Question

How did Joseph Stalin create a totalitarian state in the Soviet Union?

Answer 1

Hint:
- Totalitarian government is described as a form of government that technically allows no individual rights and attempts to delegate all facets of one's life to the state's authority.
- Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet politician who ruled the Soviet Union from 1927 until 1953. He was also the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Chairman of the Soviet Union's Council of Ministers.

Complete answer:
- Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin were among Lenin's supporters. After Lenin died these two became bitter rivals for control of the communist party.
- From 1922 to 1927, Stalin began his ruthless climb to the head of government. In 1924, Stalin placed many of his followers in key positions. By 1928, Stalin gained total control over the communist party. In 1929, Trotsky’s forced exile was the beginning of dictatorship.
- Stalin focused on the development of Russia. Stalin turned the Soviet Union into a totalitarian state in order to attain his goal.
- Stalin started controlling the economy. Under a totalitarian regime, the government controlled every aspect of the worker's life.
- Stalin formulated methods of control and persuasion. He began building his totalitarian state by destroying his real and imagined enemies. They controlled riots and monitored telephones lines, read mail, and planted informers everywhere.
- A campaign of terror was started under the name of Great Purge directed at eliminating anyone who threatened his power.
- Stalin controlled censorship, religious teachings were replaced by ideas of communism.
- Under Stalin, all education, from nursery to university, was controlled by the government. Schoolchildren were taught the ideas of the communist party.

Note:
- Historians estimate that Stalin was responsible for 8 million to 13 million deaths.
- "Comrade Index Card" was one of Joseph Stalin's oddest nicknames. Stalin was given this name by Leon Trotsky, a longtime Communist Party competitor. According to legend, before Stalin accepted his first major political job as General Secretary of the Communist Party, he was merely a secretary. Sorting and arranging files were among his responsibilities. As a result, the name "Comrade Index Card" was coined.