FREE: JOSEPH STALIN**USSR OCCUPATION OF GERMANY**1953

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Joseph Stalin was the leader of the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953.
Stalin was appointed General Secretary of the Communist Party's Central Committee in 1922.
He consolidated power following the 1924 death of Vladimir Lenin through expanding the functions of his role, all the while eliminating any opposition.

In August 1939, Stalin entered into a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany. According to the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, Germany would be allowed to invade Poland without Soviet interference. Germany invaded Poland on September 1,1939. Eastern Poland was then invaded and annexed by the Soviet Union in late September,1939. On June 22,1941, Nazi Germany invaded the USSR (Operation Barbarossa) obviously violating the agreement.
Soviet forces managed to halt the Nazi incursion after the decisive battles of Moscow and Stalingrad. After defeating the Axis powers on the Eastern Front, Stalin's Red Army captured Berlin in May 1945.

Stalin led the Soviet Union through its post-war reconstruction, which saw a significant rise in tension with the Western world that would later be known as the Cold War.

Post-war East Germany was a Communist puppet state of the USSR. This German stamp was issued in 1953 under Russian occupation.

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