Bolshevik Consolidation October Revolution Constituent Assembly War Communism Cheka War on Factions

Revolt and Response Kronstadt Rebellion New Economic Policy (NEP)

Stalin’s Rise to Power Deification of Lenin Power Struggle Party Politics Lenin’s blueprint (anti-factions, dictatorship of the proletariat) Aftermath of War Propaganda

Stalin’s consolidation Five Year Plan Collectivization/Dekulakization Cult of Personality Propaganda Dizzy with Success

Dizzy with Success But successes also have their seamy side; especially when they are achieved with comparative "ease, " "unexpectedly, " so to speak. Such successes sometimes induce a spirit of conceit and arrogance. "We can do anything!" "We can win hands down!" People are often intoxicated by such successes, they become dizzy with success, they lose all sense of proportion, they lose the faculty of understanding realities, they reveal a tendency to overestimate their own strength and to underestimate the strength of the enemy; reckless attempts are made to settle all the problems of Socialist construction "in two ticks. "

In such cases care is not taken to consolidate the successes achieved and systematically to utilize them for the purpose of advancing further. Why should we consolidate successes? We shall anyhow reach the complete victory of Socialism in "two ticks, " "We can do anything!" "We can win hands down!"

Hence the task of the Party: to wage a determined struggle against this frame of mind, which is dangerous and harmful to the cause, and to drive it out of the Party. - Joseph Stalin, 1930

17th Party Congress – Congress of Victors Praise of Stalin Plot against Stalin Confirmation vote Revenge: 1108 of 1966 Party members purged (98 of 139 Central Committee executed)

Sergi Kirov Emerging threat to Stalin Assassination Stalin’s response

Show Trials 1st Trial (1936) – Zinoviev/Kamanev (Leftist Troskyites) 3rd Trial (1938) – The Trial of Twenty-one (Bukharin/Rykov/Yagoda – Rightist Trotskyites)

Army Trial Marshall Tukhachevsky Leadership Decimated 3/5 Marshalls 13/25 Army Commanders 8/9 Fleet Admirals 50/57 Corp Commanders 154/186 Division Commanders 43,000 Officers in all

Russian Art Movement

Vera Ermolayeva

Wassily Kandinsky

Vladimir Lebedev

Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge

What is the role of propaganda in an absolutist state?

Socialist Realism Means of creating art under state control since 1917 Reaction against “bourgeois” art (cubism, impressionism) Simple art for simple folks “Girl Meets Tractor” State policy in 1932 Ruthlessly enforced by Stalin as the only acceptable art form

The First and Second Five Year Plans (1928-1937) Fight lazy workers!, 1931 Forward to World October, 1933

Railway workers keep up the fast pace..., 1932 Inv

Glorifying Stalin

K Trokhimenko

Ivan Alekseevich Vladimirov