xy

Telegram to government aviation production plant superintendents by Stalin in the autumn of 1941, warning them to produce more Il-2 Sturmovik ground attack aircraft for national defense.

Stalin's speeches, writings and authorised interviews
Context: You have let down our country and our Red Army. You have the nerve not to manufacture IL-2s until now. Our Red Army now needs IL-2 aircraft like the air it breathes, like the bread it eats. Shenkman produces one IL-2 a day and Tretyakov builds one or two MiG-3s daily. It is a mockery of our country and the Red Army. I ask you not to try the government's patience, and demand that you manufacture more ILs. This is my final warning.

Said in April, 1945, as quoted in Conversations with Stalin (1963) by Milovan Djilas
Contemporary witnesses
Context: This war is not as in the past; whoever occupies a territory also imposes on it his own social system. Everyone imposes his own system as far as his army can reach. It cannot be otherwise. If now there is not a communist government in Paris, this is only because Russia has no an army which can reach Paris in 1945.

Stalin's article "Our purposes" Pravda #1, (22 January 1912)
Stalin's speeches, writings and authorised interviews

from &quot;From (the) Editors&quot; (1901) an article in a socialist newspaper-- Stalin was one of the editors (aged 22) http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1901/09/x01.htm#* <br class="br">Stalin&#x27;s speeches, writings and authorised interviews <br class="br">Context: From the point of view of the onlooker, the question of the existence of a Georgian newspaper in general, and the question of its content and trend in particular, may seem to settle themselves naturally and simply: the Georgian Social-Democratic movement is not a separate, exclusively Georgian, working-class movement with its own separate programme; it goes hand in hand with the entire Russian movement and, consequently, accepts the authority of the Russian Social-Democratic Party—hence it is clear that a Georgian Social-Democratic newspaper should be only a local organ that deals mainly with local questions and reflects the local movement. But behind this reply lurks a difficulty which we cannot ignore and which we shall inevitably encounter. We refer to the language difficulty. While the Central Committee of the Russian Social-Democratic Party is able to explain all general questions with the aid of the all-Party newspaper and leave it to the regional committees to deal only with local questions, the Georgian newspaper finds itself in a difficulty as regards content. The Georgian newspaper must simultaneously play the part of an all-Party and of a regional, or local organ. As the majority of Georgian working-class readers cannot freely read the Russian newspaper, the editors of the Georgian newspaper have no right to pass over those questions which the all-Party Russian newspaper is discussing, and should discuss. Thus, the Georgian newspaper must inform its readers about all questions of principle concerning theory and tactics. At the same time it must lead the local movement and throw proper light on every event, without leaving a single fact unexplained, and providing answers to all questions that excite the local workers. The Georgian newspaper must link up and unite the Georgian and Russian militant workers The newspaper must inform its readers about everything that interests them at home, in Russia and abroad.

Speech &quot;The Elections in St. Petersburg&quot; (January 1913) http://marx2mao.com/Stalin/ESP13.html <br class="br">Stalin&#x27;s speeches, writings and authorised interviews

In Russian: Я считаю, что совершенно неважно, кто и как будет в партии голосовать; но вот что чрезвычайно важно, это - кто и как будет считать голоса. <br class="br">Said in 1923, as quoted in The Memoirs of Stalin&#x27;s Former Secretary http://www.panrus.com/books/details.php?langID=1&amp;bookID=5905 (1992) by Boris Bazhanov [Saint Petersburg] (Борис Бажанов. Воспоминания бывшего секретаря Сталина). (Text online in Russian) http://lib.ru/MEMUARY/BAZHANOW/stalin.txt. <br class="br">Variant (loose) translation: The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything. <br class="br">Contemporary witnesses

from &quot;The Social-Democratic View of the National Question&quot;, 1904 (aged 26) http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1904/09/01.htm <br class="br">Stalin&#x27;s speeches, writings and authorised interviews

Report to the Seventeenth Party Congress on the Work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1934/01/26.htm (January 26, 1934) <br class="br">Stalin&#x27;s speeches, writings and authorised interviews <br class="br">Context: Still others think that war should be organised by a &quot;superior race,&quot; say, the German &quot;race,&quot; against an &quot;inferior race,&quot; primarily against the Slavs; that only such a war can provide a way out of the situation, for it is the mission of the &quot;superior race&quot; to render the &quot;inferior race&quot; fruitful and to rule over it. Let us assume that this queer theory, which is as far removed from science as the sky from the earth, let us assume that this queer theory is put into practice. What may be the result of that? It is well known that ancient Rome looked upon the ancestors of the present-day Germans and French in the same way as the representatives of the &quot;superior race&quot; now look upon the Slav races. It is well known that ancient Rome treated them as an &quot;inferior race,&quot; as &quot;barbarians,&quot; destined to live in eternal subordination to the &quot;superior race,&quot; to &quot;great Rome&quot;, and, between ourselves be it said, ancient Rome had some grounds for this, which cannot be said of the representatives of the &quot;superior race&quot; of today. (Thunderous applause.) But what was the upshot of this? The upshot was that the non-Romans, i. e., all the &quot;barbarians,&quot; united against the common enemy and brought Rome down with a crash. The question arises: What guarantee is there that the claims of the representatives of the &quot;superior race&quot; of today will not lead to the same lamentable results? What guarantee is there that the fascist literary politicians in Berlin will be more fortunate than the old and experienced conquerors in Rome? Would it not be more correct to assume that the opposite will be the case?

Address to the Reception of Directors and Stakhanovites of the Metal Industry and the Coal Mining Industry http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1937/10/29.htm (29 October 1937) <br class="br">Stalin&#x27;s speeches, writings and authorised interviews <br class="br">Context: The confidence of the people in the worker-directors of the economy is a great thing, Comrades. The leaders come and go, but the people remain. Only the people are immortal, everything else is ephemeral. That is why it is necessary to appreciate the full value of the confidence of the people.

At the funeral of his first wife, Kato Svanidze, on 25 November 1907, as quoted in Young Stalin (2007) by Simon Sebag Montefiore, p. 193
Contemporary witnesses

Interview http://www.rationalrevolution.net/special/library/cc835_44.htm with H. G. Wells (September 1937) <br class="br">Stalin&#x27;s speeches, writings and authorised interviews

Anarchism or Socialism (1906)
Context: We are not the kind of people who, when the word "anarchism" is mentioned, turn away contemptuously and say with a supercilious wave of the hand: "Why waste time on that, it's not worth talking about!" We think that such cheap "criticism" is undignified and useless.
Nor are we the kind of people who console themselves with the thought that the Anarchists "have no masses behind them and, therefore, are not so dangerous." It is not who has a larger or smaller "mass" following today, but the essence of the doctrine that matters. If the "doctrine" of the Anarchists expresses the truth, then it goes without saying that it will certainly hew a path for itself and will rally the masses around itself. If, however, it is unsound and built up on a false foundation, it will not last long and will remain suspended in mid-air. But the unsoundness of anarchism must be proved.
Some people believe that Marxism and anarchism are based on the same principles and that the disagreements between them concern only tactics, so that, in the opinion of these people, no distinction whatsoever can be drawn between these two trends.
This is a great mistake.
We believe that the Anarchists are real enemies of Marxism. Accordingly, we also hold that a real struggle must be waged against real enemies.

Remark to Nikita Khrushchev and Anastas Mikoyan as quoted in &quot;Khrushchev: Notes from a Forbidden Land&quot;, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,904531-4,00.html Time, 30 November 1970, citing the publication of an installment of Khrushchev&#x27;s reminiscences in Life that week. <br class="br">Contemporary witnesses

Variant: Those who vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything.

Anarchism or Socialism (1906)
Context: We are not the kind of people who, when the word "anarchism" is mentioned, turn away contemptuously and say with a supercilious wave of the hand: "Why waste time on that, it's not worth talking about!" We think that such cheap "criticism" is undignified and useless.
Nor are we the kind of people who console themselves with the thought that the Anarchists "have no masses behind them and, therefore, are not so dangerous." It is not who has a larger or smaller "mass" following today, but the essence of the doctrine that matters. If the "doctrine" of the Anarchists expresses the truth, then it goes without saying that it will certainly hew a path for itself and will rally the masses around itself. If, however, it is unsound and built up on a false foundation, it will not last long and will remain suspended in mid-air. But the unsoundness of anarchism must be proved.
Some people believe that Marxism and anarchism are based on the same principles and that the disagreements between them concern only tactics, so that, in the opinion of these people, no distinction whatsoever can be drawn between these two trends.
This is a great mistake.
We believe that the Anarchists are real enemies of Marxism. Accordingly, we also hold that a real struggle must be waged against real enemies.

Report to the Seventeenth Party Congress on the Work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1934/01/26.htm (January 26, 1934) <br class="br">Stalin&#x27;s speeches, writings and authorised interviews <br class="br">Context: Still others think that war should be organised by a &quot;superior race,&quot; say, the German &quot;race,&quot; against an &quot;inferior race,&quot; primarily against the Slavs; that only such a war can provide a way out of the situation, for it is the mission of the &quot;superior race&quot; to render the &quot;inferior race&quot; fruitful and to rule over it. Let us assume that this queer theory, which is as far removed from science as the sky from the earth, let us assume that this queer theory is put into practice. What may be the result of that? It is well known that ancient Rome looked upon the ancestors of the present-day Germans and French in the same way as the representatives of the &quot;superior race&quot; now look upon the Slav races. It is well known that ancient Rome treated them as an &quot;inferior race,&quot; as &quot;barbarians,&quot; destined to live in eternal subordination to the &quot;superior race,&quot; to &quot;great Rome&quot;, and, between ourselves be it said, ancient Rome had some grounds for this, which cannot be said of the representatives of the &quot;superior race&quot; of today. (Thunderous applause.) But what was the upshot of this? The upshot was that the non-Romans, i. e., all the &quot;barbarians,&quot; united against the common enemy and brought Rome down with a crash. The question arises: What guarantee is there that the claims of the representatives of the &quot;superior race&quot; of today will not lead to the same lamentable results? What guarantee is there that the fascist literary politicians in Berlin will be more fortunate than the old and experienced conquerors in Rome? Would it not be more correct to assume that the opposite will be the case?

Anarchism or Socialism (1906)
Context: We are not the kind of people who, when the word "anarchism" is mentioned, turn away contemptuously and say with a supercilious wave of the hand: "Why waste time on that, it's not worth talking about!" We think that such cheap "criticism" is undignified and useless.
Nor are we the kind of people who console themselves with the thought that the Anarchists "have no masses behind them and, therefore, are not so dangerous." It is not who has a larger or smaller "mass" following today, but the essence of the doctrine that matters. If the "doctrine" of the Anarchists expresses the truth, then it goes without saying that it will certainly hew a path for itself and will rally the masses around itself. If, however, it is unsound and built up on a false foundation, it will not last long and will remain suspended in mid-air. But the unsoundness of anarchism must be proved.
Some people believe that Marxism and anarchism are based on the same principles and that the disagreements between them concern only tactics, so that, in the opinion of these people, no distinction whatsoever can be drawn between these two trends.
This is a great mistake.
We believe that the Anarchists are real enemies of Marxism. Accordingly, we also hold that a real struggle must be waged against real enemies.

Often attributed to Stalin and Marx, according to the book, They Never Said It (1989), p. 64, the phrase derives from a rumour that Lenin said this to one of his close associates, Grigori Zinoviev, not long after a meeting of the Politburo in the early 1920s, but there is no evidence that he ever did. It has also been believed that Lenin may have expressed that the profit motive cannot be undone in that "If we were to hang the last capitalist, another would suddenly appear to sell us the rope". Experts on the Soviet Union reject the rope quote as spurious. However, it is established that Lenin did remark on the same underlying theme (even if not in reference to rope), namely, that capitalists in their addiction to high profits could not help themselves from selling things to a socialist state, even if it was against their own long-term interests by strengthening an enemy; Edvard Radzinsky covers it in his discussion of Lenin's comments on the "deaf-mutes" in Radzinsky's biography of Stalin.
Misattributed