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Quality not quantity. Stalin was wrong.

• ineedasername 6y ago
  I wouldn't say he was wrong, it's just that the quality/quantity balance doesn't balance the same way in every circumstance. And Stalin wasn't making a universal proclamation. Of course he was a brutal dictator who caused the deaths of millions, so it's still probably a good idea to take his "wisdom" with a critical eye.
  • redis_mlc 6y ago
    > he was a brutal dictator who caused the deaths of millions This is a common but incomplete misunderstanding. Stalin was asked to be the leader of a backward, pre-industrial empire. By plundering the Kulak farmers, he was able to finance industrialization and a military, just in time to repel Germany. (Mao did the same thing later.) Fun fact 1: the American builders of Ford's River Rouge factory complex afterwards worked for Stalin to build his factories. Fun fact 2: Stalin was both ally and enemy of all of the Allied and Axis countries at various times during WW2. You could write an entire textbook on just his changing allegiances. Had Stalin not defeated Germany, the Russian people would have been enslaved and starved to death - the stakes were very high in WW2. Typically the Germans would cut calories in occupied countries by half every few months - you can do the math on how long people survived. Of course, Japan told their Singapore prisoners, "Grow your own food."