What if Lev Trotsky took his place as USSR leader ?

I always wondered how the USSR would have developed if instead of Stalin it was Trotsky who had been nominated as USSR leader.

Would his great military capabilities and his uncompromised views of the socialist idea made a great difference in history ?

Would he allied with the Nazis during the invasion of poland ?
The communism revolution would have arrived in Europe and America ?
The USSR would still exist ?

Lot of questions eh ?

Cant wait to hear your opinions on this topic.

I always wondered how the USSR would have developed if instead of Stalin it was Trotsky who had been nominated as USSR leader.

Would his great military capabilities and his uncompromised views of the socialist idea made a great difference in history ?

Would he allied with the Nazis during the invasion of poland ?
The communism revolution would have arrived in Europe and America ?
The USSR would still exist ?

Lot of questions eh ?

Cant wait to hear your opinions on this topic.

[FONT=Verdana]Trotsky view was that the USSR should be one big Worker Cooperative, while Stalin was for State ownership. Worker Cooperative is still private sector and still only care about increasing their profits, which in this case is the workers’ wages. Because Worker Cooperative is still private sector they can still be affected by business cycles. This means that the USSR would have been affected by the Great Depression. It would of lead to the down fall of the USSR sooner.[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]The effect would have been the same as that on the USA, which lead to the decrease in the size of it military, much like that of the USA when they had to run war games to raise the money to re-equipped themselves. [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana][FONT=Verdana]The USA did not failed during Great Depression, so I don’t think that the USSR would have also failed. But because the USSR would have not prove to be as powerful as it did under Stalin, the Bourgeoisie may of never supported the Nazis and there Leaders. This means that maybe World War 2 would have been put off to a later date. [/FONT][/FONT]


[FONT=Verdana][FONT=Verdana]I think it would of lead to the Second World War being between the USA and the USSR, which could have resulted it the Stalinist taking power in the USA. It a nice story for the next Command and conquer Red Alert game.[/FONT]
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what if trotsky had taken over in the early 1920's? my guess is that there would have been a second attempt by imperialism to directly attack the ussr. maybe trosky would have used this second civil war to assault the west directly.

I see a problem with this ideal as the West did not fear trotsky, hell that why they supported them. I would agree that the Second World War in this case would be between the USSR and the USA, but it would be a war between to imperalist powers and not between the right wing and the Left.

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so you would consider a Soviet Union led by Trotsky developing into an imperialist power in Eurasia ?

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[FONT=Verdana]Yes it would be a imperialist power, but would act like how the US does today, with more "support" then direct control. He would of used Worker cooperative as his base, to say why the Soviet Union is better than the west. I think that if Stalin is still around in this time line he would do the same thing in the USA that he did in the USSR and the result would be a Stalin USA vs a Trotsky USSR.[/FONT]

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from that perspective, how do you think Trotsky would have handled Mao ? Do you think they would have been allies or competitors ?

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[FONT=Verdana]Or maybe in the scenario you surmise Trotsky would have collaborated with Imperial Japan against Mao ?[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]Mao is a good question for this post. The first thing we would have to ask ourselves would have Mao came to power without World War 2. Also we need to ask if Imperial Japan would of start the war with China without Nazis support. The biggest problem with the if this happened game is that everyone effects each other. Remove one and the whole interaction better each member changes. The powerful USSR under Stalin leads the reactionary to put the Nazis party in power. If the USSR failed, then there would be little reason to put the Nazis in power. [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]Imperial Japan May of started their war latter do to the lack of right wing support. If the USSR invaded China before hand, then Imperial Japan and Mao could be allies against USSR imperialism, turning the entire system and history around.[/FONT]

i think yes. mao would have come to power; he had a considerable base of support among the peasantry. maybe the nationalists would have controlled a portion of the mainland. in all cases i think that imperial japan would have moved to seize manchuria, specially if the maoists and the nationalists where engaged in a civil war against each other. assuming a estrategic alliance with the USA (against a trotsky led USSR that had become imperialist), japan would have asked as a condition unrestricted access to indonesia (oil) and french indochina (rubber). the united states would have kept the philipines. .

Support among the peasantry does not always lead to power. The USSR came to power because of the support of urban workers not the peasantry. And the support of the peasantry was not yet lead the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army to take control of Colombia yet.

Now lets move on to Japan. I am not saying that imperial japan would not went to war, but am saying that "When" is in question here. This would effect if trotsky would of supported Mao or not.

nazi support was never a primary issue for imperial japan in its quest to ''liberate'' east asia from european imperial domination; by way of stablishing the G.E.A.C.S. Their joining the tripartite pact was mostly a political expression of defiance against a league of nations that had become hostile to its interests (why they walked out of it). when japan bombed pearl harbour in december 1941 it did so without consulting with Hitler, in fact he was quite upset about it even though he agreed with goebbels about plastering the famous headline ''yellow aryans'' on the Völkischer Beobachter.

Again The question of "when" is the hot topic here and will till us when imperial japan would start it quest to ''liberate'' east asia. The "if" is already know, it the time that comes into question and that effect who would be running China. For all we know a 5 year delay in World War 2 could lead to China being part of the USSR. Hilter Support of Japan only changed the time of there quest to ''liberate'' east asia not if, but this also changes those who they fight against and those who rised to power because of it(in the case of Mao).

What we do know is that around 1930, there will be a "Dust Bowl" in both the US and the USSR. Also we now that there would be a Great Depression around then, we would have to ask how differnt people would of reacted to these events.

if you want to establish a chronology then you would need to establish when trotsky takes over. also you need to consider whether Hitler would have risen if trotsky had taken over and the USSR under him became social-imperialist. i am not sure there would have been a need for the german industrialists to support hitler or a hitler like person in this case. if Trotsky had become imperialistic then the German industrialists might have allied themselves with him through a social democratic government, for example. maybe even restore the Kaiser in context of a constitutional monarchy.

This is a very good point here, we need some way of clearly telling when trotsky would takes over. It would have to be after Lenin but no later then two year, other wise someone else would take over.

lets say that Germany (ruled by a constituional monarchy with the Kaiser as head of state and an SD government) allied with a Social-Imperialist USSR led by Trotsky intervenes in China on the side of Mao against a Japanese Empire-USA alliance that supports the Nationalists.

I say around 1934-35 (when the long March took place in out timeline). I actually think WW2 would have started sooner. The market crashed in October 1929, so from the perspective of all the capitalists involved: Trotsky, the German Industrialists, FDR and Emperor Hiro Hito it would have been best to destroy surplus labour and capital, while bolstering the war industries, as soon as possible.

I was talking about this with another person, and He point out that Stalin could move south to China, and help them become a communist nation. With him(Stalin) acting like Lenin and Mao taking over after he died. Much the same way Stalin toke over for Lenin after he died. This would lead North alliance, USa, USSR, EU and Japan vs a South bloc of communist nations, all lead by a ture communist China. The problem is that we don't know which conuntry would of gone with the Souther Bloc.

V.I. Lenin dies 21 January 1924. So Trotsky becomes head of the party in 1925. but how did he get rid of the rival Bukharin and Stalin factions ? Stalin hated Trotsky so no possibility of an alliance there. Bukharin was a left social democrat (not really a bolshevik); so maybe Bukharin and Trotsky cut a deal and muscle out Stalin. Somehow Stalin scapes Moscow and ends up in China by 1935... but that would be a very long ten year interval. Maybe Stalin goes to France oand then ends up in Spain, he becomes an agitator in Barcelona or Madrid during the Republic ? But he spoke no Spanish...

How long do you think that it would take for Stalin to learn chinese and set up a party there?

For the sake of my conscious, I must remark how entirely full of shit the Stalinist posting above is about his misinformation on Trotsky.