Joseph Stalin: A Short Biography

Citation preview

J 0 S E P H

STALIN A SHORT BIOGRAPHY

l 11HF.IGN LAM.l \1,E!-t l't:Bl . J~HJ "'lf, HOl ~f.



:\I 0

S < OU

19i;

J 0 S E P H

STALIN A SHORT BIOGRAPHY

l 11HF.IGN LAM.l \1,E!-t l't:Bl . J~HJ "'lf, HOl ~f.



:\I 0

S < OU

19i;

The prt>scnl l':r1glish edition of tlw hiOfi:raphy of J. V. Stalin follGws the latest (1944i HU!~sian editio.n. issued by the Marx· F.:n,gcls-Lenin Institute in Moscow, and gives a ·brief sketch o& his life and ncti\·itirs up lo 1939.

/'rinll'tl in th~ Union of .'iouirl Socialist H~p11bltr•

J

O~EPll

STAI.I:\ (l>J{j(i,\SlIV1Ll) was born 011 December 21, 18i9, in the town of Gori, Province of Tillis. His father, Vissarion DjugashviJi, a· Georgian of peasant stock from the village of Didi-Lilo in· the same province, was a cobbler by trade, and lafer a worker at the Adelkhanov Shoe Factory in Tiilis. His mother, Ekaterina Dju· gash viii (net· Geladu), came from a family of former peaanl serfs in the village of GamhareuJi. In the autumu of 1888 Stalin entered the eccksiastl~ cal school in Gori, from which. in 1894. lw passed to theTheological Seminary in Tillis. This was a period when, with the development or indus· !rial capitalism and the attendant growth of the worki11g·class movement, Marxism had begun to ~prcad' widely through Russia. The SL Petersburg League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the 'Vorking ClaS&S, rounded an sc-minary for :\farxist propaganda. For " lime he Jived by giving lt:'ssons: later he found employment at the Tiflis Ob· wrvator~· as a calculator and observnt did he· ce.'l·'e hi,; n·volutionary activities. Stalin. had now hecomt' one of the most activt' and prominent nwmhers of the Tiflis Social·Dt'mocratic mov(•ntent. ''In 18\l8- HlOO a leading, cenlrai Social-D1•mocratic group arosP annlraJ

5

Socia,l-Dcmocratic group did an enormous amount of rcvolu, tionary propagandist and organizational work in forming .a ..ecret Social· J)emocntli~ Party orga nizalion:· (L. Beria,

On tl1e llislory of the Bolshevik Organizations in Transcaumsia, p. 20.) This group was headed by Stalin. unin's League of Struggle for tlw Emancipation of LlH! \Vorking Class was the model on which the revolutionary Social-Democrats of Tiflis faithfully moulded their acti\'ities. A.l this period the lahour movement in Tillis, led by U1c revolution.airy mi· ~10rily of the M~ded by Stalin, thc> working-class movement 111' Georgia passed from propaganda activitis confhwd to nar· row circ-les to political ngitation among the massc>s; and in the C:mc-asu" too therc> Jwgan that linking up of Socialism with the working-cla'>.S movement which had h('f'n so brilliantly effriod that Lenin wrote his mast-erIy work. .l/aft'rialism and Empirio-Criticism. Stali11. too, rose up in dt•fencory of l\farxismLt>ninism and form i1art of the ideological treasury of 0111 Party. In !heir profound treatnwnt of tht• tht>ory of 'larx· i">m-Leninism in the light of thl' urgent tasks of the ren•lulionary dass stmggle of the proletariat tlwy art' t•x1•mplary. Stalin took an adi\'e part in the work of the Fifth Coa;.(rt•ss of the R.S.D.L.P .. held in Lndon in April and :\lay rnoi. at which the victory of lhe Bolslwviks OVl'r the 'len'ht:>viks was consolidated. On his ;return, he puhlislwcl hio,; .. '.'iolgda, for a term of two -years. But on June 24, 1909, he escaped and made his way hack to Baku, lo continue his illegal work. He vigorously and unreservedly supported Lenin in his stand against the Liquidators and Otzovists. His historic "Letters from the Caucasus" appeared in the central Party press; in them he suhjected the Liquidators lo a withering criticism, using the t·xamplc of the Tiflis Menshe,·iks lo illustrate the rcnegacy of the Liquidators on questions of program and ladies. These letters severely condemned the treacherous conduct of the accomplices of Trohskyism, and formulated lhe immediate tasks of the Party, to which the Prague Conference subsequently gave effect, namely, the convoca1ion of a general Party conference, the publication of 'a legal Party newspaper and the formation of an illegal Parly c-entrd the arguments of the Trotskyites, who considered that Socialism could not ht• victorious in Russia. Anlulionary anny in two. This plan would t'n'>urc the r:1pid advan drawn up, in which their dulire approaching Red Petrograd, and had already capturcci Fort Krassnaya Gorka, al this hour of Soviet Ru~,;ia's dire need Joseph Yis.sari-onovich Djugashvili (Stalin), appointed hy the Presidium of the All-Russian CC'nlral Executh·e Comm'ttec to I he post of dangl'r, by his energy and indefatigable efforts, succeeded in rallying the faltering ranks of the Red Army. "By pcr6onal example in the fighting line, under the fire of the enemy, he lrnt inspiration to the ranks of the defend· ers of the Soviet Ht>public. "In recognilion of his scrvicrs in lhe defence of Pelrograd. as well as of his suhnin and Stalin together defonded the unity of the Party against all allacks of the anti-Party factions and groups. Thus, it was uni It'd on L Congress: "For a year we have been retreating. In the name of the Party we must now call a halt. The purpose pur~ued by the retreat has been ach:evPd. This period is drawing, or has drawn, to a close. Now our purpose is differentto regroup our forces." (V. I. Lenin, Selected Works, Vol. IX, p. 340.) The hi~1toric tasks set hy Lenin at the Congress had 11cw to he carried out. On Lenin's motion, the Plenum of the Central Committee wh ch met al the close of the Con~n·ss elected Stalin, Lenin's faithful disciple and a~sociate. Gc1wral Secretary of the Central Committee, a post at which he has remained ever since. The wound sustained by Lenin in the attempt made on his life in 1918, and the constant strain of overwork, un· dermined his hea)lh. and from fhe end Of l!J21 he W~Ih in the tide of revolutiog and a temporary, partial stabilization of capitalism had sd in. ln the U.S.S.R. the pre-war level of produclin had hen reached. It was now necessary to advance farther. Arni the question arose in all i-ts urgt·ncy- what wcrC' the pro-.1wcts for further development. what would he the de~tiny of Socialism in the Sovit Union? \Yilh the farsightedne~s of gt'nius, Str to eliminate this d.1inger, it would lit• necessary to destroy the cap· italist c:icirelcment. :md' that could lie accomplishdl only as a result of a victorious proletarian revolution in at least several countries. Only thl'n could the victory of Socialism in the U.S.S.R. be considt•red complete and final. These theses \\•ere emhodit-d in the hi.;toric resolution of the Fourteenth Party Conference (April 1925), which endorsed the Lenin-Stalin li1ll' of working for the victory of Socialism in the U.S.S.H. as a law of lhe Party, binding un all its members. In December 1925 the Party held its Fourteenth Congress. In the political report which Stalin delivered on behalf of the Central Committee, he drew a vivid picture of the growing political and economic might of the Soviet Union. But, he said, these achievements were not enough, fur the country was still a Lackward, agrarjan country. In order tiffcnsive: against which class, and in alliance with whieh clas.s, was it !wing conducted? It was not any kind of offensive we needed, Stalin wrotport('d on "The Resulls of the First Five-Year Plan.'' The U.S.S.R., he said, had been transformed from an agrarian into an industrial country, from a small peasant country into a country with an advanced, Socia.list agriculture, conducted on the largest scale in the world. The exploiting clasS~:i-34) the political departments of the machine and tr:rt for stations did a tremendous amount to consolidate the colllems of Leninism, p. 464.) Stalin's speech made a profound impression on the mil· lions of coll(•c·tive farnwrs :me! became a practical program of action for the collecti,·e farms. Speaking on U1c acli\'itiPs of tlw C