WI: Stalin became an American gangster?

[kaiju]

I was reading the first chapter of Simon Montifore's Young Stalin, and it gives a pretty good layout of how Stalin ran his criminal gang in the 1910s. I got thinking with a friend of mine on a little scenario that struck me... (mostly for fun, but I think there's a pretty interesting story here)

In 1910s Georgia, would-be Bolshevik revolutionary Iosif Dzhugashvili is stuck in a major crisis. A plan that began as the biggest bank robbery in Georgia's history ends up failing spectacularly, robbing him of his muscle and bringing down the wrath of the Okhrana on him.

With nowhere else to go, a mysterious benefactor, having witnessed his rise to power in the Georgian underworld, offers him another chance. To go to America, set up a brand new criminal empire, and convert thousands of the American working class to the Communist cause.

Reluctantly, Iosif takes the chance to "melt down the cross of gold". Making landfall in New York and setting up shop in the steeltown of Pittsburgh, the would-be revolutionary changes his name to Joseph Stalin. He soon makes a name for himself in the American underworld, while finding even greater success in manipulating the Pittsbrgh steel unions to the Communist cause. But he also finds himself against a new host of enemies: the rising Mafia syndicates, rival labor unions, and the growing influence of a certain J.Edgar Hoover...

I haven't really ironed out the rest of this, but I do have a concrete ending: by the 1920s Stalin has made enough money to majorly contribute back to the Bolsheviks at home, but has also ended up pissing off a lot of people, and started a major war against the mafia. Whatever does happen because of this, he is forced back to the USSR just as Lenin's last days become apparent.

Oh, and some other fun things that me and my friend noticed...
* What happens to Trotsky?
* How might his interactions with the mafia, Jewish mob, and the other syndicates go?
* Speaking of which, I had a fun idea for a line: "I am not Russian, Mister Capone, I am Georgian!"
* Stalin taking nightly English lessons (to better communicate with his Americanized lackeys and to finally watch those American movies he loved so much without translators)

Anyone have any more interesting ideas for what could happen if this gets kicked off? Could Stalin fight a war with the likes of Al Capone and Luciano going forward? Might this push Hoover into the spotlight a few years early? How would the American underworld change?

 

[BlackDragon98]

That sounds about as likely as John Dillinger making his way to Nazi Germany and becoming as SS officer in the Gestapo.

 

[kaiju]

That sounds about as likely as John Dillinger making his way to Nazi Germany and becoming as SS officer in the Gestapo.

Yes, indeed. Like I said, it's just for fun. My imagtination can be weird sometimes.

 

[King_Arthur]

I did make a box for this, part of a planned series where all the major interwar and figures or their parents migrate to America.

 

[Deleted member 94680]

That sounds about as likely as John Dillinger making his way to Nazi Germany and becoming as SS officer in the Gestapo.

It’s a bit more likely than that.

It’s not particularly likely, per se, just more likely than an American gangster who started his criminal career (through a lack of money) in 1924 and died in 1934 becoming a SS Officer.

 

[Megafighter3]

Joey Steel.

 

[Sam R.]

Brecht writes the Resistable Rise of Johnny Irons?

 

[kaiju]

I did make a box for this, part of a planned series where all the major interwar and figures or their parents migrate to America.

Interesting. Do you have a link for it?

 

[David T]

American organized crime was dominated by gangs that were (1) ethnic (largely Irish, Italian or Jewish) who would not look kindly on a Georgian "outsider" and (2) vigorously anti-Communist. As for the steel unions, they were notoriously weak until the rise of the CIO in 1936-7, so it's hard to see how they would offer him great financial prospects. (Successful gangster-dominated unions in the US were in other fields--trucking, the garment industry, etc.--and again tended to be politically conservative; gangster unionism was a special kind of "business unionism"--differing from other types of business unionism in that it not only saw the union as a business but as a business for the personal aggrandizement of its leaders...)

Stalin simply cannot be seen as an ordinary gangster. He was a Marxist who used gangster-like methods (bank "expropriations") to enrich a Marxist party, and its' really hard to think of any major Marxist party in the world at the time that would tolerate such methods other than the Russian Bolsheviks.

 

[Aghasverov]

As far-fetched as this is, I LOVE this idea... would like to see it more fully developed.
I think even Uncle Joe could/would compromise his Marxist idealism and be "converted" into a more run-of-the-mill American labor boss... maybe he could start out as a dues collector for some particularly rough industry with a lot of Russian immigrant labor... with his ruthlessness and organizational skills, the connections with organized crime could come quickly...
Just don' make him get on no airplanes

 

[Expat]

There’s not a large Georgian community he can tap into for a mafia power base. Established Russian immigrants (1-2 generations removed from Europe) were mostly a hodgepodge of religious minorities more inclined to organize around that identity than Russian-ness. A lot of them were also agriculturalists. Newer Russian immigrants were explicitly fleeing the Bolshevist, and also tended to be wealthier and therefore not really prone to fall into the kind of traps that lead to domination by a mafia.

That said, in a less central city like Pittsburgh, he might be able to gain significant power by playing the various ethnic groups off each other. The Italian gangs are there, but it’s a backwater. There are plenty of Poles, Irish, African Americans, various Eastern Europeans. And going after labor isn’t the worst play he could make.

I think with the right moves, he could have a little Pittsburgh crime empire. An explicitly political one? That would need a lot of work. Probably need a POD to restructure the entire American labor fight, decades before Stalin’s arrival.

 

[King_Arthur]

I will probably make an improved version at some point and have him born in Georgia.

 

[NotBigBrother]

"So, Joe, you are from Georgia? And I'm from Alabama."

 

[McPherson]

I was reading the first chapter of Simon Montifore's Young Stalin, and it gives a pretty good layout of how Stalin ran his criminal gang in the 1910s. I got thinking with a friend of mine on a little scenario that struck me... (mostly for fun, but I think there's a pretty interesting story here)

In 1910s Georgia, would-be Bolshevik revolutionary Iosif Dzhugashvili is stuck in a major crisis. A plan that began as the biggest bank robbery in Georgia's history ends up failing spectacularly, robbing him of his muscle and bringing down the wrath of the Okhrana on him.

With nowhere else to go, a mysterious benefactor, having witnessed his rise to power in the Georgian underworld, offers him another chance. To go to America, set up a brand new criminal empire, and convert thousands of the American working class to the Communist cause.

Reluctantly, Iosif takes the chance to "melt down the cross of gold". Making landfall in New York and setting up shop in the steeltown of Pittsburgh, the would-be revolutionary changes his name to Joseph Stalin. He soon makes a name for himself in the American underworld, while finding even greater success in manipulating the Pittsbrgh steel unions to the Communist cause. But he also finds himself against a new host of enemies: the rising Mafia syndicates, rival labor unions, and the growing influence of a certain J.Edgar Hoover...

I haven't really ironed out the rest of this, but I do have a concrete ending: by the 1920s Stalin has made enough money to majorly contribute back to the Bolsheviks at home, but has also ended up pissing off a lot of people, and started a major war against the mafia. Whatever does happen because of this, he is forced back to the USSR just as Lenin's last days become apparent.

Oh, and some other fun things that me and my friend noticed...
* What happens to Trotsky?
* How might his interactions with the mafia, Jewish mob, and the other syndicates go?
* Speaking of which, I had a fun idea for a line: "I am not Russian, Mister Capone, I am Georgian!"
* Stalin taking nightly English lessons (to better communicate with his Americanized lackeys and to finally watch those American movies he loved so much without translators)

Anyone have any more interesting ideas for what could happen if this gets kicked off? Could Stalin fight a war with the likes of Al Capone and Luciano going forward? Might this push Hoover into the spotlight a few years early? How would the American underworld change?

I will probably make an improved version at some point and have him born in Georgia.

I don't think he lasts that long. J. Edgar will sic this honcho on him.

 

[Aghasverov]

I think ol' Machine Gun Joe would look good in a double-breasted suit and a fedora or homburg, carrying a guitar case

 

[McPherson]

I think ol' Machine Gun Joe would look good in a double-breasted suit and a fedora or homburg, carrying a guitar case

He would look much better laid out on a slab in the Detroit morgue after the Purples get him.

 

[Aghasverov]

He would look much better laid out on a slab in the Detroit morgue after the Purples get him.

I have to agree... some men are just too dangerous to live, no matter what sort of milieu they are thrust into... though doubtless he would do less damage as an American mob boss than he did in OTL...

Hmmm... unless he were to "go legit" at some point...

 

[Draconis]

Next challenge, make Al Capone the General Secretary of the Soviet Union. Might require some assistance from our leathery winged friends.

 

[Deleted member 92195]

It cannot be denied he looks like a mafioso in this picture below.

In this picture, he looks more like a model who is advertising a new hairstyle. He does not look like the Stalin we know, this is in 1902 (23).

In this picture, he looks like he's a just-released a new music album. Therefore, this is the picture that is put on the LP cardboard music cover.

It's getting really hot now... I need to cool down...

This one is just plain weird. (Someone is very good with photoshop) Notice the pistol grip and the switchblade underneath the right side of the leader jacket.

 

[Iggies]

There's probably not much you can say about this as an AltHist scenario but it would definitely make a very interesting/amusing short story or novella.