" It is my unshakeable belief that when the proper perspective is restored, statues will be raised again to Stalin.’ ‘Goering said the same of Hitler during the Nuremberg trial. I don’t see any statues –’ ‘Hitler lost.’ ‘But surely Stalin lost? In the end? From the “objective perspective”?’ ‘Stalin inherited a nation with wooden ploughs and bequeathed us an empire armed with atomic weapons. How can you say he lost? The men who came after him – they lost. Not Stalin. Stalin foresaw what would happen, of course. Khrushchev, Molotov, Beria, Malenkov – they thought they were hard, but he saw through them. “After I’ve gone, the capitalists will drown you like blind kittens.” His analysis was correct, as always. "
― Robert Harris , Archangel