Stalin: Paradoxes of Power, 1878-1928

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With a detailed table of contents A magnificent new biography that revolutionizes our understanding of Stalin and his world It has the quality of myth: a poor cobbler’s son, a seminarian from an oppressed outer province of the Russian empire, reinvents himself as a top leader in a band of revolutionary zealots. When the band seizes control of the country in the aftermath of total world war, the former seminarian ruthlessly dominates the new regime until he stands as absolute ruler of a vast and terrible state apparatus, with dominion over Eurasia. While still building his power base within the Bolshevik dictatorship, he embarks upon the greatest gamble of his political life and the largest program of social reengineering ever attempted: the collectivization of all agriculture and industry across one sixth of the earth. Millions will die, and many more millions will suffer, but the man will push through to the end against all resistance and doubts. Where did such power come from?  In Stalin, Stephen Kotkin offers a biography that, at long last, is equal to this shrewd, sociopathic, charismatic dictator in all his dimensions. The character of Stalin emerges as both astute and blinkered, cynical and true believing, people oriented and vicious, canny enough to see through people but prone to nonsensical beliefs. We see a man inclined to despotism who could be utterly charming, a pragmatic ideologue, a leader who obsessed over slights yet was a precocious geostrategic thinker—unique among Bolsheviks—and yet who made egregious strategic blunders. Through it all, we see Stalin’s unflinching persistence, his sheer force of will—perhaps the ultimate key to understanding his indelible mark on history. Stalin gives an intimate view of the Bolshevik regime’s inner geography of power, bringing to the fore fresh materials from Soviet military intelligence and the secret police. Kotkin rejects the inherited wisdom about Stalin’s psychological makeup, showing us instead how Stalin’s near paranoia was fundamentally political, and closely tracks the Bolshevik revolution’s structural paranoia, the predicament of a Communist regime in an overwhelmingly capitalist world, surrounded and penetrated by enemies. At the same time, Kotkin demonstrates the impossibility of understanding Stalin’s momentous decisions outside of the context of the tragic history of imperial Russia. The product of a decade of intrepid research, Stalin is a landmark achievement, a work that recasts the way we think about the Soviet Union, revolution, dictatorship, the twentieth century, and indeed the art of history itself. Stalin: Waiting for Hitler, 1929-1941 will be published by Penguin Press in October 2017 Cover Also By Stephen Kotkin Title Copyright Dedication Epigraph Contents PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Maps PART I: DOUBLE-HEADED EAGLE CHAPTER 1: AN IMPERIAL SON SMALL-TOWN IDYLL GEOPOLITICAL RUPTURE,SURROGATE FAMILY SUCCOR FAITH IN GOD CHAPTER 2: LADO’S DISCIPLE GEORGIAN CULTURAL NATIONALIST STUDENT POLITICS MARXISM AND RUSSIA AGITATOR, TEACHER UNDERGROUND CHAPTER 3: TSARISM’S MOST DANGEROUS ENEMY MODERNITY AS GEOPOLITICALIMPERATIVE CRUSHING DEFEAT IN ASIA LEFTIST FACTIONALISM DISINTEGRATION AND RESCUE CHAPTER 4: CONSTITUTIONAL AUTOCRACY RUSSIA’S (SECOND)WOULD-BE BISMARCK RUSSIA’S PROTO-FASCISM A PUNDIT GEOPOLITICAL ORIENTATION DEAD-END BANDITRY PARALLEL SELF-DEFEAT TRAGIC SECRET PART II: DURNOVÓ’S REVOLUTIONARY WAR CHAPTER 5: STUPIDITY OR TREASON? SARAJEVO AND STATE PRESTIGE THE SUMMONS TO LENIN CONSCRIPTS AND THE AWOL AUTOCRACY PREPARES A REVOLUTION LAST LAST STRAW CRACKDOWN AND DESERTION INSERT 1: Photographs TREASON CHAPTER 6: RALMYK SAVIOR FREEDOM VERSUS FIRM AUTHORITY LENIN’S HELPMATES ZEALOTRY ROLLING THE IRON DICE KERENSKY’S FIRST FAILED COUP KERENSKY’S SECOND FAILED COUP THE VANISHING ACT LENIN AND TROTSKY CHAPTER 7: 1918: DADA AND LENIN MONOPOLY STATELESSNESS BALLOTING TROTSKY’S FAILURE QOQAND MASSACRE CAPITULATION FLIGHT AND ENTRENCHMENT CRUELEST MONTHS: SPRING 1918 CZECHOSLOVAK LEGION REVOLT NON-COUP ASSASSINATION AND NEARASSASSINATION CHAPTER 8: CLASS WAR AND A PARTY-STATE WHITES AND REDS, OFFICERS AND GRAINS MORE THAN A BARGE: STALIN IN TSARITSYN (1918) STALIN’S RECALL AND CLOSE CALL A WORLD TURNING (NOVEMBER 1918-JANUARY 1919) VERSAILLES 1919: THE ANOMALY LIGHTNING ROD COMMISSAR FORCES OF ORDER WHITE OFFENSIVE OF 1919 — FALL AND RISE OF TROTSKY WHITE FAILURES FUNCTIONARIES SHALL INHERIT THE EARTEH CHAPTER 9: VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY ACCIDENTAL FEDERALISTS SUPREMACY IN EASTERN EUROPE LENIN’S FLIGHT OF FANCY PEOPLES OF THE EAST A CENTRAL ASIAN ARK NO GLORY WINTER OF DISCONTENT (1920-21) “SOVIETS WITHOUT PARTIES” RELATIONS AMONG SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS “PEASANT BREST-LITOVSK,” PARTY “UNITY” WHITE GUARDS, IMPERIALISTS, SOCIALIST REVOLUTIONARIES ABSORBING GEORGIAN NATIONALISM FIRST SOVIET SATELLITE PART II!: COLLISION CHAPTER 10: DICTATOR FROM VOZDVIZHENKA TO OLD SQUARE NOMENKLATURA AND CONSPIRACY ZNAMENKA, 23 LUBYANKA, 2 BLACKSMITH BRIDGE AND HOTEL LUX OLD SQUARE, 8 ILINKA, 9 “UNDER STALIN’S WING” LOOKING FOR LEVERAGE SECRET WEAPON “THE POINT IS ABOUT LEADERSHIP” CHAPTER 11: “REMOVE STALIN™ UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS — AND A SLAP IN TIFLIS FAILED QUEST FOR ECONOMIC DICTATORSHIP SECOND STROKE FIRST RECOGNITION SUSPICIOUS DICTATION INSERT 2: Photographs THIRD STROKE AND FAKE ARTICLE ABSENT LENIN MIRACULOUS DICTATION OPERATION PARLIAMENT-2 (SOLTANGALIEVISM) “CAVE MEETING” DELIRIUM DREAD EVERLASTING HUMILIATION LEFT OPPOSITION CONFRONTATION CHAPTER 12: FAITHFUL PUPIL REVELATION POLITICAL PARALYSIS VERSUS HOLY OATHS LENINISM “LETTER TO THE CONGRESS” FASCISM’S LESSONS SOVIET GEOPOLITICS BRUSHING OFF EUROPEAN RAPPROCHEMENT A DUUMVIRATE “ENRICH YOURSELVES” TESTAMENT REPUDIATED VOROSHILOV’S ASCENT DZIERŻYŃSKI ’S MUDDLE BIRTHDAY DENUNCIATIONS AND NOW, ONE MENACING TURNS CHAPTER 13: TRIUMPHANT DEBACLE A JAUNT THROUGH THE CAUCASUS AILMENTS APLENTY TESTAMENT, AGAIN RUSSIA’S NEW RULER (EYE ON AMERICA) GRAVE DIGGER OF THE REVOLUTION PARSING THE STRATEGIC SITUATION STATE OF SIEGE IMPLOSION TERRORISM EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES ABOUT-FACE THEATER OF THE ABSURD FRANCO-SOVIET RIFT FINAL FACE-TO-FACE TENTH ANNIVERSARY: PRETEXT FOR REPRESSION 15TH PARTY CONGRESS (DECEMBER 2-19, 1927) CHAPTER 14: TRIP TO SIBERIA SELF-FULFILLING CRISIS EARTH-SHATTERING SPEECH EXILING THE LEFT, ENACTING LEFTISM COMMUNIST PARTY ON WATCH RYKOV’S DILEMMA A TOWN CALLED “MINE SHAFTS” (SHAKHTY FOREIGN “ECONOMIC” INTERVENTION INCITING CLASS WARFARE TACTICAL RETREAT (APRIL 1928) SHOW TRIAL BULLY PULPIT (MAY-JUNE 1928) SECOND TACTICAL RETREAT (JULY 1928 PLENUM) INTRIGUE OF INTRIGUES? FUTURE BRICKS, PRESENT MALEVOLENCE CODA: IF STALIN HAD DIED NOTES PART I: DOUBLE-HEADED EAGLE CHAPTER 1: AN IMPERIAL SON CHAPTER 2: LADO’S DISCIPLE CHAPTER 3: TSARISM’S MOST DANGEROUS ENEMY CHAPTER 4: CONSTITUTIONAL AUTOCRACY PART II: DURNOVÓ’S REVOLUTIONARY WAR CHAPTER 5: STUPIDITY OR TREASON? CHAPTER 6: KALMYK SAVIOR CHAPTER 7: 1918: DADA AND LENIN CHAPTER 8: CLASS WAR AND A PARTY-STATE CHAPTER 9: VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY PART III: COLLISION CHAPTER 10: DICTATOR CHAPTER 11: “REMOVE STALIN” CHAPTER 12: FAITHFUL PUPIL CHAPTER 13: TRIUMPHANT DEBACLE CHAPTER 14: A TRIP TO SIBERIA CODA: IF STALIN HAD DIED BIBLIOGRAPHY ILLUSTRATION CREDITS INDEX Back Cover