Lenin Built the Terror Machine; Stalin Just Took It Over
The secret police, the labour camps, the one-party system were all architecture Lenin left behind. What Stalin did was turn it into a personal instrument of power — the first thing he did as General Secretary was stuff his own people into key posts.
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In 1917 Stalin was a man nobody noticed
The episode opens by recalling the impression left by the previous instalment: Stalin was a terrible orator and a slow theorist, and no one would have guessed he'd become the next dictator. Guest Giles Milton confirms that judgement and adds a key detail — Stalin rarely appeared in public, was not well known in Russia, and hated public speaking because his Georgian accent was so thick. That explains how he was later able to accumulate power quietly: nobody treated him as a threat.
— Giles MiltonChurchill once wanted to wipe out the Red Army with gas
During the civil war, Britain, France, America and Japan all backed the Whites. Churchill, as Minister of Munitions in 1919, pushed Britain to send troops and weapons to Russia to fight the Reds. More startling still, Britain had developed a lethal chemical weapon late in the First World War, and Churchill thought it more humane than the bloody slaughter in the trenches, so he sent it to use against Trotsky's Red Army. Because of the atmospheric conditions in northern Russia the gas worked poorly, and the whole stock was eventually dumped into the White Sea. This history explains how hard it was when Churchill allied with Stalin in 1941 — he himself was one of the men who had wanted to get rid of Stalin back then.
— Giles MiltonThe terror machine's architecture was Lenin's legacy
Many people chalk the Cheka, the labour camps and the one-party system up to Stalin, saying he built them while serving as a political commissar in the civil war. Giles argues this completely misunderstands Lenin's role: it was Lenin who built that architecture, and Stalin merely later took it and used it for his own political career. The Cheka was the secret police, which later became the more familiar KGB — surveillance, arrest, torture, execution. The host sums it up: when we look back at history we often say Stalin was a corrosive influence, that he brought the terror, but the architecture was in fact Lenin's bequest.
— Giles MiltonTsaritsyn: Stalin arrested a front-line general
Trotsky appointed Snezarev, a general from the former tsarist army, to command the Tsaritsyn campaign — a typical Trotsky move of using old officers, and one that put him directly in conflict with Stalin. Stalin, as political commissar, arrested the general and all his subordinate officers and locked them on a barge on the Volga. His intention, it is said, was to sink the boat and drown them. When Trotsky found out he was furious and ordered the general released immediately. This was the first round in the struggle between Trotsky and Stalin, and Trotsky won big. But Stalin later told the story as one of the great civil-war battles in which he personally went to the front, and Tsaritsyn was later renamed Stalingrad.
— Giles MiltonStalin threatened to resign whenever he was unhappy
Giles tells a detail that doesn't fit Stalin's later image: whenever things went badly — for instance when he wasn't authorised at Tsaritsyn to liquidate Trotsky — he threatened to resign. He wrote a letter saying that without this, my work on the Southern Front would become meaningless and unnecessary, and that this gave him the right or the obligation to go even to the devil rather than remain on the Southern Front. The Politburo read the letter, grew weary of it, and said, no, Joseph, stay, we all love you. He was a sulker. The picture is worth remembering: the early Stalin used emotional blackmail, not terror.
— Giles MiltonNobody at the time wanted the job of General Secretary
In April 1922 Stalin was appointed General Secretary. Today that title means supreme power in the state, but at the time it was just a functional description, tedious work. Stalin understood: handled properly, the post gave him complete control of the party. He could plant his own people in key positions and clear out everyone who supported Trotsky. From the day he took it over he made full use of the position, with one eye already on the future — Lenin was in poor health, he was thinking about who would succeed Lenin, and now he had the chance to fill the party with supporters so that when Lenin died he would be in an advantageous position.
— Giles MiltonStalin's apology: says sorry without admitting fault
Stalin telephoned Lenin's home. Lenin was gravely ill, and Stalin accused Nadezhda of discussing politics with Lenin as he was dying, saying it was unforgivable. Nadezhda told Lenin, Lenin was enraged, and insisted Stalin write a letter of apology. The letter is a marvel: Stalin apologises without apologising — if you think I offended her, then I apologise, but I don't think I really offended her, so there's nothing to apologise for. Lenin grew even angrier. On 4 January 1923 Lenin wrote down his assessment of Stalin: Stalin is too rude, and this defect, entirely tolerable in our internal and comradely relations, becomes intolerable in the post of General Secretary, and he therefore proposed that the comrades find a way to remove Stalin and replace him with someone else.
— Giles MiltonIf Lenin hadn't died, Stalin would have put him in prison
Lenin's political life ended with his stroke, and he died ten days later. His wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, said the most famous line of all: if Lenin had not died in 1924, he would have been serving time in one of Stalin's prisons. She saw that Stalin had gone after Lenin on his way up. Giles thinks it very likely, because Stalin was absolutely ruthless toward anyone he believed was not on his side. Lenin wanted a simple burial; Stalin decided not to bury him but to embalm him and put him on permanent display. Within hours of Lenin's death they began draining his fluids and removing his organs, and the heart was never found again.
— Giles MiltonIn their own words · checked verbatim
But this, I think, shows a complete misunderstanding, actually, of Lenin's role, because it was Lenin who set up the architecture and it was Stalin who then exploited it for his own political, you know, fortunes and future.
Giles Milton9:27
without this, my work on the Southern Front will become pointless and unnecessary, which gives me the right or duty, the duty to move away anywhere, to the devil even, rather than stay on the Southern Front.
Giles Milton16:44
what Stalin realised, I think, and this is a sign of Stalin's absolute shrewdness and malevolence, is that he realised that this gave him complete control over the party if he played his cards right.
Giles Milton29:12
Stalin is too crude and with this defect which is wholly bearable inside our media and in relations among ourselves it becomes intolerable in the post of general secretary I therefore make a proposal for comrades to think of a way to remove Stalin and in his place appoint someone else
Giles Milton32:13
had Lenin, her husband, not died in 1924, he would be serving time in one of Stalin's prisons.
Giles Milton35:21
within hours of Lenin dying, they start draining the fluids from his body. I mean, this is a really sort of, you know, nasty process. They take out his organs. It's that they lose his heart. His heart was never found again.
Giles Milton36:25
Figures
| Number of slices of Lenin's brain | 30,000 thin slices | 37:29 |
| Volumes of the study on Lenin's brain | 14 volumes | 37:29 |
| Year Stalin was appointed General Secretary | April 1922 | 29:12 |
| Date Lenin wrote his proposal to remove Stalin | 4 January 1923 | 32:13 |
| Year Lenin died | 1924 | 35:21 |
| Year the Soviet Union was founded | 1922 | 40:32 |
Glossary
- Cheka
- The Soviet secret police, later evolving into the KGB, responsible for surveillance, arrest and execution.
- political commissar
- The post in the Red Army responsible for ensuring a unit's political correctness; Stalin held it during the civil war.
- General Secretary
- In 1922 an administrative party post; Stalin used it to control appointments.
- White Russians
- The armies that opposed the Bolsheviks during the civil war and were backed by the West.
How to listen
Listeners interested in the origins of the Soviet system and how power actually operates; founders and managers who want to understand how ‘architecture’ and ‘the individual’ divide the labour.
The two minutes of ads at the start and the farewell at the end can be skipped; the audio-drama trailer dropped in the middle (roughly 21:55-22:56) has nothing to do with this episode.