Predictive History - The Story of "Civilization", "Secret History", "Game Theory" and more - Civilization #59 - The Man of Steel

Episode Date: October 7, 2025

Civilization #59 - The Man of Steel

Good morning, so today we do Justice Stalin. And I want to make you the argument that Joseph Stalin is probably the greatest man who ever lived, for three reasons. The first reason is that Justice Stalin, he is a poor high school dropout from Georgia, which is on the fringes of the Russian Empire, and he leads an extreme fringe and despised political party called the Bolsheviks into absolute power in Russia. That's the first reason. Second reason is that among the Bolsheviks, Stalin is the least impressive. Everyone else is intellectual with many books, many speeches, many achievements

to his resume. But Stalin defeats them all and becomes the ultimate ruler of Soviet Russia. The second reason. And the third reason is during World War II, Soviet Union was up against Germany. So Stalin took a poor, divided, isolated nation, and defeated Germany and turned it into a global hegemon. So these are the three main reasons why I consider Stalin to be certainly the greatest man of the 20th century. And quite possibly, you can make the argument that he was the greatest man.

who ever lived. Okay? So let me reframe what I just said in a different way so it's clearer to you. The Bolsheviks should not have triumph, okay? If you just looked at what's going on in the early 20th century in Russia, you would not have predicted that the Soviets would have won. Stalin should not become Soviet leader and the Soviets should not have won World War II. All right? All these three things happen because Stalin willed this reality into being. He is what first Nietzsche would call the Urbarmuts. The urban mints is someone who steps out of history and warps it to his will. That is Joseph Stalin. That is the argument I will

make to you today. All right, so some basic history about Russia. As we discussed previously about Russia, Russia is very much a nation with a split personality. It is both Asian as well as European, both Christian and pagan both enlightened as well as reactionary. And because of these contradictions, it leads to many rebellions and revolutions throughout Russian history. One of the most famous being 1825,

a group of military officers called the December is, tried to overthrow the Tsar and install a military dictatorship. Ever since this event, revolutionary discussion becomes sort of like a national pastime in Russia. Dostoevsky, both Dostoevsky and Toystoy, were sympathetic to revolutions. 1853 to 1856 is a pivotal moment in Europe

in Russian history because that's when Russia loses the Crimean War to the Ottoman Empire backed by the French and the British. And this marks a limit to the expansion of Russia. So one way that Russia resolves its internal contradictions and its internal conflicts, it's by expanding eastwards

and allowing the nobles to accumulate more land, more slaves, and that mollifies a lot of these nobles. But in 1853 and 1856, after Russia loses the Korean War, Russia understands that it is backward and agricultural compared with Europe. So Alexander II, who is sara of Russia at this time, he embarked on a series of radical liberal reforms. The most major being in 1861, he emancipates the serfs. The serfs are

slaves who are tied down to the land and by liberating them he hopes to further industrialize Russia as well as create a more vibrant market economy, which is what you need to be a modern nation state. But as you can imagine, this creates a lot of pushback from the nobles who lose a lot of wealth and property because of these reforms. A fun fact about Alexander II was he was very good friends with Abraham Lincoln.

In fact, Alexander II was a huge admirer of the American Republic, so much so that when in 1861 the American Civil War started, Sar, Alexander II, was worried that the French and the British were intervened on behalf of the Confederacy. The reason why is that, first of all, the American Confederacy provides a lot of cotton to the British and the French for their textile industry, as well as well the French and the British see America as a growing threat. So by supporting the Confederacy, they believe that they can divide and weaken America. So in response, Axonir 2nd publicly stated that if the French and the British ever declare an alliance with the Confederacy, then Russia would intervene on behalf of the Union.

And to show that he was serious, he sent warships to New York and San Francisco to show that Russia would defend America. So this is forgotten, but this is a really fun fact about Russian history, that Axelman II was a huge admirer of Abraham Lincoln. They wrote letters to each other, and he did much to save the American Union in a time of crisis. Now, in 1881, his liberal reform stopped when he was assassinated. This was a day, he was assassinated on the day that he returned from a meeting where basically he was going to promote constitutional monarchy in Russia.

And then he was assassinated by a terrorist group called the People's Will. Now, there's a very good reason why the People's Will assassinate Alexander II. At this time in Russian history, there were a lot of revolutionaries who believed that to liberate Russia, you need to liberate the mindset of the peasants. The problem is the mindset love the Tsar. And so the intellectuals felt that the idea of the Tsar enslave the peasants from seeking enlightenment and free. and therefore send a signal to liberate the peasantry, you need to kill the star in an act of violence.

And that's what happened in 1881. So this is the people's will. And what you will see is that they're very small people. There's at most 2,000. And they were founded right before they assassinated, accident, 1879. And after the assassination, there were all the major members were quickly arrested by the secret police and executed and they confess to their crimes.

That's why we know so much about them. But this creates a problem. The problem is this. If the secret police were so effective in capturing all the assassins right after the assassination, why weren't they effective in stopping the assassination? That's a curious question. In fact, if you think about some more, you have some other problems. For example, the people's will, it is a terrorist organization, but where do they get the funding?

All right? This is always a problem when you are an underground organization. What do you get your financing from? Another problem is, if these are religious fanatics, they really believe that their mission is to liberate the peasantry. They're probably very opinionated, and it's probably very hard to organize them into a hierarchy. All right? So these are two major problems that the people's will. and other terrorist organizations throughout Russian history will face, including the Bolsheviks.

Now, to answer both questions, let's do a thought experiment. Let's just say you're a secret police, okay, and you're tasked with monitoring and capturing these terrorists. Now, is it to your benefit to capture them, or is it to your benefit to assist them? All right? Now this sounds like a silly question, but let's think about some, let's think about deeply. All right, so why don't you want to support political extremists? Well, there's some very good reasons. It's risky, it's violent, it's unethical, it doesn't really help anyone, okay?

So we should not help political extremists. But if you're a secret police and you ask yourself, what are the benefits of helping them? It turns out there's quite a lot. All right? Let's go over them. Number one, by helping extremists, you defame the entire political opposition. You make all the people who oppose the Tsar look bad because look these are fanatical, they're violent, okay? That's one really good reason why you want to support extremists.

Second is you want to foment internal dissent among political opponents. So the classic example is the Marxist group at this time in history are the Mensheviks. And they are intellectuals and they believe heavily in Marx. The Bolsheviks are led by Lenin and they are an extreme group. The main conflict is the Manchavik's believe that for the revolution to happen, you have to follow Marxist's prescription, which is you go from an autocracy to a Borussia's democracy, because that is what's going to help Russia industrialize. Once industrialization happens, capitalism will automatically make the politariat class conscious. And when they're class conscious, they will unite and overthrow the Borussia. throw the bourgeois democracy to create the dictatorship of the politeness.

That is a classical Marx theory of evolution towards a communist society. Lenin believe, no, we don't need this, okay? Because the Menshevik worldview is we have to be patient, we have to wait for Russia to industrialize. Right now, the industrial workers in Russia is about 3% of the population. The passenger is 80%. And Lenin's argument is, we don't have to be. wait for the politic become 80% of the population, what we can do is create a

vanguard party and lead the peasants into communist paradise. And the Manchaviks say when you do that, all you're doing is creating a peasant revolution which will lead to a dictatorship of the peasantry. You'll be no different from the Tsar. All right so eventually Lenin and the Bolsheviks will split apart from the Manchaviks, And it would be to the benefit of the secret police to support the Bolsheviks, right? And we'll see evidence for this later on. By supporting political extremism, you also induce political violence just to justify more state control, right? You collect intelligence by implying spies within these extremist groups.

You can also arrest extremists to score political points from the bureaucracy, right? Because the secret police is getting paid a lot of money. money, how do they justify their salaries? Well, they arrest assurances that they support, okay? Also, you can use these extremists to assassinate political enemies. All right, so you make the argument that within the secret police, there's a faction of nobles who were outraged at the reforms of Alexander II, especially the thought of creating a constitutional monarchy, which would limit the powers of the aristocracy, and therefore they have the

people's will kill accident in a second. You also have false flag operations where you have extremists on behalf of your enemy create terrorist events within the country which will justify a war against an enemy, okay? And also like the best reason of course is because it's fun and exciting. All right? The people in the civil police, they're all psychopaths and they enjoy this process. Okay, in fact you can make the argument that one of the main function of the secret police is to create problems or society so that they can justify their power. All right? So again, this sounds pretty extreme to you, but let's look at some evidence that this is, that this was a case in Russia in the late 19th century. All right, so this is Vladimir Lenin, and he was a revolutionary who had to escape to Europe in order to not be captured by the secret police, okay?

And again, he was a fanatic. So let's read from Wikipedia about his time in London. When his factionalism began to alienate increasing numbers of Bolsheviks, including his former close supporters, okay? So this guy was an asshole, he was a fanatic, he was extreme, he was violent, knowing him like this guy. And normally what would happen is he becomes ostracized, he becomes alienated, he is thrown aside and he is left to write his own books, okay? Which would happen in a normal course of events.

But at this time in history, the secret police intervene. The Okrana, which is the Russian imperial secret police, exploited his factional attitude by sending a spy, Roman Mlanskovsky, to act as a vocal Lenin supporter within the party. Various Bolshev's expressed their suspicions about Malavski to Lenin, although it's unclear if the latter was aware of the spy's duplicity.

It is possible that he used Malavski to feed false information to the Okraana. Do you understand? The secret police was an active supporter of Vladimir Lenin. Now, the Wikipedia tells us that, okay, well, the Okraina sent a spy to support Lenin. We can also guess that the secret police were also saying money to Lenin, which is very important, right, because now Lenin can support his faction within the larger socialist movement.

In fact, they probably have more money than the other groups. So the secret police is incubating the Bolsheviks. All right. Let's use another example. Have you ever asked yourself where Islamic extremists comes from? So when we did the Islamic Golden Age, what I said, and what I still believe today is, Islamist, the Islamic Golden Age was a period of openness and tolerance. So what changed?

Well, after World War II, the Americans and the British start to sponsor Islamic extremism. This is pretty well known historically. Why? There are three main reasons why. The first reason is, at this time in history, the Soviet Union and the American was funding a Cold War. There were no Islamic minorities within America, but guess what?

There are lots and lots of Islamic minorities within the Soviet Union. In fact, it was maybe like a third of the population. That's a lot. And they hated the communists because the communists were atheists, and they wanted to celebrate their religion. So by sponsoring Islamic extremism, you are destabilizing the Soviet Union.

That's the first really good reason. Second reason is, at this time, the Middle East is growing in importance because of its oil resource, right? While this time in history, the 50s, 60, 70s, nationalism, panorism, and socialism are the major ideologies of these nations at this time. And these are all threats to American, British commercial interests within the Middle East, right?

Because all these ideologies are saying, like, we shouldn't give our oil for free to America and Britain. We should protect our resource. So by supporting Islamic extremism, you're undermining these ideologies, which is exactly what happened in Iran. And the last reason is the Americans and the British heavily support the Saudi regime, which is extremely unpopular. So a long time ago, the Saudis made a pact with Wahhabism, which is a fanatical ideology within Islam. And so by supporting Islamic extremism, you support Wahhabism, which supports the Saudi regime. Okay?

So I want you guys to remember this. The secret police throughout history have been supporting political extremists in order to achieve short-term political objectives. All right, let's continue. So after the death of Alexander II, his son, Alexander III, comes into power, and he is a reactionary. But he dies fairly young, which leaves his son, Nicholas II, to take the throne. And Nicholas II, he's very young and he's very inexperienced. He's a nice guy, he loves his family, but he's not really equipped to lead Russia in a time of tremendous political and social tumult.

In 1904, the Russians lose a war against the Japanese. And at this time, not only did they lose the war, but there's famine going on throughout Russia. So this is a time of tremendous discontent and revolution in Russia, which leads to something called a Bloody Sunday in 1905 where worker protesters were killed by soldiers. All right. Also at this time what's happening is that the world family they start to ally themselves with a priest named Gregory Rasputin. If he looks scary it's because this is a very scary man. He styles himself as a mystic and the world family,

They have exactly one here to the throne. And his name is Alexei, the young son. The problem of that Alexi is he has something called hemophilia, which means that if he bleeds, he could die. And Rasputant was very good at calming down Alexi. So Rasputant became a member of the world family, essentially. But the Russian people hated Rasputant because there was rumors that he was like a sex maniac. he was organizing all these satanic rituals.

Also, there was a very popular rumor that the Rasputin was sleeping with Alexandra, okay? The Tsarina. And eventually, the nobles were organized and assassinate Rasputin. But not before, this entire fear does tremendous damage to the reputation and prestige of the royal family.

World War I breaks out, and even though Rasputin, pleaded with the Tsar not to intervene. The Tsar did declare war against Germany. And now Russia is up against Germany, the Austrian-Hungary Empire, as well as the Ottoman Empire. And this war is devastating for Russia. And in 1917, there's a huge, spontaneous protest

against the Tsar. And at this point, his generals tell him he should abdicate, which what he does. And so now the parliament called the Duma becomes the provisional government and they clear a republic. All right. But they're still at war with Germany. So what Germany does is it organizes Lenin to be smuggled back into Russia so that he can foment discontent and rebellion and revolution. So Stalin, sorry, so Lenin was not just a useful idiot to the Russian secret police, but he was also a useful idiot to the Germans who wanted to knock Russia out of the war.

When Lenin returned to Russia, he tried to organize a rebellion against provisional government because professional government still wanted to stay in the war and Len wanted to take Russia out of the war. Lenin called for three things, okay? Land, peace, and bread. And this was very popular among the war. the people. Eventually, a professional government tried to arrest Lenin. He escaped, but then what happened was the military tried to overflow the government, and now the professional government

under Karenski now requires Lenin to help out and defend the Republic against the military. And Lenin is not in any way a politician. He's a politician. He's a a theoretician, okay? And he's fanatical. So let's read a passage from his book, State of Revolution, which he wrote at the time of 1917 to understand his thinking. He says, the petty bourgeoisie democrats, he's talking about the professional government. Though Shem socialist, the Mensovics, who replaced the class struggle by dreams of class harmony, even pictured a socialist transformation in a dreamy fashion, not as the overflow of the rule of exploiting class, but as the peaceful submission of the minority to the majority, which has become

aware of its aim. So Lenin has absolutely contempt for all of his enemies, a violent visual contempt. All right, so in 1917 October, Lenin orders accrued a ta against provisional government. And this will eventually lead to something called the Russian Civil War. And at this time in history, the Bolsheviks are controlling only some small cities, primarily Petrograd, but their enemies called the whites, okay? the whites are former remnants of the Russian Empire, the aristocrats, the military. They control most of Russia, and it seems like they're making a huge advance against the Bolsheviks.

But there are three things that will conspire to ensure the Bolsheviks win. The first thing is the whites don't actually have a policy for reform. They don't have, they want things to stay the way they are. And peasants are hungry, they're landless, they want peace. So they lose the support of the peasants. That's the first problem. Second thing is the Bolsheviks will enact a reign of terror. They have the secret police called the Cheka, which goes around and kills all enemies of the revolution.

So they are fanatically instilling fear and terror. among the Russian people. The last reason, the most important reason, is Leon Trotsky. Leon Trotsky organizes the Red Army. And Leon Trotsky is an incredible orator, as well as organizer. He is absolutely ruthless.

He organizes something called blocking divisions. So the idea is, when you go into battle, you're supposed to run ahead. If you change your mind and you run back, someone's a back called a blocker will shoot you to death, okay? So it is brutal, but it works very effectively. Also, Leon Trotsky reorganizes the Red Army into a meritocracy,

so he doesn't care about your political affiliation, he doesn't care whether or not you support the Bolsheviks. You're capable, you'll be promoted within the Red Army. So he turns the Red Army into a very effective fighting force. And this was what allows the Bolsheviks to eventually triumph. So in many ways, the French Revolution, and the Russian Revolution are very similar. So let's go over the similarities.

In both you have a poet, Richard Russo said freedom is general will. Mark said freedom is class and this. Then you have a prophet who leads everyone into a promised land through his peer faith as well as finance. So in the French Revolution you had Rose Pier who said, reasonable set us free. Within the Russian Revolution, you have Lenin who's

you have Lenin who said violence will set us free. And the last thing, which we'll focus on in this class, is then you have a Messiah figure who comes and he conquers the world to ensure the revolution succeeds. In the first one, you had Napoleon, right, who said, I'm the expanding empire, okay? So his theory to ensure the revolution will survive is to expand outwards and conquer Europe, which is what he did.

But then you have Stalin, who is, I'm the continuous revolution. So the way that he maintains the stability and the vitality of the revolution is, like he constantly purging his enemies, okay? Very much along the lines of the culture revolution in China. All right, so let's look at the similarity between Lenin and Ove's peer, okay? Both are from the lower nobility. They're both poets in many ways, and their families faced downward mobility. So Lenin's father was an educator and member of the low nobility,

but Lenin's father died when he was young, okay? So Lenin's brother, who Lenin really admired, he was arrested while he was at university for plotting against the empire. And he was executed, okay? But both are idealists. They sought to create justice in a world of injustice. Now, the similarities between Napoleon and Stalin

also really interesting. They're both for marginalized minorities. Napoleon was Corsican, Stalin was Georgian, and they felt persecution inadequacy. And so they became obsessed about obtaining power to escape their insecurities. So the similarities between these characters are very, very enlightening for us. All right.

So now we focus on Stalin. The background of Stalin is this. His father owned a small shoe factory when Simon was born. But then the father lost the factory and became an abusive alcoholic. Stalin was born poor. He did well in school. He had a very loving Christian mother. do on school, but in high school he came in conduct with Marxism and then he dropped out.

So the fact that Stalin was a young man who suffered racial discrimination, governmental mobility, and an alcoholic father made him the perfect recruit for three types of organizations, criminal networks, revolutionaries, and a secret police. And guess what, guys? He was part of all three networks. And it was a nexus of these three networks within Georgia. Okay? All right, so this is Stalin and he came from a very poor family and eventually he will rise to the very top.

All right, so some Wikipedia background about Stalin, okay? So we won't read all of it, but I want to put out some certain sentences. Let's look at this sentence. He goes to Patuma and there his military rhetoric proved divisive amongst. among the city's Marxists, some of whom suspected he was an agent provolkata. He was a spot. His mission was to promote violence and organization within locality, so the secret police can swoop in and arrest everyone.

And this makes a lot more sense than a poor man discovers Marxism and then it's totally committed to the cause. It makes more sense that he was recruited as a Spied the secret police in order to so discontent and violence among the Marxists. Okay? Let's continue. Scylund began working at the Rolfsau Refining Storehouse where he co-organized two worker strikes. After the strike, leaders were arrested.

Really important. The moment he organized the strikes, all these leaders were arrested. He co-organized a mass administration which led to the storming of the prison. Ceylon was arrested in April 1902 and sentenced to three years exile in Siberia, arriving in November 1903. in November 1903 after one failed attempt silent escape from his exile in January 1904 all right so throughout this time he is getting arrested by the secret police but for the reason he escapes only after like a month all right and the benefit of being arrested by secret police is what

he has credentials now right you can only be a revolutionary if you are if you've been sent to Siberia by the secret police all right so he so this is all very suspicious okay let's continue In 925, government troops massacre protests. Salon was in Baku in February when ethnic violence broke out between Armenians and Azeris, and he formed Bolshevik battle squads, which he used to keep the cities warring ethnic factions apart. So of all the Bolsheviks, okay,

because at this point in history, Lenin, Trotsky, they're basically writing books. Stalin's the one who's out there organizing people, committing violence, creating organizations. In fact, he's the one funding, funding. the Bolsheviks. Why? Because he assembles his gang, criminal network, which attack black hundreds and raised money through racketeering, counterfeiting, robberies, and kidnapping children of wealthy figures for ransom. He's the main financier of a Bolshevik party. Without

him, there be no Bolsheviks. And I would make the argument to you that he's doing this on behalf of the secret police. Right? Because why would you do this? If you're stealing money, why not keep it for yourself and spread it to your friends and bribe the police why are you taking all this money and giving it to lenin right all right so ultimately Stalin will triumph why because lennon and trotsky okay his two main competitors were ego maniacs who wanted to be proved right they're intellectuals they're theorists Stalin just wants power for himself okay so vladimir lenin He is the one pushing for the revolution. He's the theorist.

And as the Soviets developed power, by the 1920s, he's starting to have strokes. He's always been in bad health, but now he's really in bad health. And so now he has to figure out who will succeed him. And ultimately he decides the best person to succeed him is Leon Trotsky. Leon Trotsky, he's a hero of the revolution. He like Lenin both believe in international movement of communism. They both believe that if communism is to survive in the Soviet Union, they have to spread it to Europe.

And they both believe very strongly that with one push, because of World War I, all of Europe will fall to communism, okay? Stalin disagrees with them, though. Sallin believes in maintaining communism within the boundaries of the Soviet Union, and being a nationalist. Ultimately, it is Stalin who will triumph over Vian Trotsky and Vatran, Lenin, and create this code of personality in the Soviet Union.

Most people will assume that Stalin and Lenin were best friends, because really, while Stalin, there would be no Lenin. But you also make the argument about Lenin, there'd be no Stalin, okay? So they were co-dependent on each other. So it was always assumed that they were best friends. But before his death, okay, Lenin rolled a secret memo to the party leaders and he said this Comrade Stalin who's now

general secretary so he's head of the organization department of the Commerce Party which is a very important position having become secretary general has unlimited authority conjured in his hands and I'm not sure whether he will always be capable of using authority with sufficient caution silent is two cores and this defect what Len is saying is this if you let Stalin continue to amass power he would become a dictator Lenin is head of the head of the Bolshek but he's not dictator there's a committee rule okay so at this point in history you would think that okay Lenin is

now leader and he's gonna make it his mission to ensure Stalin is removed from the general secretary position and Stalin is removed as a possible contender for power within this of union but then something happens which is Lenin has a stroke convulsions and he dies. We will never know what really happen. But if you talk to medical practitioners who've looked at this case, they say, look, these convulsions

are more indicative of poisoning than they are of a stroke. So there's certain people, and this is not a mainstream view, there's certain people who believe that Stalin poisoned Lenin because Lenin was about to remove Salon from his position of power.

Now, you're like, okay, That makes no sense. But at this time in history, there are three individuals that are in the way of Stalin amassing complete power. So Lenin we talked about. But then there's a man named Zakov Swarvlov, and he was Lenin's right-hand man. In fact, he was the general secretary of the Bolsheviks

before Stalin. He was extremely competent. And then, at a very young age, only his 30s, he dies of the first. an illness. That's really convenient for Stalin because now Stalin can become head of the organized department of the Bolshevik party and install all his cronies into position of power. That's really convenient for Stalin. But guess what? 1926, head of the Czechos, Felix Zavinsky, okay, he has the secret police. He dies as well under mysterious circumstances. He has a heart

attack and he's also really young and remember the secret police is where the center of power in government is and after he dies silent is now able to implant his cronies his lawyers subordinates into the secret police okay so all this is like really convenient for Stalin even though we have no evidence that he in fact poised all three it's just really convenient for him all right this is really weird how this really worked out for him We'll never know why, okay? But you have to be suspicious. Either he's the luckiest man ever in the world,

or he basically just killed everyone in order to amass power. And in fact, he continues this. From 1936 to 1938, there's something called the Great Purge, which is continued revolution. At this point in history, what someone will do is kill at least one million party members. He destroys the old guard. And it does so by having the secret police purchase the army in the proxies and then secret units within the secret police purge those guys and then new units purge those secret units, okay, and so on. All right.

There are the show trials where the Bolshevik leaders, the old guard, they confess to being traitors to the regime. Okay, they confess to being secret capitalist. All right. So let's look at the perch of the Red Army. This is from Wikipedia. The parts of the Red Army and military and maritime fleet removed three or five marshals, 13 and 15 army commanders,

eight of nine admirals, 50 or 57 Army Corps commanders, 154-186 division commanders. So what he did was, he completely wiped out the entire leadership of the Soviet military. And actually, this piece of fact is what sort of convinced a German student invade

in 1941, because they're like, well, you know, Selling killed off all the experienced officers. And so let's attack them because they won't know what to do. Okay? But in fact, you could make the argument, and I think a lot of people have made the argument that this will ultimately be beneficial

to the war effort in World War II. Why? Because you've removed all the dead weight. You've removed the conservative generals who are not experienced with innovative warfare. All right? So by doing this, what's the way? what the selling did was make the Soviet military more innovative and more open and more flexible okay and so I know this is hard idea to understand let's just do

a thought experiment to understand this idea let's say there's a hundred of you students and you're shipped off to a desert island and you're forced to survive by yourself well I mean maybe in the beginning you would struggle right you fight but eventually I think over a couple weeks you would learn to get along and you would learn to survive on this desert island okay that's that's what I think happen I don't know but I think I hope that's what happens now let's let's let's let's imagine 20 teachers go with you guys I'm pretty sure you're worse off okay because those 20 teachers would be more intent on maintaining a hierarchy all

things than actually solving a problem and so you can make the argument that by approaching the army in the late 30s Stalin made the Red Army more innovative and better prepared the German invasion in 1941 all right now Now, the show trials, basically all the leading Bolsheviks, anyone who could have possibly challenged Stalin, were arrested and they confessed to being criminals, to being traitors, to being spies. All right? And all of them were of course innocent. These are loyal Bolsheviks who sacrificed their entire lives, their families in order to

ensure the revolution would succeed. So why did they confess? Well, this is Alfred Kessler, and he wrote a book called Darkness at Noon, which is really one the best books ever written, okay? Just brilliant. And in it, he profiles an old bullshit leader. And he tries to go into the mind of this person as he is about to be executed. And he's remembering his life where for the revolution, he killed everyone, basically. He sacrificed everyone. He betrayed everyone. He is guilty as sin. But the moment that he's about to execute it, he confesses to everything. And the argument here is if you spend your entire life doing bad things, you're not going to admit this is all for nothing, right?

He's going to do everything possible to save the revolution. If that meant killing himself in order to save the revolution, he would do so. So think of the original sin, right? The original sin of the revolution is all this violence committed against civilians. Well, now this Bolshevik, he is like Jesus, who is sacrificed. he will cleanse the people of their sins and allow for the revolution to continue. All right? So what's brilliant about this is Stalin put these people on trial and he knew that ultimately they would confess.

And this would cement his power. All right. So let's summarize what we've discussed. And think about how Stalin wanted all. Okay. So there are five reasons. Okay, the first reason is from an early age, he won't have a choice of powerful patrons. criminal, like mafia bosses, secret police heads, revolutionaries, right?

And then he was absolutely loyal to them until it was no longer expedient. What's amazing about Stalin is he made everyone believe that he was loyal to them personally and absolutely, okay? That was his absolute power. Second is, he always was able to identify capable of surveillance and he promoted them selflessly, okay? Okay, so that's really important. Third reason is he understands silence can be more powerful than great speech-making. Do not become too wedded to ideas and positions and let others despise you. So Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky were tremendous orators.

They were brilliant. The problem though is that by making these speeches, it increases their hubris, and increases their ego, and it makes it more wedded to ideas. Silent refused to give speeches. So you can never understand, you can never know how Southern thought about things. And that was his secret weapon. Also, no one took him seriously. At this point in history, everyone thought Stalin was an intellectual lightweight.

Because at this point, the Bolsheviks fought that whoever had the best theories were the most righteous leaders. And Stalin didn't have any ideas of his own. Sujik retreats are most effective in times of internal conflict. So disappearing, hiding, offends no one and offers no risk. So another way of saying this is, the secret police always always arrested Stalin at a time of tremendous conflict within the socialist movement, okay? So the split between Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks, Stalin wasn't there, he was arrested, okay? So that's really convenient for Stalin. And then last is let your enemies destroy themselves,

except who they are and help them become their worst selves, okay? So Trotsky lost out because Trotsky was a tremendous egomaniac. He pissed everyone off, and Sallin encouraged that. So just let your enemies destroy themselves. And this is what he will do with Hitler as well. And that's how he won World War II. Okay? All right. So let's take a short break and we'll come back and do World War II.

So there's no way we can understand how Stalin was able to defeat the Bolshevik leadership. And so very simple formulation. Lenin Trotsky were all priests. But Stalin was a spy. And so let's look at the differences. Priests have favor and conviction. You're trying to bring God to the world. Whereas a spy has multiple personalities.

So Stalin could be a different person to different people. In fact, no one really thought Stalin was a serious threat. And no one really took Stalin seriously. Second is the priest has something called analytical intelligence. That's why they're able to write books. That's why they're able to give great speeches. A spy has emotional intelligence. A spy is able to make you trust him.

The last is, priests are concerned with the pursuit of truth in God. Spies only one power. So if you think about this way, if you look at this formulation, then the Bolsheviks didn't even have a chance against Stalin. Alright. So now let's go on to World War II. World War II. And there's tremendous debate as to what happened in World War II.

It was a calicicrysanic struggle between the Soviet Union and the Germans. Ten of millions people died in this war. It was a tragedy. So there's always going to be debate as to what happened. Why did the Germans lose? All right, so let me give you my interpretation. Basically what happened was this. The Germans had a certain doctrine of war, a certain belief system going into the war.

And they executed this belief system, this plan, perfectly in a blitzkrieg. But when the doctrine of war failed, they couldn't adapt. So the German doctrine of war is called blitzkrag. And the idea of blitzkrague is you very quickly cut off the head and the body collapses. You basically go in and you destroy the command and control center. of the military. That's what happened throughout Europe in the late 30s, right? That's what happened to France. And only about a few weeks, Germany was able to cut off the command center or the France military, and it caused the France military to collapse. But the problem of the Soviet Union is that it's huge.

And there's really no command control center. So what was happening was, even the Germans were destroying the Soviets, They were running around Russia, pointlessly, for many, many months. They really didn't have a plan because the plan was always to destroy the head of the snake. But if you can't find the head, you're going to want around inlessly. The Soviets are really good at fighting a war of tuition, right? Something called a Scorge Earth policy, which is how they defeated Charles II of Sweden as well as Napoleon of France before. And that's how they also defeated the Germans.

The Germans are known for their organizational supremacy, okay? But they're not known for the battle for flexibility. The Soviets, even though they were losing many battles in the beginning of the war, they eventually adapted themselves to German warfare, and eventually they were able to overwhelm the Germans. And I think a lot of this flexibility had to do with the fact that they lost a lot of their major leadership in the purges. So now we're saying this is, the difference between the Germans and the Russians is,

Hitler did not purge his military. Salon did purchase military and that's why the Soviets were much more innovative than the Germans in the war Also the Germans were fighting for something called Libensrom. Limensrom means living space in German. It's basically like if we are to survive as a German people as a German nation we need more resources we need more land and so we need Ukraine okay for the especially for the oil but the Soviets were running for their motherland, mother Russia so they were much more motivated to fight than the Germans Now, it was, so looking at this map, you'll see two things, okay? The first thing is the Germans were really spread out throughout the front.

That allows for encirclement, okay? That allows for the Soviets to attack them from different angles and encirclement. That's the first thing. Second thing is, you will also notice that the Germans didn't get that far in this war. They at most got to the outskirts of the war. Moscow but not beyond and the Soviet Union if just look at a map it is huge okay all right so this was one of the deadest war in human history the Germans sent in almost four million personnel and they overwhelm the Soviets in the

beginning but it was not enough okay four million men was not enough to call the Soviet Union you need 40 million and the German didn't have that. All right, so what's a big deal? So the Soviets had unlimited resources they defeated Germans. This is a big deal because let's go back to year in 1935. In year 1935, if we were to have this class and we were to discuss what will happen 10 years from now, we could probably guess that the Soviet Union would collapse. Why? Because Stalin was approaching all the major leadership of the Soviet Union creating a lot of discontent, a lot of civil conflict.

As well, if you look at a map of the world in 1935, most of the world was capitalist. Japan, which controlled the East, was capitalist. Then you had the Germans, the Nazis rising. You have the English. Then you have the Americans. And all four of these nations were under threat from communism.

They were common subversive in all these countries, and they were considered a major threat. In fact, in 1930s, there's a real threat And in America, there'd be a communist rebellion. In Germany, there's a failed communist revolution. In France, in England, the communists were everywhere. So these four nations, Japan, the Americans, the English, the Germans, they all see communism

as a major threat to them. So we could imagine that they would unite against Soviet Union at some point to destroy communism once and for all. That's the first thing. Second thing is that at this point in history, race science is very popular. Eugenics is very popular. And guess what? The Americans, the British, and the Germans all saw themselves as one people, the Nordic people, the Aryan race.

In fact, here there was a tremendous admirer of the English people. He saw the English as brave, as brilliant, as the master race. So you could make the argument that the Nordic people would eventually unite together to destroy the Slavs, which was a major threat to the in Europe. And the third major reason is, at this time, as Germany is industrializing, the Americans are helping

Hitler industrialized. This is from Chachyb-T. American industrialists invested heavily in Nazi Germany particularly before and during World War II. Okay? This is important. Major companies like General Motors, IT&T, Eastman Kodak,

Senate Oil, and others had substantial assets and investment in German subsidiary. So these American companies, the major American companies of the time, was helping Hitler to industrialize its war machine. All right? So given all this, you could imagine that America would eventually come to support Germany in a conflict with the Soviet Union. So at this point in history, the Soviet Union, it was unlikely the Soviet Union would survive, okay? But then in 1941, Hitler launches Operation Barbarossa. Now this is one of the greatest mysteries among historians.

The mystery is this. Hitler had to organize four million soldiers, a multinational force, to invade the Soviet Union. Spies, the Americans, the British, Toast Island, listen. Hitler's going to invade you. Stalin refused to believe them. Stalin said, listen, first of all, I have a non-aggression pact with Hitler. We're friends! He's not going to invade me. Number one. Number two is Hitler is being blockaded by the British. We, the Soviet Union are providing all these resources, oil, food, to the Germans. Why would they invade us? It's suicidal.

And third of all, Germany doesn't have the resources to invade us. So Stalin refused to believe that the Germans would invade. He believed it was a British and a first British plot to undermine the friendship between Germany and the Soviet Union. Also, there were some German soldiers who were sympathizers to communism. They would run away and go to the Soviets and tell them, listen, I have all the secret plans of this invasion called Operation Barbarossa.

They're going to come. The Germans are coming. Be ready. And what the Soviets do? They shot them to death for being spies. Okay? So the Germans invade and the Soviets aren't prepared. But not only that, but Stalin seems to be purposefully

sabotaging the Soviet war effort. As the Germans are advancing, the Soviets should push back, okay? But Stalin orders the army should stay where they are. So they get encircled by the Germans. And at this point, the Germans have more prisoners of war than they could possibly imagine. Millons and millions of Soviets captured in the first months of the war. It is a complete disaster for the Soviet Union. And so everyone's like Stalin has gone out of his mind.

First of all, why wasn't he ready for Hitler's invasion? He refused to believe that Hitler would invade. Second of all, why didn't he give his generals authority to run the war in the way that should have been run? Why did Stalin interfere and destroy the Soviet army? the first few months okay these are the two major mysteries of operation barrosa okay i know this going to be controversial okay but i'm going to make you this argument Stalin purposely did both things silent purposely let hither invade and Stalin purposely let millions of soldiers be captured by the nazis and you're like

that's insane well guess what happens At this point, because the Nazis are destroying the Soviet Union, the Americans come in on behalf of the Soviet Union. Remember, at this point in history, the Americans think they're going to go to war against Soviet Union. The Americans want to ally with Germany. But because the Germans are about to destroy the Soviet Union, the Americans can't let this happen. If Germany destroyed Soviet Union, the German science, technology, and organization would have access to Soviet manpower, oil and food. Germany would be invincible.

So the Americans step in. But look, let's look at what the American contribution to the war is. In total of US deliveries to US or our food land amounts to $11 billion, equivalent to $150 billion, over 400,000 jeeps and trucks, 12,000 armored vehicles, thousand tanks, 14,000 aircraft, 1.75 million tons of food. The Americans basically industrialized,

the Soviet Union, giving the Soviet Union unlimited resources, unlimited technology. Why? Because they're afraid of a German conquest. All right. From Wikipedia, roughly 17.5 million tons of military equipment, vehicles, industrial supplies, and food were shipped from the Western Hemisphere to the USSR. So Americans gave about 17.5 million tons of equipment to the British. Sorry, to the Russians. But guess what?

the Americans enter the war, they use a total of 22 million tons. That's incredible. The American army used the same amount of supplies that they gave to the Soviets. That's incredible to think about. Yeah, there are millions of soldiers captured by the Germans, okay? And it's a travesty what happens to them because most of them will starve to death. They start to death not because the Nazis are barbarians, but because the Nazis had a doctrine of war, would go in, and after three months, the civilian would collapse.

Didn't happen. Now they're stuck with these millions of soldiers. Now they're in trouble because they can't actually deal with all these soldiers, and they don't have food and supplies to continue the war. So these prisoners of war are a huge problem for the Nazi war machine. And because a lot of these soldiers are dying in prisoner camps, guess what? It motivates the Russians to fight to the bitter end. World War II deaths.

The Soviet Union lost anywhere between 26 or 27 million people. It is the greatest tragedy to befall a nation in human issue, one of the greatest tragedies. And but, okay, that is true, but let's just a great tragedy. But let's look at something called Game Theory kind of factual. What I'm going to do is I'm going to show you different possibilities, different outcomes, okay? So let's just say, so everyone knows Soviet Union and Germany is going to go to war at some point, okay? It's entirely obvious to everyone. But, and there are four possibilities.

The first possibility is the Soviet Union invades Germany and threatens Berlin, okay? What happens here? Well, I guarantee you the Americans come in on behalf of Germany. The Americans send their military to defend Germany because they cannot have afford for Europe to turn communists. So in this situation, guess what? Stalin loses the war. The Soviet Union is destroyed.

And since, scenario one. So in no, two. The Soviet Union invades Germany and is stopped at the border by the German war machine. Guess what? The Americans still come in, because they can't afford for Germany to lose this war against the Soviet Union, okay? The Americans still come in, silent loses.

So in no two. So, no three, Germany invades Soviet Union, and it stopped at the border. And this is scenario the Americans are lacking their heads off. because fine fight it out we don't care okay and Americans are probably going to sell supplies to both the Germans and Soviet Union all right to destroy both and eventually they'll come in to destroy both Germany and Soviet Union so in all the two situations the Soviet Union loses there's only one situation in which

the Soviet Union wins Germany invades Soviet Union and threatens Moscow okay this is the only situation there are 10,000 different scenarios there's only scenario and when Stalin wins the war and he He found it and he implemented it, okay? But it required the sacrifice of 27 million Soviet people, soldiers and civilians. Only in this situation does Soviet Union win World War II. Only in a situation. In every other situation, every other thing that suddenly does, he loses the war.

Because the Americans will come in on behalf of Germany. And of course, this war is fundamental and it changes the course of history. Because without this war, while Stalin winning, there'd be no Mao Zed. There'd be no communist China, there would be no new China, there'd be no today's China. You have to understand this. Communism was not inevitable. It did not have to happen. In fact, you can make the argument that in 1940s it was going to get destroyed by the capitalists.

It was only because Stalin in World War II that China was able to turn communists. So Stalin changed the course of human history. None of these things should have happened. made them happen. And of course, we today have Vladimir Putin. And Vladimir Putin, I will argue to you is also going to change the course of human history. And this is something I will argue to you next class, so Stalin was the Uber months of the 20th century. I will argue to you next class that Putin is really the overmonth of the 21st century. He sees where history is going and he controls history to his benefit. He's going to warp reality to the benefit of Russia.

All right. So we have four great questions about today's lecture. The first question is, how do the Americans feel about communism and fascism? Second question is the Americans and the British were very close allies. And we know this through Landlis, right, where the Americans are shipping billions of supplies to, Britain for the war effort. So why did the British hate the Germans so much? Okay, and the last, the third question is, what was the sound strategy via the Americans? And the last question is, in the first few months, the Soviets were going to destroy. So what was Stalin's response

and what did he promise the people to get them the fight to the bitter end? Okay, great questions. Okay, so let's go over them one by one. Americans at this time in history in 1930s, the elite, they were heavy Nazi supervisors. There was an American named Charles Lindbergh. And he found it something called the America First Party. And he was very popular. There's a very good chance that he would have won the elections in America. So American isolationist is the major dominant political trend.

And it was only when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor that the Americans entered World War. If the Japanese didn't attack Port-au-Harbour, it would have been almost impossible to convince the American people to enter into the war, okay? So the Americans were either, well, I'm probably the elite, okay, they were either neutral, like we don't care where isolation is, or pro-Nazi, okay? So that was just the general attitude of Americans in 1930s. Communism was a real threat to America, so communism anarchism, anarchism were real threats to the American political system in 1930s, especially with the Great Depression. So does that answer your question? Okay, question number two. So why were the British so intent on destroying the Germans? In fact, you guys don't know this, but Hitler made numerous peace overtures to the British, especially wasn't Churchill.

Again, the Germans had tremendous respect for the British. I mean, it's basically the same people, right? So why was Churchill so intent on destroying Germany? So there are different historical arguments. One argument is Churchill just hated Hitler. Like personally, he had a visual dislike of Hitler. That's number one. Number two is the Germans embarrassed the British.

in the war, right? Because the British and this exponential force against the Germans, and the Germans wiped them out. The British were forced retreat at Dunkirk. I think for me, the best reason is just geopolitical. So let me explain what I mean by this. So there's something called the McKender thesis. Okay?

This was developed after World War I. The idea is this. Britain is a naval power. And as long as it's able to dominate the seas, it controls the world, okay? Because at this time in history, most people are training through sea. So Britain, as long as Britain is able to control

the waterways, it controls the world. But there's a problem here. The problem is, let's just say that a power arises within the heartland, okay? and it could be Germany, and it could be Russia, okay? But it's gonna be one of these two. And if they're able to unite or conquer each other, then they unite the entire European Asian continent,

in which case, all they do is build railways. And then Britain ceases to exist as an empire. Okay? So the great threat is a great power emerging within Europe, Asia, to unite. the entire heartland. And the British believed this, but also the Americans, believe this as well, right? Because Americans will eventually inherit the British Empire. And so at this point in history, Germany was conquering all of Europe and it was about to conquer Russia. So Britain's geopolitical

interests was to ensure that Germany would be hindered. Okay? So I know in the history books that you're taught that World War II was a great conflict between Britain and Germany for democracy and human freedom. That's nonsense, okay? World War II was fought primarily between Germany and Russia. Three-fourths of German forces were directed at Russia. Most casualties were happening between Germany and Russia. What Britain was doing that was vital was blockading Germany. And as Germany was running out of food and fuel, it had no choice between to invade the Soviet Union, especially Ukraine, in order to access the resources of Russia.

So this idea that the British and the Germans always had to fight, it's something that became mythology after World War II. During World War II, Hitler wanted peace. Britain wanted to ensure Germany could not expand to the east and create the heartland. So that's what was driving British interest at this time. Does that make sense? Does that make sense to you guys?

All right. Let's go to the third question. Stalin strategy for the Americans. Okay, so what Stalin is able to do that's different from everyone else is, you know, if you're Churchill, you're thinking in terms of Europe. If you are Hitler, you're thinking in terms of Europe, right? They're all Eurocentric. What someone was able to do that made him different was he was able to see the world as it is, okay?

He was able to see the Americans. He knew the Americans would eventually come into the war. He was able to see Japan. And the reason why is at this time, communism is an international movement. So he had spies everywhere. So he was able, he basically had the best intelligence in the world. So he was able to figure out exactly how these pieces were going to move about. So for him, it was like, okay, I go conquer Germany, but then the Americans come in,

and the American's soya's. Okay? So the main problem were the Americans, because the American at this point, remember, had the greatest industrial capacity in the world. Whichever side the American support would win the war. All right? So Stann had to figure out a way to neutralize the Americans. And the best way to neutralize Americans is, let's be friends, right? Because America's democracy, if Roosevelt is saying, Uncle Joe is our friend, right? And he has all these photos in the press of Stalin and Roosevelt, shaking hands, having these conferences, then the Americans cannot go around and back stab the Soviet Union.

And guess what? After World War II ended, after Germans were defeated handedly by the Allies, there were many Americans, especially General Patton, who was one of the main generals in World War II, he recognized that, oops, we made a mistake. The real enemy are not the Germans, the real enemy are the Russians. And this would eventually give us the Cold War. So it was after World War II, the Americans realized we were duped. We should not have come into this war on behalf of the Soviet Union.

We should have stayed neutral, or we should have supported Germany. to maintain balance of power. So Stalin just tricked everyone. That's why I say he's the Uber-Rets. It should not have happened this way. If you just think about logically what each party, what each player in the game should have done, then the Soviet Union should have collapsed, okay?

So Stalin was able to trick Hitler, right? He convinced Hitler to invade him. He tricked Roosevelt. Roosevelt became his supporter, okay? He even tricked Churchill. So, I mean, I know this is not what you taught, history class usually but just look at it like just analytically okay using game theory analysis then you have to conclude that Salon was the only one who

saw the world globally and was able to manipulate people to his benefit all right and that's what's then by the way this this is what's happening today with Putin okay Putin is the only one who's able to think globally and he's able to he's only and he's the only able to think strategically everyone else like Trump he's only responding to domestic issues, okay? Does that make sense? All right.

Let's move on to the last question. Stalin, what did he promise the Soviet people? He didn't have to promise anything. He was God, okay? Do you understand this? He could do what he did because he was God. Any other leader who pulled this crap

would have been arrested and executed for incompetence. Only Stalin, who, because of the Great Purge, consolidated power only in his hands. His authority was unquestionable. questionable, right? He had spies spying on spies and he had other spies spying on these spies, okay? So he created this like dividing conquer system within the Soviet Union which made his power absolute. In fact you can make argument that he was the most powerful person ever in human

history because no one could question his authority. So he could afford to do this. He could afford to make mistakes and and look like a buffoon because no one could challenge him okay does that make sense all right and ultimately the soviet people rallied around him because they didn't want to be called by the Germans okay they want to save their their nation and Salon knew this okay this is very famous quotation attributed to Salon it's not true he actually didn't say this but he could have said this he said one million people died in the Gulaks that's a statistic okay no one cares one man gets run over by a tractor that's a national

tragedy so he understands intimately how people think he understands psychology of both individuals and of nations and as such he's able to manipulate people control people to his will all right I think I think I could have a question since he had power he kind of turned on the top of Russian because I just with the Soviet ideology there wasn't really a space for So what that meant is that he closed up the church and you kind of get rid of the traditional culture and all that kind of stuff. And during the war, the church was able to create this sort of a medium of a population

otherwise kind of divided by Okay, so that's a great point. Thank you. Okay. So his major contribution to So, communist theory, is the idea of nationalism, right? Because what made him different from Trotsky and Lenin was, he was only concerned about the Soviet Union. He wanted to maintain the integrity of the Soviet Union, whereas Trotsky and Lenin were concerned about international communism. They saw the Soviet Union as the little brother in the movement.

Germany would be the big brother because Germany had the most politariat. It was the most urbanized and maybe the French as well. The Soviet Union would be the little brother to the Germans, when the Germans eventually rebelled and established the communism. So Lenin and Trotsky were fundamentally internationalists, whereas Sondon understood, people don't want that crap, okay? People want to feel part of a community. People want to feel part of a place.

And so he heavily promoted nationalism, which galvanized the people, as Doug says, into making tremendous sacrifices for the during World War II. So people die, not for ideas, people die for each other. And that's what sound understood fundamentally. So, yeah, Mother Russia was his promise to the people. Does that make sense? Any more questions? Okay, great.

So next class, Thursday, the grand finale to the course. We've done the entire human history, from the Ice Age when we were just living in caves. On Thursday, we'll finish the course with a grand finale, which is the American Empire, Trump and the American Empire. Okay, so hopefully that will be the best class of this year. Let's let's end with the best class.