(KYIV) – Joseph Stalin was officially worshipped during his lifetime, subsequently reviled, and is now being revered once again in a display of historical fickleness. Born in 1878 in the small Georgian town of Gori, he entered the world as Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili, the son of a cobbler and a laundress in the Russian Empire. Raised in poverty and violence, he was educated at a church school before enrolling in the Tiflis Theological Seminary.
There, he encountered Marxist literature and revolutionary politics, two schools of thought that would transform him into one of the most infamous communist leaders in history. Expelled before graduation, he joined the Bolshevik movement, organising strikes, publishing propaganda, and carrying out bank robberies to fund the cause. Following the 1917 revolution led by Vladimir Lenin, Stalin steadily accumulated power within the Communist Party. Appointed general secretary in 1922, he used the seemingly administrative post to build alliances, sideline rivals such as Leon Trotsky, and consolidate control. By the late 1920s, he had become the unchallenged leader of the Soviet Union.
His rule was marked by forced collectivisation, rapid industrialisation, and pervasive terror. The state engineered famine in Ukraine known as the Holodomor, the Great Purge of the 1930s, mass deportations of ethnic minorities, and brutal labour camps in the Gulag system caused immense suffering. Combined with his rule over the USSR during the Second World War, historians estimate that Stalin was responsible for roughly 10 to 20 million deaths, making his regime one of the deadliest in modern history.
Despite this grim legacy, Stalin remains an imminent part of Russian culture and tradition. According to Marcin Kaczorowski, deputy head of the Memory of Nations Foundation, prominent Moscow propagandists like Pyotr Akopov openly state that Russia cannot be rid of him, viewing him as closer to God than the devil largely due to his status as the victor against Nazi Germany. This mindset extends beyond Russian borders; Kaczorowski noted encountering a Zimbabwean colleague in London in the early 2000s who justified Stalin as a mass murderer of millions because his actions ostensibly ensured that Russia was reformed and strong.
This justification of horrific crimes in the name of progress, heavy industrialisation, and military might allows Stalin to still be viewed as a father of the nation and a man of the state. Analysts suggest that comparing Stalin to Benito Mussolini is more accurate than comparisons to Adolf Hitler, as Stalin did everything for the state. Any perceived transgression against the state resulted in individuals being butchered by the millions rather than the thousands, with mere suspicion enough to send an innocent person to the Gulag. All of this is justified in the Russian consciousness so long as it serves the broader concept of creating a powerful state.
This mentality aligns with the deep seated tradition of iron fisted rulers in Russia, tracing back to the Mongol invasion and 200 years of terror against Ruthenian tribes where obedience was enforced by bloody example. Unlike Western figures such as Napoleon Bonaparte or Louis XIV, who were admired for legal contributions or perceived liberation, the Russian admiration of Stalin is rooted in the Asian political concept of admiring sheer strength.
Similar to the reverence for Mao Zedong in China, where tens of millions perished yet the leader remains on the national banknotes, a ruler is deemed legitimate so long as they build the state and project success. Today, the Russian dictator operating from the Kremlin acts as a modern tsar, actively merging the red past with the Orthodox Church to cement his own power. This blends two mutually exclusive concepts of government, combining a supposedly divine tsar with a mandated party apparatus.
The mechanism of this enduring cult relies heavily on early twentieth century mass media. Lenin considered filmmaking his favourite muse, and the Soviet NKVD perfected the use of subliminal propaganda alongside the absolute unconditional obedience of its officers. Stalinism proved far more efficient than German totalitarianism in demonstrating that a lie repeated a thousand times becomes the truth. More than seven decades after his death, Stalin remains a towering and deeply polarising figure.
Recent polling by organisations such as the Levada Centre indicates that between 45 and 70 percent of Russians express a positive assessment of his historical role. For many, he symbolises state strength, wartime leadership, and superpower status, having defeated Nazi Germany and emerged as a global rival to the United States.
State narratives have actively softened his image, emphasising victory in the Great Patriotic War while deliberately downplaying the terror. Consequently, public memorials to victims uneasily coexist with new statues and rehabilitated rhetoric, resulting in a selective memory that views him as a stern moderniser rather than the architect of famines.
Conversely, the victims from former vassal states of the USSR look past this manufactured facade and clearly remember the visage of a tyrant, actively protesting attempts to rehabilitate his image in Orthodox Christian icons.
Western complicity also played a role in propagating this image. United States President Franklin D Roosevelt enthusiastically embraced Stalin as Uncle Joe out of pure political calculation, relying on the ruthless Soviet leader to absorb the immense human cost of taking Berlin to save 500,000 American lives. Stalin’s reputation only temporarily waned in the 1950s when Nikita Khrushchev delivered his famous denunciation.
However, this was largely an internal factional war where Khrushchev, a former butcher under Stalin, comfortably placed all the blame on one man to distract the public from the thousands of NKVD officers who murdered millions. While the subsequent eras under Władysław Gomułka and Bolesław Bierut in Poland saw a reduction in terror, the era of Leonid Brezhnev simply swept the mass graves and crimes like the Katyn massacre under the carpet.
When confronted with these atrocities, Soviet military officials would display apathy, arguing that the country had hundreds of similar massacres, leading to a profound fatigue where the millions who died simply ceased to make an impact.
Today, the Russian dictator utilises fascist pragmatism to exploit this lingering affection for Stalin. By blending the Orthodox Church with the communist past, he successfully merges water with fire, entirely ignoring the fact that the Bolsheviks destroyed the churches and practically wiped out the priesthood. This relies on the old Bolshevik rule that the public will easily believe the greatest absurdities.
Consequently, 90 percent of the monuments to Stalin standing today were built recently under the current Russian dictator. The historiography of the Second World War in Russia now wholly ignores the millions of victims of Hitler, focusing entirely on the 1945 altar of victory. This is fuelled by the chaotic memory of the Boris Yeltsin era, where Russians recall widespread corruption, violent street gangs, being paid in vodka, and using shoes as currency.
This deeply ingrained belief that their sprawling country requires a leviathan to maintain order ensures that democracy holds no value in Russia, paving the way for the ongoing admiration of historical and modern tyrants alike.
73 years after Stalin’s death, why do 45-70% of Russians approve of the tyrant behind 20 million deaths, the Holodomor, and the Gulags? From WWII victory myths to Putin’s Orthodox–Bolshevik blend, is strongman rule Russia’s destiny? Stalin was officially worshipped in his time, then reviled, now worshipped again. History is indeed fickle. Does Russia still need him, or has it found other heroes to worship and follow? Join Jan Darasz and his guest, Marcin Kaczorowski, Deputy Head of the Memory of Nations Foundation, for How We Got Here.
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