20th Century Leaders: Joseph Stalin

"He is an unprincipled intriguer, who subordinates everything to the preservation of his own power." - Bukharin on Stalin, 1928.

Paranoid dictator? Brutal liquidator? Respected leader? . . . This book looks behind history's familiar images of Stalin to give an insightful account of the experiences and influences that shaped his character and actions.

It creates a fascinating picture of the man whom Winston Churchill famously described as having inherited a Russia with only a wooden plough, but who left it with nuclear weapons.

The '20th Century Leaders' series profiles the extraordinary personalities behind the key events of the last century. Flamboyant, powerful and ruthless, these are the people whose words and actions dominated the world's stage. Fascinating quotations and archive photographs bring their personalities to life, while authoritative texts analyse their place in history.