High Stalinism 1945-53 Flashcards
what was the position of the USSR by 1945?
-major destruction of agriculture (more serious) and industry
-over 100,000 villages ceased to exist
-increased patriotism and move towards a collective mass culture
-USSR had grown by annexing new territory and establishing satellite states in eastern europe
-USSR gained a key role in the agreements of post-war europe
-red army was the strongest land army in the world
-had atomic bomb by 1949
-ussr gained new status as world superpower
-stalin emerged as the sole man responsible for the war victory
how did the political system change 1945-53?
-stalin exile and removed any key players in war victory e.g. exiled military leader Zhukov to Ukraine
-prevented Politburo and central committee from meetings 1947-52, reducing them to an advisory role
-purge of party officials in Leningrad (leningrad affair) which led to 2,000 arrested
-stalin very concerned by increased party membership (7mil by 1952) as he saw the party as unwieldly and unreliable
-wartime institutions e.g. state defence committee were dismantled
-stalin made himself minister of defence
-used his private secretariat to bypass government and party, and to direct central authority personally
how did culture + society change 1945-53?
-cultural purge by Zhdanov - known as Zhdanovschina (because stalin feared westernisation)
-western art was condemned as bourgeois, russian art promoted as superior
-literary figures purged e.g. Pasternak
-condemned artists forced to make public recantations of their errors in order to continue working
-works that conveyed the tretchery of the west were promoted
-also accompanied an increase in anti-semitism e.g. last jewish newspaper was shut down
-scholarship was governed by marxist principles
-western influence was completely blocked
-only a very few soviet citizens were allowed to go to the west
how did the cult of personality change 1945-53?
-used war victory to present himself as the saviour of russia and a god-like figure
-his image was cultivated in the media and published works
-1948 biography of stalin presented him as the modern Lenin
-portrayed as a man of the people even though he hadn’t visited a Kolkhoz for 25 years
-huge 70th birthday celebrations e.g. his portrait was illuminated by a halo of skylights
-towns vied to use his name
-statues emerged all over the union
-he relied on films and written papers for his knowledge of what was going on
how and why did the terror remerge 1945-53?
-paranoia increased post-war
-NKVD issued a new societal terror, motivated by stalin’s fear of ideological contamination
-returning PoW treated very harshly e.g. sent to forced labour camps - 2.5mil in labour camps by 1952
-servicemen returning from abroad were interrogated at ‘filtration camps’
-Leningrad affair = purge of party officials
-expansion of gulag system
-1947 law = illegal to marry a foreigner
-NKVD strengthened and organised into two separate ministries
-12 million wartime survivors sent to labour camps
-creation of Prokuratura - gov. office responsible for ensuring citizens obeyed the law
-less deaths than 1930s terror but more arrests
how was opposition dealt with 1945-53?
-anyone who had fallen from favour was erased from history, with stalin airbrushing old disgraced bolsheviks out of pictures
-Leningrad affair 1949
-when Israel turned out to be pro-USA, stalin readopted an anti-semitic stance, and feared all jews were potential enemies
-1951 = purge in Georgia, directed at followers of VKVD leader Buria, as he was seen to have too much power
-1952 = doctors’ plot - a doctor blamed other doctors for failing to treat Zhdanov, so stalin ordered their arrests, threatening his minister of state security with execution if he didn’t obtain confessions. 9 named doctors were executed, and 100s were arrested. it also triggered more anti-semitism with thousands of jews sent to labour camps
