DOCUMENTARY: Declassified: Joseph Stalin (2006) By John J. Flynn (watchdocumentary.tv)

This is a documentary about Stalin in the American TV - History Channel

(watchdocumentary.tv) The death of one man is a tragedy; the death of millions is a statistic. These are the words of one Joseph Stalin who was a dictator in the USSR. Stalin was responsible for many of the greatest mass murders that have ever been witnessed in the world. He ruled the people in the name of making life better for them but was characterized as harming them in the process. Stalin was responsible for the murder of more country men than they were killed in all of the Russian wars combined.

In May 1945 after the end of the world war II, Stalin gave the statistic that seven million people had died in the war but it was later to be discovered that 26 million had been the actual number of people that had perished in that fight. January of 1924 was when Stalin took over from Lenin. He reigned over Russia with a storm and imposed his own laws and regulations that proved his dictatorial instincts. He believed dictatorship was the only way in which he could get things done and make his dream come true.

In 1928, he instructed his government to remove peasants from their land and turn over their produce to the state which would later be used to fund revolution and the industrialization bid that was in his mind. Anyone who dared to oppose the ruling was deported and killed. Intimidation and fear consolidated his grip on power and he achieved this using a special wing of police who performed executions and mass murder. He developed a cult personality which pushed him to eliminate the norm and tradition in society and replace it with the rules and regulations he wanted. He made an inner circle of people who would obey and do anything he asked of them.

One out of every ten people in the population had to be Stalin’s informant and this is how he kept in tabs with what was happening in the grass roots. In 1934, two million people were deported to Siberia and Kazakhstan from where they provided forced slave labor in building roads, houses and infrastructure. To ensure that he was not attacked, he signed treaties with other states but he was betrayed by Germany when they invaded and attacked USSR. As a remedy, he instructed the reopening of churches to summon help from God whom he had previously disowned. He however still maintained the internal policies that oppressed and murdered people.

He defeated Hitler and much praise was heaped on him without people realizing that he was even worse than Hitler. In 1953, he managed to create a hydrogen bomb which he would use to fight off the Americans in the war that he had catalyzed. During the war, the statistics showed that for every one American that died, 50 Russians also died.

In February 1953, he invited the inner circle for dinner but that would prove the last call he would ever make. The next day, Stalin was found in a pool of his own urine and was believed to have suffered a stroke or poisoned the previous night. He later succumbed to cerebral hemorrhage and that would mark the end of the life of the worst dictator ever to have existed on earth.



Go beyond the numbing statistics of horror and misery to probe the soul of one of the 20th century's most reviled figures.

* Secrets held for decades are exposed in this incisive series. * Highly-placed sources and leading experts reveal long-suppressed stories. * Meet the men and women whose support was critical to Stalin's campaigns.

They are the stories that have been suppressed or overlooked for years and even generations. They expose the dark side of heroes, the humanity of villains, and the behind-the-scenes deals and bargains struck on the eve of history's most important events. Filled with extraordinary footage and interviews with eyewitnesses and those who have dedicated the lives to exposing the truth, DECLASSIFIED illuminates fresh facets of some of the most compelling personalities and moments of the past.

Joseph Stalin remains a powerful and dark figure even 50 years after his death. His legacy as a personification of evil in the 20th century rivals Adolf Hitler's. Using newly unearthed materials and testimony, DECLASSIFIED reveals a never-before-seen Stalin. Archival material helps illuminate the vast foundation--human, psychological, and physical--that supported and encouraged him. And experts present portraits of the men and women who did his bidding, lived in fear of him and, more often than not, were betrayed by him.