Help..im still confused

[monkeydust]

It probably sounds silly but Im still confused as to why Stalin, not trotsky emerged as Lenins succesor. Could someone please help me out on this one?

[RGacky3]

becouse he won the election.........he was more charismatic.

[man in the red suit]

charismatic? gacky, what the fuck are you talking about? stop talking to Stevo.

[monkeydust]

Quote: from RGacky3 on 12:10 am on Sep. 26, 2002
becouse he won the election.........he was more charismatic.

Wan't Trotsky, though arrogant for more charismatic and a much better public speaker though?

[Mazdak]

Trotsky was arrogant and disliked by the party members. Stalin didnt emerge suddenly as dictator.

He was part of the triumvirate with Grigori Zinoviev and Lev Kamenev. Together, they defeated trotsky.

[RGacky3]

when I say charismatic I mean he could make him self liked, thats why he was liked, not becouse of his skill as a leader, but becouse of his people skills, which he had.

[redstar2000]

Actually, the question of "why Stalin won" is quite complex and full of interesting details.

For example, Russian communists were very conscious of the outcome of the French Revolution (Napoleon); many mistrusted Trotsky BECAUSE he had been the most successful commander of the Red Army. They did not want another "man on horseback".

Another and more sordid reason: anti-semitism. Officially, the CPSU(B) was, of course, opposed to anti-semitism. But Russian revolutionaries had lived their lives in a culture that was deeply anti-semitic...and some of them disliked Trotsky simply because he was a jew.

Nor can you overlook their personal characteristics: Trotsky was kind of like a rock star; Stalin more like a recording company executive. Trotsky was the celebrity; Stalin the guy in the background who sees to it that things that are supposed to get done actually GET done.

Finally, and I think most tellingly, Trotsky really "cut his own throat", so to speak, at the 10th Party Congress in 1921. Trotsky joined with Lenin and Stalin in the motion to ban "factions" in the CPSU(B)--a move primarily directed against the "Workers' Opposition". When the time came for a struggle between Trotsky and Stalin, Trotsky had no way to legitimately form a coherent political grouping around his views; the avenue of internal party democracy had already been closed and he had helped to close it.(!)

Be careful what you strive for; you just may get it.

[BARBUDO]

It's hard to be charismatic w/an AXE in your head!

[monkeydust]

wasnt it an ice pick that he got in his head neway

[BOZG]

There are conflicting reports of the weapon used.

[monkeydust]

I suppose Stalin wanted to make an impact and make the death seem more publicised by not simply getting him shot. He probably wanted him to suffer as well. Is it true that Trotsky died like 2 weeks later rather than instentaniously from the axe or ice-pick opr whatever it was

[booga]

"Man, as a creature of time, must approach his problems piecemeal. Yet each moment in history gives man the chance for some new achievement. Bourgeois liberalism and Marxist utopianism have mistakenly introduced "new forms" of injustice into history in the very attempt of abolishing old ones."

Dr. Reinhold Niebuhr - Theologian

[Man of the Cause]

"I suppose Stalin wanted to make an impact and make the death seem more publicised by not simply getting him shot. He probably wanted him to suffer as well. Is it true that Trotsky died like 2 weeks later rather than instentaniously from the axe or ice-pick opr whatever it was"

The pick-axe pierced Trotskis brain, killing him instantly.

[redstar2000]

booga, what makes Herr Doktor Niebuhr a quotable source on either Marxism or injustice?

[thursday]

He probably wanted him to suffer as well.

Oh geez. Are we talking about comrade Stalin or Ted Bundy here?

[bolshevik1917]

a very importain influence on the downfall of Trotsky was a letter he had written to Lenin years before the revolution, it was a very heated letter and trotsky said some nasty things in it. The letter never reached lenin however, it was intercepted in the post, only to be let out for all to see very soon after lenins death, turning many greiving russians against trotsky who had admitted beforehand that he deeply regretted writing the letter.

It was basicly a dirty trick from the stalinist clique, who were worried that due to lenin and trotskys warm friendship before his death would be the peoples choice as leader.

I will have a look for some evidence on this subject, it makes interesting reading.

[bolshevik1917]

My apologies, the letter was not to lenin personally but for pravada.

Trotsky explains himself

"My letter to Chkheidze against Lenin was published during this period. This episode, dating back to April, 1913, grew out of the fact that the official Bolshevik newspaper then published in St. Petersburg had appropriated the title of my Viennese publication, "The Pravda - a Labour Paper". This led to one of those sharp conflicts so frequent in the lives of the foreign exiles. In a letter written to Chkheidze, who at one time stood between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks, I gave vent to my indignation at the Bolshevik centre and Lenin. Two or three weeks later, I would undoubtedly have subjected my letter to a strict censor's revision, a year or two later still it would have seemed a curiosity in my own eyes. But that letter was to have a peculiar destiny. It was intercepted on its way by the Police Department. It rested in the police archives until the October revolution, when it went to the Institute of History of the Communist Party. Lenin was well aware of this letter; in his eyes, as in mine, it was simply "the snows of yesteryear" and nothing more. A good many letters of various kinds had been written during the years of foreign exile! In 1924, the epigones disinterred the letter from the archives and flung it at the party, three-quarters of which at that time consisted of new members. It was no accident that the time chosen for this was the months immediately following Lenin's death. This condition was doubly essential. In the first place, Lenin could no longer rise to call these gentlemen by their right names, and in the second place, the masses of the people were torn with grief over the death of their leader. With no idea of the yesterdays of the party, the people read Trotsky's hostile remarks about Lenin and were stunned. It is true that the remarks had been made twelve years before, but chronology was disregarded in the face of the naked quotations. The use that the epigones made of my letter to Chkheidze is one of the greatest frauds in the world's history. The forged documents of the French reactionaries in the Dreyfus case are nothing compared to the political forgery perpetrated by Stalin and his associates." (My Life, pages 515-6)

[Man of the Cause]

It is a common rumour that Stalin was elected as leader in democratic atmosphere. But that is not true, because as secretary General of the communist party, he had done his first "purge" in the years 1924-1928, when most of the trotskyite elements of the Bolshevik party were replaced with Stalin's men and thus, the election of Stalin was not democratic, because he had "chosen the voters"