberia and Kazakhstan was established, headed by Academician A.A. Baikov, who coordinated the work of 60 scientific and industrial enterprises. In 1943, a special laboratory for the fission of the uranium nucleus was resumed in Moscow, headed by I.V. Kurchatov. The topics of scientific works in social disciplines were also determined by the conditions of the war. In historical studies, monographs about the glorious pages of Russia's military past (Battle on the Ice, the Battle of Poltava, etc.) came to the fore.

Changes also took place in the system of public education, which suffered great material losses. From the first months of the war, boarding schools for orphaned children began to be created. Most of the time older students were engaged in production work, compulsory military training was introduced in schools. In 1941, admission to universities was reduced by 41%, the terms of study in them were cut to three years.

Soviet writers from the first days of the war became correspondents for army newspapers. By the content of their works, they tried to raise the morale of Soviet soldiers and officers. During these years, many talented works on a military theme were written (“Leningrad Poem” by O.F. Berggolts, “Pulkovo Meridian” by V.M. Inber, “Days and Nights” by K.M. Simonov, “Vasily Terkin” by A.T. Tvardovsky and others). The theater stages were also filled with military-themed plays. The performances “Invasion” by L.M. Leonov, "Russian people" K.M. Simonova, "Front" E.A. Korneichuk. Front-line theaters and propaganda and concert groups were created to travel to combat positions and hospitals. During the war years, the importance of documentary films and newsreels increased. Over 4 years, more than 500 newsreels and 34 full-length feature films were created. Among them are “Secretary of the District Committee”, “Two Soldiers”, “She Defends the Homeland”, “At 6 pm after the War”, “Wait for Me”, etc. In the fine arts, as in the years of the Civil War, preference was given to the propaganda poster . The artists I.M. Toidze, Kukryniksy and others. Artistic canvases on the themes of the front and rear were created by A.A. Plastov, G.G. Ryazhsky, S.V. Gerasimov.

During the war years, Soviet culture suffered huge losses. About 80,000 schools were destroyed, 430 museums and 44,000 libraries were plundered, architectural monuments of ancient Russian cities suffered from bombing. The human losses were irreplaceable.

To eliminate the consequences of the war and to strengthen control over the development of culture in the Union republics, special committees for cultural and educational institutions were created. In 1953 they were merged into the Ministry of Culture. In 1946, the Ministry of Higher Education was established, and in 1950, the Department of Science and Higher Education under the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. "Released" during the war years, Soviet culture was again taken under strict party and state control.

Particular attention in the second half of the 1940s was given to new branches of the natural sciences involved in military production. The Institute of Fine Mechanics and Computer Engineering, the Institute of Radio Engineering and Electronics, the Institute of Atomic Energy, the Institute of Nuclear Problems, etc. were opened. In 1949, the first test of the Soviet atomic bomb was successfully passed. During the years of the IV Five-Year Plan (1945-1950), compulsory seven-year education was restored, and the network of educational and cultural institutions was expanded compared to 1941. Much has been done to develop evening and correspondence education.

But the main efforts of the Stalinist leadership were aimed at solving ideological problems. This direction was headed by the Secretary of the Central Committee A.A. Zhdanov. He initiated discussions on certain branches of science, which led to a total purge of dissidents. In 1947 there was a discussion on philosophy, in 1950 on questions of linguistics, in 1951 on problems of political economy. Patriotism, revived during the war years, began to assume ugly forms of great-power chauvinism due to party dictates. Everything Russian was declared the best, and foreign was completely rejected. Thus, many major discoveries made by foreign scientists in the field of physics, quantum mechanics, chemistry, and cybernetics were rejected. Genetics and molecular biology were declared "bourgeois pseudosciences" and banned. The attack on artistic culture, organized by Zhdanov, began in 1946. A series of resolutions was adopted (“On the magazines Zvezda and Leningrad”, “On the repertoire of drama theaters”, etc.), accusing artists of apoliticality and lack of ideas, of propaganda of bourgeois ideology. The writers A.A. Akhmatova, M.M. Zoshchenko, composers V.I. Muradeli, D.D. Shostakovich. The creative workers who fell into disgrace were not able to publish their works, they were expelled from trade unions, even attracted under criminal articles. In 1949–1950 in all creative teams, elaborative campaigns were carried out to combat cosmopolitanism, directed primarily against cultural figures of Jewish nationality. The tightening of ideological pressure on art has led both to a reduction in the number of creative works and to a sharp decline in their quality level. For example, in 1945, 45 feature films were released, and in 1951 - only 9. The words of M.A. Sholokhov, uttered by him at the II Congress of Soviet Writers in December 1954: "... the gray stream of colorless mediocre literature remains our disaster." These words of the writer can be safely attributed to other areas of official art.

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We stand for peace and uphold the cause of peace.
/AND. Stalin/

Stalin (real name - Dzhugashvili) Iosif Vissarionovich, one of the leading figures of the Communist Party, the Soviet state, the international communist and workers' movement, a prominent theorist and propagandist of Marxism-Leninism. Born in the family of a handicraft shoemaker. In 1894 he graduated from the Gori Theological School and entered the Tbilisi Orthodox Seminary. Under the influence of Russian Marxists who lived in Transcaucasia, he joined the revolutionary movement; in an illegal circle he studied the works of K. Marx, F. Engels, V. I. Lenin, G. V. Plekhanov. Since 1898 a member of the CPSU. Being in a social democratic group "Mesame-dashi", led the propaganda of Marxist ideas among the workers of the Tbilisi railway workshops. In 1899 he was expelled from the seminary for revolutionary activity, went underground, and became a professional revolutionary. He was a member of the Tbilisi, Caucasian Union and Baku committees of the RSDLP, participated in the publication of newspapers "Brdzola" ("Struggle"), "Proletariatis Brdzola" ("Struggle of the proletariat"), "Baku Proletarian", "Beep", "Baku Worker", was an active participant in the Revolution of 1905-07. in the Caucasus. Since the creation of the RSDLP, he supported Lenin's ideas of strengthening the revolutionary Marxist party, defended the Bolshevik strategy and tactics of the class struggle of the proletariat, was a staunch supporter of Bolshevism, and exposed the opportunistic line of the Mensheviks and anarchists in the revolution. Delegate of the 1st Conference of the RSDLP in Tammerfors (1905), the 4th (1906) and 5th (1907) Congresses of the RSDLP.

During the period of underground revolutionary activity, he was repeatedly arrested and exiled. In January 1912, at a meeting of the Central Committee elected by the 6th (Prague) All-Russian Conference of the RSDLP, he was co-opted to the Central Committee in absentia and introduced to Russian Bureau of the Central Committee. In 1912-13, while working in St. Petersburg, he actively collaborated in newspapers "Star" and "Truth". Participant Krakow (1912) meeting of the Central Committee of the RSDLP with party workers. At this time, Stalin wrote the work "Marxism and the National Question", in which he highlighted the Leninist principles for resolving the national question, criticized the opportunist program of "cultural-national autonomy". The work was positively evaluated by V. I. Lenin (see Poln. sobr. soch., 5th ed., vol. 24, p. 223). In February 1913, Stalin was again arrested and exiled to the Turukhansk region.

After the overthrow of the autocracy, Stalin returned to Petrograd on March 12 (25), 1917, was introduced to the Bureau of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b) and to the editorial board of Pravda, took an active part in expanding the work of the party in the new conditions. Stalin supported the Leninist course of developing the bourgeois-democratic revolution into a socialist one. On the 7th (April) All-Russian Conference of the RSDLP (b) elected member of the Central Committee(since that time he was elected a member of the Central Committee of the party at all congresses up to and including the 19th). At the 6th Congress of the RSDLP (b), on behalf of the Central Committee, he delivered a political report of the Central Committee and a report on the political situation.

As a member of the Central Committee, Stalin actively participated in the preparation and conduct of the Great October Socialist Revolution: he was a member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, the Military Revolutionary Center - the party body for leading the armed uprising, in the Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee. At the 2nd All-Russian Congress of Soviets on October 26 (November 8), 1917, he was elected to the first Soviet government as People's Commissar for Nationalities(1917-22); simultaneously in 1919-22 headed People's Commissariat of State Control, reorganized in 1920 into the People's Commissariat Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate(RCT).

During the period of the Civil War and foreign military intervention of 1918-20, Stalin carried out a number of responsible assignments of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) and the Soviet government: he was a member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, one of the organizers defense of Petrograd, a member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Southern, Western, Southwestern Fronts, a representative of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee in the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense. Stalin showed himself to be a major military-political worker of the party. By decree of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of November 27, 1919, he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner.

After the end of the Civil War, Stalin actively participated in the party's struggle for the restoration of the national economy, for the implementation of the New Economic Policy (NEP), for strengthening the alliance between the working class and the peasantry. During the discussion about trade unions, imposed on the party Trotsky, defended the Leninist platform on the role of trade unions in socialist construction. On the 10th Congress of the RCP (b)(1921) made a presentation "The Immediate Tasks of the Party in the National Question". In April 1922, at the Plenum of the Central Committee, Stalin was elected General Secretary of the Central Committee Party and held this post for over 30 years, but since 1934 he was formally Secretary of the Central Committee.

As one of the leading workers in the field of nation-state construction, Stalin took part in the creation of the USSR. However, initially in solving this new and complex problem, he made a mistake by putting forward autonomy project(the entry of all republics into the RSFSR on the rights of autonomy). Lenin criticized this project and substantiated the plan to create a single union state in the form of a voluntary union of republics with equal rights. Taking into account the criticism, Stalin fully supported Lenin's idea and, on behalf of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), spoke at 1st All-Union Congress of Soviets(December 1922) with a report on the formation of the USSR.

On the 12th Party Congress(1923) Stalin delivered an organizational report on the work of the Central Committee and a report "National Moments in Party and State Building".

V. I. Lenin, who perfectly knew the cadres of the party, had a huge influence on their education, sought the placement of cadres in the interests of the general party cause, taking into account their individual qualities. AT "Letter to the Congress" Lenin gave a description of a number of members of the Central Committee, including Stalin. Considering Stalin one of the outstanding figures of the party, Lenin at the same time wrote on December 25, 1922: “Comrade. Stalin, having become General Secretary, concentrated immense power in his hands, and I am not sure whether he will always be able to use this power with sufficient caution” (ibid., vol. 45, p. 345). In addition to his letter, on January 4, 1923, Lenin wrote:

“Stalin is too rude, and this shortcoming, which is quite tolerable in the environment and in communications between us communists, becomes intolerable in the position of general secretary. Therefore, I suggest that the comrades consider a way to move Stalin from this place and appoint another person to this place, who in all other respects differs from Comrade. Stalin with only one advantage, namely, more tolerant, more loyal, more polite and more attentive to comrades, less capriciousness, etc.” (ibid., p. 346).

By decision of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), all delegations were familiarized with Lenin's letter 13th Congress of the RCP (b), which took place in May 1924. Given the difficult situation in the country, the severity of the struggle against Trotskyism, it was considered expedient to leave Stalin in the post of General Secretary of the Central Committee, so that he would take into account criticism from Lenin and draw the necessary conclusions from it.

After Lenin's death, Stalin actively participated in the development and implementation of the policy of the CPSU, plans for economic and cultural development, measures to strengthen the country's defense capability and conduct the foreign policy of the party and the Soviet state. Together with other leading party leaders, Stalin waged an uncompromising struggle against the opponents of Leninism, played an outstanding role in the ideological and political defeat of Trotskyism and right-wing opportunism, in defending Lenin's teaching on the possibility of the victory of socialism in the USSR, and in strengthening the unity of the party. Stalin's works were of great importance in the propaganda of Lenin's ideological heritage. "On the Foundations of Leninism" (1924), "Trotskyism or Leninism?" (1924), "To Questions of Leninism" (1926), "Once More About the Social-Democratic Deviation in Our Party" (1926), "On the right deviation in the CPSU (b)" (1929), "On the issues of agrarian policy in the USSR"(1929) and others.

Under the leadership of the Communist Party, the Soviet people carried out the Leninist plan for building socialism and carried out revolutionary transformations of gigantic complexity and world-historical significance. Stalin, together with other leading figures of the Party and the Soviet state, made a personal contribution to the solution of these problems. The key task in building socialism was the socialist industrialization, which ensured the economic independence of the country, the technical reconstruction of all sectors of the national economy, the defense capability of the Soviet state. The most complex and difficult task of the revolutionary transformations was the reorganization of agriculture on socialist lines. When conducting collectivization of agriculture errors and omissions were made. Stalin also bears responsibility for these mistakes. However, thanks to decisive measures taken by the party with the participation of Stalin, the mistakes were corrected. Of great importance for the victory of socialism in the USSR was the implementation cultural revolution.

In the context of the impending military danger and in the years Great Patriotic War 1941-45 Stalin took a leading part in the party's many-sided activities to strengthen the defense of the USSR and organize the defeat of fascist Germany and militarist Japan. However, on the eve of the war, Stalin made a certain miscalculation in assessing the timing of a possible attack by Nazi Germany on the USSR. May 6, 1941 he was appointed Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR(from 1946 - Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR), June 30, 1941 - Chairman of the State Defense Committee ( GKO), July 19 - People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR, August 8 - Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of the USSR.

As head of the Soviet state, he took part in Tehran (1943), Crimean(1945) and Potsdam (1945) conferences the leaders of the three powers - the USSR, the USA and Great Britain. In the post-war period, Stalin continued to work as General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Party and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. During these years, the Party and the Soviet government did a tremendous job of mobilizing the Soviet people to fight for recovery and further development National economy, carried out a foreign policy course aimed at strengthening the international positions of the USSR, the world socialist system, at uniting and developing the international working and communist movement, at supporting the liberation struggle of the peoples of colonial and dependent countries, at ensuring peace and security of peoples throughout the world.

In Stalin's activities, along with the positive aspects, there were theoretical and political mistakes, some traits of his character had a negative effect. If in the first years of work without Lenin he considered critical remarks addressed to him, then later he began to deviate from the Leninist principles of collective leadership and the norms of party life, to overestimate his own merits in the successes of the party and people. Gradually took shape Stalin's personality cult which entailed gross violations of socialist legality, caused serious harm to the activities of the party, to the cause of communist construction.

20th Congress of the CPSU(1956) condemned the personality cult as a phenomenon alien to the spirit of Marxism-Leninism, the nature of the socialist social order. In the resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU of June 30, 1956 "On overcoming the cult of personality and its consequences" the party gave an objective, comprehensive assessment of Stalin's activities, a detailed criticism of the cult of personality. The cult of personality did not and could not change the socialist essence of the Soviet system, the Marxist-Leninist character of the CPSU and its Leninist course, did not stop the natural course of development of Soviet society. The Party worked out and implemented a system of measures that ensured the restoration and further development of the Leninist norms of Party life and the principles of Party leadership.

Stalin was a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks in 1919-52, the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU in 1952-53, a member of the Executive Committee of the Comintern in 1925-43, a member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee from 1917, the Central Executive Committee of the USSR from 1922, a deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of the 1st-3rd convocations . He was awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labor (1939), Hero of the Soviet Union (1945), Marshal of the Soviet Union (1943), the highest military rank - Generalissimo of the Soviet Union (1945). He was awarded 3 Orders of Lenin, 2 Orders of Victory, 3 Orders of the Red Banner, the Order of Suvorov 1st degree, and medals. After his death in March 1953, he was buried in the Lenin-Stalin Mausoleum. In 1961, by decision of the XXII Congress of the CPSU, he was reburied on Red Square.

Works: Soch., vol. 1-13, M., 1949-51; Questions of Leninism, and ed., M., 1952: On the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, 5th ed., M., 1950; Marxism and questions of linguistics, [M.], 1950; Economic problems of socialism in the USSR, M., 1952. Lit.: XX Congress of the CPSU. Stenographic report, vol. 1-2, M., 1956; Decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU "On overcoming the cult of personality and its consequences." June 30, 1956, in the book: CPSU in resolutions and decisions of congresses. Conferences and plenums of the Central Committee, 8th ed., vol. 7, M., 1971; History of the CPSU, vol. 1-5, M., 1964-70: History of the CPSU, 4th ed., M., 1975.

Events during the reign of Stalin:

• 1925 - the adoption of a course towards industrialization at the XIV Congress of the CPSU (b).
• 1928 - the first "five-year plan".
• 1930 - beginning of collectivization
• 1936 - adoption of the new constitution of the USSR.
• 1939 –1940 - Soviet-Finnish war
• 1941 –1945 - The Great Patriotic War
• 1949 - Creation of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA).
• 1949 - successful testing of the first Soviet atomic bomb, which was created by I.V. Kurchatov under the direction of L.P. Beria.
• 1952 - renaming of the CPSU (b) in the CPSU

The era of Stalin is a period in the development of the USSR, when Joseph Stalin was actually its leader.

Stalin's period in power is marked by:

On the one hand: the accelerated industrialization of the country, victory in the Great Patriotic War, massive labor and front-line heroism, the transformation of the USSR into a superpower with significant scientific, military and industrial potential, an unprecedented increase in the geopolitical influence of the Soviet Union in the world;

On the other hand: the establishment of a totalitarian dictatorial regime, mass repressions, sometimes directed against entire social strata and ethnic groups (for example, the deportation of Crimean Tatars, Chechens and Ingush, Balkars, Koreans), forced collectivization, which led at an early stage to a sharp decline in agriculture and famine 1932-1933, numerous human losses (as a result of wars, deportations, German occupation, famine and repression), the division of the world community into two hostile camps, the establishment of pro-Soviet communist regimes in Eastern Europe and the beginning of the Cold War.

Characteristics of the era

An analysis of the Politburo's decisions shows that their main goal was to maximize the difference between output and consumption, which required massive coercion. The emergence of excess in the economy has led to the struggle of various administrative and regional interests for influence on the process of preparation and execution of political decisions. The competition of these interests partly smoothed out the destructive consequences of hypercentralization.

Collectivization and industrialization

From the beginning of the 1930s, the collectivization of agriculture was carried out - the unification of all peasant farms into centralized collective farms. To a large extent, the elimination of property rights to land was a consequence of the solution of the "class question". In addition, according to the then prevailing economic views, large collective farms could work more efficiently due to the use of technology and the division of labor. Kulaks without trial or investigation were imprisoned in labor camps or exiled to remote regions of Siberia and the Far East.

Kulaks were imprisoned in labor camps or exiled to remote regions of Siberia and the Far East (see the Law on the Protection of the Property of State Enterprises, Collective Farms and Cooperatives and the Strengthening of Public Property).

Real wheat prices in foreign markets fell from $5-6 per bushel to less than $1.

Collectivization was a catastrophe for agriculture: according to official data, gross grain harvests fell from 733.3 million centners in 1928 to 696.7 million centners in 1931-32. The grain yield in 1932 was 5.7 centners per hectare against 8.2 centners per hectare in 1913. Gross agricultural output in 1928 was 124% compared with 1913, in 1929-121%, in 1930-117%, in 1931-114%, in 1932-107%, in 1933-101% Livestock production in 1933 was 65% of the 1913 level. But at the expense of the peasants, the collection of marketable grain, which was so necessary for the country for industrialization, increased by 20%.

Stalin's policy of industrialization of the USSR required more funds and equipment, obtained from the export of wheat and other goods abroad. Larger plans were set for the collective farms to hand over their agricultural products to the state. the massive famine of 1932-33, according to historians [who?], were the result of these grain procurement campaigns. The average standard of living of the population in rural areas until the death of Stalin did not reach the indicators of 1929.

Industrialization, which, due to obvious necessity, began with the creation of the basic branches of heavy industry, could not yet provide the market with the goods needed for the countryside. The supply of the city through the normal exchange of goods was disrupted, the tax in kind was replaced in 1924 with cash. A vicious circle arose: in order to restore the balance, it was necessary to accelerate industrialization, for this it was necessary to increase the influx of food, export products and labor from the countryside, and for this it was necessary to increase the production of bread, increase its marketability, create in the countryside a need for heavy industry products (machines ). The situation was complicated by the destruction during the revolution of the basis of commodity production of bread in pre-revolutionary Russia - large landlord farms, and a project was needed to create something to replace them.

This vicious circle could only be broken through a radical modernization of agriculture. Theoretically, there were three ways to do this. One is a new version of the "Stolypin reform": support for the growing kulak, redistribution in its favor of the resources of the bulk of the middle peasants' farms, stratification of the village into large farmers and the proletariat. The second way is the liquidation of the centers of the capitalist economy (kulaks) and the formation of large mechanized collective farms. The third way - the gradual development of working individual peasant farms with their cooperation at a "natural" pace - by all accounts turned out to be too slow. After the disruption of grain procurements in 1927, when extraordinary measures had to be taken (fixed prices, market closures and even repressions), and the even more disastrous grain procurement campaign of 1928-1929. The issue had to be resolved urgently. Extraordinary measures during procurement in 1929, already perceived as something completely abnormal, caused about 1,300 riots. The way to create farming through the stratification of the peasantry was incompatible with the Soviet project for ideological reasons. A course was taken for collectivization. This also meant the liquidation of the kulaks.

The second cardinal issue is the choice of the method of industrialization. The discussion about this was difficult and long, and its outcome predetermined the nature of the state and society. Not having, unlike Russia at the beginning of the century, foreign loans as an important source of funds, the USSR could only industrialize at the expense of internal resources. An influential group (member of the Politburo N. I. Bukharin, chairman of the Council of People's Commissars A. I. Rykov and chairman of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions M. P. Tomsky) defended the "sparing" option of gradual accumulation of funds through the continuation of the NEP. L. D. Trotsky - a forced version. JV Stalin at first stood on the point of view of Bukharin, but after Trotsky's expulsion from the Central Committee of the party at the end of 1927, he changed his position to a diametrically opposite one. This led to a decisive victory for the proponents of forced industrialization.

The question of how much these achievements contributed to the victory in the Great Patriotic War remains a matter of debate. In Soviet times, the point of view was accepted that industrialization and pre-war rearmament played a decisive role. Critics draw attention to the fact that by the beginning of the winter of 1941, the territory was occupied, in which 42% of the population of the USSR lived before the war, 63% of coal was mined, 68% of cast iron was smelted, etc. As V. Lelchuk writes, “victory had forge not with the help of that powerful potential that was created during the years of accelerated industrialization. However, the numbers speak for themselves. Despite the fact that in 1943 the USSR produced only 8.5 million tons of steel (compared to 18.3 million tons in 1940), while the German industry this year smelted more than 35 million tons (including those captured in Europe metallurgical plants), despite the enormous damage from the German invasion, the industry of the USSR was able to produce much more weapons than the German one. In 1942, the USSR surpassed Germany in the production of tanks by 3.9 times, combat aircraft by 1.9 times, guns of all types by 3.1 times. At the same time, the organization and technology of production were rapidly improved: in 1944, the cost of all types of military products was reduced by half compared to 1940. Record military production was achieved due to the fact that the entire new industry had a dual purpose. The industrial and raw material base was prudently located beyond the Urals and Siberia, while the pre-revolutionary industry turned out to be predominantly in the occupied territories. The evacuation of industry to the regions of the Urals, the Volga region, Siberia and Central Asia played a significant role. Only during the first three months of the war, 1360 large (mainly military) enterprises were moved.

According to Western historians A. M. Nekrich and M. Ya. Geller, collectivization was a disaster for the agriculture of the USSR: according to official data, gross grain harvests decreased from 733.3 million centners in 1928 to 696.7 million centners in 1931 -32. The grain yield in 1932 was 5.7 centners per hectare against 8.2 centners per hectare in 1913. Gross agricultural output in 1928 was 124% compared with 1913, in 1929-121%, in 1930-117%, in 1931-114%, in 1932-107%, in 1933-101% Livestock production in 1933 was 65% of the 1913 level. But at the expense of the peasants, the collection of marketable grain, which was so necessary for the country for industrialization, increased by 20%.

For the years 1928-1940, according to the CIA, the average annual growth of the gross national product in the USSR was 6.1%, which was inferior to Japan, was comparable to the corresponding indicator in Germany and was significantly higher than the growth in the most developed capitalist countries experiencing the "Great Depression" . As a result of industrialization, in terms of industrial production, the USSR came out on top in Europe and second in the world, overtaking England, Germany, France and second only to the United States. The share of the USSR in world industrial production reached almost 10%. A particularly sharp leap was achieved in the development of metallurgy, power engineering, machine tool building, and the chemical industry. In fact, a number of new industries emerged: aluminum, aviation, automotive, bearings, tractor and tank building. One of the most important results of industrialization was the overcoming of technical backwardness and the assertion of the economic independence of the USSR.

The rapid growth of the urban population led to a deterioration in the housing situation; the strip of "seals" again passed, the workers who arrived from the village were settled in barracks. By the end of 1929, the card system was extended to almost all food products, and then to industrial products. However, even with cards it was impossible to get the necessary rations, and in 1931 additional "orders" were introduced. It was impossible to buy groceries without standing in huge queues. According to the data of the Smolensk Party Archive, in 1929 in Smolensk a worker received 600 g of bread a day, family members - 300 each, fat - from 200 g to a liter of vegetable oil per month, 1 kilogram of sugar per month; a worker received 30-36 meters of chintz per year. In the future, the situation (until 1935) only worsened. The GPU noted acute discontent among the workers.

In 1933, in Moscow and Leningrad, a counter-revolutionary conspiracy of the “society of pederasts” was uncovered, according to which 130 people were arrested. The OGPU identified and suppressed the activities of several groups that were engaged in "creating a network of salons, hearths, dens, groups and other organized formations of pederasts with the further transformation of these associations into direct spy cells." By direct order of Stalin:

"It is necessary to punish the bastards in an exemplary manner, and introduce an appropriate guiding decree into the legislation."

On March 7, 1934, article 121 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR was introduced, according to which sodomy was punishable by imprisonment.

As a result of Stalin's policy of collectivization, in 1930-1933 gross grain harvests began to fall. Livestock production has almost halved. The standard of living of the overwhelming majority of rural residents dropped sharply and did not reach the indicators of 1929 until Stalin's death. Malnutrition swept the entire territory of the USSR. In 1932, a massive famine broke out in the grain-producing regions of Ukraine, the North Caucasus, the Lower and Middle Volga, the Southern Urals, Western Siberia and Kazakhstan, which claimed the lives of 4 to 11 million people in two years. Despite the famine, the country's leadership continued to sell grain for export.

Changes in living standards

Despite rapid urbanization beginning in 1928, by the end of Stalin's life, the majority of the population still lived in rural areas, remote from large industrial centers. On the other hand, one of the results of industrialization was the formation of a party and labor elite. Given these circumstances, the change in living standards during 1928-1952. characterized by the following features (see below for details):

The average standard of living in the country underwent significant fluctuations (especially associated with the first five-year plan and the war), but in 1938 and 1952 it was higher or almost the same as in 1928.

The greatest increase in the standard of living was among the party and labor elite.

According to various estimates, the standard of living of the vast majority of rural residents has not improved or has deteriorated significantly.

Introduction of the passport system in 1932-1935 provided for restrictions on rural residents: peasants were forbidden to move to another area or go to work in the city without the consent of the state farm or collective farm, which thus severely limited their freedom of movement.

Cards for bread, cereals and pasta were abolished from January 1, 1935, and for other (including non-food) goods from January 1, 1936. This was accompanied by an increase in wages in the industrial sector and an even greater increase in state ration prices for all types of goods. Commenting on the cancellation of the cards, Stalin uttered the catchphrase that later became: "Life has become better, life has become more fun."

Overall, per capita consumption rose by 22% between 1928 and 1938. Cards were re-introduced in July 1941. After the war and the famine (drought) of 1946, they were abolished in 1947, although many goods remained in short supply, in particular, in 1947 there was again a famine. In addition, on the eve of the abolition of cards, prices for rations were raised. The restoration of the economy allowed in 1948-1953. lower prices repeatedly. Price cuts significantly increased the standard of living of the Soviet people. In 1952, the cost of bread was 39% of the price of the end of 1947, milk - 72%, meat - 42%, sugar - 49%, butter - 37%. As noted at the 19th Congress of the CPSU, at the same time the price of bread rose by 28% in the USA, by 90% in England, and in France more than doubled; the cost of meat in the US increased by 26%, in England - by 35%, in France - by 88%. If in 1948 real wages were on average 20% below the pre-war level, then in 1952 they already exceeded the pre-war level by 25%.

The average standard of living of the population in regions remote from large cities and specializing in crop production, that is, the majority of the country's population, did not reach the indicators of 1929 before the start of the war. In the year of Stalin's death, the average calorie content of the daily diet of an agricultural worker was 17% lower than the level of 1928 of the year.

Demographics in the era

Stalinist repressions

On December 1, 1934, the Central Executive Committee of the USSR, after the murder of Kirov, adopted a resolution “On Amendments to the Current Criminal Procedure Codes of the Union Republics” of the following content, signed by the Chairman of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR M. I. Kalinin and the Secretary of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR A. S. Yenukidze: Make the following changes to the current criminal procedure codes of the Union republics for the investigation and consideration of cases of terrorist organizations and terrorist acts against workers of the Soviet government:

1. The investigation of these cases shall be completed within no more than ten days;

2. The indictment shall be handed over to the accused one day before the trial of the case in court;

3. Cases to hear without the participation of the parties;

4. Cassation appeal against sentences, as well as filing petitions for pardon, should not be allowed;

5. The sentence to capital punishment shall be carried out immediately after the sentence is pronounced.

The mass terror of the “Yezhovshchina” period was carried out by the then authorities of the country throughout the USSR (and, at the same time, in the territories of Mongolia, Tuva and Republican Spain controlled at that time by the Soviet regime), on the basis of the “planned tasks” figures “laid down” by Yezhov identifying and punishing people who harmed Soviet power (the so-called "enemies of the people").

During the "Yezhovshchina", torture was widely used on those arrested; sentences that were not subject to appeal (often to death) were passed without any trial, and were immediately (often even before the sentence was pronounced) carried out; all the property of the absolute majority of arrested people was immediately confiscated; relatives of the repressed were themselves subjected to the same repressions - for the mere fact of their relationship with them; The children of the repressed (regardless of their age) left without parents were also placed, as a rule, in prisons, camps, colonies, or in special "orphanages for children of enemies of the people." In 1935, it became possible to attract minors, starting from the age of 12, to the highest measure of criminal punishment (execution).

In 1937, 353,074 people were sentenced to death (not all those sentenced were shot), in 1938 - 328,618, in 1939-2601. According to Richard Pipes, in 1937-1938, the NKVD arrested about 1.5 million people, of which about 700 thousand were shot, that is, on average, 1,000 executions per day.

Historian V. N. Zemskov names a similar figure, arguing that "in the most cruel period - 1937-38 - more than 1.3 million people were convicted, of which almost 700,000 were shot," and in another publication he clarifies: “According to documented data, in 1937-1938. 1,344,923 people were convicted for political reasons, of which 681,692 were sentenced to capital punishment.” It should be noted that Zemskov personally participated in the work of the commission, which worked in 1990-1993. and considering the issue of repression.

As a result of Yezhov's activities, more than seven hundred thousand people were sentenced to death: in 1937, 353,074 people were sentenced to death, in 1938 - 328,618, in 1939 (after Yezhov's resignation) - 2601. Yezhov himself was subsequently arrested and sentenced to death. More than 1.5 million people suffered from repressions in 1937-1938 alone.

As a result of famine, repressions and deportations, mortality was above the "normal" level in the period 1927-1938. amounted, according to various estimates, from 4 to 12 million people.

In 1937-1938. Bukharin, Rykov, Tukhachevsky and other political figures and military leaders were arrested, including those who at one time contributed to Stalin's rise to power.

post-war period

At the same time, human losses did not end with the war, in which they amounted to about 27 million. Only the famine of 1946-1947 claimed the lives of from 0.8 to two million people.

The state security agencies with harsh measures suppressed the nationalist movements that were actively manifesting themselves in the territory of the Baltic States, Western Ukraine.

Science in the era of Stalin

Entire scientific areas, such as genetics and cybernetics, with the direct participation of Stalin, were declared bourgeois and banned, which slowed down the development of these areas of science in the USSR for decades. According to historians, many scientists, such as academician Nikolai Vavilov and other most influential anti-Lysenkoists, were repressed with the direct participation of Stalin.

The first Soviet computer M-1 was built in May-August 1948, but computers continued to be created even further, despite the persecution of cybernetics. The Russian genetic school, which was considered one of the best in the world, was completely destroyed. Under Stalin, government support was given to areas that were sharply condemned in the post-Stalin era (in particular, the so-called "Lysenkoism" in biology).

The development of Soviet natural sciences (except biology) and technology under Stalin can be described as a takeoff. The established network of fundamental and applied research institutes, design bureaus and university laboratories, as well as prison camp design bureaus, covered the entire front of research. Such names as the physicists Kurchatov, Landau, Tamm, the mathematician Keldysh, the creator of space technology Korolev, the aircraft designer Tupolev are known all over the world. In the post-war period, based on the obvious military needs, the greatest attention was paid to nuclear physics.

The decision to build Moscow State University was supplemented by a set of measures to improve all universities, primarily in cities affected by the war. Universities were given large buildings in Minsk, Voronezh, Kharkov. Universities of a number of Union republics began to actively create and develop.

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