More than 1,000 people gathered in Red Square early this morning to mark the 70th anniversary of Stalin’s death, laying flowers and wreaths at his tomb located nearby on the Kremlin wall.

Some held Soviet flags, others portraits of the ruthless leader who was born in Georgia in 1878. “Without the return of Stalin to Russia we, the Russians and other indigenous peoples of Russia will not survive,” assured Vladimir Kvachkov, 74, a retired colonel the military intelligence agency (GRU). “We would be happy if such a leader came back,” agreed Yuri, another pensioner who went to Red Square to honor Joseph Vesarianovich Dzhugashvili, the “father” as Soviet propaganda called him.

Stalin, who rose to power in the late 1920s and died on March 5, 1953, turned the USSR into a massive totalitarian state, promoting his personal cult. Hundreds of thousands of people were executed while millions more were sent to gulags, the forced labor camps.

However, some Russians still defend him. They claim that he was the one who turned the USSR into a superpower and single-handedly defeated Hitler in 1945 – something that many historians dispute.

Unlike Lenin, whose statues and monuments still stand in almost every Russian city, authorities have yet to restore Stalin’s monuments, which were removed after his death and when so-called “de-Stalinization” began. In recent years, however, some monuments have been erected in his honor, such as a bust of him in Volgograd (formerly Stalingrad), which was unveiled in early February to celebrate the Soviet victory over the Nazis in that city.

“People have different opinions about Stalin,” noted Piotr Sokolov, a retired history professor who spoke to AFP on Saturday. “Mostly the elderly have a good opinion of him, as if they forgot about the repression. Young people don’t know him well and middle-aged people are divided,” he summarized.

The Kremlin does not deny the crackdown, but downplays it in schools and public media, portraying it as a blameless tragedy. At the same time, he glorifies the geopolitical and military power of the USSR.

In the private sector, however, some do not forget. “My great-grandmother did not escape persecution in 1945. She was imprisoned, until Stalin’s death,” said Tatyana Kuznetsova, a 25-year-old scientist. “For 70 years (since his death) we don’t celebrate anything, we remember the persecutions. And of course, it’s horrible to see what’s happening today,” he added.