Joseph Stalin and Adolph Hitler

Both Joseph Stalin and Adolph Hitler have similar characteristics as to their use of fear, propaganda, and economic control in the 20th century. They also had different views and aspects on their form of government, how they came to power, who they chose to eliminate, and their own form of secret police.

To start, Stalin isn’t really his last name it actually refers to the meaning the man of steel because he wanted to be known as the most powerful dictator ever known to man. Stalin used the NKVD as his secret police and chose to eliminate kulaks, Ukrainians, and old communists. Although Hitler also had a form of secret police which was the Gustapo and the SS, he chose to eliminate Jews, homosexuals and Gypsies. Stalin had a system of prisons which were called Gulags but the people who were sent there already knew that was their final place they will be before they die. Hitler however didn’t hide what he wanted to accomplish and had death camps where people were sent to be killed instantly. Stalin in fact did not have a personal body guard like Hitler did when he was in power but was very cautious wherever he was because Stalin was a very worried man and thought anyone could overthrow him. Overall both Hitler and Stalin used the same tactics to use fear and oppression against the people that they had hatred toward.

Adolph Hitler had a totally different viewpoint than Stalin as to the economic control and how he wanted to run his country. Hitler wanted to have a socialist government while Stalin wanted a communist country. According to Stalin’s laws, he owns all businesses and industry plus he gets to make all of the economic decisions. In Hitler’s mind, economy wasn’t his top priority and he put Non-Nazi officials in charge of running Germany’s government. Hitler also has an economic policy Lebensraum which means children were taught to be a soldier, make kids, or be a farm worker. For economics, Stalin unlike Hitler had economics as the #1 thing to focus on. He crated 2 five year plans to produce more coal and steel and created 2 because the first one failed. Stalin also failed at trying to improve the agricultural part of their economy. He created collectivization in which land was taken from the peasants and had to work together. The result was mass starvation and created Ukrainian Genocide. From 1932-33 he killed 2-10 million people. Hitler on the other hand was very successful at his attempts and rarely failed at his attempts to control Germany and eliminate all that opposed him. All and all they both had a major economic control over their countries and played a big part in their totalitarian rule.

Finally, the major idea or the main reason of why these two dictators were so successful at what they wanted to accomplish was propaganda. For several centuries propaganda was huge for dictators and rulers around the world and was one of the most important aspects of being a successful ruler. The purpose of educational propaganda is to brain wash the youth into supporting the ruler and the government. Stalin’s educational approach on propaganda was to educate the workers of Russia to create a modern industrial nation and also taught communists values. Hitler had several youth programs such as Hitler youth and Hitler tots and Stalin had young pioneers. For art/religion side of propaganda Stalin’s goal was to glorify the workers and government and have no religion. This was seen as a threat to the Russian society. Stalin had statues of himself all over