Why Did Stalin Cultivate The Image Of Stalin

Stalin is known as one of the most brutal and unforgiving dictators of all time with people estimating that during his time in power he killed about 50 million people. But for some reason the people of Russia believed that he was amazing and incorruptible. So how did Stalin cultivate this image. Stalin made sure that images of him were everywhere. While walking through the streets of any city, posters of Stalin would be visible. It was also mandatory for all families to have a portrait of Stalin in their households. In these images, Stalin was always depicted heroically or being seen as a man of the people through photos of him with workers. Through these images, people began to believe that Stalin was a man of the people and that he was the heroic and strong man which they had seen, while in actuality Stalin was only 1.63 m tall (5ft 4in). As people believed Stalin was heroic, they believed he was what the U.S.S.R. needed and so followed his commands and believed in his policies even though they killed millions of people through famine like collectivisation.

There is a famous example of when Stalin had himself inserted into a photograph of Lenin to give the impression that he was Lenin’s right hand man, which couldn’t be further from the truth. Lenin believed Stalin was dangerous and unpredictable, which was eventually proved correct. This “photo” of Stalin and Lenin together made Stalin out to have been close with Lenin and due to the cult of Lenin, which Stalin created, put Stalin in a very positive light and made him out to be an obvious choice for the position as the next leader of the U.S.S.R. This made people respect Stalin even more and therefore they would be more likely to follow him and believe in