Stalin Quotes

“Perhaps 20 million had been killed; 28 million deported, of whom 18 million had slaved in the Gulags. Yet, after so much slaughter, they were still believers.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“The Bolsheviks were atheists but they were hardly secular politicians in the conventional sense: they stooped to kill from the smugness of the highest moral eminence. Bolshevism may not have been a religion, but it was close enough. Stalin told Beria the Bolsheviks were “a sort of military-religious order.” When Dzerzhinsky, founder of the Cheka, died, Stalin called him “a devout knight of the proletariat.” Stalin’s “order of sword-bearers” resembled the Knights Templars, or even the theocracy of the Iranian Ayatollahs, more than any traditional secular movement. They would die and kill for their faith in the inevitable progress towards human betterment, making sacrifices of their own families, with a fervour seen only in the religious slaughters and martyrdoms of the Middle Ages—and the Middle East. They”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“He later told President Truman, “Music’s an excellent thing, it reduces the beast in men,” a subject on which he was surely something of an expert. Stalin’s pitch was perfect: it was a “rare” and “sweet” voice. Indeed, one of his lieutenants said Stalin was good enough to have become a professional singer, a mind-boggling historical possibility.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“But Stalin’s real fault lay in his raging overconfidence: he lacked the resources for this vast enterprise which, instead of capitalizing on his Moscow victory, handed Hitler the constellation of stunning victories that led to the ultimate crisis of Stalingrad.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“If you want to know the people around you,” Stalin said, “find out what they read.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“He did not possess literary talents himself but in terms of his reading alone, he was an intellectual, despite being the son of a cobbler and a washerwoman.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“That doesn’t matter. Gorky’s a vain man. We must bind him with cables to the Party,” replied Stalin.3 It worked: during the kulak liquidation, Gorky unleashed his hatred of the backward peasants in Pravda: “If the enemy does not surrender, he must be exterminated.” He toured concentration camps and admired their re-educational value. He supported slave labour projects such as the Belomor Canal which he visited with Yagoda, whom he congratulated: “You rough fellows do not realize what great work you’re doing!”4 Yagoda,”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Party-mindedness” was “an almost mystical concept,” explained Kopelev. “The indispensable prerequisites were iron discipline and faithful observance of all the rituals of Party life.” As one veteran Communist put it, a Bolshevik was not someone who believed merely in Marxism but “someone who had absolute faith in the Party no matter what . . . A person with the ability to adapt his morality and conscience in such a way that he can unreservedly accept the dogma that the Party is never wrong—even though it’s wrong all the time.” Stalin did not exaggerate when he boasted: “We Bolsheviks are people of a special cut.”2 Nadya”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“The Party justified its “dictatorship” through purity of faith. Their Scriptures were the teachings of Marxism-Leninism, regarded as a “scientific” truth. Since ideology was so important, every leader had to be—or seem to be—an expert on Marxism-Leninism, so that these ruffians spent their weary nights studying, to improve their esoteric credentials, dreary articles on dialectical materialism. It was so important that Molotov and Polina even discussed Marxism in their love letters: “Polichka my darling . . . reading Marxist classics is very necessary . . . You must read some more of Lenin’s works coming out soon and then a number of Stalin’s . . . I so want to see you.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Stalin must have drafted it himself. This 1st December Law—or rather the two directives of that night—was the equivalent of Hitler’s Enabling Act because it laid the foundation for a random terror without even the pretence of a rule of law. Within three years, two million people had been sentenced to death or labour camps in its name. Mikoyan said there was no discussion and no objections. As easily as slipping the safety catch on their Mausers, the Politburo clicked into the military emergency mentality of the Civil War.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Yury still remembers Stalin’s Jesus joke: they were working in the summerhouse, which stood under a big oak tree, when Stalin glanced at his closest friends: “Look at you here with me,” he said, pointing at the tree. “That’s the Mamre tree.” Zhdanov knew from his Bible that the Mamre tree was where Jesus assembled his Apostles.72”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Sometimes Stalin managed to show brisk affection: he sent him one of his books, The Conquest of Nature, inscribing it: “Yasha read this book at once. J. Stalin.” 4”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Playing ominously with a pearl-handled penknife and now suddenly “stern,” with a “taste of iron” in his voice, Stalin proposed: “The artist ought to show life truthfully. And if he shows our life truthfully he cannot fail to show it moving to socialism. This is, and will be, Socialist Realism.” In other words, the writers had to describe what life should be, a panegyric to the Utopian future, not what life was. Then there was a touch of farce, as usual provided unconsciously by Voroshilov: “You produce the goods that we need,” said Stalin. “Even more than machines, tanks, aeroplanes, we need human souls.” But Voroshilov, ever the simpleton, took this literally and interrupted Stalin to object that tanks were also “very important.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Kaganovich suppressed the rebellious textile workers of Ivanovo, Voroshilov was unhappy and sent Stalin a remarkable letter: “Across the Stavropol region, I saw all the fields uncultivated. We were expecting a good harvest but didn’t get it . . . Across the Ukraine from my train window, the truth is it looks even less cultivated than the North Caucasus . . .” Voroshilov finished his note: “Sorry to tell you such things during your holiday but I can’t be silent.”11 Stalin later told Churchill this was the most difficult time of his life, harder even than Hitler’s invasion: “it was a terrible struggle” in which he had to destroy “ten million [kulaks]. It was fearful. Four years it lasted. It was absolutely necessary . . . It was no use arguing with them. A certain number of them had been resettled in the northern parts of the country . . . Others had been slaughtered by the peasants themselves—such had been the hatred for them.”12 The peasants understandably attacked Communist officials. Sitting on the terrace of the Sochi dacha in the baking heat, an angry, defensive Stalin seethed about the breakdown of discipline and betrayal in the Party.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Party-mindedness” was “an almost mystical concept,” explained Kopelev. “The indispensable prerequisites were iron discipline and faithful observance of all the rituals of Party life.” As one veteran Communist put it, a Bolshevik was not someone who believed merely in Marxism but “someone who had absolute faith in the Party no matter what . . . A person with the ability to adapt his morality and conscience in such a way that he can unreservedly accept the dogma that the Party is never wrong—even though it’s wrong all the time.” Stalin did not exaggerate when he boasted: “We Bolsheviks are people of a special cut.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Stalin’s “quasi-Islamic” fanaticism was typical of the Bolshevik magnates: Mikoyan’s son called his father “a Bolshevik fanatic.” Most41 came from devoutly religious backgrounds. They hated Judaeo-Christianity— but the orthodoxy of their parents was replaced by something even more rigid, a systematic amorality: “This religion—or science, as it was modestly called by its adepts—invests man with a godlike authority . . . In the Twenties, a good many people drew a parallel to the victory of Christianity and thought this new religion would last a thousand years,” wrote Nadezhda Mandelstam. “All were agreed on the superiority of the new creed that promised heaven on earth instead of other worldly rewards.”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Власть навсегда ушла из этого страшного загородного дома. Колосс исчез. На диване лежал жалкий мертвый старик”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Его лицо лишилось всех красок, оно стало каким-то чужим, неузнаваемым… – писала Светлана. – Он буквально задыхался у нас на глазах. Смертельная агония была ужасна. В последний миг он открыл глаза. Это был страшный взгляд, безумный или гневный, полный страха перед смертью”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“20 миллионов человек погибли, еще 28 миллионов были депортированы. 18 миллионов из них работали в ГУЛАГе и мало чем отличались от рабов и тем не менее продолжали верить в идеалы коммунизма”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Никита Сергеевич Хрущев правил Украиной с 1938 года. Перед войной он безжалостно уничтожал кулаков, во время войны и после нее громил украинских националистов и униатских епископов”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Рузвельт умирал, Черчилль часто болел, Гитлер почти впал в слабоумие. Тотальная война дорого обошлась верховным главнокомандующим”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Сталин всегда был уверен, что вопрос, кому править Восточной Европой, будет решен не за столом переговоров, а силой, которая теперь была на его стороне. Восточную Европу занимали 10 миллионов советских солдат”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“За столом Иосиф Виссарионович называл себя «наивным и болтливым стариком», чем вызывал улыбки у окружающих. Затем он произнес тост за генералов:
– Их ценят только во время войны и быстро забывают в мирное время. После войны их престиж снижается, женщины поворачиваются к ним спиной…
Советские генералы еще не догадывались, что Сталин забудет о них первым”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Впервые с начала войны русские вступили на территорию Германии. Они устроили вакханалию мести. В следующие месяцы будут изнасилованы два миллиона немок. Русские солдаты насиловали даже своих соотечественниц, освобожденных из немецких концлагерей. Сталин почти не обращал внимания на донесения о бесчинствах”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Все соратники вождя были при деле, трудились не покладая рук. Когда один из чиновников обратил внимание на то, что в Ростове живут 1300 калмыков, Вячеслав Молотов ответил, что они все должны быть немедленно депортированы.
Затем Лаврентий Павлович заподозрил в измене татар, живших в Крыму. Вскоре 160 тысяч человек уже ехали на сорока пяти железнодорожных составах на восток.
Весь год Берия находил все новых и новых предателей среди национальных меньшинств. 20 мая нарком внутренних дел попросил разрешения депортировать еще 2467 человек из Кабардинской республики. «Согласен. И. Сталин», – написал вождь в нижней части рапорта наркома.
Довольный Берия успокоился лишь тогда, когда переселил полтора миллиона человек. Сталин одобрил национальную чистку. Ордена и медали получили 413 чекистов. Более четверти депортированных лиц, по данным НКВД, скончались. Однако на самом деле умерли в пути или по прибытии в лагеря 530 тысяч человек. Для каждого из них переселение стало апокалипсисом, который мало чем отличался от гитлеровского холокоста”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Сталину было ясно: Советскому Союзу угрожали новые враги. В стране свирепствовал голод. Среди народов на Кавказе зрела измена, на Украине против советских войск начали воевать националисты. Не все спокойно было и в фундаменте, на котором стоял СССР. У русских входил в моду опасный либерализм. Все эти проблемы вождь собирался решить испытанным большевистским способом – террором и репрессиями”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“За моего друга Черчилля, если можно считать мистера Черчилля моим другом”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“После потери Ростова-на-Дону Сталин издал еще один жестокий указ, известный как «Ни шагу назад!». Документом повелевалось расстреливать паникеров и трусов на месте. Началось формирование заградительных частей, которые располагались за линией фронта, отлавливали и расстреливали тех, кто колебался и уходил с передовой. Несмотря на эти сверхжесткие меры, остановить продвижение немцев не удалось”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Чтобы поддержать боевой дух красноармейцев на высоком уровне, главный политрук Красной армии запретил рыть траншеи и окопы. Он утверждал, что всякий, кто пытается предпринять хотя бы элементарные меры безопасности, является паникером и трусом. Немцы превратили советские войска в кровавую кашу. Мехлис забрасывал Сталина телеграммами с просьбой разрешить ему усилить репрессии. «Товарищ Берия, правильно! Позаботьтесь о том, чтобы в Новороссийске не дышал ни один подонок, ни один мерзавец!» – написал Сталин на одной из телеграмм Мехлиса”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar

“Когда линия фронта приблизилась к Москве, Булганин по приказу Верховного приступил к формированию заградительных батальонов. Они должны были отлавливать трусов, паникеров и дезертиров. Всего за три дня арестованы 23 064 «дезертира». В 1941–1942 годах 994 000 военнослужащих были осуждены и 157 000 из них расстреляны. Только казненными красноармейцами можно было укомплектовать пятнадцать дивизий”
― Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar