WI: Stalin dies in April, 1945

[Minnesota_Nationalist]

Stalin, one of the most evil people of all time... Do I really need to introduce Stalin to you guys? You should know who he is and how bad he is.

Anyways, what I want to look at is if Stalin died at the end of the Second World War, at a point where victory would be inevitable, probably around the same point as FDR. IOTL, following WWII, Stalin implement puppets across Eastern Europe, have the USSR develop its first nukes, and in general start antagonizing the West, beginning the Cold War.

Now, what if Stalin were to die before being able to implement these? Who would succeed him? Kalinin, Perhaps? Whoever Stalin's successor is while have a lot on their hands: Potsdam, the fate of Eastern Europe, Japan, China, Nukes, and the Cold War (if there'll be one). Will Europe still fall to Communist puppets? Would they declare war on Japan? How would they interact with Truman and Churchill (and later Attlee)? How would Churchill React, now that the Devil himself is dead?

 

[Tehshudge]

Even though Stalin's successor would likely not share his sheer ruthlessness, they would still have at least a basic sense of realpolitik and would certainly try to leverage their (as you said, inevitable) victory for the gain of the Soviet Union as much as possible. It's almost certain that a similar policy in central/eastern Europe would manifest itself.

Recall that the uprisings in Hungary and the Czech Republic were crushed by Khrushchev and Brezhnev, rather than Stalin. Heavy-handedness towards satellite states was a feature of the regime, rather than a bug of the Stalin administration. Add to that the fact that if Stalin dies during the war, that he's almost certainly getting replaced by Malenkov or Beria, and things don't look rosier than OTL.

If Malenkov takes the reins, the Soviet Union basically has a mini-Stalin with a bit less cunning on its hands, and he isn't scheduled to die until 1988. Unless he gets ousted It's not hard to imagine that the Cold War proceeds as planned, only without any thawing of relations with the west in the 1960s. Basically, I would imagine a timeline initially very similar to our own, only with less civil liberties and a slightly higher chance of the Cold War going hot.

Beria is a bit more of a wild card. He was seemingly pushing for a high level of political openness following Stalin's death, but anybody who knows three things about the man knows that he was possibly the most brutal person in Stalin's administration, as well as a serial rapist. If he somehow ended up with the top job, he would probably be hampered by opposition from various forces in the Kremlin, as well as his own brutality and incompetence. From this point, the timeline butterflies out into something that probably doesn't resemble our own at all.

 

[Mark E.]

If Malenkov takes the reins, the Soviet Union basically has a mini-Stalin with a bit less cunning on its hands, and he isn't scheduled to die until 1988. Unless he gets ousted It's not hard to imagine that the Cold War proceeds as planned, only without any thawing of relations with the west in the 1960s. Basically, I would imagine a timeline initially very similar to our own, only with less civil liberties and a slightly higher chance of the Cold War going hot.

Then the USSR might remain a closed country through the introduction of the world wide web. Would there likely be a USSR and Cold War to this day?

 

[Masked Grizzly]

With this POD what would be needed for the USSR (and whatever countries become part of the Eastern Bloc) to develop an automobile industry more comparable with the West (and Japan) compared to OTL without completely ditching Communism (nor accelerating/prolonging the Cold War)?

Since the various OTL prototypes the USSR (and Eastern bloc) developed until the end of Cold War appeared to be fairly competitive to Western/Japanese rivals, though financial issues / etc precluded them from reaching production.

 

[thorr97]

A lot depends on when, exactly, the "Man of Steel" dies off. The Battle of Berlin ran from April 16 to May 2 of '45 in OTL. Germany officially surrendered on May 7th and the Potsdam Conference started on July 17th.

I don't think that whoever "the Guy In Charge Back There In Moscow" mattered much to the Red Army in terms of pressing the overall offensives against the Wehrmacht. Stalin did play one of his generals off against the others when it came to who would get the glory of being the one to take Berlin. Absent that game playing the date Berlin falls could shift around a little bit and there would be the ensuing honors and higher stature, post-war, of whichever general's troops got the Hammer & Sickle raised over the Reichstag. That, in turn, could have an affect on which of the new "power elite" in the post-war world was among the top dogs of the USSR. Khrushchev, for instance, benefited from his close relationship to Zhukov. A different marshal of the Soviet Union gets the glory then it might not be Little Nikky who gets the benefit.

As to Eastern Europe? That's a done deal. The Red Army was already occupying almost the entirety of it by that point in the war so, unless the new leader of the Soviet peoples becomes unusually generous and eager to accommodate the wishes of the evil capitalist oppressors of the working class, then the Soviets are going to keep what they just bled liberating. So, come war's end there will be one "spontaneous" Communist regime being installed in those countries.

Depending on how intense the power play turns out, the Soviets might simply not have the time or attention span to get involved in the Far East. Stalin was an opportunist and recognized and silver platter presented gift when the Allies handed him one with their begging for help against the Japanese. Now, without the grasping hands of Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili on the tiller to guide the Soviet ship of state, that gift might not be seized so readily.

Maybe the new leader isn't sure enough of his newly acquired position to risk such a redeployment of the nation's defenders to the far away Far East. Also, would the new Guy In Charge Back There In Moscow be so trusting of all that intel about the Atom Bomb? And then, once the Americans had loosed such "Instant Sunshine" not once but twice, would he be so dismissive of its effects as was Uncle Joe?

For the best possible outcome of a Dead Stalin In 1945 I'd opt for the monster's dying off just before Hitler. Then there'd be a wonderful scramble in Moscow for who'd get to claim the throne. A scramble so intense, so bloody, and so decimating that the Allies could get no help against Japan. The Great Patriotic War would still end on cue but at least China and Korea wouldn't wind up so Red. Japan would still get the world's largest deposits of Trinitite - at least until the boys at Los Alamos lit some more of their gadgets off to test their new designs - and the world would get to settle in to not being in a world war.

Eastern Europe would thus be bound up tighter and the USSR would be more insular but somewhat less interventionist for at least the next few years. It would have fewer opportunities for such international destabilization without being as involved in China and Korea as in OTL.

Beyond that, it'd really depend on who came out on top in that succession struggle in Moscow.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

Also, would the new Guy In Charge Back There In Moscow be so trusting of all that intel about the Atom Bomb?

Given all the extremely capable nuclear physicists who would be backing it up, probably yes.

China and Korea wouldn't wind up so Red.

Korea, sure. China though was pretty well already set. That was determined by it's internal politics, not by anything Stalin did. I'm dubious that the scramble would be as bloody and decimating as you described it given that OTL it didn't happen after Stalin croaked, although I imagine they'd still all gang up on Beria, but even a less bloody power struggle doesn't preclude someone less adventurous then either Stalin or Khruschev coming to power.

 

[David T]

To quote an old post of mine (about Stalin's likely successor if he had died in 1946, but I don 't think 1945 makes that much difference):

***

Zhdanov was often mentioned as a possible successor to Stalin at the time. The problem, however, is that his health was already poor, due in part to heavy drinking. My guess is that even if he does come to power (he could indeed become General Secretary, though if he does so it might be as part of a deal limiting the General Secretary's power) he will not last too long (Stalin is sometimes accused of killing him, but it is just as plausible that without Stalin around, Zhdanov will die even earlier, since apparently Stalin did at least try to restrain Zhdanov's drinking [1]). After his death, a Malenkov-Beria alliance will (as in OTL with the "Leningrad Affair") probably take vengeance against his supporters. Molotov might serve as Prime Minister--a position not as powerful as it sounds (the fact that Rykov was kept on in the post well after the defeat of the "Rightists" and Bulganin for some time after the defeat of the "Anti-Party Group" is evidence of this). Khrushchev might survive the factional strife; he was helped by the fact that people tended to underestimate him, to think of him as a dumb muzhik, etc.

Soviet domination of the "people's democracies" was pretty much a fait accompli by 1946, and I don't see any plausible successor to Stalin reversing this. It is, however, possible that Malenkov and Beria will show more flexibility than Stalin on German unification--as they apparently did in 1953. But there would still probably be a considerable divergence between the terms they would want for German unification and those acceptable to the West.

[1] At least according to Khrushchev: "Before his death, Zhdanov had been in poor health for some time. I don't know what he was suffering from, but one of his ailments was that he had lost his will power and was not able to control himself when it came to drinking. It was pitiful to watch. I even remember that in the last days of Zhdanov's life, Stalin used to shout at him to stop drinking. This was an astounding thing because Stalin usually encouraged people to get drunk. But he compelled Zhdanov to drink fruit water and suffer while the rest of us were drinking wine or something stronger." http://spartacus-educational.com/RUSzhdanov.htm

 

[sloreck]

The only possible change I see in Europe would be Czechoslovakia. It is possible that absent Stalin, the coup does not happen and Czechoslovakia is neutral or even somewhat western aligned. As far as the rest of Eastern Europe, its a done deal. Tito will still avoid being roped in, I can't see a Stalin successor putting more pressure on Tito than was already applied.

As far as Beria taking over, IMHO this is possible only if Stalin's death is only known to him for long enough for him to kill off some of the folks who would band together to get rid of him. He had no allies in the party or army, and the one thing most of the level below Stalin could agree on was that Beria had to go as soon as possible.

 

[Minnesota_Nationalist]

The only possible change I see in Europe would be Czechoslovakia. It is possible that absent Stalin, the coup does not happen and Czechoslovakia is neutral or even somewhat western aligned. As far as the rest of Eastern Europe, its a done deal. Tito will still avoid being roped in, I can't see a Stalin successor putting more pressure on Tito than was already applied.

To be fair, the reason Stalin didn't put more pressure on Tito was that he was a bit busy with Korea, saying something along the lines of "Korea first, then Tito." If there is no Korean war (I'm not going to discount it entirely, whether it be through more conventional civil war or Mao getting a bit ballsy), then the Soviets would be free to take on Tito.