Stephen Kotkin — How Stalin became the most powerful dictator in history

My guest today is Stephen Kotkin, who is a senior  fellow at the Hoover Institution and author of

two-thirds of his three-volume Stalin biographies. The first one, Stalin: Paradoxes of Power.  The second one, Stalin: Waiting for Hitler. Thank you for coming on my podcast.

Thank you for the honor of the invitation. Let's begin with the tsarist regime.  First question, how repressive  was the tsarist regime actually?

Presumably the motivation behind the revolution is  to get rid of this autocracy. But you have these

examples. Lenin's brother tried to kill the tsar. Lenin himself is writing these long manifestos