Introduction The period of 1921-1940 within the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was one of enormous change. It saw the implementation of the Five-Year Plans, industrialisation, socialism and a wave of terror. Joseph Stalin was dictator of the USSR from 1929-53 and a key driving force behind the cohesion ... . We must make good this distance in 10 years. Either we do it, or we shall be crushed ". The achievements of the plans were impressive. Production increases between 1927-37 saw a rise in electricity by 700%, coal by 250% and oil by 400%. The Plans brought prosperity and strengt...

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... Mao. Nevertheless, the ideal of moral force was still a potent one in China even after the Communist takeover. It is noteworthy that Shirk feels that the Chinese Communist Party leaders saw economic reform as a way to regain their and their party's moral virtue even after Mao's death. Thus, paradoxically, by demonstrating their expertise in a more practical area of competence, the ... investment in the society's infrastructure and the establishment of a "judicial system that is based firmly on the principle of equality before the law" (Cheung 32). Echoing Cheung's sentiments, James Dor...

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... war only helped to highlight the potential disputes. In 1927, this was bought to the surface when the British government raided the Soviet trade mission in London. The Soviet government saw this and other signs as an indication of an anti-Communist conspiracy. Industrialisation was made out to be patriotic by the government and formed an essential pillar in Stalins cry ... were ultimately improved greatly by the five-year plans. Whilst immediately, conditions plummeted as workers were forced to live in huts and tents on the outskirts of the cities, Stalin saw the value in a motivated an...

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... nor outside the camps admitted that they all had an equal right to freedom. Ivan witnessed people's natural longing to escape and be back with their families, but he also saw how a man could leave the camp, become a free laborer, and succumb to an even greater imprisonment brought on by the fear of their own thoughts, being arrested again and an ... factors that led Russia into the era of collectivization and the Terror. Not only is there blame to be placed on leaders and followers making victims out of who they saw fit, the centuries old history of hardships of Russian life resounds th...

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The brink of the French Revolution saw the fall of Louis XVI, and with his kingship lost, the path was clear for the rise of a powerful and influential military commander; Napoleon Bonaparte. Napoleon became the emperor of ... time later. Napoleon Bonaparte's conquests were extraordinary. Despite his downfall, he is generally remembered as one of the greatest military commanders of all time. The brink of the French Revolution saw the fall of Louis XVI. His kingship gone set the path for the rise of one of the greatest military commanders of all time. Napoleon Bonaparte rose as the emperor .....

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... clear camps and only strengthen the tensions during the period. In addition all the countries in Europe took an a traditional approach towards war and saw it has an opportunity to gain something out of the war and some saw it has a good opportunity to deflect its own domestic issues. However other factors contributed to the reasons why there was a war and they ... ...

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... since the Soviet Union had large untapped reserves of natural resources and a huge peasant population that could be put to work in heavy industry by compulsion. The Soviet economy never saw the need to shift to a pattern whereby the increases in production would be achieved primarily through growth in the overall productivity of labor and capital. The lack of productivity was ... from communism. Alcoholism and absenteeism, which surfaced in the workforce, were also taking its toll on the military. Defense Spending and the Cold War After World War II, Joseph Stalin saw the world as divid...

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... -Communism of the most militant shades had a firm foundation among those ethnic groups with roots in Eastern Europe, communities for whom the name of Yalta was an abomination, and who saw American liberals as despicably soft of the Communist menace. These ethnic groups view the decisions made at Yalta as a political betrayal of their respective nations. When the Polish American Congress ... Roosevelt Soviet agreement to participate in the United Nations seemed so important that it justified concessions on what, at the time of Yalta, seemed less important points. Winston Churchill perhaps...

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... became classed as bureaucrats were paid for loyalty with material wealth, allowing them a better standard of living, because of this public interests were placed secondary to personal gain. The 1980's saw a dramatic drop in the Soviet citizens already impoverished standard of living. This caused strikes and public outcry against the administration which threatened the stability of the Soviet Union. The people ... the Russian Federation is far from being democratic. The government acted too quickly in it's economic reforms with not enough practical experience in Democratic/Capitalistic t...

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... had informed his wife of the disaster. Shortly thereafter, on November 8, 1932, Nadezhda shot herself. It was the end of any trace of "normal" family life for Stalin, and witnesses saw tears in his eyes at her funeral--the only report that we have of the great dictator crying. Meanwhile, Stalin remained the unquestioned master of the Soviet Union, with all ... not a new attachment--Marxist claptrap had long dominated true science in the Soviet Union, especially in the biological sciences. He also continued in his constant political plottings, and, as always, saw enemies everywhere. In 1...

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... rest of Europe, mainly in terms of military and technological development and Peter believed that unless something was done Russia would emerge from this period stunted and vulnerable. He also saw that to combat this problem Russia would have to go through great changes not only in terms of increased military strength but just as importantly in terms of her culture ... creation of the alliance against Sweden and eventually to the war in the North, which was possibly, Peter the Great's greatest attempt at cutting a window into Europe. Peter the Great saw Sweden as his stepping-stone into...

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Suprematism and Constructivism Suprematism was a term created in 1915 by Kazimir Malevich. The word Suprematism itself implied the supremacy of this new art in relation to the past. Malevich saw it as aesthetic and was concerned only with form, free from any political or social meaning. He stressed the purity of shape, particularly of the square, and he regarded suprematism ... out into space, articulating a complex volume whose shadow was still more complex and variable. In their program in April 1921, written by Gan, the Constructivists emphasized that they no longer saw an autonomous func...

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... peasants who didn't join collectives would move into urban industrial employment. To begin with, many farmers decided against collectivisation but progressively the peasant's "voluntary" collectivization became brutally forceful as Stalin saw a great need for a dictator-like leadership to bring his country to industrial prowess. As collectivization was forced upon farmers throughout rural areas a problem became obvious; with a high percentage of grain ... oriented quite differently from the first; they focused more on the production of machinery in factories and was more realistic than ...

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... order and wanting to destruct the old in order for something new to be formed. The novel had been written as a response by Turgenev to the cultural division that he saw between the growing nihilist movement and the liberals. The Nihilists who can also be seen as the "sons" in this particular novel, sought changes in social structure that ... ...

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... emotional side. Gladkov provides a thorough, gruesome account of Dasha's experience with the Cossacks: "With dead eyes, Dasha looked at the torturing of her comrades. Dumb, with bursting brain she saw only blood which boiled and bubbled like the moving sea"(Gladkov 165). Explicit descriptions of torture and rape permit the audience to understand the experience Dasha underwent. It then ... ...

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... the death penalty. The Kornilov affair came about as Kerensky and Kornilov had different strategies on how to restore order in the Provisional Government. A miscommunication between the pair involving V.N. Lvov saw the two lose trust for one another. Kornilov believed that Kerensky wished for him to become a dictator, whilst Kerensky thought that Kornilov wanted to be a dictator, so Kerensky believed that ... ...

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... did not travel like a leisured gentleman looking at works of art, but went as a workman in order to learn useful crafts, new techniques, especially in shipbuilding and sailing, he also saw Anatomical theater, visited factories and workshopsviii. When Peter returned to Moscovy, he started make changes in Russians lifestyle, the first thing was decree that men should shave their beards, wearing ... ...

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... of foreign markets, shipping and investments, the restriction of its boundaries, and the occupation of the Ruhr, made it very hard for Germany to rebound from its financial depression. Hitler saw all of this economic hardship and began to rally the people of Germany behind their collective hate of the Treaty of Versailles (by calling it a national humiliation) and called for ... ...

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... idea of a total communist government, and began talks with the west. Once he took sides with the west and wanted to put more western capitalist ideas into place, the Russians saw that as a threat to their goal of spreading communism in the Middle East. On December 27th, 1979, a group of Spetsnaz, or Russian Special Forces, assaulted the presidential palace where Amin ... ...

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... city did not fall, after the war it earned the title of "Hero City." Nine Soviet scientists starved whilst protecting the world's largest seed bank, refusing to eat what they saw as their nations future . Brutality The Eastern Front from 1941-45 was "the most terrible place in the course of human history. Whilst not to condone Soviet atrocities their barbarity ... ...

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... the conventional views held to that point. Revisionists challenged the orthodox idea that U.S foreign policy after World War II was anything but righteous and compassionate; on the contrary, revisionist scholars saw eagerness by the US to promote its own securities abroad. In an article written in 1976 for the journal Peace and Change, Athan Theoharis states that revisionists "challenged the orthodox ... ...

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... economic modernization. China has been the least changed by the ending of the Cold War since its great shift in course came a decade earlier, at the end of 1970s which saw the development of Deng Xiaoping's program of economic reform. The post Cold War era sees China more firmly committed to a capitalist vision, with its focus on economic modernization and growth ... ...

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... warn people against the evils and dangers of alcohol. Thus, the country's lone provider of alcohol was the leader in opposing its consumption. Despite the irony, many in the country saw the formation of the Guardianship as an example and formed their own temperance societies. Herlihy spends the majority of her book discussing the efforts of these societies to combat alcohol ... ...

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... , suspicion from both sides led Stalin to sign his own, non aggression, pact with Hitler in August 1939 (see Appendix II) . Stalin's policies toward the nazi Germany were controversial. Stalin saw an allie on Hitler. He believed, despite Hitler's known beliefs about the Slavs and the communists, that he could co-operate with him. Towards this end, he helped Hitler's rise ... ...

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... War II, got arrested by the Soviet counterintelligence for criticizing Stalin in his letters to a friend. He was sentenced to eight years and was sent to a labor camp. There he saw and experienced himself the plight of Ivan Denisovich in One Day In The Life of Ivan Denisovich and Oleg Kostoglotov in Cancer Ward. In 1954 after his sentence was finished ... ...

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