Editing Historical revisionism (section)

===Excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Stalin===
{{Main|Excess mortality in the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin}}
Prior to the collapse of the [[Soviet Union]] and the archival revelations, Western historians estimated that the numbers killed by Stalin's regime were 20 million or higher.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Conquest |first1=Robert |title=The Great Terror |year=1990 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0195055801 |page=[https://archive.org/details/greatterror00robe/page/486 486] |url=https://archive.org/details/greatterror00robe |url-access=registration |quote=20 million. |access-date=May 6, 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Rummel |first1=Rudolph |title=61,911,000 Soviet Victims: Totals, Estimates, and Years |url=https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/USSR.TAB1A.GIF |access-date=May 6, 2019 |archive-date=August 7, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190807044727/https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/USSR.TAB1A.GIF |url-status=live }}</ref> After the Soviet Union dissolved, evidence from the Soviet archives also became available and provided information that led to a significant revision in death toll estimates for the [[Stalin]] regime, with estimates in the range from 3 million<ref>{{cite web |last1=Ellman |first1=Michael |title=Soviet Repression Statistics: Some Comments |url=https://sovietinfo.tripod.com/ELM-Repression_Statistics.pdf |work=From 1921 onwards about 3–3.5&nbsp;million seem to have died from shooting, while in detention, or while being deported or in deportation. |access-date=May 6, 2019 |archive-date=May 25, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190525134942/http://sovietinfo.tripod.com/ELM-Repression_Statistics.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> to 9 million.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Snyder |first1=Timothy |title=Hitler vs. Stalin: Who Was Worse? |date=January 27, 2011 |url=https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2011/01/27/hitler-vs-stalin-who-was-worse/ |work=The total number of noncombatants killed by the Germans – about 11 million – is roughly what we had thought. The total number of civilians killed by the Soviets, however, is considerably less than we had believed. We know now that the Germans killed more people than the Soviets did [...] All in all, the Germans deliberately killed about 11 million noncombatants, a figure that rises to more than 12&nbsp;million if foreseeable deaths from deportation, hunger, and sentences in concentration camps are included. For the Soviets during the Stalin period, the analogous figures are approximately six million and nine million. These figures are of course subject to revision, but it is very unlikely that the consensus will change again as radically as it has since the opening of Eastern European archives in the 1990s. |access-date=May 6, 2019 |archive-date=September 20, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190920180922/https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2011/01/27/hitler-vs-stalin-who-was-worse/ |url-status=live }}</ref> In post-1991 Russia the [[KGB]] archives remained briefly open during 1990's, which helped creation of organisations such as [[Memorial (society)|Memorial]], which engaged in research of the archives and search of secret mass burial grounds. After Putin came to power however, access to archives was restricted again and research in this area once again became politically incorrect,<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Satter |first=David |title=It Was a Long Time Ago, and It Never Happened Anyway: Russia and the Communist Past |publisher=Yale University Press |year=2011 |isbn=9780300192377}}</ref> culminating with forcibly shutting down the organization in 2021.<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Hopkins |first1=Valerie |last2=Nechepurenko |first2=Ivan |date=December 29, 2021 |title=As the Kremlin Revises History, a Human Rights Champion Becomes a Casualty |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/29/world/europe/russia-memorial-human-rights-center.html |access-date=2023-09-06 |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>