Tyrant’s End: Did Joseph Stalin Die From Warfarin Poisoning?

Abstract

One of the most brutal dictators in humanity's history, Joseph Stalin forged the Soviet Union into a massive superpower, crushing the lives of millions of his own citizens along the way. His sudden death in March 1953 from a stroke took the world by surprise and led to a frantic power struggle within the ranks of the Soviet government. In recent years, researchers have proposed that Stalin's stroke was not natural and was potentially caused by one of his lieutenants poisoning him with warfarin or a similar anticoagulant. After examining the evidence, this article concludes that both Stalin's disease course and the properties of warfarin make it highly unlikely that he was deliberately assassinated.

Controversies in medicine and neuroscience: Through the prism of history, neurobiology, and bioethics

“…Furthermore, it is more likely than not that that Warfarin will cause a diffuse coagulopathy, and while there were myocardial and intestinal petechiae, there should have been more than just brain and stomach bleeding. [ 11 ] In addition, Bulganin wondered if it were possible that Stalin had stomach cancer. Bulganin is the perfect example of how the Soviet system worked to give the most mediocre people a great deal of power.…”