Stalin: A Biography

by Robert Service

  5. Stalin. K shestidesyatiyu so dnya rozhdeniya, pp. 193–4

  6. Pravda, 1 January 1931. See also the account in J. Brooks, Thank You, Comrade Stalin!, pp. 80–1.

  7. Pravda, 1 January 1937.

  8. Ibid., 29 June 1936.

  9. Zastol’nye rechi Stalina, p. 175. This came in a speech given at a Kremlin reception for recently elected USSR Supreme Soviet deputies on 20 January 1938.

  10. A. Fadeev (ed.), Vstrechi s tovarishchem Stalinym, pp. 40, 98, 112, 133, 160, 178 and 195.

  11. Zastol’nye rechi Stalina, p. 123.

  12. Stalin i Kaganovich. Perepiska, p. 526.

  13. I. A. Valedinskii, ‘Vospominaniya o vstrechakh o t. I. V. Staline’, p. 72.

  14. Stalin i Khasim (1901–1902 gg.). Nekotorye epizody iz batumskogo podpol’ya.

  15. V. Shveitser, Stalin v turukhanskoi ssylke. Vospominaniya podpol’shchika.

  16. H. Barbusse, Staline: Un monde nouveau vu à travers d’un homme.

  17. See F. Bettanin, La fabbrica del mito, p. 157.

  18. For an exception to the trend see ibid., p. 174.

  19. The possibility should not be discounted that the admiration of Lenin was genuine.

  20. See also below, pp. 541–2.

  21. Istoriya Vsesoyuznoi Kommunisticheskoi Partii (Bol’shevikov). Kratkii kurs.

  22. Ibid., pp. 198–204.

  23. See above, pp. 292–3.

  24. Pravda, 7 October 1935.

  25. V. Kaminskii and I. Vereshchagin, ‘Detstvo i yunost’ vozhdya: dokumenty, zapisi, rasskazy’, pp. 22–100.

  26. Ibid.

  27. Pis’ma ko vlasti, pp. 124 ff.

  28. O. Volobuev and S. Kuleshov, Ochishchenie, p. 146.

  29. Cited by N. N. Maslov, ‘Ob utverzhdenii ideologii stalinizma’, p. 78.

  30. V. Ivanov, ‘Krasnaya ploshchad’, Novyi mir, no. 11 (1937), pp. 259–60.

  31. K. Chukovskii, Dnevniki, 1930–1969, p. 86. I owe this reference to B. S. Ilizarov, ‘Stalin. Bolezn’, smert’ i “bessmertie”’, pp. 294–5.

  32. S. Fitzpatrick, Stalin’s Peasants, pp. 289–96.

  33. Obshchestvo i vlast’. 1930-e gody, p. 25.

  34. S. Davies discusses the ambiguities of the evidence in Popular Opinion in Stalin’s Russia, pp. 155–82.

  33. Brutal Reprieve

  1. Iz vospominanii Sukhanova D. N., byvshego pomoshchnika Malenkova G. M.’, Volkogonov Archive, reel no. 8, p. 5.

  2. Pisatel’ i vozhd’: perepiska M. A. Sholokhova s I. V. Stalinym, p. 150. For Yezhov’s fall see M. Jansen and N. Petrov, Stalin’s Loyal Executioner, chap. 7.

  3. Ibid., pp. 160–1.

  4. Ibid., pp. 171–4.

  5. Ibid., p. 164.

  6. Directive quoted by Oleg Khlevniuk, ‘Party and NKVD: Power Relationships in the Years of the Great Terror’ in B. McLoughlin and K. McDermott (eds), Stalin’s Terror, p. 31.

  7. See above, p. 7.

  8. G. Dimitrov, Diario. Gli anni di Mosca (1934–1945), p. 267.

  9. Vosemnadtsatyi s”ezd Vsesoyuznoi Kommunisticheskoi Partii (b), p. 29.

  10. Ibid., pp. 29–30.

  11. See his comments at the conference on propaganda on 1 October 1938: ‘I. V. Stalin o “Kratkom kurse po istorii VKP(b)”. Stenogramma vystupleniya no soveshchanii propagandistov Moskvy i Leningrada’, Istoricheskii arkhiv, no. 5 (1994), pp. 12–13.

  12. Vosemnadtsatyi s”ezd Vsesoyuznoi Kommunisticheskoi Partii (b), pp. 515–17.

  13. Zastol’nye rechi Stalina, p. 235.

  14. See N. Petrov, ‘The GUlag as Instrument of the USSR’s Punitive System’ in E. Dundovich, F. Gori and E. Guercetti (eds), Reflections on the Gulag, p. 22.

  15. Vosemnadtsatyi s”ezd Vsesoyuznoi Kommunisticheskoi Partii (b), p. 26.

  34. The World in Sight

  1. The exception was their brief collaboration in the Bolshevik robbery organisation before the First World War.

  2. See D. Watson, ‘The Politburo and Foreign Policy in the 1930s’, pp. 149–50.

  3. The foreign-policy discussions of the 1930s were amenable to thorough scholarly investigation only from the late 1980s, when archives started to be published more readily and even to become directly accessible.

  4. O voprosakh leninizma in I. V. Stalin, Sochineniya, vol. 8, p. 64.

  5. See R. Service, Lenin: A Political Life, vol. 3, p. 136.

  6. M. Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam nach Moskau, p. 284.

  7. I am grateful to Katya Andreyev for her comments on inter-war Soviet foreign policy.

  8. Dimitrov and Stalin, 1934–1943, p. 13.

  9. Semnadtsatyi s”ezd Vsesoyuznoi kommunisticheskoi partii (b), pp. 13–14.

  10. Dimitrov and Stalin, 1934–1943, p. 18.

  11. A. Kriegel and S. Courtois, Eugen Fried, pp. 255–61.

  12. J. Hochman, The Soviet Union and the Failure of Collective Security, 1934–1938, pp. 43–51.

  13. G. Dimitrov, Diario. Gli anni di Mosca (1934–1945), p. 203.

  14. Ibid., pp. 46–7.

  15. Endnote 10 in Dimitrov and Stalin, 1934–1943, p. 50.

  16. P. Togliatti, Opere, vol. 4, part 1, pp. 258–72.

  35. Approaches to War

  1. See S. Alieva (ed.), Tak eto bylo, vol. 1, pp. 44, 50, 86 and 96.

  2. See above, pp. 169 and 203.

  3. See above, p. 267.

  4. Dimitrov and Stalin, 1934–1943, p. 28.

  5. Ibid., p. 32, citing Dimitrov’s diary. I have re-translated the phrase na ruku.

  6. Editorial notes of A. Dallin and F. I. Firsov, Dimitrov and Stalin, p. 34.

  7. Editorial notes of ibid., p. 108.

  8. See H. P. Bix, Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan, p. 351.

  9. See J. Erickson, The Soviet High Command, p. 522.

  10. See C. Andrew and V. Mitrokhin, The Mitrokhin Archive, p. 300.

  11. See G. Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion, pp. 57–8, 135–6 and 180.

  12. See below, pp. 362–3.

  36. The Devils Sup

  1. ‘“Avtobiograficheskie zametki” V. N. Pavlova — perevodchika I. V. Stalina’, p. 98.

  2. Ibid., p. 99.

  3. See R. Overy, Russia’s War, p. 49.

  4. V. N. Pavlov, ‘Predistoriya 1939 goda’, Svobodnaya mysl’, no. 7 (1999), pp. 109–10.

  5. A. Mikoyan, Tak bylo, p. 392.

  6. See above, p. 178.

  7. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 54.

  8. See K. Sword (ed.), The Soviet Takeover of the Polish Eastern Provinces, 1939–1941.

  9. See H. Shukman and A. Chubaryan (eds), Stalin and the Soviet–Finnish War, 1939–1940, especially Stalin’s comments on the failures and successes of the campaign, pp. 236–7.

  10. Khrushchev Remembers: The Glasnost Tapes, p. 154.

  11. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 19.

  12. See H. P. von Strandmann, ‘Obostryaushchiesya paradoksy: Gitler, Stalin i germano-sovetskie ekonomicheskie svyazi. 1939–1941’, p. 376.

  13. See J. Erickson, The Soviet High Command, p. 566.

  14. See G. Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion, p. 129–35.

  15. Dimitrov in Zastol’nye rechi Stalina, p. 234.

  16. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, pp. 40–1.

  17. G. Dimitrov, Diario. Gli anni di Mosca (1934–1945), p. 302.

  18. N. Lyashchenko, ‘O vystuplenii I. V. Stalina v Kremle, 5 maya 1941’, Volkogonov Papers, reel no. 8, p. 1.

  19. G. Dimitrov, Diario. Gli anni di Mosca (1934–1945), p. 310.

  20. These comments come from the notes taken by V. A. Malyshev: ‘Proidët desyatok let, i eti vstrechi ne vosstanovish’ uzhe v pamyati’, p. 117.

  21. See D. Glantz, Stumbling Colossus, p. 97.

  22. L. Samuelson, Plans for Stalin’s War Machine, p. 199.

  23. N. Lyashchenko, ‘O vystuplenii I. V. Stalina v Kremle, 5 maya 1941’, Volkogonov Papers, reel 8, p. 3. The episode was recounted to Lyashchenko by Minister of Defence Semën Timoshenko.

  37. Barbarossa


  1. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 2, p. 8.

  2. Ibid., p. 9.

  3. See the archivally based account of G. Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion, p. 311.

  4. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 2, p. 9.

  5. Ibid., pp. 9–10.

  6. Ibid., p. 10.

  7. Ibid., pp. 12–13.

  8. G. Dimitrov, Diario. Gli anni di Mosca (1934–1945), p. 319.

  9. See G. Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion, pp. 275–8; D. Glantz, Stumbling Colossus, p. 242.

  10. See G. Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion, pp. 53–5.

  11. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 2, p. 9.

  12. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 60.

  13. ‘Zhurnal poseshcheniya I. V. Stalina v ego Kremlëvskom kabinete’ in Yu. Gor’kov, Gosudarstvennyi Komitet Oborony postanovlyaet, pp. 223–4.

  14. Ibid.

  15. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 2, p. 73.

  16. ‘Zhurnal poseshcheniya I. V. Stalina v ego Kremlëvskom kabinete’, loc. cit., pp. 223–4.

  17. A. Mikoyan. Tak bylo, p. 390.

  18. Ibid., p. 391. Molotov recorded that Stalin ‘wasn’t himself’ that day but insisted that his mood was firm: Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 60.

  19. A. Mikoyan. Tak bylo, pp. 391–2.

  20. Pravda, 1 July 1941.

  21. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 71 gives the account supposedly provided by his father. This account has Moscow Party City Committee Secretary Alexander Shcherbakov, not Voznesenski, as having made the proposal for Molotov to take over the leadership.

  22. Yu. Gor’kov, Gosudarstvennyi Komitet Oborony postanovlyaet, p. 501.

  38. Fighting On

  1. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 2, pp. 126–7.

  2. R. Overy, Russia’s War, p. 171.

  3. There is nothing in the memoirs of Molotov, Kaganovich, Khrushchëv and Zhukov — men who knew him very well in the war — to contradict this point.

  4. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 2, p. 344.

  5. Ibid., p. 346.

  6. Ibid., p. 347.

  7. Ibid., pp. 348–9.

  8. Ibid., p. 361.

  9. Ibid. This statement, like many others, was censored in the 1969 edition and allowed to be published only in its 1995 successor.

  10. Ibid., p. 367.

  39. Sleeping on the Divan

  1. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 154.

  2. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 3, pp. 215–16.

  3. A. M. Vasilevski: interview in G. A. Kumanëv (ed.), Ryadom so Stalinym, p. 242.

  4. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, pp. 153–4. This story was told to Sergo Beria by his mother, who spoke to Yakov.

  5. Ibid., p. 155.

  6. ‘Dnevnik M. A. Svanidze’ in Iosif Stalin v ob”yatiyakh sem’i, p. 159.

  7. Testimony of Alexei Kapler: E. Biagi, Svetlana, p. 21.

  8. Ibid., p. 27.

  9. ’Dnevnik M. A. Svanidze’: Iosif Stalin v ob”yatiyakh sem’i, p. 161.

  10. Ibid., p. 158.

  11. S. Allilueva, Tol’ko odin god, p. 320.

  12. Ibid., p. 326.

  13. Ibid., pp. 129–30.

  14. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 150.

  15. S. Allilueva, Dvadtsat’ pisem k drugu, pp. 163–6.

  16. Ibid., pp. 166–7.

  17. Ibid., pp. 167–8.

  18. Ibid., p. 169.

  19. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 152.

  20. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 5078.

  21. V. Alliluev, Khronika odnoi sem’i: Alliluevy. Stalin, p. 97.

  22. Ibid.

  23. I. A. Valedinskii, ‘Vospominaniya o vstrechakh s t. I. V. Stalinym’, pp. 69–70.

  24. See below, pp. 456–7.

  25. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 3, p. 109.

  26. He let no one know of his physical weaknesses with the exception of Churchill. Preparing to meet the British Prime Minister in autumn 1944, he wrote: ‘The doctors don’t advise me to undertake long trips. For a certain period I need to take account of this’: Perepiska predsedatelya Soveta Ministra SSSR s prezidentami SShA i prem’er-ministrami Velikobritanii vo vremya velikoi Otechestvennoi voiny, vol. 1, p. 262. Even this remark, however, cannot be taken at face value. Stalin would do anything to make the mountain come to Mohammed; he always tried to get Churchill and Roosevelt to do the travelling.

  27. ‘Dnevnik M. A. Svanidze’ in Iosif Stalin v ob”yatiyakh sem’i, pp. 158–60, 169, 174, 177.

  28. Ibid., p. 168.

  29. Ibid., p. 175.

  30. L. Vasil’eva, Deti Kremlya, p. 261; V. Alliluev, Khronika odnoi sem’i: Alliluevy. Stalin, p. 128 (where it is mentioned that her parents-in-law never forgave Yevgenia for marrying again so quickly after Pavel’s death).

  31. L. Vasil’eva, Deti Kremlya, p. 261.

  32. L. M. Kaganovich, Pamyatnye zapiski, p. 33; Tak govoril Kaganovich, pp. 49–50. The date of death is given variously as 1924 and 1926. See also S. Allilueva, Tol’ko odin god, p. 331.

  33. L. Kaganovich, Tak govoril Kaganovich, p. 49. Sergo Beria, however, claimed that the identity of Stalin’s lover was not Kaganovich’s sister or daughter but his niece: see S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 166. As yet there is no corroboration of this assertion.

  34. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, pp. 181 and 191.

  35. ‘Dnevnik M. A. Svanidze’ in Iosif Stalin v ob”yatiyakh sem’i, p. 170.

  36. Kira Allilueva: interview, 14 December 1998.

  37. See the recollection by A. P. Alliluev as given to R. Richardson, The Long Shadow, pp. 142–3.

  38. J. von Ribbentrop, Zwischen London und Moskau. Erinnerungen und letzte Auchzeichnungen, p. 25.

  39. Testimony of A.T. Sergeev to F. Chuev: Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 359.

  40. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 3, p. 108.

  41. N. K. Baibakov, Ot Stalina do Yel’tsina, pp. 80 and 83.

  42. See K. Charkviani’s account summarised by Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar, p. 101.

  40. To the Death!

  1. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 3, p. 14.

  2. Ibid., p. 23.

  3. Ibid., p. 32.

  4. Ibid., p. 45.

  5. Ibid., p. 46.

  6. Ibid., p. 61.

  7. Ibid., p. 59.

  8. See W. Moskoff, The Bread of Affliction.

  9. Official military postcard, 6 January 1944.

  10. V. Tsypin, Istoriya Russkoi pravoslavnoi tserkvi, 1917–1990, pp. 95, 104 and 106.

  11. See D. Pospielovsky, The Russian Orthodox Church under the Soviet Regime, p. 111.

  12. V. A. Alekseev, ‘Neozhidannyi dialog’, Agitator, no. 6 (1989), pp. 41–4.

  13. V. A. Alekseev, Illyuzii i dogma, pp. 336–7.

  14. G. Dimitrov, Diario. Gli anni di Mosca (1934–1945), pp. 615 and 617.

  15. Ibid., p. 618.

  16. See M. Mevius, Agents of Moscow, chapter 3.

  17. J. Rossi, Spravochnik po Gulagu, part 1, p. 40.

  18. See P. J. S. Duncan, Russian Messianism, p. 59.

  19. ‘Proidët desyatok let, i eti vstrechi ne vosstanovish’ uzhe v pamyati. Dnevnikovye zapisi V. A. Malysheva’, pp. 127–8. See also G. Dimitrov, Diario. Gli anni di Mosca (1934–1945), p. 802.

  20. See A. V. Fateev, Obraz vraga v Sovetskoi propagande, 1945–1954 gg., p. 23. Fadeev’s article appeared in Pod znamenem marksizma, no. 11 (1943).

  21. See C. Andreyev, Vlasov and the Russian Liberation Movement. Soviet Realities and émigré Theories.

  41. Supreme Commander

  1. Sochineniya, vol. 14, p. 1.

  2. See below, note 4.

  3. Sochineniya, vol. 14, p. 5.

  4. Letter of July 1941: Zvezda, no. 2 (2003), p. 191.

  5. Sochineniya, vol. 14, p. 6.

  6. Ibid., p. 33.

  7. Ibid., p. 34.

&nb
sp; 8. This is a point made by J. Brooks, Thank You, Comrade Stalin!, p. 160.

  9. See in general D. C. Watt, How War Came, pp. 224–33.

  10. The Times, 4 January 1943.

  11. Ibid., 1 January 1940.

  12. See below, chapter 32.

  13. N. K. Baibakov, Ot Stalina do Yel’tsina, pp. 43–8.

  14. Ibid., p. 64.

  15. Ibid.

  16. Testimony of A. E. Golovanov in G. A. Kumanëv (ed.), Ryadom so Stalinym, pp. 272–3.

  17. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 3, p. 59.

  18. Ibid., pp. 113 and 115.

  19. K. Simonov, Glazami cheloveka moego pokoleniya, p. 111.

  20. A. Mikoyan, Tak bylo, p. 463.

  21. P. A Sudoplatov and A. Sudoplatov, Special Tasks, p. 328.

  22. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 2, p. 266.

  23. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 244.

  24. Ibid., p. 270.

  25. Ibid., p. 134.

  26. A. Mikoyan, Tak bylo, p. 563.

  27. G. A. Kumanëv, ‘Dve besedy s L. M. Kaganovichem’, Novaya i noveishaya istoriya, no. 2 (1999), p. 107.

  42. The Big Three

  1. Perepiska predsedatelya Soveta Ministrov SSSR, vol. 2, p. 98. See also W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 4, p. 594.

  2. Perepiska predsedatelya Soveta Ministrov SSSR, vol. 2, p. 101.

  3. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 93.

  4. The carriage now stands outside the State Home-Museum of I. V. Stalin at Gori.

  5. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 4, p. 447.

  6. Perepiska predsedatelya Soveta Ministrov SSSR, vol. 2, p. 43.

  7. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 4, p. 443.

  8. J. von Ribbentrop, Zwischen London und Moskau. p. 25.

  9. I. P. McEwan, ‘Quo Vadis?’, p. 113. I am grateful to Philippa McEwan for supplying me with this memoir.

  10. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 5, pp. 334–6.

  11. Churchill and Stalin: Documents from the British Archives: conversation of Churchill and Stalin, 28 November 1943, doc. 46, p. 3.