Stalin and Gorbachev – The limits of comprehension
Viewpoint: Stalin’s greatness and aura as well as charisma was due to his capacity to inspire fear and terror
Lakhinder Singh Delhi
The 20th century which has a large catalogue of major events which are also terrible in nature closed with the dissolution of the U.S.S.R also known as the Soviet Union. Starting with the Boer War and ending with the long buried conflicts of the Balkans as well as the coming of age of Islamic militancy the whole century at times looks like a long unending horror movie. The end of Queen Victoria’s era reflecting the glories of the British Empire slowly gets sucked into the black hole of World War 1 and following it, the Russian revolution. These two events create the nightmarish permutations and combinations which carry on right till the end of the century when Mikhail Gorbachev announces his resignation as president of the Soviet Union.
The period between these cataclysmic events and after brings out very clearly the extreme lack of a objective, unprejudiced and holistic approach in the comprehension of history, post- Soviet Union the Americans take off on an orgy of self congratulation and Euphoria till such time as the Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden make their grand entrance. The Russian people – as is common with all races which have empires that have collapsed – go into a period of nostalgic pain and angst. At the close of the century Mikhail Gorbachev is nowhere is the reckoning for Russian popular support while it is only with considerable difficulty that the voice of Russia organisers trying to pick the top persons of the millennium manage to prevent Stalin from being the number 1 choice. This is an issue which should rightfully engage at least of the social thinkers and philosophers of the world. The reasons why one is preferred to the other are possibly concealing some of the greatest problems and issues of the human race.
At the close of the century Mikhail Gorbachev is nowhere is the reckoning for Russian popular support while it is only with considerable difficulty that the voice of Russia organisers trying to pick the top persons of the millennium manage to prevent Stalin from being the number 1 choice
Coming to the question of Stalin about whom possibly a few thousand books have been written, we see him emerging under the shadow of the great Lenin. Lenin himself manages to start a revolution helped considerably by the absolute ineptitude of Nicholas Romanov and his circle including of course the Tsarina Alexandra. World War 1 breaks out in time and helps Lenin create for himself an image worth more than 5 or 6 lines in history books.
Lenin, unlike the Romanovs and his other opponents is not a man of generalities and lack of focus. The tragic execution of his brother Alexander makes him a compulsive revolutionary with the right degree of opportunism cunning, political skill, along with the capacity for total ruthlessness. The 20th century coming in the wake of great technological advancement cherishes people with a ruthless bent of mind and who know where they are heading for. The grim Russian civil war and the attempts to keep the ship of the Soviet state on an even keel takes its toll of Lenin and by the last two years of his life in a vegetated state he dies in 1924. The stage is set for the rise of the “miraculous Georgian” – as named by Lenin, to make his entrance on the arena of world history. The only thing is that his rise is so camouflaged and inconspicuous that not till he acquires almost total power do other people realise that he is also in the race.
The Soviet Union engulfed in crisis and a state with pariah status possibly resembles the white star liner titanic at approximately 1 am on 14th of April 1912 almost 1 hour after it had struck the iceberg. Stalin whose whole life right from Gori in Georgia as a part of Tsarist Russia has been a continuous endeavour in dealing with, metaphorically speaking, capsized ships or boats is the right person to take charge of affairs in the Soviet Union. His only other rivals Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev or Bukharin being people whose self opinion far-far exceed their abilities. In a process described many hundreds of times by different writers, Stalin manages to literally exterminate the opposition and brings about the great transformation in the Soviet Union and later on becomes the central figure in the defeat of Hitler and Nazism thereby rising to an almost superhuman status in the eyes of the world.
In Barbarossa it was the invincible spirit of the Russian People that defeated Hitler and the Nazis. In both cases it can be argued that Stalin’s contribution was extremely negative. If we add to this the tremendous suffering he brought on his own people there is no further need for calibration
Stalin peacefully dies in his bed sometime in January 1953 and his successors and lieutenants though relived at the old dictator’s death proceed cautiously in dismantling his legacy. But so successful has been the career of Stalin that Stalinism has become a basic ingredient in the DNA of the Soviet Union. Khrushchev trained and mentored by Stalin replaces him and evinces a strong strain of humanity. But the soviet state is so entrenched in its totalitarian ethos that his effect is almost marginal. His successors Brezhnev and Kosygin do not aspire to that also and only carry forward the Stalinist apparatus giving it a totally non imaginative and solidly bureaucratic flavour.
After two more short lived successors it is the turn of Mikhail Gorbachev to emerge on the stage. Gorbachev stays on till December 1991 when he resigns and the Soviet Union stands dissolved. Among Russians Gorbachev is regarded as the fall guy and becomes the focus of all Russian post USSR disillusionment. In the west he is considered more favourably with observers often treating him with disdain and condescension and at the same time exalting the rank of Ronald Regan and Mrs Margret Thatcher as being the cold warriors who brought the Soviet Union to its knees.
This period of say, nine decades encompassing the history of the Soviet Union shows the terrible flaws in the basic thinking to which human beings are prone. It is a terrible discovery after a few centuries after enlightenment and scientific advancement that objective and holistic thinking eludes the human race 2000 years after the Christian era and is probably the same what it was a few centuries before the Birth of Christ. There are some aspects of human mental endeavour which are almost constant like a calculation in mathematics or like Planck’s constant for quantum mechanics. The reasons why one is lead to so extreme an opinion are as follows:-
a) Christopher Hitchens – one of the most perceptive intellectuals of recent times had defined Stalin as a grave digger of communism. By the time Ronald Regan and Margret Thatcher come on the scene in 1980 and 1979 – the Soviet System is already in a state of terminal decline.
b) The damage done to basic communist theory and action by both Lenin and Stalin and the ruthlessness and the scale on which it was done ensured that the Soviet Union was only being kept alive by mechanical processes.
c) Ronald Regan was in the happy position of some football teams where the only player one has to beat is the goalkeeper. The adulation given to him at the end of the century (where he was considered by some as the first amongst the presidents, just as Stalin was considered the greatest Russian) just shows to what extent the human race has to travel before it can be considered as showing maturity, objectivity and judgement in its views and decisions. Like I mentioned above this is a very frightening thought.
d) Close and minute analysis coming to a holistic judgement is totally absent. The role of Stalin in the three decades he was in power is marked by great criminality and great evil which enables him to acquire great power. These three factors have managed to create a great delusion about his role in history. The Soviet Union would have managed to defeat Germany in WW II even without Stalin possibly with much lesser losses and suffering. Also, the Soviet Union would have achieved great economic progress in the period between the two world wars regardless of the communist system. It was only the lack of mind power or brain power on the part of the Romanovs which led to the Russian Revolution which was subsequently hijacked by Lenin with totally disastrous results for the Russian people.
e) In 1985 Gorbachev could have saved the Soviet Union only through a miracle. So far, medical science has not advanced to that extent that the DNA can be changed significantly in a living organism whether a human being or a Nation state. He could only make an attempt to bring more efficiency, humanity and purpose in the lives of his countrymen. This moderate attempt itself was sufficient to bring about the dissolution of the whole state which could never have survived any efforts to create a democracy or govern according to the will of the people.
The damage done to basic communist theory and action by both Lenin and Stalin and the ruthlessness and the scale on which it was done ensured that the Soviet Union was only being kept alive by mechanical processes
In the beginning I had mentioned that the 20th century at times resembles a nonstop, endless horror movie. People like Lenin, Stalin, Hitler or Mao along with lesser luminaries like Pol Pot, Mobutu etc make a solid and prime contribution to that fact, the very fact that he is being idolised in parts of the erstwhile soviet union – something which can only be considered as slightly less shocking than the atrocities committed – would go to confirm the major limitations of the human thinking process as well as capacity for perspective and judgement. Neither the modernisation of Russia nor the victory of the Soviet Union in operation Barbarossa can be considered as great achievements on his part. With the natural resources available to Russia and its hard working people modernisation and sophisticated technological mastery was only a matter of time. In Barbarossa it was the invincible spirit of the Russian People that defeated Hitler and the Nazis. In both cases it can be argued that Stalin’s contribution was extremely negative. If we add to this the tremendous suffering he brought on his own people there is no further need for calibration. His greatness and aura as well as charisma was due to his capacity to inspire fear and terror and nothing else. If these are taken to be the prime attributes of leadership or creative greatness it can lead one to have serious fears about the limitations and mind power of the human race.
Lakhinder Singh is a retired officer of the 1972 batch of the IRS, Government of India.