<<Stalin didn't move much East before the invasion because the invasion cought him flat footed ,I mean if you can't trust treatys made with your fellow dictator what can you trust? Krushev was the hero of the hour AFTER the invasion , Kruchev moved everything he could ahead of the invaders and salvaged an amazeing amount , that was later reassembled in the eastern parts of europe beyond the invaders reach. If the Invasion had reached as far as Magnitorsk they would ahve captured everything of consequence anyway, it was a near thing .>>

Well, I started out to prove you wrong on that point, but it looks like you are correct in that that bulk of the movement of the Soviet industrial production eastwards took place in the second half of 1941, during and after the German invasion. However, the move had begun earlier:

<<Even before the war, the Soviet leadership began the relocation of Russian industry in and beyond the Ural Mountains so that it would not be susceptible to immediate ground attack from the West.>>
http://www.britannia.com/history/euro/3/4_2.html

Khruschev obviously did not have the power to initiate anything, he was Stalin's appointee; interestingly enough, the Wikipedia bio of Khruschev makes no mention at all of Khruschev's alleged role in the eastward movement of Soviet industry, so I have to ask you where you got that information from.

<<The fantastic strength of caricter common in the Russian Army made up for a lot of Stalins foolishness, and that half of Hitlers air  strength was unavailible, or destroyed,due to the failure of the Luftwaffe in  the Battle of Britian . The USSR owed more then to the native toughness of the Russian people and to the RAF than it owed to Stalin .>>

That's an assessment almost impossible to verify in any way.  Obviously the Battle of Britain must have had some effect on German air strength, but in 1941, new planes were still rolling off of German production lines at a fairly healthy clip, IIRC.

<<There is hardly any reason to consider Stalin to be anything but an impediment to the Defense of the Motherland.>>

Ridiculous.  It was under his command that the movement of Soviet industry east of the Urals was initiated before the German invasion and continued thereafter.  It was also his responsibility to review the progress of the Red Army and to promote or fire its commanders as necessary.  He was the Top Dog, and as such takes the credit and the blame for everything that happens - - for the initial defeats and losses of territory, for Stalingrad, and for the victories that followed Stalingrad.  For the production numbers of Soviet industry.  For the morale of the Red Army.

<<Of course anyone who might have said so certainly didn't survive to say so twice , that is the real strength oand virtue of Stalin , he could shut you up, Stalin was a lot really , like Rich wishes he is in his dreams.>>

His was the power, regardless of what anyone said or thought, and under that power, the greatest victory in the history of human warfare was achieved.  The credit goes to Stalin for the utter destruction of Nazi Germany, shared of course with the Western Allies and the Anti-Fascist Resistance Forces of occupied Europe.

<<I am unaware of Stalin ever accepting the fault for a bad decision.>>

LMFAO.  Yes, I know how all your Presidents, especially your last one, were so forthcoming to accept the blame for their bad decisions.  They lacerate themselves constantly in public, accepting the blame for everything that goes wrong on their watch, whether it's their fault or not.  Not like that miserable commie SOB Stalin.

Actually, once we pull out of Planet Cold War's bullshit-filled orbit, we can see that Stalin has in fact admitted error, specifically between the first and second editions of his Foundations of Leninism, in which he went from denying to affirming  the viability of "Socialism in One Country."
http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/fi/vol03/no06/editorial.htm


<<I am also unaware of any time that Stalin welcomed healthy criticism.>>

That's because you were locked out of all Politburo meetings for political unreliability.

<<Our President Bush accepted a highly critical press, getting every day criticism that Stalin would have killed for.>>

Well, at least you seem to accept that, unlike  Stalin, Bush did NOT admit to his mistakes.

Bush ACCEPTED a highly critical press?  BFD, it wasn't in his power to strike out at his critics, since he saw what had happened to Nixon when he tried to do so.  This may be a great tribute to your system (well, I gotta face it, your system can't be ALL bad) but it is not much of a credit to Bush.

<<Stalin was not strong enough to put up with that much criticism >>

Stalin WAS strong, very strong as you would have found out had you ever voiced any of your own criticisms of him on his turf, in his time.  It was WEAK Communists, communists like Gorbachev, who are responsible for the downfall of the system because they fell for this "let a thousand flowers bloom" crap that had already failed in China and decided to let everyone have a voice.  Whole fucking thing fell apart in no time.  If Stalin had lived, the U.S.S.R. would still be a power on this earth, and we wouldn't have seen the kind of shit happening like the invasion of Iraq or the oppression of the Palestinians.

<< a reporter who might question Stalins wisdom in decimateing his officer corps and exileing his aircraft designers on the very eve of conflict, or jailing anyone with the termidity to say that Darwin was right would have died young.>>

Which is to say that a reporter who might have tried to undermine national unity and  party unity on the eve of the Nazi attack on the USSR by trying to voice your criticisms, would have paid the price for his treasonous acts.  I'd say Stalin knew what he was doing and you didn't.   Their system works one way, and it has its weaknesses for sure.  Your system works a different way, and while you seem to be well aware of its strengths, I don't think you like to admit any of its weaknesses.  The mistake you always make is in trying to judge Uncle Joe by the standards of the one system, while the system that he was functioning in was a whole nuther system.  Like applying football rules to a game of baseball -- why didn't the shortstop tackle the base runner? kind of thing.  Everyone will make mistakes in any system, maybe Uncle Joe made some, the issue is, how did he deal with his mistakes and what did they lead to?  In his case, he recovered nicely, the evacuation of Soviet industry to beyond the Ural Mountains went on to a successful completion, the Red Army regrouped, after some command changes, ultimately went on the offensive and killed more Nazis than all the Western Allies combined.  Two thirds of all the Nazis killed in WWII were killed by the Red Army.  Their success is measured in miles of territory gained and numbers of Nazi corpses.  Uncle Joe was the leader in what turned out to be the biggest triumph of Communism in its history to date, all the "sour grapes" griping that follows notwithstanding.

You almost get it.

Stalin himself was a weakness of the Soviet system, he had to contain and supress criticism harshly and present a picture of perfection to the people as real as a Potemkin-ville.

An American style system would have exposed him to criticism and presented the people with choices , I can imagine that in the whole of the Soviet Union there might have been a few better leaders , but they unfortunately lived in a system with a critical weakness , impossibly strong incumbancy is a weakness for the nation.

<<Because even in football you can only tackle the ball carrier.>>

Alright, so football/baseball wasn't the right analogy.  How about boxing/baseball?  Why doesn't the shortstop deck the base runner with a right uppercut to the jaw?

Starting to sound like hockey without the ice...