Tactics Of Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin was the leader of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1952. He was a rough communist leader who spread fear, terror, and other horrid emotions to his people. Many hate Stalin for his brutal leadership and have even called him worse than Hitler in terms of authority and deaths among his people. Like many strong dictators, Stalin used many different forms of horror to keep a iron grip reserving his position of lead in his country. But how exactly did Joseph Stalin keep the Soviet Union under his control with so many against him? He used four primary tactics:show trials, purges, censorship, propaganda, and fear and terror to keep a hold onto his extremely powerful state. Before digging deeper into that, Stalin’s five-year plan needs …show more content…
Purges were what Stalin stooped to to show that he was a dictator to not be messed with. In the year 1934, Stalin began the Great Purge. This was the real way to show that Stalin meant business. Almost all of the Bolsheviks were slaughtered to put an end to the old revolutionist ways. By the end of the 30’s the Great Purge or Great Terror had moved away from the old Bolsheviks and extended to the regular peasants. Around 20 million Russians were sent to the gulag --an arrangement of hard labor camps located in Siberia. Half of the twenty million Russians sent to the camps there died there from the harsh conditions. …show more content…
Stalin made religions he thought were a threat to his leadership illegal. The Christian Church and Islam were completely forbidden in Soviet Russia. Other ethnic groups in the state were also considered illegal and were persecuted. Stalin’s big idea of Russification was highly exalted. Russification is the escalation and spreading of the Russian language and culture. Anyone who did not comply to these new ideals were turned in to the NKVD which was the secret police order. They were then arrested and never heard from again. Presumably they were killed or imprisoned for life. (3) Like Hitler, Stalin had his own praise system. Newspapers would applaud him, poets and songwriters would thank and praise him for a bountiful harvest, and pictures of him were everywhere to teach children to love him and follow him no matter what because he was a great and kind man. (3) All pieces of written and spoken work must have praised Stalin or else. Stalin used written works as well to portray himself as a closer ally of Lenin’s. (Who was a older communist revolutionary believe it or not). All these lies helped him win the public support in the state.