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Stalin: A Biography

Page 83

by Robert Service

12. Ibid., doc. 48, p. 2: meeting at Soviet embassy in Tehran, 1 December 1943.

  13. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 5, p. 350.

  14. Churchill and Stalin: Documents from the British Archives, doc. 47

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

  16. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 6, p. 198. The English spelling in Churchill’s manuscript and book was ‘Roumania’.

  17. Ibid.

  18. Istochnik, no. 4 (1995), p. 17.

  19. N. Lebrecht, ‘Prokofiev was Stalin’s Last Victim’.

  20. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 6, p. 345. This was sometimes shortened to ‘U.J.’: ibid., p. 199.

  21. Ibid., The Second World War, vol. 4, p. 596.

  22. Ibid., vol. 5, p. 330.

  23. Ibid., p. 342.

  43. Last Campaigns

  1. See R. Overy, Russia’s War, pp. 240–1.

  2. J. Erickson, The Road to Berlin, pp. 274–90; N. Davies, Rising ’44, pp. 209–11 and 265–72.

  3. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 3, pp. 173–4. Alas, the other participants — Stalin, Molotov and Beria — left no useful memoirs on the subject.

  4. W. S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 6, p. 117.

  5. Churchill and Stalin: Documents from the British Archives, doc. 55, p. 1: telegram of A. Eden to Sir O. Sergeant, 12 October 1944. It must be added that Churchill said this in a moment when he was trying to cajole Stalin into making concessions to the ‘London Poles’.

  6. M. Djilas, Conversations with Stalin, p. 87. Stalin also made exculpatory remarks about Red Army soldiers to a Czechoslovak delegation on 28 March 1945: ‘Proidët desyatok let, i eti vstrechi ne vosstanovish’ uzhe v pamyati. Dnevnikovye zapisi V. A. Malysheva’, p. 127.

  7. See the text in Novaya i noveishaya istoriya, no. 3 (2000), p. 181.

  8. Ibid.

  9. See J. Erickson, The Road to Berlin, pp. 606–16.

  10. See D. Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb, p. 125.

  11. See ibid., p. 124.

  12. Ibid., p. 126.

  13. Ibid., p. 128.

  14. Ibid., pp. 128–9.

  44. Victory!

  1. I have taken this account from A. Werth, Russia at War, 1941–1945, p. 969; J. Bardach and K. Gleeson, Surviving Freedom, p. 95.

  2. S. Allilueva, Dvadtsat’ pisem k drugu, p. 175.

  3. N. S. Khrushchëv, ‘Memuary Nikity Sergeevicha Khrushchëva’, Voprosy istorii, no. 7–8 (1991), p. 100.

  4. I. V. Stalin, Sochineniya, vol. 16, p. 197.

  5. Ibid., p. 198.

  6. Pravda, 25 May 1945.

  7. G. K. Zhukov, Vospominaniya i razmyshleniya, vol. 3, pp. 308. Zhukov’s information came from Stalin’s son Vasili.

  8. Ibid.

  9. Ibid., p. 309.

  10. Pravda, 27 June 1945.

  11. S. G. Wheatcroft and R. W. Davies, ‘Population’, p. 78.

  12. Ye. Zubkova, Obshchestvo i reformy, 1945–1964, p. 43.

  13. Vostochnaya Evropa v dokumentakh rossiiskikh arkhivov, 1945–1953 gg., vol. 1, p. 132. The date of the Moscow discussion was 9 January 1945.

  14. Ibid., pp. 456–7. The meeting occurred on 22 May 1946.

  15. Ibid., p. 132.

  45. Delivering the Blow

  1. V. Alliluev, Khronika odnoi sem’i: Alliluevy. Stalin, p. 218. See Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar, p. 472; Y. Gorlizki and O. Khlevniuk, Cold Peace. Stalin and the Soviet Ruling Circle, 1945–1953, p. 177.

  2. Politbyuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1945–1953, p. 398.

  3. A. S. Belyakov’s recollections of A. A. Zhdanov’s oral account of a meeting of central party leaders: G. Arbatov, Svidetel’stvo sovremennika, p. 377.

  4. See V. Zemskov, ‘Prinuditel’nye migratsii iz Pribaltiki’, pp. 13–14.

  5. See E. Bacon, The Gulag at War, pp. 93–4.

  6. N. A. Antipenko, Ryadom s G. K. Zhukovym i K. K. Rokossovskim, p. 71.

  7. F. Gori and S. Pons (eds), The Soviet Union and Europe in the Cold War, 1943–1953, especially the account by A. Filitov, pp. 5–22.

  8. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, pp. 148–9.

  9. S. Allilueva, Dvadtsat’ pisem k drugu, pp. 176–7.

  10. See A. Applebaum, Gulag, pp. 424–5; Y. Gorlizki and O. Khlevniuk, Cold Peace. Stalin and the Soviet Ruling Circle, 1945–1953, pp. 127–9.

  11. It must be added, however, that Stalin did not repeat his paean to the Russians even on this occasion: perhaps he was getting worried about over-encouragement of Russian nationalism: Pravda, 7 September 1947.

  12. For examples see Resheniya partii i pravitel’stva po khozyaistvennym voprosam, vol. 3, pp. 350 ff.

  13. See A. Pyzhikov, Khrushchëvskii ‘ottepel’’, p. 19.

  14. See A. Nove, Economic History of the USSR, p. 308.

  15. See W. Taubman, Khrushchëv: The Man and His Era, p. 201.

  16. N. S. Khrushchëv, ‘Memuary Nikity Sergeevicha Khrushchëva’, Voprosy istorii, no. 11 (1991), p. 38.

  17. See R. Service, Lenin: A Biography, pp. 88–9. I am grateful to Mark Harrison for the point about Stalin’s assumption about the peasantry.

  18. See the forthcoming book on post-war Soviet youth by J. Fuerst.

  19. The exception, after the war, was Nikolai Voznesenski: see below, p. 535.

  20. See above, pp. 294–7.

  21. See below, p. 522.

  22. See G. Bordyugov, ‘Ukradënnaya pobeda’; Ye. Zubkova, ‘Obshchestvennaya atmosfera posle voiny (1945–1946)’, p. 12; D. Filtzer, Soviet Workers and Late Stalinism, pp. 1–5.

  46. The Outbreak of the Cold War

  1. See M.P. Leffler, A Preponderance of Power, pp. 56–9.

  2. See ibid., pp. 19 and 115.

  3. Ibid., p. 148.

  4. Vostochnaya Evropa v dokumentakh rossiiskikh arkhivov, 1944–1953 gg., vol. 1, p. 673.

  5. Quoted by R. Pikhoya, Sovetskii Soyuz: istoriya vlasti, 1945–1991, p. 26.

  6. Vostochnaya Evropa v dokumentakh rossiiskikh arkhivov, 1944–1953 gg., vol. 1, p. 673.

  7. Ibid., pp. 673–5.

  8. The Cominform: Minutes of the Three Conferences, pp. 270 ff.

  9. M. G. Pervukhin, ‘Kak byla reshena atomnaya problema v nashei strane’, p. 133.

  10. Ibid.

  11. See above, p. 95.

  12. See D. Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb, p. 211.

  13. See V. Zubok and C. Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War, pp. 58–9.

  14. Quoted in ibid., p. 59.

  15. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 118.

  47. Subjugating Eastern Europe

  1. Vostochnaya Evropa v dokumentakh rossiiskikh arkhivov, 1944–1953 gg., vol. 1, pp. 118–33.

  2. Ibid., p. 303.

  3. Ibid., p. 443.

  4. See G. Dimitrov’s letter to Molotov about the composition of the Polish communist leadership, 18 January 1944: SSSR — Pol’sha. Mekhanizmy podchineniya. 1944–1949. Sbornik dokumentov, pp. 21–2. On the attitude of communists of Jewish background see Jakub Berman’s testimony in T. Toranska, Oni: Stalin’s Polish Puppets, p. 321.

  5. See M. Mazower, Dark Continent, pp. 12–25.

  6. The Cominform: Minutes of the Three Conferences, p. 82.

  7. Ibid., pp. 226 and 244.

  8. Ibid., p. 240.

  9. Ibid., pp. 296 and 302.

  10. See S. Pons, ‘The Twilight of the Cominform’, in ibid., pp. 483–4.

  11. Ibid., pp. 496–7.

  12. Ibid., pp. 610–19.

  13. See L. Gibianskii, editorial comment in ibid., p. 654.

  14. See below, pp. 567–9.

  15. See below, pp. 576–7.

  48. Stalinist Rulership

  1. S. Allilueva, Dvadtsat’ pisem k drugu, p. 177. Svetlana in this memoir fudged the fact that they stayed in separate dachas.

  2. Visit by author: 11 September 2002. I am grateful to Liana Khvarchelia and Manana Gurgulia for their efforts in obtaining access to the d
acha for me.

  3. Quoted in D. Volkogonov, Triumf i tragediya: politicheskii portret I. V. Stalina, vol. 1, part 1, p. 41.

  4. Unpublished memoirs of Kandide Charkviani, p. 55.

  5. A. Mgeladze, Stalin, kakim ya ego znal, p. 65; Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, pp. 65 and 181.

  6. Interview with L. F. Ilichëv: ‘Stalin i “Pravda”: rabochii kontakt’.

  7. See Y. Gorlicki and O. Khlevniuk, Cold Peace, pp. 19–29.

  8. See below, p. 567–8.

  9. Politbyuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1945–1953, p. 313.

  10. Ibid., pp. 326–7.

  11. Ibid., p. 200.

  12. Politbyuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1945–1953, p. 198.

  13. Ibid., p. 224.

  14. T. Toranska, Oni: Stalin’s Polish Puppets, p. 235.

  15. A. Mgeladze, Stalin, kakim ya ego znal, p. 113.

  16. V. Semichastnyi, Bespokoinoe serdtse, p. 41. Apparently Khrushchëv tried to maintain a more conventional life-style schedule: ibid., p. 46.

  17. A. A. Gromyko, Pamyatnoe, vol. 2, p. 326.

  18. Testimony of Yakub Berman: T. Toranska, Oni: Stalin’s Polish Puppets, p. 337.

  19. K. Simonov, Glazami cheloveka moego pokoleniya, p. 139.

  20. K. Simonov, Glazami cheloveka moego pokoleniya, p. 139.

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

  22. Politbyuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, pp. 28–9.

  23. Ibid., pp. 30–2 and 51.

  24. Ibid., p. 29.

  25. Ibid., pp. 421–31. See Y. Gorlizki, ‘Stalin’s Cabinet: The Politburo and Decision-Making in the Post-War Years’ for a fuller account.

  26. Neizvestnyi Zhukov, pp. 476–7.

  27. See below, p. 534–5.

  49. Policies and Purges

  1. O. V. Khlevnyuk, ‘Stalin i Molotov. Edinolichnaya diktatura i predposylki “oligarkhizatsiya”’, p. 281.

  2. Ibid., pp. 283–4.

  3. Ibid., p. 26.

  4. ‘Dve besedy I. V. Stalina s General’nym Sekretarëm Ob”edinënnykh Natsii Tryugve Li’, Novaya i noveishaya istoriya, no. 3 (2001), pp. 111–12.

  5. Politbyuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1945–1953, pp. 32–3.

  6. Ibid., pp. 205–6.

  7. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 377.

  8. A. Mikoyan, Tak bylo, p. 466.

  9. Ibid., po. 496–8.

  10. Ibid., p. 535.

  11. See Y. Gorlizki, ‘Party Revivalism and the Death of Stalin’.

  12. Testimony of A. M. Vasilevski: G. A. Kumanëv (ed.), Ryadom so Stalinym, pp. 237–40.

  13. A. Mikoyan, Tak bylo, p. 559.

  14. The ‘Russian’ factor in the Leningrad Affair is downplayed in the recent outstanding account by Y. Gorlizki and O. Khlevniuk, Cold Peace, pp. 79–95. I remain impressed, however, by documents and memoirs asserting the significance of this factor.

  15. Politbyuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1945–1953, pp. 66–7 and 246.

  16. A. Mikoyan, Tak bylo, p. 559.

  17. See above, pp. 513–14.

  18. A. Mikoyan, Tak bylo, p. 565.

  19. I want to acknowledge my thanks to Geoffrey Hosking for our lengthy discussions about this matter.

  50. Emperor Worship

  1. Slovo tovarishchu Stalinu, p. 466.

  2. Ibid., pp. 470–2.

  3. Ibid.,p. 471.

  4. Speech by G. M. Malenkov, Cominform: Minutes of the Three Confererences, p. 82.

  5. Istoriya Sovetskoi politicheskoi tsenzury, p. 507. In 1946 there were still sixteen Soviet republics: the Karelo-Finnish Soviet Republic was abolished in 1956.

  6. Ibid.

  7. I owe this idea to Rosamund Bartlett.

  8. N. Voznesenskii, Voennaya ekonomika SSSR v period otechestvennoi voine, passim; Iosif Vissarionovich Stalin. Kratkaya biografiya (2nd edn); Istoriya Vsesoyuznoi Kommunisticheskoi Partii (Bol’shevikov). Kratkii kurs (2nd edn).

  9. I. Ehrenburg, Post-War Years: 1945–1954, p. 160.

  10. Iosif Vissarionovich Stalin. Kratkaya biografiya (2nd edn), passim.

  11. I. V. Stalin, Sochineniya, vol. 1, p. xiii.

  12. See J. Brooks, Thank You, Comrade Stalin!, pp. 195–232.

  13. Kniga o vkusnoi i zdorovoi pishche.

  14. Iosif Vissarionovich Stalin. Kratkaya biografiya (2nd edn), pp. 1–161.

  15. Ibid., pp. 172 and 208.

  16. Ibid., p. 228.

  17. S. Alliluev, Proidënnyi put’; A. S. Allilueva, Vospominaniya.

  18. RGASPI, f. 668, op. 1, d. 15, p. 67.

  19. See in particular sections of the original text of Anna’s memoir in RGASPI, f. 4, op. 2, d. 45.

  20. S. Alliluev, Proidënnyi put’, p. 109.

  21. A. S. Allilueva, Vospominaniya, pp. 165, 167, 168 and 191.

  22. RGASPI, f. 668, op. 1, d. 15, p. 67.

  23. Ibid., p. 69.

  24. J. Bardach and K. Gleeson, Surviving Freedom, p. 117.

  25. Really he had turned seventy in 1948: see above, p. 14.

  26. Churchill and Stalin: Documents from the British Archives, doc. 70, p. 4: conversation of Churchill and Stalin at Potsdam, 17 July 1945.

  27. Vostochnaya Evropa v dokumentakh rossiiskikh arkhivov, 1945–1953 gg., vol. 1, p. 407.

  28. Ibid., p. 443.

  29. Ibid., p. 582.

  51. Dangerous Liaisons

  1. See above, p. 501 and below, p. 567.

  2. See the account by A. M. Ledovskii in I. V. Kovalër, ‘Dvenadtsat’ sovetov I. V. Stalina rukovodstvu kompartii Kitaya’, p. 130.

  3. Ibid., pp. 134–9.

  4. ‘Posetiteli kremlëvskogo kabineta Stalina’, pp. 49–50.

  5. G. Dimitrov, The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 1933–1949, p. 443. Dimitrov’s diary entry concurs in essentials with Djilas’s memoir, at least about the Chinese communists in Conversations with Stalin, p. 141.

  6. See D. Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb, p. 277.

  7. A. A. Gromyko, Pamyatnoe, vol. 2, pp. 249–50.

  8. See D. Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb, pp. 280–1.

  9. Quoted by V. Zubok and C. Pleshakov, Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War, pp. 66–7.

  10. Ibid., pp. 67–8.

  11. Ibid., pp. 68–9.

  12. Ibid., p. 69.

  13. V. Zubok and C. Pleshakov give the intelligence reports on which Stalin based his judgement: Ibid., p. 63.

  14. See D. Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb, p. 283.

  15. V. Semichastnyi, Bespokoinoe serdtse, p. 58

  16. See Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb, p. 285.

  17. Ibid.

  52. Vozhd and Intellectual

  1. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 143.

  2. Ibid.

  3. A. Mgeladze, Stalin, kakim ya ego znal, p. 271.

  4. See D. Joravsky, The Lysenko Affair, chapter 3, ff.,

  5. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 143.

  6. A. Malenkov, O moëm ottse Georgii Malenkove, p. 24.

  7. Pravda: 10 February 1946 (speech to electors of the Stalin Electoral District); 13 April 1948 (speech to reception of official Finnish delegation); 15 October 1952 (speech to the Nineteenth Party Congress).

  8. I. V. Stalin, Sochineniya, vol. 16, pp. 114–57.

  9. A. Mgeladze, Stalin, kakim ya ego znal, pp. 224–5.

  10. V. Brodskii and V. Kalinnikova, ‘Otkrytie sostoyalos”, Nauka i zhizn’, no. 1 (1988).

  11. Konstantin Simonov, chief editor of Literaturnaya gazeta, wrote down his impressions in a self-censoring form, in his diary; and later, in 1979, he wrote additions and a commentary on the meeting: Glazami cheloveka moego pokoleniya, pp. 113–16.

  12. Ibid., p. 111.

  13. Ibid.

  14. This is not to say that he would not have preferred the Soviet order to have been more amenable to his commands: see above, pp. 537–40.

  15. Vosemnadtsatyi s”ezd Vsesoyuznoi Kommunisticheskoi Partii (b), p. 36.

  16. Ibid.

  17. Moloto
v. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, pp. 346, 348, 351 and 352–3.

  18. Ibid., p. 353.

  19. Ibid., p. 19.

  20. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 3, d. 165: V. V. Piotrovskii, Po sledam drevnikh kul’tur, p. 77.

  21. Ibid., p. 8.

  22. See Roy Medvedev’s memoir in Zh. and R. Medvedev, Neizvestnyi Stalin, pp. 259–60.

  23. I. V. Stalin, Marksizm i voprosy yazykoznaniya, in Sochineniya, vol. 16, p. 119.

  24. Ibid., pp. 123 and 133.

  25. Ibid., p. 145.

  26. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 237.

  27. I. V. Stalin, Marksizm i voprosy yazykoznaniya in Sochineniya, vol. 16, p. 159.

  28. Ibid., p. 143.

  29. Ibid., p. 169.

  30. Molotov. Poluderzhavnyi vlastelin, p. 301.

  31. K. Simonov, Glazami cheloveka moego pokoleniya.

  32. Ekonomicheskie problemy sotsializma v SSSR in I. V. Stalin, Sochineniya, vol. 16, pp. 188–304.

  33. Ibid., p. 197.

  34. Ibid., p. 226.

  35. Ibid.

  36. Ibid., p. 224.

  37. Ibid., p. 256.

  38. Ibid., p. 231.

  39. Ibid., pp. 235–6.

  40. See above, p. 94.

  41. See above, pp. 153–5.

  42. See above, p. 226.

  43. See above, pp. 432–4.

  44. See also above, p. 390.

  45. See B. Pinkus, The Soviet Government and the Jews, 1948–1967, pp. 151–64. I am grateful to John Klier for help in elaborating this paragraph.

  46. See L. Rucker, Staline, Israël et les Juifs, p. 238.

  47. Tak govoril Kaganovich, p. 211. S. Beria, Beria, My Father, p. 211: apparently Lavrenti Beria too thought Stalin was not an anti-semite.

  48. Tak govoril Kaganovich, p. 175.

  53. Ailing Despot

  1. See above, pp. 231–2 and 437–8.

  2. P. Moshentseva, Tainy kremlëvskoi bol’nitsy, pp. 6–7.

  3. Y. Rapoport, The Doctors’ Plot, p. 218.

  4. Politbyuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1945–1953, p. 398: his stay in the south lasted from 10 August to 22 December 1951.

 

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