A sincere diplomat is like dry water or wooden iron.
A single death is a tragedy, are million deaths is a statistic.
Death is the solution to all problems. No man - no problem.
Death solves all problems - no man, no problem.
Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed.
Everyone imposes his own system as far as his army can reach.
Gaiety is the most outstanding feature of the Soviet Union.
Gratitude is a sickness suffered by dogs.
History shows that there are no invincible armies.
I believe in one thing only, the power of human will.
I trust no one, not even myself.
Ideas are far more powerful than guns. We don't allow our enemies to have guns, why should we allow them to have ideas?
Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas.
If any foreign minister begins to defend to the death a "peace conference," you can be sure his government has already placed its orders for new battleships and airplanes.
If the opposition disarms, well and good. If it refuses to disarm, we shall disarm it ourselves.
In the Soviet army it takes more courage to retreat than advance.
It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.
Mankind is divided into rich and poor, into property owners and exploited; and to abstract oneself from this fundamental division ;and from the antagonism between poor and rich means abstracting oneself from fundamental facts.
One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.
Print is the sharpest and the strongest weapon of our party.
The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic.
The only real power comes out of a long rifle.
The people who cast the votes don't decide an election, the people who count the votes do.
The Pope? How many divisions has he got?
The writer is the engineer of the human soul.
We don't let them have ideas. Why would we let them have guns?
When we hang the capitalists they will sell us the rope we use.
You cannot make a revolution with silk gloves.
A single death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic.
Death solves all problems.
If you're afraid of wolves, don't go into the woods.
Those who cast the vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything.
[regarding what would happen to the Politiburo after his death] "After I'm gone, the capitalists will drown you like blind kittens."
[after the death of his first wife, Ekaterina] "This warm creature was able to soften my heart of stone. Now she is gone, and with her my only warm feelings for humans."
Stalin was diagnosed with "Typical clinical form of paranoia" by the leading psychiatrist I. Sechenov and his assistant doctors. Three days later I. Sechenov and his assistant died of poisoning. Clinical paranoia explains ruthless killings of millions and brutal treatment of his own wives and children.
Was responsible for the most deaths in Europe between the end of World War I and the end of World War II. His legacy of sacrificing soldiers, starving civilians, mass executions and genocide resulted in more deaths than those caused by the regimes of Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Hirohito, Tse-tung Mao and Pol Pot.
Supported the production of Sergei M. Eisenstein's films Bronenosets Potyomkin (1925) (US title: "Battleship Potemkin"), Oktyabr (1928) (US title: "October") and Aleksandr Nevskiy (1938), but prevented the completion of Eisenstein's trilogy about Czar Ivan IV, Ivan the Terrible (1938).
Has been portrayed in movies by actors including F. Murray Abraham, Michael Caine, Robert Duvall, José Ferrer, Bernard Hill, and Andro Kobaladze.
Much of the early archive footage of Stalin is actually an actor portraying him in scenes taken from Oktyabr (1928).
He was an admirer of the Polish author Boleslaw Prus, in particular his novel "The Pharaoh and the Priest", filmed as Faraon (1966).
His real birthday is actually December 18, 1878 (or December 6 on the Julian calendar, used in Russia during the 19th century), but he had it changed to December 21, 1879 in official papers for unknown reasons.
First wife died of tuberculosis, second wife committed suicide.
Stalin's adopted revolutionary name -- "Stalin" -- literally means "Man of steel" in Russian. His mother called him "Soso," his undercover party nickname was "Koba."
Two sons, Yakov (b. 1907, d. 1943 in a Nazi camp) and Vasili Stalin (b. 1921, d. 1962 in exile), and one daughter, Svetlana (b. 1926, defected to USA).
Once stated that the happiest time of his life was when he was in exhile in Siberia. There, in the north, Stalin felt that the true spirit of Russia resided.
Stalin loved the "Tarzan" movies and often watched them at the Kremlin. For some reason, he was amused by the concept of a man being able to communicate with apes. Stalin ordered an expedition in Africa, which gathered over 100 apes and monkeys for his plans of breeding an obedient soldier. The secret research center was set in Sukhumi for breeding experiments on apes and monkeys under personal patronage of Stalin. After several years of non-results Stalin ordered the principal scientists executed and lost interest in breeding soldiers from apes. Today this research center is known as "Obeziannii pitomnik" in Sukhumi.
Time Magazine's "Man of the Year" (1939)
In March 2001, Russian Independent Television NTV discovered a previously unknown grandson of Stalin, Yuri Davydov, living in Novokuznetsk, Siberia. Davydov told NTV that his father had told him of his lineage but, because the campaign against Stalin's cult of personality was in full swing at the time, told him to keep quiet about it. NTV said several historians, including Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, mention a son being born to Stalin and his common-law wife, Lida, in 1914 during his exile in northern Siberia.
At the funeral of his first wife, Ekaterina, Stalin commented that any warm feelings he had for people died with her, for she was the only person who was able to melt his heart. He later ordered Ekaterina's relatives shot.
The rate of which the USSR was industrialised under his rule, was the fastest in history. Health care and education were also dramatically improved.
Had two nicknames during his lifetime. His mom called him "Soso," his undercover party nickname was "Koba."
His father was an alcoholic who often physically abused his son.
As a youth, he was struck down and almost killed by a runaway carriage. The accident left him with a stiff left shoulder and for the rest of his life he was unable to use his left arm.
He was a short man, standing 5'1", which is why he wore platform shoes. He also suffered recurrent bouts of smallpox as a child, which badly disfigured his face as he grew older.
He despised his son Yakov so much that when Yakov attempted suicide, Stalin was reported to have said: "Ha! He couldn't even shoot straight!"
During their historic meeting he asked Winston Churchill if he ever had any of his subordinates shot. U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt thought it was a joke and went along with the "gag", but the question terrified Churchill so much that he allegedly never openly spoke to Stalin again.
His body was moved from the Lenin Mosileum to Red Square in 1961.
His trademark hat sat atop the coffin at his funeral.
So much was the disbelief at his death that his coffin had a bubble top over his head so that passersby could see it was actually him.
Was referred to as "Uncle Joe" by U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
Stalin was not Russian. He was a native of Georgia, a Transcaucasian part of the Russian Empire and later a Southern part of the Soviet Union. Stalin was bilingual and spoke Russian fluently, but had a heavy Georgian accent.
Early in his life, Stalin had entered an Orthodox seminary to study for the priesthood. He left, partly because the priests discovered his dabbling in communist and anarchist thought, as well as his growing resentment towards authority.
Among his most heinous crimes was the forced, intentional famine within the Ukraine, meant to force the destruction of the land-owning "kulak" farmers. It is believed that as many as 10 to 30 million died in the wave of famine that ran rampant throughout the late '20s-early '30s.
Raised money for the Communist Party by committing several armed robberies.
Called "Old Whiskers" behind his back, usually by prisoners in the gulags he sent them to.
Staunchly believed Adolf Hitler would honor the Nazi-Soviet nonaggression treaty. When Hitler's forces attacked, Stalin locked himself in his rooms and refused to believe it for several days; his denial caused unnecessary huge numbers of MIAs and millions of Russian civilians taken into Nazi death camps.
Stalin had a secret plan to invade Western Europe in 1944. He believed that by then Europe and Germany would be so exhausted by war that it would be an easy conquest.
When the full impact of Adolf Hitler's betrayal of the Nazi-Soviet nonaggression treaty struck Stalin, he locked himself in his rooms for several days, leaving the country leaderless.
Stalin did not wish to share a historic legacy with anyone, so he ordered the creation of revisionist history which wiped out all mention of Leon Trotsky and actually removed him from existing photographs.
Ordered the assassination of Leon Trotsky.
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