You could also say Stalin saved Europe during WWII.

Before WWI the rediculously mediocre attempts by the Tsars and Tsarina’s of Russia to arm itself were pathetic.
During WWI many Russian units went into combat unarmed and told to pick up a rifle if a fellow soldier was injured or to capture a weapon from the enemy.
If such a state of affairs had continued to WWII Russia wouldn’t have had the largest tank army or the largest airforce in the world.
Certainly these forces did not do much… the vast majority of the equipment was obsolete and most of the aircraft were destroyed on the ground and the tanks destroyed or captured, but their industry was already fully developed and working on much better models like the KV-1 and the T-34 on the ground and Migs, Laggs and Yaks and Lavochkins in the air. Without the industrial base created during so many of Stalins 5 year plans Russia would not have lasted very long… especially if they still had to import small arms. By WWII the Soviets were pretty much self sufficient in most weapons… the only problems were getting the industry back into production after being moved east, and a shortage of trucks and transport… the latter alieviated by lend lease and horses.