CHAPTER 7
Restoring the Stalinist Dictatorship in a Broken Society
In May 1945 the Soviet dictator, fresh from the war, made two public addresses. On May 9 he announced victory in a radio speech, and three weeks later, at a reception for Red Army officers, he toasted the “Great Russian people,” singling them out for praise. Both talks were short and unemotional and said little about the greater significance of the war.1 Over the next eight months, his silence was deafening; after 1946 he spoke to the public only three times. The only chance for people to see him at all was from afar, when he appeared for parades twice a year atop the Lenin Mausoleum.2
Joseph Stalin was sixty-six years old at war’s end and rumored to be suffering from poor health. Instead of retiring, as some close to him in Moscow might have hoped, he set out to use the political capital he had won through victory to continue his mission in his own country and to extend it across war-torn Europe and to other parts of the globe.3 Vast sums of money were poured into military spending and soon into the Cold War. Soviet citizens paid for it all with persistent shortages of consumer goods and in the poor quality of their lives.
VICTORY FOR ONE-MAN RULE AND COMMUNISM
Stalin, the Leader or the Boss in the Kremlin, ran his vast domain like a medieval prince, conferring personally with those called to the seat of power. He was the center of a leadership cult he created. It was adorned with semireligious overtones because he recognized that the elevation of the mighty leader was useful in fulfilling the regime’s “pedagogical” mission and had a place in society, which he viewed as a kind of “permanent classroom.”4 The cult reached new heights at war’s end because it could be linked to Stalin’s military role in leading to victory.
Behind the scenes he brushed aside the remaining institutional checks on his power and surrounded himself with a handful of men variously called the “close circle” or the “ruling group.” Since the 1930s these men were usually referred to by number, such as the “quintet,” and in 1945 they included, besides the dictator, Molotov, Beria, Malenkov, and Mikoyan.5
Nikita Khrushchev, who was later admitted to the “select group,” gave a vivid portrait of Stalin’s ruling style. It was to “hand out orders off the cuff. Sometimes he would listen to others if he liked what they were saying, or else he might growl at them and immediately, without consulting anyone, formulate the text of a resolution of the Central Committee or Council of Ministers [changed from Council of People’s Commissars, or Sovnarkom, in March 1946] all on his own, and after that the document would be published.” This was political domination by a single individual in its most extreme form. “It was completely arbitrary rule. I don’t even know what to call it, but it’s a fact that that’s the way things were.”6
Vyacheslav Molotov was closest to Stalin, the most recognized figure after him at home and abroad and generally regarded as nearly as important. Indeed, there were times when Churchill and others mistakenly thought he was the real leader and Stalin the front man. Anastas Mikoyan, one of the perennial survivors in the ruling elite, provides another perspective. He recalled that whenever he entered Stalin’s office, Molotov was usually there—a fact supported by the record of Stalin’s appointment book, which shows him present more than any other single person.7 He sat there mostly in silence, at least according to Mikoyan, who thought Molotov was just someone the Boss wanted around to avoid giving the impression that he was deciding everything himself.8 Molotov was not the real boss, as Churchill seemed to think; nor was his presence a mere comfort to Stalin. Even after the dictator officially demoted him later on, Molotov was kept around and frequently consulted.
Stalin had a way of dressing down those close to him, such as in November 1945, when the USSR Academy of Science elected Molotov an honorary member. As much as he might play games with Molotov and the others over drinks, he did not want anyone thinking too much of themselves.9 The seasoned commissar was not helped when the Daily Herald speculated that he was the real power in the land, with Stalin ill and out of town. Some experts in the U.S. State Department thought the same. The dictator did not want any plausible heirs gaining traction and reprimanded Molotov speedily for allowing publication in Moscow of the text of a Churchill speech given in London on the anniversary of the Russian Revolution. He had only offered his respects, but for Stalin, praise from such a man encouraged “servility to foreign figures.” Molotov humbly begged forgiveness and was allowed to stay. Stalin tucked the matter away in the file on “Molotov’s mistakes” but would take it out again in 1949 to dismiss him.10
The big Communist Party events in Moscow brought together hundreds of delegates, though after the Fifteenth Congress in 1927 and Sixteenth Conference in 1929, such gatherings took place only three times in the 1930s. Stalin held only one more conference (in 1941) and a final Nineteenth Congress in 1952.11 Even the party’s Central Committee, with 138 members and candidate members in 1930, held few full meetings and during the war hardly any at all; they were called together twice in 1940 and 1941 but only once in 1944, 1946, and 1947, though twice in 1952.12
Since 1917 the Politburo consisted of the country’s leading political lights. It had fifteen members and candidate members in 1930.13 Until 1932 it met weekly, with additional working meetings from 1928. However, beginning in 1933 it met ever less frequently, and the real decision making became more personalized to the point where it took place in Stalin’s office. In addition to hearing out those he brought in to consult, he delegated enormous power to subordinates and expected them to show initiative. Yet his remained the ultimate voice. He took a hands-on role in the most important matters, like internal security and foreign and economic policies, as well as official appointments. After the war he briefly revived the Politburo, but while it had more than symbolic significance, it was still a shadow of its former self.14
It was primarily also Stalin who determined how the country should interpret and remember the Second World War. Only in a February 1946 “election” speech did he outline what became the grand narrative. He said the recent war “was not only a curse” (proklyatiye) but was also like a “great school” that examined social systems and political regimes. All the combatants appeared for a test “without masks and without makeup, with all their defects and merits.” Victory, he proclaimed, proved several things—first of all, the superiority of the Communist social system. Far from being what enemies called a “dangerous experiment,” according to Stalin, the Soviet regime turned out to be viable and was supported by the people. Second, the great multinational state, which foreigners said was artificial and could not last, “grew stronger than ever during the war.” Finally, in defeating all foes, the Red Army had demonstrated it was anything but a “colossus with feet of clay,” as the critics hoped. And yet the bravery of those in uniform would never have been enough to win. Taking the credit he felt was due the Kremlin, he reminded everyone that his three five-year plans—the third had been cut short by war—had transformed the country from an agrarian into an industrial and military power.15
Stalin’s claim that the validity of Communism was proven by winning the war became the official story line. The disciples across Europe sincerely bought the story and repeated it for decades. Now he reminded voters about another Lenin axiom, namely that national security would be impossible without more heavy industry. He pledged—to loud applause from party officials present in the Bolshoi Theater for his speech—to exceed prewar production of pig iron, steel, coal, and oil in three more five-year plans.16 In fact, already in the summer of 1945, the Central Committee had indicated that the State Planning Committee (Gosplan) was preparing a new plan.17 For the average person, the long-suffering consumer who was accustomed to reading between the lines, the very mention of the phrase five-year plan—never mind three new ones—meant more sacrifices and harder work.18