Stalin was Deadlier Than Two Nuclear Bombs

It all start with this idiotic comment by Russian President Vladimir Putin denying the criminal past of the Soviet Union and the terror it inflicted on it's own people:

Another teachers' guide getting Kremlin support, meanwhile, recasts key elements of Soviet history. Dictator Josef Stalin is described as "the most successful Soviet leader ever," for building industry and leading the country to victory in World War II. The guide explains his purges and the system of camps for political prisoners as a function of his desire to make the Soviet Union strong.

Mr. Putin himself echoed that view at the meeting with teachers, saying Stalin's "Great Terror" of 1937 -- during which at least 700,000 people were executed -- wasn't as bad as atrocities other nations had perpetrated, such as the U.S. use of the atomic bomb. - WSJ (Alt Link)

Is he kidding? For starters, the 700,000 Stalin executed were his own citizens. The US dropped atomic bombs on the enemy, not on our own people. As for how much damage those two bombs did:

Hiroshima: As a result of the blast an estimated minimum 90,000 people died within two months.[24] Included in this number were about 2,000 Japanese Americans and another 800-1,000 who lived on as hibakusha, a Japanese term meaning, "explosion-affected people". As US citizens, many were attending school before the war and had been unable to leave Japan. It is likely that hundreds of Allied prisoners of war also died. - Wikipedia

By December of 1945, thousands had died from their injuries and a small number from radiation poisoning, bringing the total killed in Hiroshima in 1945 to perhaps 140,000. In the years between 1950 and 1990, it is statistically estimated that hundreds of deaths are attributable to radiation exposure among atomic bomb survivors from both Hiroshima and Nagasaki. - Wikipedia

Nagasaki: According to some estimates, about 70,000 of Nagasaki's 240,000 residents were killed instantly, and up to 60,000 were injured. The radius of total destruction was about 1.6 km (1 mile), followed by fires across the northern portion of the city to 3.2 km (2 miles) south of the bomb. The total number of residents killed may have been as many as 80,000, including the few who died from radiation poisoning in the following months. - Wikipedia

The two US atomic bombs dropped on Japan during World War II killed approximately 220,000 people. That is less than a third of the people that Stalin executed in the 'Great Terror' of 1937 (As opposed to the great terrors of all the other years). That of course was just a fraction of the total number that died under Stalin's rule:

... it appears that a minimum of around 10 million surplus deaths (4 million by repression and 6 million from famine) are attributable to the regime, with a number of recent books suggesting a likely total of around 20 million. Adding 6-8 million famine victims to Erlikman's estimates above, for example, would yield a total of between 15 and 17 million victims. Robert Conquest, meanwhile, has revised his original estimate of up to 30 million victims down to 20 million. Others, however, continue to maintain that their earlier much higher estimates are correct. - Wikipedia

As for Soviet deaths during World War II, a citizen of the Soviet Union was more likely to be killed by his own Government than by the German Military.

Maybe Stalin is considered the "most successful Soviet leader ever" because he managed to kill more than any of the other leaders before or after. Not that the others didn't try:

Putin's comments comparing America's actions during WWII to Stalin's murder rampage are insulting and dangerous.

P.S.
Just to show you how nice the Soviets were, they also dropped nuclear bombs on their own citizens as well.

Decades of Soviet nuclear testing unleashed a plague of birth defects. When the Soviet Union tested its nuclear devices, it chose eastern Kazakhstan, one of its remotest, most desolate areas. But no one bothered to evacuate the people living there.

The testing began in 1949 at a site known as Polygon and continued until 1989. According to the Nuclear Threat Initiative, there were 456 tests, including 116 nuclear bombs tested above ground. The Polygon site officially closed on August 29, 1991 -- 16 years ago this week.

Local officials say there were hundreds of thousands of people, possibly as many as a million, who lived in the region during the nuclear testing. The end of the Cold War might have ended this dark chapter, but thousands are still paying a terrible price. - CNN (Warning, the story is horribly graphic)

Anything bad the US might have done the Soviet Union was many times worse. And no, Russia has not taken ownership of those helping those who continue to suffer today from their atomic bomb blasts.

Remembering the Soviet Union v.1

World War II casualties - Wikipedia