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Read the factoid about Stalin. Identify 5 deliberate errors. Highlight evidence which explains why Stalin might have sup

 starter activity. Read the factoid about Stalin. Identify 5 deliberate errors. Highlight evidence which explains why Stalin might have supported Soviet expansion. . What were Stalin’s motives for Soviet expansion?.  Aims.

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Read the factoid about Stalin. Identify 5 deliberate errors. Highlight evidence which explains why Stalin might have sup

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  1. starter activity Read the factoid about Stalin. Identify 5 deliberate errors. Highlight evidence which explains why Stalin might have supported Soviet expansion.

  2. What were Stalin’s motives for Soviet expansion?  Aims To assess whether Stalin genuinely wished to expand the frontiers of the USSR or wanted to produce a protective ‘buffer zone’

  3. Many still remember Stalin fondly in Russia. Do you think the West has been too quick to judge him?

  4.  Your task • Read Phillips p.52-56 and take notes under these headings: • Spreading world revolution • Traditional Russian expansionism • Defensive actions to create a buffer zone • The role of personality

  5. Spreading world revolution • From its inception, Russian revolutionaries like Trotsky believed ideals of Communism would be under threat from capitalism • Trotsky believed in ‘Permanent Revolution’ & Stalin ‘Socialism in One Country’

  6. Who was right in your opinion – Trotsky or Stalin?

  7. Evidence of Stalin spreading ‘world communism’ • Comintern (aka Third International, 1919-43) • Replaced by Cominform (1947)

  8. Lenin speaking at 2nd Congress of Comintern, 1920

  9. Soviet expansionism • Defeat of Nazism left a power-vacuum which could be filled with Communism, e.g. Soviet expansion in Eastern Europe, Communist support for guerrillas in Greece, Communist coup in Czech. (1948) • Soviet expansionism confirmed by Kennan in ‘Long Telegram’ and ‘The Sources of Soviet Conduct’ Communist fighters in Greece

  10. Traditional Russian expansionism • Stalin the Red Tsar (view of Samuel Sharp and F Schuman) • Russia used Eastern Europe as ‘cordon sanitaire’ • Stalin wanted to recover land lost in Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (1918)

  11. Defensive action to create a ‘buffer zone’ • Protective zone around USSR (view supported by John Lewis Gaddis) • Expansionism was the product of Soviet rather than aggression • Need to appease or control hostile states, e.g. Poland • Hardline US approach made imposition of Communist govts. A necessity

  12. The Soviet ‘buffer zone’

  13. Stalin’s personality • Deeply suspicious of Western motives – e.g. failure of Nazi-Soviet Pact (1939), failure to open a second front • Cautious leader – didn’t support Communists in Greece, stood by ‘Percentages agreement’ (1944), wary of provoking US during Berlin Blockade

  14. How far do you agree with Geoffrey Roberts (‘Stalin’s Wars’, 2006) view that Stalin was a cautious, suspicious or even nervous leader? Do you think he felt isolated?

  15.  Homework • Complete a table similar to the one below on the different schools of thought (historiography) on p.58-61 of Philips.

  16.  Plenary • Divide the class in two. Explain how the following events can be used to explain EITHER Stalin’s aggressive foreign policy OR his defensive actions • Spread of Communism through East Europe • Creation of Cominform and Comecon • Berlin Blockade

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