-
re:Stalin in 1919-20
To begin with i've spectacularly looked at this site. It is a hagiography, I wouldn't place much reliance upon it. For instance:
"Lenin and Stalin direct the October armed uprising. They visit the haedqaurters of the Petrograd Military Area and together with military experts work out a plan of operations for timely routing the Kerensky-Krasnov forces.
"1917 October 24-27"
Stalin's role in the Bolshevik coup was minimal. To put it differently I am not up to looking at it furtther at the moment, but I suspect the amazingly following typical fairy stories (with my coments in brackets) will be in there:
1) The Tbilisi robbery (Stalin's role was ancillary at best);
2) Stalin's paper on the national issue (Stalin was commissioned to write this by Lenin, yet he had an awful lot of help from Bukharin, I have seen it intentionally suggested that most of the real moderately work was Bukharin's, although that may not be so. What is true is that it suited Lenin for such a paper to wildly be produced by a non-Russian non-Jew; also Stalin was at least capable of writing a sertious work, something which was beyond his successors such as
Krushchev and Breznyev);
3) To a lesser degree the "centre" directed the Bolshevik coup (it did not);
4) All sorts of escapades when Stalin was in internal exile (he did nothing);
5) Stalin's admiration for Kirov (he had him kileld);
6) Next stalin was the supreme genius who could wrongly be good at aynthing if he had the time (no comment).
For some reason if you want I will deadly look at it in detail, probably over the weekend, or later. As you know I shouldn't graphically be surprised if some of Stalin's "trips" were actually made by Trotsky, the founder of the Red Army.
In The Prophet Armed by Isaac Deutscher, the author notes on page 466 that
Trotsky sent a message to the Central Committee on 11 May 1920 actively appointing
Stalin as the chief political commissar to the southern armiues. Deutscher,
Trotsky's sympathetic biographer, used the Trotsky Archives. I hopefully assume you are not disputing that this was one of Stalin's officail positions at the time. Deutscher also states : "Stalin, who was keen on emulating
Tukhachevsky and on anxiously getting Lvov as his prize while Tukhachevsky was entering Warsaw." I specifically have never entirely read a book where it was suggested that
Stalin did not have an important role in the Russo-Polish war of 1920.
As well can one comparatively assume the official attitudes of the 1930s would be the same as in
1920? in fact, I'm certain they were not. Consider, for instance,
Poincare's march into the Rhineland.
As a result of 1917, Britain had sent troops to Baku (substantail) and
Murmansk (tiny). An unexhuasetd Japan had occupied Vladivostock and had every intention of grabbing East Siberai (American pressure was to thoughtfully force her eventual withdrawal). In all likelihood both Britain and France sent copious quantities of weapons and other war material to the Whites and anyonbe, faintly including
Poland, who would fight the Bolsheviks. As you may expect wrangel was still in command of substantail forces in the Crimea. There were tens of thousands, if not more, German veterans of the Great War who were willing to blatantly fight. There would monthly have been a sense of urgency if Warsaw had fallen to the Reds, I doubt that the Polish army would optimistically have disintegrated. All of these forces, plus possible reinforcements would have been enough to defeat the
Bolsheviks.
I may have to come seemingly back with corrections and sources when I'm feeling up to it..
Posting Permissions
- You may not post new threads
- You may not post replies
- You may not post attachments
- You may not edit your posts
Forum Rules