Overview

Background. The defeat of the Russian Empire in World War I led to the overthrow of the Czar and the seizure of power by the communists. The formation of the USSR followed a brief civil war. The brutal rule of Josef Stalin (1924-1953) strengthened communist dominance of the Soviet Union at a cost of tens of millions of lives. The Soviet economy and society stagnated during the Cold War with the United States and the West despite Russia's powerful military and its achievements in...