Andrey Tarasenko. Ordinary manager

Ordinary manager
To the anniversary of Joseph Stalin

Andrey Tarasenko

Publication date: December 20, 2004

From the editor. On December 18-19, the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences hosted a conference dedicated to the 125th anniversary of the birth of I.V. Stalin and dedicated to the creative heritage of the leader. The philosopher Zinoviev branded “Westernism”, the communist Tyulkin branded the communist Zyuganov for betraying ideals, the deputy chairman of the Belgian Communist Party read out a report on behalf of his boss, apologizing to those gathered for the fact that Comrade Martens himself could not arrive because he was in the Congo, where he was helping Congolese comrades in the national liberation struggle against American imperialism and its Rwandan mercenaries.

On the backdrop of the conference room, in the place where the icon of Lenin is usually located in such meetings, this time there hung a huge image of the leader of the peoples. However, not a canonical portrait of the 30s, but a photograph taken in his youth, from which an unshaven face of Caucasian nationality looked into the hall with prickly evil eyes. And underneath it, right on the fabric of the curtain, a single carnation is tied with thread.

This text is also dedicated to Stalin’s anniversary. Although, probably, its main task is not so much to once again remember on the occasion about a person who turned out to be a politician of the 1st century of the past century, but to open a new topic. Let's talk about the fact that his image in the 21st century will probably have nothing in common with the clichés that the past century awarded him - no matter which one he is familiar with.

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Whether we know it or not, Dzhugashvili-Stalin is undoubtedly one of the iconic figures of Russian history. One publicist once said that “Stalin is a well-promoted brand, the demand for which will not disappear soon.” I don't agree. The demand for Stalin in some form will always exist. Our man is still interested in the personality of Ivan the Terrible, although many centuries have passed. Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great, Stalin are not just historical figures, they are symbols. And, as happens with any symbol, they are no longer real characters, but mythological ones.

The cult of Stalin's personality was revived thanks to his "revelations" during the perestroika period. Stalin was declared the embodiment of absolute evil. It has become the universal cause of all our hardships and disasters, just like the Mongol-Tatar yoke. It’s difficult to blame all of Russia’s misfortunes on this last one, many years ago, but it’s just right on Stalin. And although the frenzy of sadomasochistic anti-Stalinism of our intelligentsia has already passed, many historians and publicists still cannot write about Stalin without emotion. They are still under the spell of this personality. After all, a villain can also be impressive. In this regard, many Stalinists are much more outspoken than anti-Stalinists. They do not hide the fact that they are attracted to Stalin by his political cunning, cruelty, ruthlessness, and will to power. Anti-Stalinists are attracted to the same thing, only they are ashamed to admit it.

Stalin's popularity with a plus sign has increased according to the law of counteraction, thanks to the vilification to which his name has been subjected in recent decades. But - amazing thing! - Stalinists use the image of Stalin created by his critics, only trying to give it a positive connotation. It was not historical predilections or political ideologies that came together as a wedge on Stalin. The swords of different worldviews are sharpened on Stalin - what seems evil to some, is seen as good by others. And very rarely does anyone pose the question: maybe Stalin is not the same or the other? And although the liberation from Stalin’s personality cult is already noticeable in some unbiased studies of recent years (see, for example, Yu.V. Emelyanov. Stalin: the path to power. M., 2003; his own. Stalin: at the pinnacle of power. M., 2003), it has not yet become available to the majority of the writing and reading public.

Yes, and it’s unlikely to happen. Stalin is really a brand, no matter what you say. No matter how much historians prove with facts in their hands that there and there it was not at all as it was previously imagined, there will always be those who will ignore the obvious truth and will chew the old tedium about the “great tyrant” or “a great leader” (but always about a great one!), about “millions of innocent people killed” or about “the inspirer of all our victories.” The business of such subjects is to artificially maintain public interest in the object of their attention, created by their own imagination.

If Stalin had not been in our history, he would still have been invented. Just like Karamzin came up with a dramatic image of Ivan the Terrible as a lesson to future sovereigns. In history, as in literature, everything must be clear and beautiful, otherwise people will not perceive it. There are heroes and anti-heroes, black is black without a gap, and white should shine with unsullied whiteness. The bearers of the black and white principles can be interchanged, but the essence of the moral teaching will not change.

The Manichaean way of thinking is so ingrained in our consciousness that the majority somehow do not perceive facts that do not fit into the usual image of the embodiment of evil. And historians who extract these facts have difficulty finding a place for them, speak about them in passing, with hints, or give a deliberately false explanation like: “in principle this is good, but because Stalin did it, it is bad.”

Stalin's directive of June 29, 1941, which really inspired the country to selflessly fight the enemy, was not so long ago fashionable to interpret as a “scorched earth order,” allegedly dooming millions of civilians to starvation under German occupation. But Stalin’s order, which ordered not to take away the necessary agricultural equipment, food supplies, personal livestock and poultry from the population remaining in the occupied territory, is very rarely remembered. Historians mentioned it once (in the 4-volume “The Great Patriotic War.” M., 1998) and forgot.

They also rarely remember that Stalin was an opponent of the unconditional surrender of Germany and at the Tehran Conference raised this issue with the allies, but they did not want to hear it. Of course: after all, the Soviet people bore the brunt of the losses. Accepting Stalin's proposal would have saved millions of human lives. But if they talk about this, then, as a rule, it is in the spirit that Stalin secretly sympathized with Hitler... It is known that Stalin was by no means the most ardent supporter of rapid collectivization, that he was the only one who voted at the Politburo against death sentences for many “saboteurs” and “enemies of the people”, that he was a consistent supporter of international legitimacy and completely abandoned the “world revolution”, that he was preparing alternative elections to the Supreme Council... Well, how can it be, because Stalin is a priori bad.

This is who turned out to be the most alive of all the living! Moreover, he also multiplied. Now there are two Stalins - good and bad. Well, just like Peter the Great - the Antichrist and transformer. One Stalin is woven entirely from negative facts, the other - from facts of the above kind. And it will be oh so difficult for them to merge together!

Stalin is to some extent a victim of his own cult, created not by him, but by the people, who always want to see at the top of power the focus of all virtues. In that era, the mass tense expectation of a just leader reached the point of exaltation. Everyone - the Bolsheviks, ordinary people, and hidden "enemies of the people" - equally exhausted by the continuous revolution that lasted from 1905 to 1933, turned their hopes to the ruler, under whom visible calm finally came. The object of the cult of personality was not Stalin, but the ideal best qualities of a leader, which the popular imagination endowed the leader of the Bolshevik Party with, because there was no one else to project them onto. The cult of Stalin's personality is a product of the myth-making of the people, and the myth-making of the sincere, childishly naive, beautiful in its spiritual simplicity.

Was Stalin really a good leader and organizer? Of course, there is no need to ask Stalinists and anti-Stalinists about this. Both will be encouraged to look at the results. At the same time, some will point to a superpower, a won war, a powerful industry, an atomic bomb, and finally to the UN (although this is a truly useless organization, the fruit of the dream of the kingdom of God on earth; but it is precisely this dream that perhaps characterizes Stalin most clearly). Others will say just as correctly about ruined agriculture, failures of the five-year plans, miscalculations in preparation for war, and the lack of a prepared successor. It was both. But to what extent was all this the result of Stalin’s actions?

The scale of time and space erases the personal qualities of a leader. It is a common illusion that the leader of a huge country has enormous opportunities to influence the situation. A gardener in his garden is much more omnipotent than a dictator in a state. The will of the leader is distorted exactly as many times as there are human atoms that carry it out. The qualities of a leader are more clearly manifested in small-scale work, in a low position, where it is the work of a person that is visible, and not the vague geological movement of gigantic layers of human masses.

Stalin's rise in the party began with his creation in 1909-10. powerful Bolshevik organization in Baku. But before the revolution, it was mainly theorists who enjoyed recognition in the RSDLP. The revolution of 1917 required practitioners. Stalin was not such a profound theoretician and tactician of the revolution as Lenin, such an inspirer of the masses as Trotsky. He was a diligent performer, and only within the limits that his position allowed him, he showed initiative and independence. But he turned out to be a truly conscientious and hard-working executor, and the further, the more the party entrusted him with posts. In the early 20s, Stalin combined three positions at once, all of an organizational and technical nature. Isn't this recognition of his leadership qualities? When Lenin's comrades began to squabble for power, taking advantage of the habits of the revolutionary era, Stalin did what he was accustomed to - routine bureaucratic work. It happened that just such work turned out to be at the right place and time. The ordinary party masses, tired of the revolution, turned away from the noisy Trotskys and Zinovievs with their locomotive organizational efficiency and went to serve the assiduous, modest, demanding, but qualified manager of a company for the construction of socialism in a single country.

I will take the liberty of asserting that few of the revolutionaries could have made a career for themselves in stable times. Lenin tried to become a lawyer, but he turned out to be a mediocre lawyer. Trotsky failed to become a successful businessman. Most of the professional revolutionaries fell away like husks as soon as Russia's revolutionary fever passed. The company no longer needed them, and the general manager, sorry - general secretary, fired them. Well, the form in which the dismissal took place was, you see, provided for in the contract.

Who could Stalin be in today's Russia? I think that his qualities could well ensure him a career in some large company. His ability to innovate, analyze and forecast would allow him to occupy a prominent leadership position, in which he would look much less demonic than, say, Chubais. He could have fulfilled his mother’s orders and made a spiritual career, achieving the rank of metropolitan by the end of his life. He could have become a deputy of the State Duma on some party list, but he would hardly have become a leader of the state. He would have been wiped out by people who were much more unprincipled in the struggle for power. Stalin was the grandmaster of cell and apparatus politics, but the element of public democracy with its wolf laws was not for him.

It is an idle exercise to count whether Stalin had more successes or miscalculations, as well as to weigh the evil and genius of this man. Whoever needs it, his actions have long been weighed, as a result of which Stalin’s soul is forever found in places where living people are not allowed to look.