Lots of short men seem to dominate history - I guess height does not keep them back. Stalin, Napoleon, Putin...
Napoleon's height was average in the 19th century
Putin is a midget
Stalin was statistically taller than average at the time. Some documents even listed his height as 5'7" , but I think it was mostly due to inadequate conversions from traditional Russian Imperial units of measurement ( metric system was implemented on Imperial Order in 1899, and took effect in 1900.)
Height was traditionally measured in arshin ( 1 arshin = 2'3" or 71.12 cm ) and vershok ( 1 vershok = 1.74 inches or 4,44 cm )
According to numerous booking records, Stalin's height was either 2 arshin 6 vershok ( 5'5" or 1m69) or 2 arshin 7 vershok ( 5'7" or 1m74)
He was most likely 5'5".
With that said, here is photo of Stalin with Sergey Kirov ( 1st Secretary of Leningrad's Organisational Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.)
According to Kirov's autopsy report, he was 5'5" or 168 cm ( Кирилина А.А. Неизвестный Киров. СПб.–М., 2001. С.223).
As you can see, Stalin was clearly taller than him