New Stalin Book

At Tom's suggestion, I am posting my lengthy (sorry) comment from an earlier post here on the main page. The book in question is Simon Sebag Montefiore's new book on Joey Stalin.

Tom,

I had heard this book was coming out but did not know that it had been released. Thanks for the tip.

The contribution here is important, though I suspect it will still be bedeviled by the problems inherent in any biographical work on Stalin or on the nature of his power. The man signed millions of documents in his lifetime (many of them execution, deportation, or arrest orders), but left very few written in his own hand that gave any insight at all into his own mind. He left no true diary. As a result, conclusions have to be drawn from contemporaries' accounts of meetings and conversations with Stalin, giving everything written about him the dubiousness of being based on second-, third-, fourth-hand anecdotes and the like. Such conclusions can be made responsibly and argued effectively, as scholars like Robert Conquest, Richard Pipes, and others have done, but the lack of direct primary material from Stalin makes even the best studies of his life seem inadequate in light of the monstrous nature of his regime. Of course, this reality rightfully should not be a hindrance to scholarly pursuit of deeper understanding of Stalin, especially as archival material emerges from Russia and more importanly, from the archives of Eastern Europe.

That said, this book focuses not only on the man but the entire ruling apparatus that he set up after his appointment to General Secretary of the Communist Party under Lenin. For now, I will have to base my responses on the NRO review, subject of course, to change once I get my paws on a copy of the book.

First, I have never been in agreement with arguments that cite the 1928 decision to collectivize agriculture as the point where the Communist "experiment" went haywire or first illustrated its murderous nature. It always seemed to me that ten million dead in the Russian Civil War, the horrible social and economic effects of War Communism, the creation of the Cheka, the establishment of the Red Army and its Political Commissar overseers, the brutal suppression of the Krondstadt Rebellion, and the forced collectivization of industry were all very clear examples before 1928 of the true nature of the Soviet regime.

My hope is that Montefiore does not fall into the common trap of believing that the New Economic Plan established by Lenin at the end of the Civil War was a genuine effort by the Bolsheviks to moderate their ideology by allowing some vestiges of capitalism to operate in Soviet lands. The NEP was a breathing space for the Bolsheviks, a chance to allow themselves first to recover and then consolidate their grip on their territories after the tumult of the Civil War. It is my belief that had Lenin lived longer, he would have decided similarly to collective agriculture. To use brutal force to accomplish this would have been as easy for Lenin to order and support as it was for Stalin.

This clearly marks me as a member of the school of thought that sees Stalin as a continuation of Lenin's ideas and goals, not as an aberration that took "well-intentioned" communist ideas down a genocidal and totalitarian path. There are scholars who disagree with this, but I think Lenin's words and writings make clear that in general but very significant terms he himself would have supported Stalin's efforts and methods. To be fair, though, Vladimir Ilych would likely have rejected Stalin's "Socialism in One Country" idea in favor of continuing to foster international revolution directly. Of course, global communism remained Stalin's long-term goal as well. The two men had common goals, differed on how and when exactly to act, but they both agreed that the use of brutality, murder, deceit, and subversion were not only acceptable, but necessary for the Soviet Union and world communism to survive and flourish.

Second, I am not sure that men like Beria, et al went bad just because Stalin bloodied their hands in the Great Terror, though this was indeed an important factor. These men also received access to the best food, doctors, and "entertainment" available as benefits of their toadyism. They also knew that to disobey meant their heads--literally--so abject fear was also a motivator. But also, should we not perhaps also acknowledge that for these men to reach such lofty heights under such a tyrant, they themselves inherently and regardless of Stalin's influence, had to be pretty bad guys to begin with? These men had no problem with the mass murder of millions of Ukrainians, Russians, Poles, Cossacks, Muslims, nor with the bloody purges of their fellow comrades and of the military leadership. The GULAG was acceptable to them, though they themselves feared having to visit it for a permanent stay. In the end, can we blame Stalin for the sadistic ways of say, Lavrenti Beria? Or should we blame Beria just as much, if not more? Unlike early communists or some fellow travelers like John Reed, these men knew better than anyone the true nature of Stalin and the Soviet regime and still served it willingly and to their utmost. To me, these were men who at their core had enough common ground to justify their cooperation and coexistence, and therefore, they were exactly what we call people like that--co-conspirators.

Lastly, Stalin indeed was paranoid of his own shadow by the end of his life. Exactly when this took hold, though, is still a matter of great debate. This, too, is difficult. After all, most of us would consider Stalin's ideas and any "morality" he had to be absolutely crazy, so how does one measure the sanity or lack of paranoia in a genocidal dictator? That said, I do believe that by the time of his death in 1953, Stalin was off his rocker, but at least through the Berlin Airlift and the division of Germany in 1949, he was acting in his own perversely rational way.

Any scholarly work that does not make excuses for Stalin or any of his predecessors, successors, or compatriots is always welcome. Scholars still often try to split hairs on Stalin vs. Lenin, for example, and in doing so lose sight of the larger truths about the nature of communism itself. To comment on how exactly this book differs from other studies, I will have to wait until I actually read it.

Therefore, I hope all I have said above is not wasted breath. Or typing. Or whatever.