From time to time, the account of horror is only an aside: 'Before he turned wantonly to kill another of his friend's wives...' But that is how Stalin lived. His story is, unavoidably, a tale of continual slaughter. He, not Sebag Montefiore, is guilty of excess. There is violent death on almost every page because that is the defining characteristic of life 'at the Court of the Red Tsar'.
Some of the henchmen took pleasure in the butchery. Beria 'distinguished himself by personally performing the torture of Lakobas's family, driving his widow mad by placing a snake in her cell and beating her children to death'.
But Stalin seems motivated only by the desire to seize and hold on to power. Of course he claimed to be driven forward by his passionate belief in communism. When Lenin's widow tried to exploit her status, he demanded to know if, 'because she used the same toilet' as the Father of the Revolution, she imagined herself 'to understand Marxist-Leninism'. Stalin understood it perfectly well. Sebag Montefiore leaves the reader in no doubt that the monster had brains. But the philosophy - though perhaps once genuinely respected - became a front. In the end, all he wanted was power.
It was very nearly denied him. A few weeks before he died, Lenin dictated a secret 'Testament' which not only wanted to rob Stalin of the succession but actually called for his dismissal. Sebag Montefiore does not explain which quirk of Russian temperament or Politburo convention made it necessary for the denunciation to be revealed only after Lenin's death. Whatever the reason, the delay was crucial. By the time that the truth was out, Stalin had organised Lenin's funeral in a manner more appropriate to an 'Orthodox saint', and convinced the people that he was the rightful heir.
And the power brokers had agreed, in a major error of judgment, that the potential tyrant against whom they had to organise was 'Trotsky, the revolution's preening panjandrum'. 'Preening panjandrums' is an example of alliteration for alliteration's sake. There are many better descriptions of Trotsky than that little conceit.
Apologists for the old Soviet Union, if there are any left, will regard the slightly forced brio as evidence that Sebag Montefiore is incurably biased against communism in theory and practice. I suspect that to be true. For he writes about the excesses of Stalin's regime with uninhibited relish. But the prejudice neither invalidates the truth of his story nor diminishes the clarity with which it is told. The references are exact and the sources are impeccable. The obvious, open contempt for the regime which he describes allows him to write with an ?lan which would be impossible for an observer weighed down with regret that a noble idea had been so corrupted.
http://artukraine.com/famineart/red_tsar3.htm
A Glimpse into The Soviet Terror Machine
Images of the Ukrainian Famine
Holodomor: Genocide by Famine
May 27 through January 11, 2009 (extended)
An exhibition that details the horrors and magnitude of the Holodomor – the little-known Ukrainian genocide that resulted in the deaths of some 10 million people – opens at The Ukrainian Museum on Tuesday evening, May 27 at 5:30 p.m.
The exhibition, Holodomor: Genocide by Famine, is one of a series of events taking place around the world to commemorate the 75th anniversary of what James Mace, the director of the U.S. Commission on the Ukraine Famine (1988), referred to as "the crime of the century that nobody's ever heard of."
The horrific event, known in Ukrainian as the Holodomor (literally, murder by starvation), took place in 1932-1933, less than twenty years after Ukraine was forcibly incorporated into the Soviet Union. Determined to force all Ukrainian farmers onto collective farms, to crush the burgeoning national revival, and to forestall any calls for Ukraine's independence, the brutal Communist regime of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin embarked on a campaign to starve the Ukrainian people into submission.
The Soviet government confiscated all the grain produced by Ukrainian farmers, withheld other foodstuffs, executed anyone trying to obtain food, and punished those who attempted to flee. As a result, in the land called the Breadbasket of Europe, millions of men, women, and children were starved to death.
Stalin boasted privately that 10 million people – 25% of Ukraine's population – had perished during the Holodomor. At least 3 million of the victims were children.
Despite the magnitude of the atrocity, the Soviet regime, behind its Iron Curtain, denied the existence of the Holodomor for decades, denouncing any reports as "anti-Soviet propaganda." It was not until the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the subsequent establishment of an independent Ukraine that the contents of many sealed government archives were uncovered, exposing a wealth of gruesome information.
(ukrainianmuseum.org) "Genocide by Famine"
The Holodomor, Manmade Ukrainian Famine
Source: Stalin's Lies, "Big Lies of the 20th Century"
Chicago-American newspaper, from the Holodomor. Famine used as a weapon to starve 7 million, in effort to break Ukrainian Nationalism during the period between 1932-1933. See leftwing distortions of history on encyclopedia sites such as Wikipedia and Answers.com minimizing the evil of Communism.
Holodomor to Break Ukrainian Nationalism
"I have registered an article on the English Wikipedia to restore balance to the article about the soviet enigneered famine in Ukraine, conducted as a genocide against the Ukrainians. This article has been heavily assaulted by a small group of mostly Russian users, some of them openly declaring they're support for the criminal soviet system. I have made extensive explanations in my edit summaries (eg.: [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11]) as well as explained the situation and pointed out sepcific issues ([12], [13]) to which haven't gotten any reasonable reply. --Vernyhora 10:34, 20 December 2006 (UTC)"
Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Vernyhora
"Stalin replaced the New Economic Policy (NEP) of the 1920s with Five-Year Plans in 1928 and collective farming at roughly the same time. The Soviet Union was transformed from a predominantly peasant society to a major world industrial power by the end of the 1930s. Confiscations of grain and other food by the Soviet authorities under his orders contributed to a famine between 1932 and 1934, especially in the key agricultural regions of the Soviet Union, Ukraine Holodomor, Kazakhstan and North Caucasus that resulted in millions of deaths. Many peasants resisted collectivization and grain confiscations, but were repressed, most notably well-off peasants deemed "kulaks".
In the first years of collectivization it was estimated that industrial production would rise by 200% and and agricultural production by 50%[21], but these estimates were not met. Stalin blamed this unanticipated failure on kulaks (rich peasants), who resisted collectivization. (However, kulaks proper made up only 4% of the peasant population; the "kulaks" that Stalin targeted included the slightly better-off peasants who took the brunt of violence from the OGPU and the Komsomol. These peasants were about 60% of the population). Those officially defined as "kulaks," "kulak helpers," and later "ex-kulaks" were to be shot, placed into Gulag labor camps, or deported to remote areas of the country, depending on the charge.
The two-stage progress of collectivization—interrupted for a year by Stalin's famous editorial, "Dizzy with success" (Pravda, March 2, 1930), and "Reply to Collective Farm Comrades" (Pravda, April 3, 1930)—is a prime example of his capacity for tactical political withdrawal followed by intensification of initial strategies.
Many historians assert that the disruption caused by collectivization was largely responsible for major famines.
The 1932-1933 famine in Ukraine and the Kuban regions has been termed the Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор).
According to Alan Bullock, "the total Soviet grain crop was no worse than that of 1931 … it was not a crop failure but the excessive demands of the state, ruthlessly enforced, that cost the lives of as many as five million Ukrainian peasants." Stalin refused to release large grain reserves that could have alleviated the famine, while continuing to export grain; he was convinced that the Ukrainian peasants had hidden grain away, and strictly enforced draconian new collective-farm theft laws in response.
Other historians hold that it was largely the insufficient harvests of 1931 and 1932 caused by a variety of natural disasters that resulted in famine, with the successful harvest of 1933 ending the famine.
Famine affected other parts of the USSR. The death toll from famine in the Soviet Union at this time is estimated at between five and ten million people. The worst crop failure of late tsarist Russia, in 1892, had caused 375,000 to 400,000 deaths.)
Soviet and other historians have argued that the rapid collectivization of agriculture was necessary in order to achieve an equally rapid industrialization of the Soviet Union[citation needed] and ultimately win World War II. This is disputed by other historians; Alec Nove claims that the Soviet Union industrialized in spite of, rather than because of, its collectivized agriculture.
Retrieved from Soviet democracy
"...Other historians..." (questionable credentials) "...the insufficient harvests of 1931 and 1932 caused by a variety of natural disasters that resulted in famine..."
Can anyone say, "Communist Propaganda?!?"
Those who make ongoing excuses for this man-made famine holocaust have dealt a blow to every person who has suffered directly or indirectly from Communist policies. Leftwing apologists, Atheists, obviously have no shame or human empathy when they create such blatant distortions of history.
Soviet Democracy
The Civil War had ended, the White (or Imperial) Armies had sailed away, but the desperate policies of the Bolshevik party had brought the country to its knees. Many of the Kronstadt sailors' were from peasant families and the letters received from home made for depressing reading. But some of the party elite were beginning to conspicuously beginning to enjoy the priveleges of power.
By the end of 1920, Raskolnokov and Reisner lived a comfortable life in Kronstadt complete with full staff. When not at home they made full use of the flagship and held regular reception parties and they became deeply unpopular with the sailors. The sailors had seen over the civil war, their direct act of democracy in 1917 being replaced with commissars, by people appointed above them, banning of their daily meetings, control of their Soviet and to an extent they had been prepared to put up with that for the civil war period by with as the Civil War had wained, the soldiers anticipated a fulfilment on promises of Soviet Democracy.
The soldiers of Kronstadt who were the heros of the Russian Revolution, are betrayed by Lenin and the Communist (Bolshevik) Party, and the Red Army advance on Kronstadt. Goals of the 1917 Revolution are lost in the last hope for Russian democracy. (Scene from "Russian Revolution in Color")
Kronstadt Soldiers Duped by Lenin and the Bolsheviks (Part II)
References
Russian Revolution in Color (DVD)
The Russian Revolution and Civil War, this bloodsoaked time from the battlefields, testimonies, and colorized archives help unfold the dramatic story of the Communist rise and seizure of power in 1917.
Peasants of Russian - The Russian Revolution
The people of Russia suffered just as much. To feed the urban workers and maintain war production, peasants were forced to hand over their grain surpluses at prices determined by the state. Those who resisted were shot.
Whole villages were wiped out if they failed to hand over their grain to the Checka.
In the worst cases, they also removed the seed grain the peasants needed for planting the following year. At a time of rebellion and drought, this desperate policy lead to another five million deaths.
Trotsky put it in such terms, of the Civil War, 'We got victory in the Civil War, the price was we ruined the country.'
References
Russian Revolution in Color (DVD)
The Russian Revolution and Civil War, this bloodsoaked time from the battlefields, testimonies, and colorized archives help unfold the dramatic story of the Communist rise and seizure of power in 1917.
Allied Forces Support the White Army in the War against the Reds
With the collapse of Germany came intervention, or at least support for the Whites becomes a much more serious possibility. The Baltic Sea and Black Sea is open, Turkey has pulled out of the war, and for that allies can move forces into Central Russia.
British Troops occupy the ports of Archangel and Murmansk in the north and advance hundreds of miles inland.
Japan and Britain move into Siberia from Vladivostok in the east, where they are joined by troops from the United States.
France supports the Generals in the south from their base on the coast of the Black Sea.
Russia is now surrounded by former allies and Lenin's paranoia proves itself justifiable. The whole world really was against them.
The different white armies strike again and again at the Reds from almost every direction, but the Red Army has been able to respond to every attack in turn. When Petrograd is threatened with invasion from the White General Yudenich, the sailors from Kronstadt are again dispatched. Again, the whites are defeated. Despite their support, the White armies remain separated by great distances, their supplies are poor and they are unable to coordinate their attacks.
Slowly the white Generals realize that while the Russians maintain control of Russia's industrial heartland they could never succeed. After two years, the last White General is defeated and the allies leave Russia for good.
The Civil War in Russia brutalized life in Russia to an unimaginable degree. Around three million Soviet and enemy troops were killed in action, another two million died of disease. The people of Russia suffered just as much.
References
Russian Revolution in Color (DVD)
The Russian Revolution and Civil War, this bloodsoaked time from the battlefields, testimonies, and colorized archives help unfold the dramatic story of the Communist rise and seizure of power in 1917.
The Red Army
The Bolshevik leadership believed the Kronstadt sailors were the most resolute and loyal of forces of the Red Cause.
Trotsky and the Kronstadt sailors went back on the river chasing the retreating rebel forces. Aboard the ship that had previously belonged to the murdered Royal family, now a staff ship, Larisa Reisner was exploring her new position as commissar and wife of Fedor Raskolnikov, now commander of the Baltic Fleet.
While aboard, Larisa Reisner noticed the former Czarena Alexandria had etched her name in the window, and she replaced it with her own.
A few months later, on the 11th of November 1918, the war with Germany ended.
Europe seemed to be at peace, but for Russia there was no end to death and killing. The country had exploded into massive civil war that would cause more deaths in Russia, than all the bloody years of the first world war.
The Civil War had grown into a power struggle between the Bolshevik Reds and Conservative White Generals. These men wanted a return to Imperialists rule, to life before the Revolution.
Unlike the trench war with the Germans in the West, the Civil War was fast-moving, troops covered thousands of miles on armored trains and swept across the country-side on horseback.
While the Reds struggled in the War against Germany, the Whites had the advantage. Hurriedly, the government moved the capitol from Petrograd to Moscow as the area controlled by the Bolsheviks shrank to not much more than the core of European Russia. The Whites also had the support of the newly victorious European powers. They saw Lenin's worldwide Communist mission as a clear threat to Democracy and capitalism. Britain, France, America and Japan together sent 200,000 troops to help supply the Whites and strangle any Bolshevik expansion, by keeping them busy at home.
With the collapse of Germany came intervention, or at least support for the Whites becomes a much more serious possibility. The Baltic Sea and Black Sea is open, Turkey has pulled out of the war, and for that allies can move forces into Central Russia.
References
Russian Revolution in Color (DVD)
The Russian Revolution and Civil War, this bloodsoaked time from the battlefields, testimonies, and colorized archives help unfold the dramatic story of the Communist rise and seizure of power in 1917.
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