Stalin’s Communism
Stalin’s Communism
Stalin is the man who took over the Russian revolution and made it work. By 1935 Stalin started relaxing some of the draconian rules governing the economy. He wrote in Leninism the following describing the Soviet economy:
“1. The power of the capitalist class has been overthrown and has been replaced by the power of working class.
“2. The tools and means of production, the land, factories, etc., have been taken away from the capitalists and handed over to the working class and to the peasantry.
“3. The development of production is subordinated, not to the principle of competition and the safeguarding of capitalist profits, but to the principle of planned guidance and systematic improvement of the material and cultural level of toilers.
“4. The distribution of the national income takes place - in the interest of systematically raising the material position of the workers and peasants, and extending socialist production in town and country.
“5. The systematic improvement of the material position of the toilers and the ceaseless growth of their requirements (purchasing power) - guarantee the working class against crises of overproduction, against the growth of unemployment, etc.
“6. The working class is the master of the country, working not for the capitalist, but for its own class.” - Stalin
Under Soviet Union, the issue of “socialist inequality” can be summarized in two paragraphs.
- No man in the Soviet Union has any individual control of the means of production. A man may accumulate and transfer wealth, but not the means of producing wealth.
- No man on the Soviet Union may exploit labor for private profit. Interest may be paid on bonds, but this interest does not represent private dividends on the use of labor.
By now we know that communism did not work because it was unsustainable. It was just plain utopia. However, Europe was respectful towards Stalin but also quite afraid. Stalin was not just the leader of a national state but of a movement, the Communist International, which had roots in all countries.
Yalta accord between US, UK and Stalin was signed in 1945. By then, the Soviet troops were about 200 miles from Berlin, essentially controlling the east part of Europe which became Eastern Europe under Soviet political control.
The best reference book I found is Inside Europe by John Gunther, a time capsule, the 1938 edition. 
