Rise of Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee from 1922 until his death in 1953. In the years following Lenin's death in 1924, he rose to become the leader of the Soviet Union.

After growing up in Georgia, Stalin conducted activities for the Bolshevik Party for twelve years before the Russian Revolution of 1917. After participating, Stalin took military leadership positions in the Russian Civil War and Soviet-Polish War. Stalin was one of the Bolsheviks' chief operatives in the Caucasus and grew very close to Lenin, who saw him as a capable and loyal follower. Stalin played a decisive role in engineering the 1921 Red Army invasion of Georgia, adopting a particularly hardline approach to opposition. His connections helped him attain high positions in the new Soviet government, eventually becoming General Secretary in 1922. Lenin grew critical of Stalin, and many other Bolsheviks at this time, but in 1922 a stroke forced Lenin into semi-retirement. Lenin recommended Stalin's dismissal. Thereafter, Stalin politically isolated his major enemies, such as arch-rival Leon Trotsky, and had them dismissed from government altogether. This eventually led him to be the sole uncontested leader of the Party and the Soviet Union.

For over a decade before the Russian Revolution of 1917, Stalin was one of the chief Bolshevik operatives in the Caucasus, organising cells, spreading propaganda, and raising money through criminal activities. He eventually earned a place in Lenin's inner circle and the highest echelons of the Bolshevik hierarchy. In 1917, he participated in the Bolshevik uprising in the Russian capital of Petrograd. His pseudonym, Stalin, means "man of steel".

In the civil war that followed, Stalin forged connections with various Red Army generals and eventually acquired military powers of his own. He brutally suppressed counter-revolutionaries and bandits. After winning the civil war, the Bolsheviks moved to expand the revolution into Europe, starting with Poland, which was fighting the Red Army in Ukraine. As joint commander of an army in Ukraine, Stalin's actions in the war were later criticized by many, including Leon Trotsky.

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