... Russia from a backward power, restrained for many years under the ties of repressive, incompetent Tsars, into a world Superpower, capable of sustaining an arms race requiring military expenditure of up to 15% per year. This modernisation of Russia was achieved in an extremely short period of time, as Stalin himself said: "We are 50 or 100 years behind the western powers, if the revolution is to survive, we must make up this gap in 10 years" Whether the gap with the west was made up as quickly as Stalin intended is insignificant at this point, the fact is that the gap was made up in a very short time. In order to achieve this, Stalin was willing to remove opponents to his ideas. This resulted in parts of the party opposed to Stalin's ideas being purged. Although these deaths can't be excused, there was at least a purpose in these ...

See this essay or coursework document in full right now