Joseph Stalin’s Drinking Habits

6 May 1941: Seventy-five years ago today, Joseph Stalin became the Premier of the Soviet Union, relieving Vyacheslav M. Molotov who had engineered the ultimately doomed non-aggression pact with Hitler’s Germany. Prior to taking the post as Premier, Stalin had Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, a post he has held since 1922. Regardless of his actual title, Stalin had essentially ruled the Soviet Union since the late 1920s.

There is some inconsistency in the accounts regarding the degree of Stalin’s drinking, with some ranking him at Churchillian magnitudes while others have him secretly drinking water in the place of vodka. While no stranger to vodka — legend has it that he was given a vodka-drenched rag as a baby to dull teething pains — Stalin was not a heavy day-to-day drinker. Ever calculating, he was known to get his Kremlin ministers falling down drunk and then use the information gained against them.

In spite of his cautious sobriety, Stalin could display an impressive tolerance for alcohol, drinking Dirty Martinis with Franklin Roosevelt and matching Winston Churchill glass-for-glass at the 1943 Tehran Conference.

So what did he drink?

Stalin, a native Georgian, preferred Kinzmarauli, Hvanchkara, Tsinandali and Telianilight, wines indigenous to his home region. The Soviet dictator also known to be fond of Russia’s sweet, syrupy brandies and a pommace-based spirit, similar to grappa, known as Kizlyar.