one of its biggest massacres — the GreatnPurges.nThese were hardly completed whennStalin concluded the long-desired alliancenwith Hitler, an alliance that in thenend backfired, disastrously. Stalin hadnmiscalculated twice. First, in commonnwith most of the world, he had assumed,nin 1939-1940, that the Britishnand the French would hold back thenGermans, and that the war in the Westnwould be a mutually exhausting stalemate.nSecond, in 1941 he fecklesslynignored the clearest possible warningsnthat the Nazis would attack. Just howncomplete those warnings were is onlynnow fully clear; it has recently beenndisclosed that Schulenburg, thenGerman ambassador in Moscow, betrayednHitler’s plans to Molotov in Mayn1941, explaining that his master intendednto attack on June 22. In dealing withnthe era 1929-1941, Tucker has producedna masterpiece that offers a coherentnexplanation for many things thatnpreviously have seemed unfathomable.nHis interpretation is formidable evennwhen it is difficult to agree with it, and itnis noteworthy that Stalin emerges lookingneven worse than in previous biographies.nTucker makes the strongest case yetnfor the view that Stalin’s policy in laternWeimar Germany was not a criminalnblunder but a deliberate maneuver tonhelp the Nazis to power and bringnabout an eventual world war. The policynthat led to the Nazi-Soviet Pact wasnthus not merely a product of circumstancesnfollowing Hitler’s seizure ofnpower (much less a last-minute improvisationnafter Munich) but had been fixednand consistently pursued since 1925.nNor was the horrible course of farmncollectivization just a solution — albeitnthe worst possible solution — to thengenuine problem of collecting sufficientngrain to feed the urban populace, asnmany historians have argued. Lenin’snNew Economic Policy was not at andead end, doomed by an objectivendifficulty. Rather, Tucker stresses, thencrisis was the planned result of deliberatenpolicy. Stalin lowered prices forngrain and raised those of manufacturedngoods as part of a scheme to provoke anshowdown, impose collectivization, terrorizenthe peasantry, and gain forcednlabor for the industrialization drive. Innthe last few decades, it has been rathernfashionable to discount the impact ofnplanning and calculation by politicalnleaders on the course of events, and tonexplain those events according to bureaucraticnpolitics or to snap reactionsnmade by individuals in situations thatnwere suddenly forced on them. Whatevernthe validity of this view, it has nonapplicability to Stalin’s Soviet Union.nStalin did not always get what he wanted,nbut what he wanted he planned for.nTucker touches on two related criticalnissues. Was Stalin Lenin’s heir, Stalinismnbeing only a minor modification ofnBolshevism, or did he break sharplynwith Lenin’s ideas? And what was thenrelationship of the system Stalin creatednto that of eariier epochs of Russiannhistory?nIt has often been noted that Stalin’snpurges recall those of Ivan the Terrible,nthat farm collectivization was in somenways a revival of the serfdom imposed innthe 17th century, and that Stalin’s industrializationnprogram recalls thenforced modernization initiated by Peternthe Great. These similarities, it is said,nestablish true “continuity” between thenSoviet and pre-Soviet eras of Russiannhistory. The Russian social system ofnthe late 19th and early 20th centuries,nwhatever its other faults, had left thesenearlier horrors (which themselves belongednto widely separated epochs) farnbehind. By 1914, Russia seemed wellnon its way to “convergence” with WesternnEurope and North America. Argumentsnassuming that some sort of Russiannarchetype was unconsciouslynresurrected after 1917 have never beennvery convincing. But Tucker argues thatnthere is a relationship between Stalinismnand earlier events, and that the keynto this relationship is discoverable innthe mind of Joseph Stalin.nTucker makes a strong case —nmuch stronger than this reviewernwould have believed—for a definitenbreach between Stalin’s ideas and programnand those of the majority of thenOld Bolsheviks. The difference was notnsimply Stalin’s greater ruthlessness andnwillingness to import into intra-partynconflicts methods that Lenin and othersnhad deemed acceptable against non-nGommunists. That Lenin and most ofnhis colleagues envisaged a gradual transformationnfrom small-scale peasantnownership and the NEP to collectivizationnand a “socialist economy” — notnthe overnight “second revolution” thatnnnStalin imposed—has been generallynaccepted. But Tucker goes further.nStalin’s need to become a hero of thenrevolution equal to or greater thannLenin could only be satisfied by an”second revolution.” That, plus anstrong tendency to paranoia and a devotionnto an idealized self-image thatnprevented him from admitting that hencould be in any way fallible, explainsnmuch of the history of the Stalinist era.nAfter his wife killed herself (or he killednher in a rage), Stalin wished to disposenof blame for all that had gone wrongnand to eliminate those who had knownnhim when he was a minor figure andnwho knew very well that he was not anninfallible genius. He also wished to paventhe way for a pact with Hitler, whichnmany Old Bolsheviks sensed would endnin disaster. These considerations, andnthe aim of creating a new elite dependentnon him and analogous to then”service nobility” created by Ivan IV,nlargely determined the targets and thenextent of the Great Purges.nThe social system created in thensecond revolution was in part a result ofnStalin’s understanding of Russian history.nTucker argues ingeniously, and onnmuch evidence, that Stalin, unlike Leninnand the rest of the Old Bolsheviks,nwas a strong Russian chauvinist with anreal, if peculiariy slanted, interest innRussian history. Stalin’s powerfuln”transferred nationalism” (to borrow anuseful phrase invented by Orwell) lednhim consciously to see Ivan IV’s destructionnof the old nobility, the bondagenof peasantry, and Peter the Great’snmodernization program as efforts “prefiguring”na means to build a “socialist”nsystem in Russia that did not occur tonother Communist leaders. Later, it lednhim to revive elements of Russian traditionalism,nto impose ranks, titles, andnpay differentials, and to develop a “NationalnBolshevism of the right” similarnin many respects to Nazism. Hence thengreat paradox that while no real continuitynexisted—nor could exist—hisnrule did recall the very worst aspects ofneariier Russian history. The argument isnan impressive one, although perhapsnTucker does exaggerate the difierencesnbetween Lenin and Stalin. While thenlatter felt compelled to destroy his oldncolleagues, the fact is that he hadnreached the summit of power withoutnincurring massive opposition or causingnany sense of unease among most Gom-nAUCUST 1991/25n