Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet politician who ruled the Soviet Union from the mid-1920s until his death in 1953. He served as the general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (1922–1952) and premier of the Soviet Union (1941–1953). Despite initially governing the Soviet Union as part of a collective leadership, he eventually consolidated power to become the country’s de facto dictator by the 1930s. A communist ideologically committed to the Leninist interpretation of Marxism, Stalin formalised these ideas as Marxism–Leninism, while his own policies are known as Stalinism.
Shortly after his death, the Soviet Union went through a period of de-Stalinization. Malenkov denounced the Stalin personality cult, which was subsequently criticised in Pravda. In 1956, Khrushchev gave his “Secret Speech”, titled “On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences”, to a closed session of the Party’s 20th Congress. There, Khrushchev denounced Stalin for both his mass repression and his personality cult.[914] He repeated these denunciations at the 22nd Party Congress in October 1962. In October 1961, Stalin’s body was removed from the mausoleum and buried in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis next to the Kremlin walls, the location marked only by a simple bust. Stalingrad was renamed Volgograd. (via Wikipedia)
A few of his quotes are listed below:
On Death:
Death is the solution to all problems. No man – no problem.
A single death is a tragedy, are million deaths is a statistic.
This creature softened my heart of stone. She died and with her died my last warm feelings for humanity.
On History:
History has shown there are no invincible armies.
It is not heroes that make history, but history that makes heroes.
On Vote:
Those who vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything.
It doesnt matter how many people vote, only who counts them.
Other Quotes:
Advance towards socialism cannot but cause the exploiting elements to resist the advance, and the resistance of the exploiters cannot but lead to the inevitable sharpening of the class struggle.
Undoubtedly, our path is not of the easiest; but, just as undoubtedly, we are not to be frightened by difficulties. Paraphrasing from the well-known words of Luther, Russia might say: ‘Here I stand on the frontier between the old, capitalist world and the new, socialist world. Here on this frontier I unite the efforts of the proletarians of the West and of the peasantry of the East in order to shatter the old world. May the god of history be my aid!
When the Bolsheviks came to power they were soft and easy with their enemies . . . we had begun by making a mistake. Leniency towards such a power was a crime against the working classes. That soon became apparent . . .
The only real power comes out of a long rifle.
In the Soviet Union, it’s takes more courage to retreat than advance.
You cannot make a revolution with silk gloves.
Gratitude is an illness suffered by dogs.
Quantity has a quality all its own.
When there’s a person, there’s a problem. When there’s no person, there’s no problem.
Education is a weapon, whose effect depends on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed.