There will be no monument to Joseph Stalin...
to patriots," he said.The outbreak of the war saw Stalin reportedly taken by surprise and enter a period of depression and shock, and little was initially heard of the dictator as German forces swept across the Soviet Union. However, he soon recovered and was undoubtedly the figurehead of the Soviet war effort, even if many analysts have questioned the wisdom of his military tactics.
"Not a step back," was the Soviet forces" slogan, and it was often literally enforced, with troops in some cases ordered to shoot to kill retreating soldiers. After the war, many Red Army men who had fallen into the hands of the enemy were sent to Gulags, the system of prison camps set up in the harsher areas of the world"s first socialist state.
Stalin"s role during World War Two has been the subject of intense debate in Russia.
Communist Party members and veteran organizations insist that it was Stalin"s leadership that pulled the Soviet Union through its darkest
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