In the volatile aftermath of the Great War and the stringent demands placed by the Versailles Treaty, seeds were sown for the rise of one of history's most notorious dictators, Adolf Hitler. In a similar vein, the untimely demise of Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin precipitated Joseph Stalin's grip on power in the Soviet Union. Exploring the landscape of these leaderships reveals a stark reality that their similarities in governance and control mechanisms—encompassing terror, exile, execution, repression, and propaganda—overwhelmingly eclipsed their differences, creating an atmosphere of dread that was deemed necessary to emerge from the Great Depression's shadow.

Both Hitler and Stalin were charismatic leaders who capitalized on the discontent and economic turmoil of their respective nations. They both appealed to nationalist sentiments, promising to restore their countries to greatness and rid them of perceived enemies. However, their methods of achieving these goals were vastly different.

Hitler rose to power in Germany through a combination of persuasion and force. His Nazi party used propaganda and intimidation tactics to gain support and silence opposition. Once in power, Hitler consolidated his control by systematically eliminating political rivals and creating a cult of personality around himself.

Upon his release from Landsberg prison, Adolf Hitler ingeniously recalibrated the strategic orientation of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP), positioning himself as the unchallenged Führer at its helm. This reformation was ceremoniously announced at the Bürgerbräukeller in Munich, a venue steeped in symbolic significance due to its association with Hitler's failed 1923 coup attempt. Fresh from incarceration and profoundly shaped by his experiences, Hitler eschewed the path of violent revolution in favor of a seemingly democratic approach. He pledged to secure power via the ballot, aspiring to transform the political landscape through electoral success. This strategic pivot did not represent a commitment to democratic principles; rather, it was a facade designed to facilitate the establishment of a totalitarian regime under Nazi rule. Hitler's adept manipulation of the political system, reinforced by his command over the NSDAP, facilitated an unyielding pursuit of absolute authority within Germany.

In a landmark moment on 1 February 1933, Hitler addressed the nation for the first time as Reich Chancellor, utilizing the radio to extend his reach. This initial radio broadcast, which also saw widespread dissemination through posters and newspapers, underscored Hitler's adeptness at leveraging contemporary media to propagate his message. In his speech, largely penned by himself with minor contributions from Franz von Papen concerning Christian values and the family unit, Hitler articulated a narrative of decline and resurgence. He depicted the post-1918 era as a period of Marxist dominance and national humiliation, casting the SPD and the Weimar coalition as architects of Germany's misfortunes. With skillful oration, Hitler invoked religious imagery and appealed to divine sanction, framing his campaign as a righteous crusade against the specter of Bolshevism and anarchy. The timing of his address, closely following President Paul von Hindenburg's assent to dissolve the Reichstag and call for new elections, marked the onset of an aggressive electioneering phase, setting the stage for the Nazi's rapid ascent to unbridled power.

Photo One: Nuremburg, Germany 1928. Adolf Hitler giving the Nazi salute at a rally. Source: National Archives and Records Administration, 242-HAP-1928 (46).) Click to enlarge.

Photo Two: Adolf Hitler and German President Paul von Hindenburg, shortly after Hindenburg asked Hitler to become chancellor in 1933. (Image: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-S38324.) Click to enlarge.

In comparison, Stalin's rise to power was marked by more subtle maneuvering within the Communist party. He outmaneuvered his opponents through strategic alliances and manipulation of party officials. Once in control, he utilized a network of informants and secret police to maintain his grip on power and eliminate any potential threats.

After securing his dominion through a series of politically motivated purges and the strategic placement of loyalists, Joseph Stalin's authoritative reign was characterized by an uncompromising crackdown on any form of dissent or opposition. The Great Purge, which unfolded from 1936 to 1938, stood as a macabre testament to Stalin's absolute power, enveloping the Soviet Union in a climate of fear and repression. The central mechanism of this terror was the show trial, a spectacle cunningly designed to teach a grim lesson in loyalty. High-ranking officials, once comrades in arms, were paraded before the public, their confessions of counterrevolutionary crimes extracted under extreme duress. This theater of political repression not only eliminated Stalin’s perceived rivals but also served as a chilling warning to anyone who dared question his authority. Entire echelons of the Communist Party, military leadership, and intelligentsia were decimated, leaving a void filled by those unequivocally loyal to Stalin. This period of systematic terror, meticulously engineered by Stalin, not only fortified his grip on power but also profoundly transformed Soviet society, leaving a deep and indelible scar on the nation's collective memory.

Despite their differences in tactics, both leaders employed brutal methods to maintain their rule. Hitler's regime was responsible for the systematic extermination of millions of Jews and other minority groups deemed undesirable. Stalin's purges saw the execution or imprisonment of millions, including high-ranking officials within his own party.

Their ideologies were also vastly different, with Hitler's fascist and racist beliefs pitted against Stalin's communist ideology. However, both leaders shared a desire for absolute control and a willingness to use any means necessary to achieve their goals.

Historical Context and Dictatorial Emergence

The path to dictatorship in both Germany and the Soviet Union is a lesson in historical causality. The disintegration of monarchical rule following the First World War, coupled with the despair of the Depression era, provided the perfect confluence of circumstances for authoritarian figures to ascend. Richard Overy's seminal work The Dictators: Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Russia ponders over the social and political environments that facilitated the emergence of these regimes. His scholarly inquiry confronts the complex interplay of factors that made possible their rise to power, suggesting that rather than being aberrations, these dictatorships were the products of a "particular political culture and social environment."

Overy emphasizes continuity in the conditions that fomented Hitler’s and Stalin's ascent. Both figures materialized during a historical interlude fraught with economic instability and geopolitical uncertainty—a breeding ground for radicalization. The far-reaching consequences of global conflict and domestic upheaval set the stage for their draconian leadership.

Photo Three: March, 1919. Joseph Stalin, left, and Vladimir Lenin, right. Source: The Moscow Times. 

Photo Four: Soviet Union, 1921. Photograph of Stalin which Stalin wearing a Krasnoye Znamya (Order of the Red Banner). According to information published in Pravda (Pravda. December 24, 1939. No: 354 (8039)), this photograph taken in Bolshevik Sergo Ordzhonikidze's house in 1921. Source: Wikimedia. Click to enlarge.

Ideologically, both dictatorships subscribed to visions that championed the collective at the expense of individual liberty. Stalin's campaigns often targeted those deemed counter-revolutionary, while Hitler fixated on the perceived threat of biological impurity menacing the German Volk. In The Dictators, Overy elucidates this narrative, specifying the targeted nature of repression and its alignment with each regime's strategic priorities.

The approaches toward societal roles and expectations further underscored the distinct paths these dictatorships carved. Stalin's regime endorsed women's participation in industrialization efforts, whereas Hitler perpetuated traditional role expectations from the Weimar Republic era, limiting women's societal involvement to Küche, Kirche, and Kinder — kitchen, church, and children.

Terror and Purges

Foreboding similarities emerged in the methods used by both dictators to solidify their rule and eliminate dissent. Stalin's NKVD and Hitler's SS were both instrumental in orchestrating purges and systemic terror. Not merely confined to political adversaries, Hitler's definition of the enemy expanded to encompass what he saw as 'biological' threats, which included Jews, the disabled, and other groups deemed undesirable.

These 'social engineering' endeavors diverged significantly between the two, illustrating distinct ideological imperatives. Stalin's push for motherland industrialization contrasted with Hitler's pursuit of 'racial purity' – both devastating in their impact and executed under the pretense of lawful governance.

The most harrowing likeness between these rulers lies in their policy of extermination, wherein ethnicity and dissent became capital offenses. Soviet Poles suffered extensively under Stalin, whereas Hitler is infamously associated with the Holocaust. Examining these grim parallels, Timothy Snyder's in his 2010 work Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin, he presents a stark account of the era's state-sponsored murders. Snyder writes that: “The most persecuted European national minority in the second half of the 1930s was not the four hundred thousand or so German Jews (the number declining because of emigration) but the six hundred thousand or so Soviet Poles (the number declining because of executions). Snyder adds that “Stalin was a pioneer of national mass murder, and the Poles were the preeminent victim among the Soviet nationalities.” 

Similarly, both regimes weaponized exile as a means to purge society. Those not subjected to execution faced the relentless torment of the Gulag or concentration camps—a testament to the insidious nature of totalitarianism.

Efforts to craft unassailable cults of personality were crucial to both Hitler and Stalin. Their regimes harnessed media, including film, sport, and the arts, to entrench their ideological narratives in the minds of their citizenries. Films such as Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will and Eisenstein's Alexander Nevsky encapsulated the triumph of the collective will as conjured by dictatorial vision. Sergei Eisenstein was the ‘Russian counterpart’ to Germany’s Riefenstahl in terms of propagandist film. Eisenstein’s films embraced the political message, with relevant work including The Battleship Potemkin (1925) and October: Ten Days that Shook the World (1928). His film Alexander Nevsky (1938) was created under Stalin’s directive of glorifying Russian heroes. More importantly, the film represented the triumph of ‘collectivism’, a central economic initiative for Stalin’s dictatorship. These propaganda films, alongside other methods of indoctrination, glorified the leaders and vilified their enemies. (Sergei Eisenstein: The Art & Science of Cinema. Russian Archives Online. 2016)

Legacy

In the end, both Stalin and Hitler's regimes met a similar fate: eventual downfall. However, they left behind legacies that still resonate today. The Soviet Union's dissolution in 1991 marked an end to communism in Eastern Europe but also revealed the deep scars of Stalin's rule, from political repression to economic stagnation to the oppression in Russia and terror and war in Ukraine by Vladimir Putin today. In Germany, Hitler's atrocities have been extensively studied and memorialized as a reminder of the dangers of fascism and totalitarianism.

Both Hitler and Stalin were obsessively preoccupied with their public image. However, their methodologies differed; Hitler's frenetically charged public appearances starkly differed from Stalin's preference for the sidelines, a muted observer manipulating from the shadows.

Chronicling the methodologies and impacts of Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Soviet Union unveils profound and disconcerting parallels. Though differing in their pursuits—nationalism and militarism compared to socialist industrialization—the confluence of their strategies in maintaining control was uncannily harmonized. The tapestry of brutal repressions woven by their administrations stands as a grim testament to the capabilities of unbridled power, with devastating consequences for historical trajectories and human lives.

Bibliography

Applebaum, Anne. Gulag: A History. New York: Doubleday, 2003.

Eisenstein, Sergei. The Art & Science of Cinema. Russian Archives Online. (http://www.russianarchives.com/gallery/old/eisen.html), Accessed July 4, 2016.

Evans, Richard J. The Coming of the Third Reich. New York: Penguin Press, 2004.

Evans, Richard J. The Third Reich in History and Memory. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015.

Kershaw, Ian. Hitler: 1889 - 1936 : Hubris. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1999.

Kitchen, Martin Europe Between the Wars. London: Routledge, 2013.

Kotkin, Stephen. Stalin. New York: Penguin Press, 2014.

Longerich, Peter. Hitler: A Biography. New York: Oxford University Press, 2019.

Overy, R. J. The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia. New York: W.W. Norton & Co, 2004.

Snyder, Timothy. Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin. New York: Basic Books, 2010.

Suny, Ronald G. Stalin: Passage to Revolution. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2020.