Date of Issue: January 4, 1943

KEY DATES 1879 Born on December 21. 1922 Becomes Secretary General of the Communist Party. 1928-53 Rules the Soviet Union with dictatorial force, ordering massive slaughter of his opponents. 1939 Signs "non-aggression pact" with Hitler. 1941 Stunned by Hitler’s attack on Russia, Stalin eventually beats back German invasion and extends Communism to much of Eastern Europe. 1953 Dies on March 5 in Moscow.

He stopped Hitler from conquering Russia
The year 1942 was a year of blood and strength. The man whose name means steel in Russian, whose few words of English include the American expression "tough guy," was the man of 1942. Only Joseph Stalin fully knew how close Russia stood to defeat in 1942, and only Joseph Stalin fully knew how he brought Russia through.

	Had German soldiers taken over Stalingrad, Hitler would have been not only man of the year, but the undisputed master of Europe.

But the whole world knew what the alternative would have been. The man who knew it best of all was Adolf Hitler, who found his past accomplishments turning into dust. Had German soldiers swept past steel-stubborn Stalingrad and destroyed Russia’s ability to fight back, Hitler would have been not only man of the year, but also the undisputed master of Europe, looking for other continents to conquer. He could have sent at least 250 victorious divisions to make new conquests in Asia and Africa. But Joseph Stalin stopped him. Stalin had done it before — in 1941 — when he started with all of Russia intact. But Stalin’s achievement of 1942 was far greater because his resources were fart scarcer.

During 1941, Stalin had sold more than 400,000 miles of territory in order to save most of his army. Gone was nearly half of Russia’s best farmland. Gone was a fib fraction — how large only he news — of the precious tanks, planes and war equipment.

Stalin had only one new resource in 1942: the help of the U.S. But as events were to prove, that was to come late and to be bottlenecked by German attacks.

In his birch-paneled office within the dark-towered Kremlin, Joseph Stalin worked at his desk 16-18 hours a day. Before him he kept a huge globe showing the course of the fighting. There were new steaks of grey in his hair and new etchings of fatigue in his granite face. But there was no break in his hold on Russia.

To keep his home front intact, Stalin had only work and black bread to offer. He added a promise of victory in 1942 and called to his people to sacrifice collectively, to preserve the things they had built collectively. Children and women foraged in forests for wood. Apartments went unheated, electricity was turned off four days a week. At year’s end the Russian children had no new toys for the New Year’s celebration. There was no smoked salmon, no goose, no vodka, no coffee for the grownups. But there was rejoicing. The Motherland had been saved for the second time in two years, and now victory and peace could not be too far off.