Stalin vs Hitler

[GrizzlyOne]

who was a worse leader

I vote Stalin, as he destroyed Communism, his nation's economy for 30-40 years, worked 20 million of his own people to death, and lasted longer, who do you think was the more fearsome?

[leanlifter1]

At 2/9/13 04:58 PM, GrizzlyOne wrote: who was a worse leader

Bush JR !

[Warforger]

At 2/9/13 04:58 PM, GrizzlyOne wrote: who was a worse leader

I vote Stalin, as he destroyed Communism, his nation's economy for 30-40 years, worked 20 million of his own people to death, and lasted longer, who do you think was the more fearsome?

Stalin didn't destroy Communism as much as he demonstrated the faults of the philosophy. His actions industrialized a huge nation where previous industrialization attempts had failed so that's why he's one of the most popular leaders in Russian history according to Russians. The problems he encountered was because the entire world wanted to bring down the Soviet Union so he had to focus on building up the nations industry in order to establish good enough security and he was right. Now he does get alot of bad credit for the famine in the Ukraine and all, but Collectivization was a universal Communist goal no matter how terrible it ended up being.

Although I'd still say Stalin, because he didn't change his domestic policy even when it was failing and forced other countries to adopt those policies (like collectivization). Hitler at least accomplished what he wanted to do for the most part.

[leanlifter1]

At 2/9/13 05:26 PM, Warforger wrote:

At 2/9/13 04:58 PM, GrizzlyOne wrote: who was a worse leader

I vote Stalin, as he destroyed Communism, his nation's economy for 30-40 years, worked 20 million of his own people to death, and lasted longer, who do you think was the more fearsome?

Stalin didn't destroy Communism as much as he demonstrated the faults of the philosophy. His actions industrialized a huge nation where previous industrialization attempts had failed so that's why he's one of the most popular leaders in Russian history according to Russians. The problems he encountered was because the entire world wanted to bring down the Soviet Union so he had to focus on building up the nations industry in order to establish good enough security and he was right. Now he does get alot of bad credit for the famine in the Ukraine and all, but Collectivization was a universal Communist goal no matter how terrible it ended up being.

Although I'd still say Stalin, because he didn't change his domestic policy even when it was failing and forced other countries to adopt those policies (like collectivization). Hitler at least accomplished what he wanted to do for the most part.

actually Stalin's regime was not Communist it was a quasi form as a monetary system was introduced which is the instant death of Communism. To say that it was Communism is to say that America is a democracy when we all know that America is a Republic.

[Ceratisa]

At 2/9/13 04:58 PM, GrizzlyOne wrote: who was a worse leader

I vote Stalin, as he destroyed Communism, his nation's economy for 30-40 years, worked 20 million of his own people to death, and lasted longer, who do you think was the more fearsome?

So wait more fearsome or worse?

[Lumber-Jax12]

Stalin.

Hitler at least held some kindness and sympathy for his own people so long as you were a good citizen of the third reich you were safe.

Now Stalin would kill you simply because you looked at him wrong, he was entirely too paranoid and purged his own military for fear of them rebelling against him. Hitler had no such fear, the people loved him, at least until the war went bad.

[Warforger]

At 2/9/13 09:34 PM, Lumber-Jax12 wrote: Stalin.

Hitler at least held some kindness and sympathy for his own people so long as you were a good citizen of the third reich you were safe.

And not Jewish, and you didn't speak out against him etc. etc. Hitler wasn't as much "loved" as much as he was tolerated.

Now Stalin would kill you simply because you looked at him wrong, he was entirely too paranoid and purged his own military for fear of them rebelling against him. Hitler had no such fear, the people loved him, at least until the war went bad.

No Stalin wasn't that stupid. Stalin purged people because he knew that people had allegiances to his political enemies such as Trotsky, Zinoviev, Bukharin etc. and he needed to get rid of those people or risk his power be challenged. He was paranoid, but his paranoia may be well justified. He was paranoid of an invasion by foreign powers so he rapidly industrialized his country, he placed factories away from Eastern Europe into the Far East because he knew that if someone were to invade they would take over the Soviet Union's industrial capacity. The guy knew his stuff when it came to strategy in politics and the military, but he didn't know much about say agriculture.

But at the end of the day what Stalin feared he would lose had he say held elections or allowed the CPSU to form factions ended up being right. Kruschev allowed factions in the party to form, they brought him down and hid him away making him spend his life in obscurity, Gorbachev let free and fair elections happen and that tore apart the Soviet Union. Stalin unlike Kruschev and Gorbachev understood what would happen had the party loosened its grip, so his paranoia may have been well placed.

[leanlifter1]

At 2/9/13 09:43 PM, Warforger wrote:

At 2/9/13 09:34 PM, Lumber-Jax12 wrote: Stalin.

Hitler at least held some kindness and sympathy for his own people so long as you were a good citizen of the third reich you were safe.

Hitler wasn't as much "loved" as much as he was tolerated.

Well that I would say that is a matter of an opinion your opinion ? I would wager that Hitler was about as loved and Hated as much as Obama or Bush was/is loved/hated. I would also wager to state that the people of Germany in that time were much the same as the people now in days are of the USA well with all the Nationalistic fervor while the head of state/regime vies for global domination to secure resources and treasures for the motherland. I think Hitler treated his Nazis allot better than Obama treats his IMO.

[Ceratisa]

At 2/9/13 09:43 PM, Warforger wrote:

At 2/9/13 09:34 PM, Lumber-Jax12 wrote: Stalin.

Hitler at least held some kindness and sympathy for his own people so long as you were a good citizen of the third reich you were safe.

And not Jewish, and you didn't speak out against him etc. etc. Hitler wasn't as much "loved" as much as he was tolerated.

Or non-Aryan right?

[Korriken]

I'd say stalin was worse because Hitler cared for at least 1 group of his own people.

EVERYONE was livestock to Stalin.

[Ericho]

I heard that Stalin actually wasn't racist like Hitler was. Hitler mostly killed people because he was racist, but with Stalin, it was probably more about the economy. Besides, Stalin helped us win World War II and his name is simply not as well associated with evil as Hitler's is. Have you seen the sheer number of Nazis on Wikiquote? There's only about a couple of people there who worked for Stalin.

[S3C]

At 2/9/13 10:09 PM, leanlifter1 wrote:

At 2/9/13 09:43 PM, Warforger wrote:

At 2/9/13 09:34 PM, Lumber-Jax12 wrote: Stalin.

Hitler at least held some kindness and sympathy for his own people so long as you were a good citizen of the third reich you were safe.

Hitler wasn't as much "loved" as much as he was tolerated.

Well that I would say that is a matter of an opinion your opinion ? I would wager that Hitler was about as loved and Hated as much as Obama or Bush was/is loved/hated. I would also wager to state that the people of Germany in that time were much the same as the people now in days are of the USA well with all the Nationalistic fervor while the head of state/regime vies for global domination to secure resources and treasures for the motherland. I think Hitler treated his Nazis allot better than Obama treats his IMO.

you've mentioned the USA and USA related goverment individuals three times in a thread not about the USA even when no one has engaged you until now. Why are you bringing up the USA?

[Warforger]

At 2/10/13 01:29 AM, Ceratisa wrote: Or non-Aryan right?

Not necessarily. Slavs for example were meant to be 2nd class citizens in this new Reich and well slaves I guess.

[Korriken]

At 2/10/13 02:36 PM, S3C wrote:

you've mentioned the USA and USA related goverment individuals three times in a thread not about the USA even when no one has engaged you until now. Why are you bringing up the USA?

he actually makes a valid point. well not so much a valid point, but more of a reference people will understand.

[Shade]

I'm going to say Hitler was worse mainly because Stalin wasn't actively trying to take over the world.

[Warforger]

At 2/11/13 07:46 AM, Shade wrote: I'm going to say Hitler was worse mainly because Stalin wasn't actively trying to take over the world.

Both Hitler and Stalin subscribed to idea's that probably would've led them to conquer the world. In fact Stalin had to dissolve the Comintern before Britain and America would've gotten closer to working with him (officially anyway, he just formed a separate organization designed for the same thing). The whole USSR was built off this idea that they would control the whole world eventually by continuous revolution.

[superdan123]

No doubt stallin he killed anyone for no particular reason if i recall

[GrizzlyOne]

actually, i change my opinion

I was talking to a friend about it, and he said that Hitler wasn't actually racist, and that he just used hatred of Jewish people so he would get elected for dictator for the power and money of the job, if that's true, that would make him an even worse person.

I've also looked back a little and without Stalin's military leadership, Germany would have eradicated most, if not all of the Jewish race of people, and the whole wold or at least most of it, would be under Germany's control, also Stalin was constantly paranoid of people trying to kill him, which was one of the main reasons why he spent so much time making Russia into a fortress rather than developing it as a country.

So, yah, I think Hitler, regardless of being racist or not, was dozens of times worse than Stalin.

[Warforger]

At 2/13/13 04:49 PM, GrizzlyOne wrote: actually, i change my opinion

I was talking to a friend about it, and he said that Hitler wasn't actually racist, and that he just used hatred of Jewish people so he would get elected for dictator for the power and money of the job, if that's true, that would make him an even worse person.

Then why did he commit Genocide? To begin with Germany was actually pretty tolerant relative to other countries particularly France and Russia (after losing the Franco-Prussian war France detained its Jewish military officials to offshore colonies and Russia would constantly massacre Jews that they even had a word for it, pogroms) so antisemitism wasn't going to be winning elections. The Nazi's themselves weren't exactly that popular, they won a mere 30% of the vote at their peak when elections were fair. That's not bad and all, but by no means were they supported by a majority. The next election they unleashed a huge wave of violence and terror through their militant wing and go a whopping 40% of the vote. This still made them the biggest party in the German Parliament but again this was through violence, the German President appointed Hitler Chancellor and later on he mysteriously died in a plane crash leading Hitler to succeed him.

I've also looked back a little and without Stalin's military leadership, Germany would have eradicated most, if not all of the Jewish race of people, and the whole wold or at least most of it, would be under Germany's control, also Stalin was constantly paranoid of people trying to kill him, which was one of the main reasons why he spent so much time making Russia into a fortress rather than developing it as a country.

No Stalin spent his time industrializing the USSR. In essence developing its economy. He knew though that the USSR was going to be invaded eventually by someone, if not Germany then Britain or Japan. It was hardly a fortress when Germany invaded.

[Brubblu]

the hitler unit

so technically hitler > stalin

[thegarbear14]

At 2/13/13 07:24 PM, Warforger wrote:

At 2/13/13 04:49 PM, GrizzlyOne wrote: actually, i change my opinion

I was talking to a friend about it, and he said that Hitler wasn't actually racist, and that he just used hatred of Jewish people so he would get elected for dictator for the power and money of the job, if that's true, that would make him an even worse person.

Then why did he commit Genocide? To begin with Germany was actually pretty tolerant relative to other countries particularly France and Russia (after losing the Franco-Prussian war France detained its Jewish military officials to offshore colonies and Russia would constantly massacre Jews that they even had a word for it, pogroms) so antisemitism wasn't going to be winning elections. The Nazi's themselves weren't exactly that popular, they won a mere 30% of the vote at their peak when elections were fair. That's not bad and all, but by no means were they supported by a majority. The next election they unleashed a huge wave of violence and terror through their militant wing and go a whopping 40% of the vote. This still made them the biggest party in the German Parliament but again this was through violence, the German President appointed Hitler Chancellor and later on he mysteriously died in a plane crash leading Hitler to succeed him.

I've also looked back a little and without Stalin's military leadership, Germany would have eradicated most, if not all of the Jewish race of people, and the whole wold or at least most of it, would be under Germany's control, also Stalin was constantly paranoid of people trying to kill him, which was one of the main reasons why he spent so much time making Russia into a fortress rather than developing it as a country.

No Stalin spent his time industrializing the USSR. In essence developing its economy. He knew though that the USSR was going to be invaded eventually by someone, if not Germany then Britain or Japan. It was hardly a fortress when Germany invaded.

Stalin spent time killing military generals before ww2 out of paranoia, and murdering those who got in the way of "progress." He set up prison camps and killed far more people then hitler.

He was a shit leader and evil. He tried to save his country by making a nonagression treaty with hitler, and when the germans ignored that millions of people were required to fight in defense of the country.... some unarmed and if they fled they were killed.

Committed genocide in Ukraine (1/4th of the population killed holodomor), murdered generals, assassinated political opponents and fucked up his military before ww2 causing more people to die because he was paranoid.

Btw his son was captured in ww2 and he refused to negotiate to rescue his own son.

They're pretty close but stalin is more evil imo.

[Lumber-Jax12]

I think, personally, when it comes down to it, the only thing these men had in common, were that they were both dictators and lacking in any morals what so ever.

As to who is more evil, I think is subjective.

I mean the comparison really is night and day.

Hitler was a dreamer, Stalin was a pragmatist.

You watch Hitler's speeches and understand german (I know a bit and in my class we watched a series on him) you can see it. His promises are all so grand, and built on the idea of some great awakening, and they way he conducts himself he got so caught up in simple things like speeches and ceremonies (of which he had far too many to count).

He was big of pageantry and spectacles, and most importantly tradition. The man lived in a fantasy world, and when he beat France he was on an ego trip, man viewed himself as God. And in this state, he was very benevolent (to his own) and trusted the war to his generals, and let subordinates run the country.

He was just content to sit back and take the credit, it's all he ever really wanted any way, though he'd stoop to despicable means to achieve it.

Stalin, as I said was paranoid, but yes for good reason, but it drove a lot of his actions. He constantly tried to take the easy way, in terms of ruling the USSR. I mean the whole pact with Germany was done so he had a buffer, if France and the UK attacked they hit Germany first not him. I wouldn't necessarily call it cowardly, but he really was Machiavellian.

If Germany never rose to power, ww2 would be between the USSR and a great Communist union against the Free World. Basically the Cold War turned hot.

Fascism rose just at the right time to curb communism, and had hitler never rose to power, Spain would turn communist and from there the pincers would move in. Hell we were so afraid of it we almost had ww2 right after ww1 with the Allied Intervention.

[Sir-S-Of-TURBO]

At 2/9/13 04:58 PM, GrizzlyOne wrote: who was a worse leader

The before and after pictures between the two would suggest that Hitler was bad for his country whereas Stalin oversaw

I vote Stalin, as he destroyed Communism, his nation's economy for 30-40 years, worked 20 million of his own people to death, and lasted longer, who do you think was the more fearsome?

Let's see, Stalin took over a rapidly weakening state of peasants and turned it into a scientific, economic and military superpower within a decade, and armed it with nuclear weapons before his death. His enemies are still afraid, communism endures and the world owes him boundless gratitude for being the architect of the state that vanquished fascism.

Hitler left his country a bombed out field of rubble split between Soviets, Americans, British and French occupiers, with German pride being controversial to this day.

[laughatyourfuneral]

At 2/9/13 09:43 PM, Warforger wrote:

::

No Stalin wasn't that stupid.

oh look, its a 12year old that discovered that you can defend communism and look like the smartest guy in the room, where'd i put my hipster gun ?

[laughatyourfuneral]

At 2/13/13 10:25 PM, Lumber-Jax12 wrote:

He was big of pageantry and spectacles, and most importantly tradition. The man lived in a fantasy world, and when he beat France he was on an ego trip, man viewed himself as God. And in this state, he was very benevolent (to his own) and trusted the war to his generals, and let subordinates run the country.

ironically enough, hitlers fiddelingwith the gengerals plans was what fucked Operation Barbarossa xD

[Warforger]

At 2/15/13 07:19 PM, laughatyourfuneral wrote:

At 2/9/13 09:43 PM, Warforger wrote:

No Stalin wasn't that stupid.

oh look, its a 12year old that discovered that you can defend communism and look like the smartest guy in the room, where'd i put my hipster gun ?

Uh what? It's a simple fact Stalin industrialized the USSR. Communism is indefensible in any regard at least in the way it ended up being. I wasn't defending it at all, if anything it's a loony ideology that's pretty much a religion in its own right. But it had its successes, rapid economic development was one of them.

That is if you didn't read my post at all or you missed what I was saying, I'm going to guess I simply know more about Communism than you do.

[laughatyourfuneral]

At 2/15/13 10:21 PM, Warforger wrote:

At 2/15/13 07:19 PM, laughatyourfuneral wrote:

At 2/9/13 09:43 PM, Warforger wrote:

No Stalin wasn't that stupid.

oh look, its a 12year old that discovered that you can defend communism and look like the smartest guy in the room, where'd i put my hipster gun ?

I'm going to guess I simply know more about Communism than you do.

its not even communism, Stalinism is nothing but red faschism.

[Warforger]

At 2/16/13 02:01 PM, laughatyourfuneral wrote: its not even communism, Stalinism is nothing but red faschism.

No Stalinism is Communism, it's pretty much descendant of Marxist-Leninism. Communism preaches a violent overthrow of the current Capitalist system by the workers and the establishment a "Dictatorship Of the Proletariat". Marx himself did not go into specifics as he spent most of his life talking about how Capitalism is going to fail and didn't talk too much in depth about what he envisioned. He laid out some instructions on how it would go in the Communist Manifesto but he didn't say talk about how the government should be organized or how it would come about. It was Lenin who did that, he alienated the more moderate Socialists by preaching violence. When the Bolsheviks at first took power they allowed for elections, they lost badly with only 20% of the vote (this however placed them 2nd behind the Socialist-Revolutionaries who attained 40% of the vote). Within days of this new Duma Lenin dissolved it and got rid of the Duma members who weren't on his side. Lenin also allowed for pure Socialism at first but this ended up annihilating the economy and he reverted to State control. According to the Bolsheviks the people were backwards and they needed to be trained systems to be reorganized and societies to be reconstructed. The whole oppressive nature was not as much due to ideology as much as it was due to pragmatic need since otherwise they would've been brought down (and indeed as Gorbachev demonstrated, they were right).

Anyway Stalin at the time knew that he couldn't do things ideologues dreamed of, because he had an entire world which sought to take down his country, he had to increase Soviet industrial capacity, he had to use more of the natural resources he had to solidify his hold on power. If he hadn't then Nazi Germany would have brought down the Soviet Union as Hitler had envisioned it would. He also had to stop trying to export so much revolution, outside of Russia Communist revolutions had proven to be complete failures until after WWII. The Hungarian Communist revolution was a disaster, economic policies were complete failures, the military was unable to hold its ground and above all the regime was extremely unpopular. The multiple revolutions in Germany weren't even as successful. He also couldn't have say allowed for the people to control their own means of production, because again that would've been even worse than what ended up happening (that happened in Chile under Allende and it was a failure).

Otherwise Stalinism was Communism, it may have been oppressive and be Red Fascism, but it was still Communism. The reason being that Fascism glorifies the state whereas Stalinism like Leninism predicted a "withering" away of the state once it had achieved its goals.

[laughatyourfuneral]

At 2/16/13 03:00 PM, Warforger wrote:

At 2/16/13 02:01 PM, laughatyourfuneral wrote: its not even communism, Stalinism is nothing but red faschism.

Otherwise Stalinism was Communism, it may have been oppressive and be Red Fascism, but it was still Communism. The reason being that Fascism glorifies the state whereas Stalinism like Leninism predicted a "withering" away of the state once it had achieved its goals.

Stalinism SAYS alot, and PREDICTS alot, but in reality the only difference between Stalinism and faschism was the private sector (or the lack of one) am i wrong ? im not sure if we are talking about practice or theory.

[Warforger]

At 2/16/13 03:39 PM, laughatyourfuneral wrote: Stalinism SAYS alot, and PREDICTS alot, but in reality the only difference between Stalinism and faschism was the private sector (or the lack of one) am i wrong ? im not sure if we are talking about practice or theory.

In government structure they were very similar. The Nazi's encouraged a centralized approach like the Soviets (this was more or less like what Germany had during and before WWI) and had some outlandish ideology, but otherwise they were mostly different mainly in the intended goal. The Soviets sought to use the state as a way of forming a new society, of correcting the bad things of the old and making everything equal then the state's ultimate demise while the Nazi's wanted to build a strong permanent state, engineering the right people etc. etc. all very similar I suppose. This is where it gets difficult to distinguish though, and why Right wingers try to throw Nazi's onto the Left (The Nazi's themselves were an attempt to fuse right wing and left wing ideologies but only ended up being mostly right wing).

Although what Stalin was doing wasn't anything new, it had been established by Lenin before, it's just Stalin centralized that structure even more into his own hands instead of the parties.