Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (18 December 1878 - 5 March 1953) was the first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee from 1922 until his death in 1953. While formally the office of the General Secretary was elective and was not initially regarded as top position in the Soviet state; after Vladimir Lenin's death in 1924; Stalin managed to consolidate more and more power in his hands; gradually putting down all opposition groups within the party.

Stalin's idea of socialism in one country became the primary line of the Soviet politics. He dominated Soviet politics and the USSR through the Great Purges of the 1930s; then the catastrophic Second World War; remaining in power until his death in 1953.