Joseph Stalin, born Ioseb Dzhugashvili in 1878 in Gori, then part of the Russian Empire, led the Soviet Union from the late 1920s until his death in 1953. After the 1917 revolution he rose through the Bolshevik Party and became General Secretary of its Central Committee in 1922.

He is best known for the five-year plans of rapid industrialization, the collectivization of agriculture, and his leadership of the Soviet Union through the Second World War. Historians continue to debate his legacy, and the human cost of his policies, including famine and mass repression, is widely documented. This version draws on that documented record.

Someone who texts this version is usually curious about twentieth-century history, Soviet politics, or how