Stalin

Rule of Stalin

By Aaron_B

  • Stalin publicly attacks Trotsky for being unfaithful to "Leninism."

    1924-1925

  • Stalin publicly articulates his theory of "Socialism in One Country."

  • Death of Lenin

  • Allied with Bukharin and the "Rightists," Stalin begins attacks on Zinoviev.

  • At the Fifteenth Party Congress, Stalin attacks the "United Opposition" of Zinoviev, Kamenev, and Trotsky.

    Lasted October-November

  • Beginning of the first Five-Year Plan

  • Kamenev and Zinoviev expelled from the Party; Trotsky expelled and sent to Central Asia.

  • Stalin begins assault on Bukharin

  • Bukharin removed from the Politburo

  • Stalin announces "liquidation of the kulaks as a class"; collectivization begins in earnest.

  • Terrible famine across the Soviet Union; millions die

    lasted 1931-1932

  • Murder, by Stalin's agents, of Sergei Kirov. Beginning of "Great Terror," which continues until 1938.

  • Zinoviev, Kamenev, and others are arrested, accused of complicity in Kirov's assassination.

  • First "Show Trial." Zinoviev, Kamenev, and their allies confess and are executed.

  • Second Show Trial

  • Purge of the army begins, top generals are tried and executed

  • Third Show Trial, conviction and execution of Bukharin, Rykov, others.

  • At Eighteenth Party Congress, Stalin announces end of the Great Terror.

  • Outbreak of World War II

  • Nazi-Soviet Pact is signed in Moscow

  • Trotsky assassinated, by Stalin's agents, in Mexico City

  • Hitler invades Soviet Union

  • Battle of Stalingrad. Germans are defeated, marking the turning point in the war.

    August 1942-February 1943

  • Stalin meets with Roosevelt and Churchill in Teheran

  • Stalin meets with Roosevelt and Churchill at Yalta

  • United States uses atomic bomb against Japan, bringing an end to the war in the Pacific.

  • Hitler commits suicide in bombed-out Berlin, ending war in Europe. Red Army controls all of Eastern Europe.

  • Communists seize power in Czechoslovakia, cementing Soviet control of Eastern Europe.

  • Soviets blockade East Berlin.

    Lasted during the summer

  • Communists, under Mao, are victorious in Chinese Civil War.

  • Communists, under Mao, are victorious in Chinese Civil War.

  • Sino-Soviet Treaty signed

  • Announcement of Jewish "Doctors' Plot" against Stalin, plans for new wave of terror.

  • Death of Stalin