NationStates Jolt Archive

I am currently immersed in a research project concerning the rise of the Soviet Empire, and its effects on American history. This is a subject that has always fascinated me, which is why I chose it.

Now, I could of course go to Google and simply skim around until I found something. However, I though I could save myself some time and have some more fun if I got the biggest group of amatuer Political Scientists/Historians/Experts on the Soviet Union that I know of to help me; that would be, of course, NationStates.

I invite everyone with something useful to say to come and post here. If at all possible, try and list some websites or books I would benefit from looking at (remember, it is a research project). This is not a debate; please do not turn it into one. However, I am not adverse to some light, intelligent discussion on the topic.

Naturally, I'm not trying to get you all to do my work. But, any help you could provide would be most appreciated. And, I'll be sure to thank you for you efforts in my report.

Come on, I know there are people out there itching to get in on this!

Well, if you want to start with a good laugh, go to the unversity library and see if they have an old copy of the Great Soviet Encyclopedia.

There you will find that EVERYTHING in the world was invented by Soviets, and every theory was discovered and validated by Soviets, and everything bad in the world was caused by fascists fighting amongst themselves, and that the Soviets always step in and straighten things out.

Unlike American history, where they might criticize themselves for abusing the Native Americans, or questioning the dropping of the atom bomb on Japan, the Great Soviet Encyclopedia spares ALL.

While you're at it, try to find the entry for Beria.

Well, I'm from the Soviet Union. What do you want to know about it?

You could find the Soviet world map. It's kind of a new perspective. Also, the story about the Soviets using pencils on the space missions always amused me.

Let's see, Lenin and Trotsky invented state sponsored terror.

Lenin and Stalin sent about 60 million people to their deaths.

Stalin encouraged Kim il Sung to start the Korean war in 1950.

Oh, and i always find wikipedia and wikisource useful for doing research. As long as you double-check what's stated there, they're both an excellent place to start.

Let's see, Lenin and Trotsky invented state sponsored terror.

Lenin and Stalin sent about 60 million people to their deaths.

Stalin encouraged Kim il Sung to start the Korean war in 1950.

Lenin was not near as bad as Stalin. Lenin killed because he thought it was for the good of the country. Stalin killed because he wanted absolute power, and he was a paranoid freak.

I can give you an annotated bibliography on Stalin, if you're interested. Its got sources, and summaries of each source.

Telegram me with your email if you're interested.

Well, the rise of the Soviet Empire can be traced to WWII. You see, before WWII, the USSR wasn't an empire, it had no colonies, and about all it had going for it was that it was big. It had been previously driven out of Eastern Europe by the Polish/Ukrainian alliance in the Polish-Bolshevik War, and as such, it had been somewhat humbled. The USSR didn't make a move on Eastern Europe again, until Hitler gave Stalin the eastern part of Poland, and he took the west. After that, the Soviets tried to take Finnland, which failed utterly.

We all know that Hitler attacked the Soviets in early 1941, with his blitzkrieg tactics taking large amounts of ground. As a result, an eventual alliance between Britain, the US and the USSR was forged out of necessity. The western allies negotiated for Europe's post-war future in good faith, and agreements were made to allow occupied territories to have free elections after a given time, but the duplicity of Stalin cursed these deals, he set up puppet governments in all occupied countries, except one, Austria, which was also partly occupied by western allied forces.

After which point these puppet governments became Soviet satellites, buffers for the Anglophobic Stalin against the western powers united by the accord known as the Warsaw Pact, which made the Soviet military supreme. We can see several instances of the maintenance of this pact with military might, such as the Prague Spring or the intervention in Lithuania at the very end of the Soviet Union's existence. (This of course stands in contrast to NATO, which allowed France to peacefully leave the alliance and then rejoin.) Instances of Soviet and Warsaw Pact forces enforcing the rules with an iron fist can be espescially seen when dealing with the border nations, where sometimes if one got caught trying to cross the border, you'd be executed.

The Soviet military relied heavily upon Eastern European railroads to transport it's troops back and forth between the East/West German border, and had a constant level of military readiness.

Another tool that the Soviet's were able to use to maintain their Eastern European empire was their nuclear arsenal, which was one of the two largest in the history of the world.

Yadda, yadda, yadda.

Look on Wikipedia, it's better.

Thank you to those who have contributed so far. I have used Wikipedia in the past, and I will most definetly use it here.

However, if anyone has some more information, specifically about the actual expansion of the Soviet Union, I would be much obliged.

Once again, thank you for your efforts. :)

Because, as you stated, this is a research paper, I recomend going to the library and checking out ten or so books, reading them, and taking notes. You'll get a lot more done than asking random cyberpeople what they know.

The only good book I know on the (kind of related to) subject is The Highest Levels by Michael Beschloss and David Talbott. It's about the end of the Cold War

There's actually an interesting story. I can't remember where I read it from (yes, it was a book), but the gist of it was thus:

In the 50s, Stalin went to China to meet Mao Tse Dong, who was the Premier of China, the other great Communist State. Stalin and Mao talked about just about every topic under the sun when the topic became nuclear weapons. The Soviets got the atomic bomb in... 1949 and were providing technical assistance to the Chinese. Mao, at some point apparently sat up and said something to the effect of "Two hundred million Chinese deaths is an acceptable price in a full out nuclear war".

Stalin was absolutely shocked (even though he culled off millions of his own people) and called back all the Soviet citizens and the USSR and China became enemies (if not in war). It was an interesting story because of how much Stalin completely turned his back on his like minded friend.

Because, as you stated, this is a research paper, I recomend going to the library and checking out ten or so books, reading them, and taking notes. You'll get a lot more done than asking random cyberpeople what they know.

The only good book I know on the (kind of related to) subject is The Highest Levels by Michael Beschloss and David Talbott. It's about the end of the Cold War
I was planning on it; I'm headed there today, as a matter of fact. But, I thought it would be more fun to get some NS people going on it. You never know what might happen...

There's actually an interesting story. I can't remember where I read it from (yes, it was a book), but the gist of it was thus:

In the 50s, Stalin went to China to meet Mao Tse Dong, who was the Premier of China, the other great Communist State. Stalin and Mao talked about just about every topic under the sun when the topic became nuclear weapons. The Soviets got the atomic bomb in... 1949 and were providing technical assistance to the Chinese. Mao, at some point apparently sat up and said something to the effect of "Two hundred million Chinese deaths is an acceptable price in a full out nuclear war".

Stalin was absolutely shocked (even though he culled off millions of his own people) and called back all the Soviet citizens and the USSR and China became enemies (if not in war). It was an interesting story because of how much Stalin completely turned his back on his like minded friend.
Where did you get that quote i have book somewhere about the USSR and it says that at one time Stalin looked at the deaths at Hirosima and Nagaski and the deaths of russsians in WW2 and said that the USSR coould surivive a fist strike from the U.S. with nukes. I wwould think Mao would be the one to turn his back.

Let's see, Lenin and Trotsky invented state sponsored terror.

Lenin and Stalin sent about 60 million people to their deaths.

Stalin encouraged Kim il Sung to start the Korean war in 1950.

That last one's not true - I studied the Korean War last semester and it seems that Stalin was actually quite reluctant, but Kim il Sung managed to convice him it would be easy to beat the South Koreans and America wouldn't get involved.

Also the first one isn't quite true, many other states did the same before him, not least revolutionary France... not sure about the 2nd one though.

Where did you get that quote i have book somewhere about the USSR and it says that at one time Stalin looked at the deaths at Hirosima and Nagaski and the deaths of russsians in WW2 and said that the USSR coould surivive a fist strike from the U.S. with nukes. I wwould think Mao would be the one to turn his back.

Also studied the Cold War in general, specifically American Foreign Policy during it, and the political histories of Eastern Europe. It is pretty certain that, for at least the first 10 years after the end of World War Two, the nuclear threat from the USA was extremely minimal, and if the USSR really wanted to go to war it could have done so without great threat of US nuclear intervention. The fact is, a totalitarian system like the Stalinist system can stand to lose a few cities, even the capital; the people of a democracy would be far more upset about losing some cities; and a nuclear weapon is not terribly effective as a military force. For example, General MacArthur wanted to use nukes in Korea, but he was forbidden to do so by Truman who knew that the world response to the use of nukes AGAIN in East Asia would be terrible; and that nuclear weapons specifically target civilians, not combatants.

I'm not sure if they're what you're looking for, but two books I remember using on this course were 'The Long Peace' by JL Gaddiss (and I'd recommend just about anything by him by the way!); and 'Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy since 1938' by Stephen Ambrose and Douglas Brinkley.

Russia really couldn't stand to lose cities as much as you might think. Moscow imparticular was the nerve center of the country. In ww2 the germans would have won hadf they taken moscow as for smaller cities im not sure but the peasnats would have revolted at the loss of say Kiev and such and there would be coups.

Well...NKVD head Beria roamed the streets at night finding young women and used them to satisfy his sadistic needs. Thought I'd share that cheerful fact. He called it the 'flower' game or 'sun' game or something strange like that.

Russia really couldn't stand to lose cities as much as you might think. Moscow imparticular was the nerve center of the country. In ww2 the germans would have won hadf they taken moscow as for smaller cities im not sure but the peasnats would have revolted at the loss of say Kiev and such and there would be coups.

Given time to prepare, awareness of the possibility of a nuclear strike, and the sheer difficulty involved in nuking Moscow at the time, I think the USSR could indeed have withstood the loss of a few cities including Moscow. Anyway this isn't meant to be a debate.

I advise you to read soviet books as well as western ones because the propaganda which has been going on both sides may hide the true story.

I advise you to read soviet books as well as western ones because the propaganda which has been going on both sides may hide the true story.

True, but I think you'll find much more propoganda on the Eastern side. There was even an academic movement in the West at one point which blamed the US for the Cold War! William Appleman Williams was one of the first of these, he wrote 'The Tragedy of American Diplomacy' in the 1950s.

You may want to compare/contrast the influence of the USSR vs Red China. It would seem that the US spent a considerable amount more time concerned by the Soviets than the Chinese. Ask yourself 'why' then expand on it. I promise not to lead you.

Other things to consider. Without the Soviet Union would there have been as much need for a large military? What would the reduced spending have done to the economy? (Don't forget how much of the economy WAS dependant on military spending!)
What about the race to space? Without the Soviets would we have cared? It not, does that mean that the Soviets are indirectly responsible for Velcro?

You may want to compare/contrast the influence of the USSR vs Red China. It would seem that the US spent a considerable amount more time concerned by the Soviets than the Chinese. Ask yourself 'why' then expand on it. I promise not to lead you.

Other things to consider. Without the Soviet Union would there have been as much need for a large military? What would the reduced spending have done to the economy? (Don't forget how much of the economy WAS dependant on military spending!)
What about the race to space? Without the Soviets would we have cared? It not, does that mean that the Soviets are indirectly responsible for Velcro?

Interesting stuff, and of course a lot of US foreign policy was centred around attempts to split the USSR and China from being friends with each other...

Given time to prepare, awareness of the possibility of a nuclear strike, and the sheer difficulty involved in nuking Moscow at the time, I think the USSR could indeed have withstood the loss of a few cities including Moscow. Anyway this isn't meant to be a debate.
Actually, this is fascinating. Please, I encourage you all to continue with this. When I say "no debate", I mean "please don't hijack my thread to debate communisim". But this is perfect.

And thank you to those of you who have supplied reading material. I will definetly have to look into them.

Please post more! While my project does not hinge on the particpation of the NationStates community, it becomes more fun when I hear things from all of you.