Josef Stalin: Difference between revisions

** Upon learning that one of his sons had been made a PoW by the Nazis during WWII, he is noted as [[I Have No Son|denouncing him as being any relation]]. This was in line with Soviet policy that retreat or surrender was cowardly, so the only acceptable outcomes for a Soviet soldier were death or victory - being captured implied he surrendered, and was [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness|no longer of any value to the revolution]]. Still, refusing to rescue or ransom PoWs (or compensate their families) is one thing - ignoring your own son (and severing ties with your daughter-in-law) is another...

** This is not ''quite'' as cold as it seems. The Germans offered to exchange Yakov for Field Marshal von Paulus, but Stalin refused. However, it is difficult to imagine Churchill or Roosevelt not doing the same thing in his shoes, and there is some evidence that Stalin was tormented by his decision afterwards, especially after Yakov was shot for trying to escape.

* [[A Father to His Men]] - Even though Stalin is widely known today as an evil mass murderer, he was loved by the common peoples of Russia up until the 80's (when Gorbachev released a whole bunch of secret documents on him). Simply put, everyone thought Stalin was the savior against [[Adolf Hitler]] and protector of the people. Any other trouble (like people vanishing without a trace) was supposed to be due to lower-level officers, not Stalin. In addition, for all his villainy, the fact that he fought [[Adolf Hitler]] in [[World War II]], who openly declared that the Russian Campaign was to be a war of annihilation, makes him tolerable enough to most people during that specific period.

** This is subverted by the rural portion of his population, who hated him with a vengeance at least until WWII.