I'm no fan this truly evil SOB. Stalin was actually FOR Hitler before he was AGAINST him.
But it is foolish to discount the massive effort that Russia put up against the Nazis (once they were no longer allies).
KPRF? Is that a Pacifica, NPR, or Air American radio station?
There's no question that Russia was the primary battlefield on which Nazi Germany was destroyed.
The question, though, is whether the Soviets would have done better and suffered less massive death and destruction if they had had different leadership other than Stalin. That is unknown and unknowable. Had Stalin not killed the military elite, would Russia's military have functioned better? America's most impressive generals were not in command at the outset of the war.
It is difficult to say.
I think there are two considerations that undermine Stalin as a war leader. First, the Hitler-Stalin pact that encouraged Hitler to start the war. Second, the Kommisars and the purges, which suggest that Stalin was more concerned to exterminate his domestic enemies than to fight Hitler.
No question that the Russian people fought bravely against Hitler, but I don't know how much credit Stalin deserves for it.
What most Russians don't admit, either, is that they might not have held out if not for US lendlease providing food and weapons at a crucial time.
America and the Soviet Union had close to the same amount of people in them. But the amount of Soviet dead is many times that of American dead.Obviously somebody had it wrong. Stalin could have kept the Germans from Soviet borders but he was bending over backwards to appease Hilter while he was purging his army of its talent! If he had not invaded Finland and revealed to Hilter what a mess he'd made of things by his tremendous losses to Finland Hilter would have left him alone.
Stalin was worse than Hitler.
Hitler would have defeated the USSR if he had only insisted that Japan make attacks against the eastern USSR prior to attacking Pearl Harbor. Japan needed Hitler's assurance that he would declare war on the US.
Hitler gave that assurance and asked for absolutely nothing in return. That was stupid for Japan as well because they needed to ensure that Germany took care of Russia before attacking the US.
If Japan had made only moderately large attacks on the USSR, that would have prevented Stalin from moving his best Siberian divisions from eastern USSR in December, 1941, thus saving Moscow.
Stalin didn't go crap except get huge concessions from his buddy in socialism FDR.
It was the Russian soldiers who beat the Germans, not Stalin....
Most Soviet historians (including Robert Conquest, Adam Ulam, and Alan Bullock) contend that Stalin made a series of disastrous decisions that cost millions of Russian lives. Before the war he purged the officer class of the Soviet military (including some prominent Soviet marshals). And, despite numerous clear and reliable warnings that Germany was planning an attack he ignored them. After the NAZI attack he was so shocked that he was virtually immobilized for more than a week. It's also a fact that the Russian people initially welcomed the invading forces so horrible was life in the Soviet Union. It was only when the NAZI's proved themselves even more brutal than Stalin that they fought against them. Stalin did learn from experience and had enough sense to stop trying to micromanage the war effort and leave it to the generals. Stalingrad was his biggest PR victory and despite enormous Soviet losses it established his reputation. He even was shrewd enough to appeal to Russian nationalism and made temporary peace with the Orthodox Church. On balance though, he unnecessarily cost millions of lives.
It should not be forgotten that Stalin joined with Hitler and divided up eastern Europe. Together they invaded Poland in September of 1939. Hitler took the western half of Poland and Stalin took the eastern half.
The Hitler/Stalin agreement allowed Stalin the Baltic States, Finland some territory to the south toward Iraq.
The great benefit to Hitler was that his back was protected so that he could fight Britain and France.
Stalin reluctantly agreed to fight Germany only after Hitler turned on his erstwhile partner and attacked Russia.
Without American Lend Lease, and the military aid it received from Britain, the Germans would have easily defeated the Russians.
The Russian people are the least likely to know anything about what Joe Stalin did during the war. This was a closed police state. The people were given the option of dying for Stalin or just dying.
Later in 1939 Stalin came within an inch of signing the Nazi's "Pact of Steel" which would have made him the fourth partner with Japan, Italy and Germany.
Stalin also signed a peace treaty with Japan and protected Japan's back during the entire war. Stalin declared war on Japan two days after the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima so that he could get in on the spoils.
The whole of Russian history is a tale of deception, tyranny, blood-thirsty revolution, hate and finally failure on a scale never before seen in human history.
Cornel West and Chomsky are waiting in the wings to contribute..
A lot of people cite Stalingrad or Kursk, but the German defeat and subsequent surrender in N. Africa was every bit as costly to the Germans.
Of course the entire Russian transport was provided by the U.S. as was most of their food. Also many P-39 aircraft, and probably huge amounts of other supplies. I wonder just how well the Ruskies would have done if facing the Germans alone, and by that I mean the Germans didn't have to fight in N. Africa or face bombing from England etc.