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Stalin & Putin — Weirdly Similar or Entirely Different?
It is impossible to create complete replications of personalities in history. To say that “Putin is the new Hitler” or “Putin is the new Stalin” is therefore not only inaccurate but unhelpful, since it would arguably make light of both Hitler’s and Stalin’s atrocities.
That being said, it can be very useful to look to history (especially the 20th century, since modern politics is shaped by its shortcomings) for guidance on why things are the way they are today.
Therefore, when I look at parallels between Stalin and Putin, I am not suggesting that they are identical personalities. Instead, I am looking at how they differed in order to illuminate on the present. This approach will prevent some historical leaps in logic and unfortunate revisionism that we are all capable of.
In order to create my case, I will take extensively from a recent book by the Russian historian, Oleg V. Khlevniuk, Stalin: New Biography of a Dictator. In it, Khlevniuk portrays a unique picture of Joseph Stalin’s life, who has been mystified, deified, and revised from the time of his birth to the extent that it is difficult to demarcate truth from fabrication or falsehood.
Khlevniuk’s intentions, are to amend some of the mistakes or distortions past historians have succumbed to when it came to writing…
