> Yes, there was oversacrifices and exaggerations, and that was cruel regime and highly militarized. But it was necessary to protect ourselves from the unfriendly West (the West openly hated communism since the beggining, even when it was only internal Russian affair). And in the end, it was Churchill, who declared Сold War, not Stalin.
Come on. The large-scale purges, the public trials, the goulags... this was done to suppress not only internal dissent, but any independent thought. How many loyal communists, original bolsheviks, were executed or sent to die in the camps? This had nothing to do with "protecting the USSR from the West" (I'll note that Stalin seemed very willing to work with the West, in the person of Adolf Hitler, as long as he got something out of it).
Stalin was a mass murderer. You cannot brush his crimes under the carpet by talking about "exagerations", "sacrifices" and "necessity".
And am I brushing something away? I'm just saying, that he was not catastrophic to our country. For instance during Yeltsin's democratic government there was no repressions but because of povetry died over 3000000 people, and we lost a lot of industrial enterprises. During Stalin's repressions died 650000 people, but he developed our country... So... Who was a greater catastrophe for Russia?
You know, just claiming that Stalin was complete disaster for us is oversimplification.
Come on. The large-scale purges, the public trials, the goulags... this was done to suppress not only internal dissent, but any independent thought. How many loyal communists, original bolsheviks, were executed or sent to die in the camps? This had nothing to do with "protecting the USSR from the West" (I'll note that Stalin seemed very willing to work with the West, in the person of Adolf Hitler, as long as he got something out of it).
Stalin was a mass murderer. You cannot brush his crimes under the carpet by talking about "exagerations", "sacrifices" and "necessity".