The Age of Totalitarianism: Stalin
and Hitler
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The Age of Anxiety, the age of the lost
generation, was also an age in which modern Fascism and Totalitarianism made their
appearance on the historical stage. By 1939, liberal democracies in It goes without saying that the governments of Before the 19th century these monarchs legitimized their rule by recourse
to the divine right theory of kingship, an idea which itself appeared in
medieval In the 19th century, it was the dual revolution -- the Industrial and French Revolutions -- which
created the forces of social change which monarchs, enlightened or not, could
not fail to take heed. A large middle class had made its appearance in the
18th century but lacked status. Now, in the 19th century, this large class of
entrepreneurs, factory owners, civil servants, teachers, lawyers, doctors,
merchants and other professionals wanted their voices heard by their
governments. They became a force which had to be reckoned with and the
government began to utilize its talents by creating large, obedient
bureaucracies. In this way, government seemed to reflect the interests of all
when in actual fact, they represented the interests
of the bourgeoisie. So European governments maintained order by giving the
middle classes a stake in the welfare of the nation. Governments also built
strong police forces and armies of loyal soldiers. Meanwhile, the great mass
of people, the "swinish multitude," lay completely unrepresented.
And radicals were either imprisoned or exiled because of their liberal,
democratic, socialist, communist or anarchist
inclinations. Despite these measures, and there were others as well, traditional
authoritarian governments were not completely successful. Their power and
their objectives were limited. These governments lacked modern communications
and modern transportation. They lacked, in other words, the ability to
totally control their subject populations. The twentieth century -- thanks to
improved technology -- would change all that. In fact, it can be said that
true totalitarian regimes are limited only by the extent to which mass
communications have been made a reality. And, of course, with mass
communications comes mass man, and the capability of
total control. Following World War One, there was a revival of traditional authoritarian
regimes, especially in Although many of these central and eastern European countries would adopt
fascist characteristics, their general aim in doing so was not to become
fascist themselves. Instead, their aim was to maintain the established order.
They wanted to avoid revolution and more important, they wanted to avoid
another world war. Modern totalitarian regimes made their appearance with the total effort
required by the Great War. The reason for this is quite simple -- war required
all institutions to subordinate their interests to one objective at all
costs: victory. The individual had to make sacrifices and so their freedoms,
whatever they might have been, were constantly reduced by increasing
government intervention. The invisible hand of Adam Smith had to be replaced
by the visible hand. Governments could not longer remain idle hoping that
some "laissez-faire" mentality would carry them through the day.
No. Governments had to intervene and the great event which made this notion
of intervention a necessity, was the Great War. Beyond this, the crucial experience of World War I was Lenin, the
Bolsheviks and the Russian
Civil War. Lenin had shown how a dedicated minority -- the Bolsheviks --
could make a dedicated effort and achieve victory over a majority. This was
as true of the Revolution as much as it was of the Civil War when the Bolsheviks
overcame the White Army who were numerically
superior. Lenin also clearly demonstrated how institutions and human rights
might be subordinated to the needs of a single party and a single leader. So,
Lenin provided a model for a single party dictatorship, i.e. the Bolsheviks.
It was Lenin, who provide the model for Stalin as
well as Hitler and Mussolini. Totalitarian regimes -- thanks to technology and mass communications --
take over control of every facet of the individual's life. Everything is subject
to control -- the economy, politics, religion, culture, philosophy, science,
history and sport. Thought itself becomes both a form of social control as
well as a method of social control. Those of you familiar with Orwell's premonitionary novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four, should
have an easy time understanding this development. The totalitarian state was based on boundless dynamism. Totalitarian
society was a fully mobilized society, a society constantly moving toward
some goal. Which begs the question: Is democracy the means to an end or the
end itself? Paradoxically, the totalitarian state never reached its ultimate
goal. However, it gave the illusion of doing so. As soon as one goal was
reached, it was replaced by another. Such was the case in Stalin's
Russia. Stalin implemented a series of Five Year Plans in an effort to
build up the industrial might of the
However, Stalinist society did have its frightening aspects and none was
more frightening than the existence of brutal, unrestrained police terrorism.
First used against the wealthy peasants or kulaks during the 1920s and 1930s,
terror was increasingly used against party members, administrators and
ordinary people. No one would ever be above suspicion -- except Stalin, of
course. Some were victims of terror for deviating from the party line --
others were victims for no apparent reason other than Stalin's moodiness. One
Soviet recalled that in 1931, "we all trembled because there was no way
of getting out of it. Even a Communist can be caught. To avoid trouble became
an exception." As we now know, Stalin's second wife also publicly rebuked Stalin for the
destruction the terror famine was working and she committed suicide in 1932.
And on But Stalin had already begun to doubt the loyalty of the In 1936, Stalin brought his old comrades Zinoviev and Kamenev to a
staged public trial. An international press corps was invited to lend a sense
of legitimacy to the proceedings. When their trial had ended Zinoviev, Kamenev and fourteen
other old Bolsheviks either admitted involvement in the Kirov
Affair or signed confessions that had been fabricated for them. These men
had not been conspirators but they did satisfy Stalin's paranoia. As to be
expected, they were all executed. The confessional process was helped by the
black jack, continuous interrogation and the swan dive, where towelling was put between the jaws and the feet and
tightened, arching and breaking the back. But often, the confession was
voluntary because the Party demanded it. As one survivor recalled,
"serving the party was not just a goal in life but an inner need." In January 1937 a second great show trial was held in which seventeen
leading Bolsheviks declared that they had knowledge of a conspiracy between Trotsky and the
German and Japanese intelligence services by which Soviet territory was to be
transferred to The last of the public trials took place in March 1938, as twenty-one
leading Bolsheviks, including Nikolai Bukharin (1888-1938), confessed to similar charges
and were executed. Also to go was Yagoda, Stalin's hand-picked
head of the NKVD. These public show trials and the secret trials of the generals provide
only a faint idea of the extent of the Great Terror. Every member of Lenin's
Politburo except Stalin and Trotsky were either killed or committed suicide to
avoid execution. A partial list of those who ceased to exist would include: --two vice-commissars of foreign affairs Not since the days of the Inquisition had the test of ideological loyalty
been applied to so many people. And not since the days of the French
Revolution had so many died for failing the test. Arrests multiplied tenfold
in 1936 and 1937. Anything was used as an excuse for an arrest: dancing too
long with a Japanese diplomat, not clapping loudly enough or long enough
after one of Stalin's speeches, buying groceries from a former kulak. People
went to work one day and simply did not return -- they were either killed
immediately or sent to the GULAG. The NKVD employed millions of secret
informers who infiltrated every workplace. Most academics and writers came to
expect arrest, exile and prison as part of their lives. A historian could be
sent to exile for describing Joan of Arc as nervous and tense just when the
general party line wished her described as calm in the face of death. When a
linguistic theory that held that all language was derived from four sounds
was accepted as official, professors who opposed this view had their books
confiscated. By 1938 at least one million people were in prison, some 8.5
million had been arrested and sent to the GULAG and nearly 800,000 had been
executed. In fact, before the KGB was dissolved in 1991, it was revealed that
47 million Soviet citizens had died as a result of forced collectivization
and the purges. That figure, of course, represents the recorded tally. How
many more people died without being recorded is a matter of conjecture. There is no doubt in anyone's mind that Stalin wanted to destroy any
possibility of future conspiracies. So he trumped up charges against anyone
who could conceivably become a member of a regime that might make the attempt
to replace his own. He did this to maintain his power. He also did this, as
his biographers are quick to point out, because he was paranoid. Despite the
upheaval of the constant purge trials, the Soviet state did not break down.
New bureaucrats were found to replace the old. New Stalin-trained officials
filled all top-level posts and terror became one of the principal features of
the government itself. In the end, the purgers were
also purged. They were the scapegoats used by Stalin to carry out the Great
Terror. Meanwhile, Trotsky had been out of Stalin's purges baffled nearly all foreign observers. He saw threats
everywhere. Were they real? Leading Communists confessed to crimes against
the State they never committed. Some were brainwashed, others tortured. Still
others, like Nikolai Bukharin, were shot in the
head. And eventually, even Trotsky was murdered in Soviet life in the 1930s, purge trials aside, was one of
constant propaganda and indoctrination. Party members lectured to workers in
factories and peasants in the field. Newspapers, films and radio broadcast
endless socialist achievements and capitalist evil. Art, literature, film and
science were politicized -- sovietized. The
intellectual elite of the 1930s were ordered by Stalin to become
"engineers of human souls" or, as Maxim Gorky put it, the "CRAFTSMEN
OF CULTURE." Russian nationalism had to be glorified. Capitalism was
portrayed as the greatest of evils. Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great
were resurrected and depicted as the forerunners of Stalin. History had to be
rewritten. "Who controls the past, controls the future; who controls the present controls the past," wrote
Orwell. Stalin rarely appeared in public but his presence was everywhere:
portraits, statues, books, films and quotations from his idiotic books
surrounded the Soviet man and woman. Life was hard inside Soviet Russia and the standard of living declined in
the 1930s, despite Stalin's claim that the Five Year Plans had modernized the
nation. Black bread and shabby clothes came to represent the Russian masses.
There were constant shortages of food although heavily taxed vodka was always
available. Housing was poor and in short supply. Although life was hard, the Soviet people were by no means hopeless. The
average Russian saw himself heroically building the world's first socialist
society while capitalism was crumbling in the west. On the positive side, the
Soviet worker received social benefits such as old age pensions, free medical
services, free education and even day care facilities. Unemployment was
technically non-existent and there was the possibility of personal
advancement. The key to advancement was specialized skills and a technical
education. Rapid industrialization under the Five Year Plans required massive
numbers of experts, technocrats, skilled workers, engineers and managers. So
the State provided economic incentives for those people who would faithfully
serve the needs of the State. But for the unskilled, low wages were the rule.
But, the State dangled high salaries and special housing to those members of
the growing technical and managerial elite. This elite joined forces with the
"engineers of the human mind" to produce a new social class -- and
all this in a supposedly classless society. Stalin's ego mania and paranoia eventually contributed to the near
destruction of Soviet Russia. His perpetual and pathological lying and
deception, culminating in the infamous purge trials of the 1930s, took the In the 1770s, Edward Gibbon sat down to complete his
major work of historical scholarship, The Decline
and Fall of the Roman Empire. In it, he says, "The story of Despite all that has been said, popular memory reveals that of all the
totalitarian regimes of the 20th century, none was more terrifying than that
of Nazi Germany. As a product of The story of Hitler is well-known -- there is an entire Hitler industry
of book publishing these days, unmatched only by books on the JFK
assassination. Why this might be the case is rather obvious. Hitler seemed to
be evil incarnate. So too was Stalin. But then again, the west did not fight
a war, not a hot one, at least, against Stalin. We also have more information
regarding the Nazis than we do Stalin, whose regime was always clouded in
secrecy. The Nazis, on the other hand, kept good records. In his now classic
work, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William Shirer mentions that in
1945 the Hitler was born in When war
broke out in 1914, Hitler believed he had found salvation. The struggle and
discipline of war gave meaning to Hitler's life. Life was struggle and so too
was war. What better atmosphere for Hitler to further develop his nationalist
and social Darwinist sentiments. But when defeat came in 1918, Hitler's world
was shattered. The war had been his reason for living. What could have
happened? Well, for Hitler, the Jews and Marxists had stabbed Back home following the war, Hitler began to make wild speeches to small
audiences in the streets. He didn't care if many people heard him out, only
that he could articulate his message of anti-Semitism and German nationalism.
And people did listen to Hitler. And they began to take seriously what he
gesticulated on the streets. By 1921, Hitler had become the leader of a small
but growing political party. It is interesting to note that Hitler shared
very little of the interests of this party, instead, he simply took it over
because he needed a party of his own. The German
Workers' Party denounced all Jews, Marxists and liberals. They promised
national socialism. They used propaganda and theatrical rallies. They wore
special badges and uniforms and as they marched, robotlike,
through the streets of Münich, they rendered their
special salute. Most effective of all their tools was the mass rally -- a
rally made for mass man. Songs were sung, slogans were cast
about. It was a revivalist movement, or at least it had the atmosphere
of a religious revival. Hitler was a charismatic speaker and easily worked
his audiences up into a frenzy. Party membership began to grow. In 1923, Hitler launched a plot
to march on Münich, a plot that eventually failed
and sent Hitler to prison for five years. At his trial, Hitler presented his
own program to solve By 1928, the Nazi Party now had 100,000 members and Hitler had absolute
control. The Nazis were still a marginal political group but world events in
1929 and 1930 produced a new mania for the Hitler program. Unemployment stood
at 1.3 million in 1929. The following year, it had risen to 5 million while
industrial production in 1932 fell by more than 50%. In that same year, 43%
of all Germans were unemployed. Hitler now began to promise The Nazis also made their appeal to GERMAN YOUTH. Hitler
and his aides were, in general, much younger than other leading politicians.
In 1931, for instance, 40% of all Nazis were under thirty years of age, 70%
were under 40. This is quite different from what we would find in Stalinist
Russia at the same time. National recovery, rapid change and personal
advancement formed the main appeal of the Nazi Party. By 1932, Hitler had
gained the support of key people in the army and in big business. These
individuals thought they could use Hitler for their own financial interests.
So, they accepted Hitler's demand to join the government only if he became
Chancellor. Since the government was a coalition consisting of two Nazis and
nine conservatives, they reasoned that Hitler could be used and controlled.
And so, on Hitler moved quickly to establish a dictatorship. He used terror to gain
power while maintaining an air of legality throughout. He called for new
elections to Parliament and then had the Parliament building burned to
the ground. He blamed the Communists for this act thus helping to get
them out of the way and out of any possible public following. He convinced
President Hindenburg to sign an emergency act that [1] abolished the freedom
of speech and [2] abolished the freedom of assembly. On In the economic sphere, all strikes were made illegal and unions were
abolished. The members of professional organizations such as doctors,
lawyers, professors and engineers were swallowed up in Nazi-based organizations.
In the cultural sphere, the press now feel under
total state control. Blacklisting became the rule, books were burned, modern art was prohibited and anti-intellectualism became
the rule of the day. Hitler promised the German people work and bread and he delivered both. As
most shrewd politicians are capable, Hitler gave the people what they wanted
the most. He launched a massive public works program to pull What all this recovery showed was that Hitler was more than show -- he was
no Mussolini who made the trains run on time. No, Hitler had accomplished
something for Although economic recovery and increased opportunity won Hitler support,
Nazism was totally guided by two main ideas: Lebensraum and race. As War did break out in 1939 for one specific reason -- Hitler's ambitions
were without limit. The Nazi armies scored impressive victories until late in
1942. Hitler's aggression was so strong that a mighty coalition of nations
was needed to destroy his growing empire. By the summer of 1943, the tide had
turned and two years later, The Second World War marked the climax of the Age of Anxiety. Stalin's |
