Stalin was a Russia dictator.  A dictator if you forgot is an absolute ruler.  That means he would run every single aspect of you life.  Simple?  It is.  Stalin was born on December 21, 1879, in Gori, Georgia (the Russian State).  After some amount of schooling, he ended up getting expelled from school.  He ended up joining the Socialist Democratic party.  This was where he organized strikes and other forms of trouble.  From that point until he got total power he was always not in line.  Once he was exiled to Siberia.

        By the late 1920's Stalin could call most of the U.S.S.R power his.  He saw the backwardness of his country and wanted to improve it.  (This is under Five Years Plans)  Stalin took over everything.  The government controlled industry, commerce, and all social activity.  By the time Lenin (the reformer we read about) died, Stalin had changed everything.  Around the time of the second world war, Stalin signed an agreement with Hitler and the Germans.  This stated that they wouldn't attack each other.  This was a way for Stalin to keep Russia out of the turmoil of the Germans.  Also in the pact was the deal that Poland would be split and Russia and Germany would each get half.  In June 1941 Germany attacked Russia, thus breaking the pact.  After that took place, Stalin sided with Winston Churchill and Theodore Roosevelt to form the "Big Three".

        After World War 2, Stalin took back all the Soviet citizens who weren't actually living in the Soviet Union.  He thought all these people were traitors of the Soviet Union, and in other words left when the going got tough.  He sent all these millions of people to labor camps.  50% of these labor camp bound people never came back.  In other words, they died.  Big surprise.

       In 1953, Joseph Stalin died.  After his death the Soviet leaders began what was called "Destalinization."

       Included in all the sidebars you've read by now are details about all the things discussed.  When you think about history you probably think of people like Hitler, people that killed people from other nations.  What makes Stalin different was the fact that he killed his own people, his fellow Russians.  20 million of them.  Some consider him a hero.  After all, he took a country and did about 100 years of work in like 15 or so.  But is a industrialized nation worth 20 million lives?  You decide.
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