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While Lenin masterminded the revolution from Geneva and Trotsky formed the first Workers' Soviet in St. Petersburg, Stalin wrote fiery pamphlets in Georgia: "Russia is like a loaded gun, at full cock, ready to go off at the slightest concussion. Rally around the Party Committees . . . Only they can lead us in a worthy manner." Thus early he revealed his bent: control through committees. But what committees! "Our committees ought at once to set out to arm the people . . . to set up regional centers for the collection of arms, to organize workshops for the preparation of ... explosives." The revolution failed, Trotsky was sent to Siberia, and Koba's young wife died of tuberculosis. These were hard days for Koba, the Indomitable.
Disappointing Eagle. But his pamphlets had caught the eye of Lenin. That year young Djugashvili met the famous Lenin at a party conference in Finland. At that point (as today), Lenin was a certified god in the world Pantheon of social progress, but hard-boiled Djugashvili was not impressed: "I had hoped to see the mountain eagle of our party," he wrote. "How great was my disappointment to see a most ordinary looking man, below average height, in no way distinguishable from ordinary mortals."
But, listening to Lenin's cold, hard logic, Stalin became a devoted disciple. A cold and careful mind responded to a cold and brilliant mind. The party was flat broke and Koba became the appropriations member of the Caucasian Bolshevik Bureau, i.e., he directed "fighting squads" which robbed banks, public treasuries, steamships. His biggest haul: a quarter of a million rubles in a stickup in the main square of Tiflis. Among those arrested as a result of this raid was Litvinov, future Commissar for Foreign Affairs, who was trying to dispose of the loot in Paris. Koba, although on the police "wanted" list, managed to keep in the background. He was a terrorist, but a terrorist who operated through committees. This was caution; none ever questioned his personal courage.
Mass Leader. Czarist rule toughened. Koba spent a total of seven of the next ten years in prison. During periods of freedom he organized the oil workers in Baku which, he afterwards said, "hardened me as a practical fighter ... I first learned what it means to lead masses of workers." He began using the name Stalin (Man of Steel).
In 1912 the young (33) terrorist visited Cracow, where Lenin, in exile, trying to build up a group of hard-core professional revolutionaries inside Russia, was delighted with him, wrote to Maxim Gorky about his "wonderful Georgian." In Vienna he met Trotsky, who paused to note "the glint of animosity" in "Stalin's yellow eyes." Stalin wrote in Pravda (which he had helped to found): "Trotsky's childish plan for the merging of the unmergeable [Bolsheviks and Mensheviks] has proved him ... a common, noisy champion with faked muscles." In St. Petersburg in 1913, police got wind of Stalin's presence at a party musical matinee. His friends tried to smuggle him out of the trap dressed in a woman's coat, but Stalin was arrested again and sent into exile for the sixth and last time.