Hitler, Stalin, and the Terror

Hitler, Stalin, And the Terror State of the 20th Century

In the history of the 20th century, the actions and legacy of Hitler's Nazi Germany too often overshadow the similar terror-infused events that simultaneously happened in Stalin's Soviet Union. The parallels between the two totalitarian leaders are significant and pervasive, most notably that both developed nations built on state-authorized programs of terror. Our studies of terrorism in the modern era are generally limited to substate actions by fanatics with a political agenda: the IRA, al-Qaeda, or Aum Shinrikyo. But the influence of terror at the state level is no less important and should be considered in its range and depth so at to better understand totalitarian regimes and their methods for enforcing the power of their leaders. Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Soviet Union are historically powerful examples of the ways in which a government can use terror to its own advantage, at the expense of its citizenry.

State terrorism consists of the threatened or perpetrated violence at some victim with the intended effect of inducing terror or fear in some witness, often at a distance. The use of state terrorism will seem, to citizens of the nation, to be sporadic and indiscriminate -- meaning anyone could be targeted at any time for even the smallest of infractions. In Stalin's Soviet Union, the violence of being relocated to a forced labor camp could be used to induce obedience in citizen's working in factories. In Histler's Germany, the atrocities committed against concentration camp prisoners was enough to quell rebellious tendencies amongst the rest of the population, no matter their personal feelings on the matter. Both leaders used the powerful effects of state-sponsored violence on a select few individuals to more capably control the rest of the nation.

Interestingly, and quite unlike what we generally think of as terrorism in the modern age, state terrorism is generally very secretive and does not crave publicity. The possibility of terror is often more terrible than witnessing it first hand. Thus, Hitler's SS and Stalin's Gestapo were able to induce fear and compliance simply because rumors of their methods spread rapidly throughout the population. Stalin's secret police was instrumental in protecting his regime (Bering, 2005). Hitler, too, had his close-knit cadre of followers and enforcers who were willing to carry out the dirty work of protecting Hitler's powerbase and ensuring that threats to that power were eliminated thoroughly and in such a fashion as to terrorize anyone who might make a future threat (Nagorski, 2005).

Beyond the similarities in the mechanisms of their state terrorism, both Hitler and Stalin shared other aspects of their rule, which are evidenced in the vast body of literature that has been produced on each of them in the intervening decades. Both Hitler and Stalin ran regimes of personality; both nations were driven by the charismatic leadership that each provided. A kind of leader worship developed in both countries (Bering, 2005). Hitler and Stalin each became something of demigods to their people, a fact that only helped reinforce their control and allowed citizens to justify the use of terrorism against dissidents. It would have simply seemed that the "troublemakers" were getting what they deserved for daring to defy their seemingly infallible leaders.

Also of note, both Hitler and Stalin came from similar backgrounds, though their eventual methods would differ somewhat. Both came from deprived backgrounds. Both had enormous chips on their shoulders. Both were possessed of an over-inflated sense of destiny that fueled their political ambitions (Bering, 2005). Because Hitler and Stalin were both moral absolutists who saw themselves as the embodiments of their people and their nations, they felt it was justifiable to use terrorism to enforce their regimes. It was a kind of medicine that could be used to excise unwanted aspects of their countries. The Jews were a kind of cancer to Hitler, in much the same way that the Kulaks were for Stalin. In either case, the mechanism of terror was turned against these groups in order to seemingly maintain the health of the nation (Bering, 2005).