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De-Stalinization (Russian: десталинизация, romanized: destalinizatsiya) comprised a series of political reforms in the Soviet Union after the death of long-time leader Joseph Stalin in 1953, and the thaw brought about by ascension of Nikita Khrushchev to power, [1] and his 1956 secret speech "On the Cult of Personality and Its ...
Khrushchev decided that Stalin had made a series of mistakes, such as heavy-handed pressure in Turkey and Iran in 1945 and 1946, and especially heavy pressure on Berlin that led to the failed Berlin blockade in 1948. Germany was a major issue for Khrushchev, not because he feared a NATO invasion eastward, but because it weakened the East German ...
Khrushchev was a staunch party man and lauded Leninism and communist ideology in his speech as often as he condemned Stalin's actions. Stalin, Khrushchev argued, was the primary victim of the deleterious effect of the cult of personality, [19] which, through his existing flaws, had transformed him from a crucial part of the victories of Lenin ...
While Khrushchev's Secret Speech denounced Stalin's personality cult and purges as early as 1956, rehabilitation of Old Bolsheviks proceeded at a slow pace. Nikolai Bukharin and 19 other co-defendants were officially completely rehabilitated in February 1988.
Khrushchev was one of the more complex and prominent political figures of the 20th century. He was known for his often contradictory decisions and political leadership. While he supported the Great Purge and authorized thousands of arrests and executions when Stalin was in power, he denounced these actions upon Stalin's death. He conspired in ...
On 25 February, the last day of the Congress, it was announced that an unscheduled session had been called for the Soviet delegates. First Secretary Khrushchev's morning speech began with vague references to the harmful consequences of elevating a single individual so high that he took on the "supernatural characteristics akin to those of a god".
The Khrushchev Thaw (Russian: хрущёвская о́ттепель, romanized: khrushchovskaya ottepel, IPA: [xrʊˈɕːɵfskəjə ˈotʲːɪpʲɪlʲ] or simply ottepel) [1] is the period from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s when repression and censorship in the Soviet Union were relaxed due to Nikita Khrushchev's policies of de-Stalinization [2] and peaceful coexistence with other nations.
After Stalin's death, Nikita Khrushchev's 1956 "Secret Speech" to the Twentieth Party Congress famously denounced Stalin's cult of personality, saying, "It is impermissible and foreign to the spirit of Marxism-Leninism to elevate one person, to transform him into a superman possessing supernatural characteristics akin to those of a god."