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Recommended: Lenin compared to stalin
I think there are a number of main factors to consider when
investigating this issue. The first thing to consider is the fact that
Trotsky and Stalin come from completely different backgrounds. Trotsky
was from a prosperous Jewish farming family whereas Stalin was from s
peasant stock in Georgia. This meant he understood the peasants
situation, as he had been there himself and peasant made up a lot of
the population therefore he was quite popular already.
Trotsky believed in war communism. This made him unpopular because it
caused a famine in 1920-21. 7 million Russian people died and
therefore people didn't like Trotsky supporting this kind of
behaviour. They didn't want to have a leader who would think it ok to
cause famine. However, Trotsky was not too concerned about amassing
supporters and wasn't to bothered by this. Stalin, however, was a
supporter of the New Economic Policy, which was less tightly
constrained than the war communism that Trotsky supported. Stalin was
only a supporter of this policy publicly, because he introduced
collectivisation when he was elected. This was all propaganda by
Stalin.
Stalin wanted to concentrate on communism in just one country -
Russia. Trotsky wanted Russia to be the focus for the spread of World
Communism but the Russian people thought it would be better to sort
out their country first before concentrating on any others.
Trotsky was the most obvious successor after Lenin. He was the best
known of the communist leaders after Lenin. He was extremely able as
he had organised the Bolshevik takeover and saved the entire Bolshevik
government. He had a reputation outside the Soviet Union and was well
known across Russia. Despite all this, he never really had a good
chance to take over Russia, or gain many supporters because the other
communist leaders disliked him and were determined to prevent him
becoming the Russian leader. They found him arrogant, which stemmed
from his upbringing, and they suspected his cleverness. This was a bad
thing for Trotsky because people didn't trust him, as they knew he
Around the early 1920’s, Stalin took power and became leader of Russia. As a result Russians either became fond of Stalin’s policies or absolutely despised them. Stalin’s five-year plans lured many into focusing on the thriving economy rather than the fact that the five year plan hurt the military. The experience of many lives lost, forced labor camps, little supply of food, influenced the Russians negative opinion about Stalin. Having different classes in society, many Russians had different points of views. For the Peasants, times were rough mainly because of the famine, so they were not in favor of Stalin and his policies; where as the upper classes had a more optimistic view of everything that was occurring. Stalin’s policies affected the Russian people and the Soviet Union positively and also had a negative affect causing famine for the Russian people.
As relations changed between Russia and the rest of the world, so did the main historical schools of thought. Following Stalins death, hostilities between the capitalist powers and the USSR, along with an increased awareness of the atrocities that were previously hidden and ignored, led to a split in the opinions of Soviet and Western Liberal historians. In Russia, he was seen, as Trotsky had always maintained, as a betrayer of the revolution, therefore as much distance as possible was placed between himself and Lenin in the schoolbooks of the 50s and early 60s in the USSR. These historians point to Stalin’s killing of fellow communists as a marked difference between himself and his predecessor. Trotsky himself remarked that ‘The present purge draws between Bolshevism and Stalinism… a whole river of blood’[1].
When Stalin became leader of the USSR the quality of life and standard of living dropped considerably. For instance the people had no personal freedom. Meaning that they had to worship Stalin as all other religions had been abolished and most churches had been demolished. The people who went into those churches that were left standing were arrested or punished otherwise. Soon there were food shortages. Somewhere between 1932 and 1933 over 6 million people died of starvation. This was the greatest man made famine in history. The famine came as a result of Stalin’s unrealistic goals . Also, people had poor family lives. Abortions came a dime a dozen as did divorces. Wedding rings were banned. There was insufficient housing, as some people had to live in tents. This may be because of workers not working hard enough. Maybe if the workers worked harder they could have received better housing.
to do so if the workers of the West revolted, and he was right. Stalin
Trotsky played a key role in the Bolshevik party, encouraging revolution, which saw the Bolsheviks gain power in 1917. He built up a strong Red Army during the civil war, used to ensure the survival of the Bolshevik government and was seen by many as the most likely candidate to take over as leader after Lenin’s death, showing the significance he was held in by Russians. However, evidence suggests that after Lenin’s death he lost his a considerable amount of power, eventually being exiled from the Communist party. In the short-term it is clear that Trotsky had a huge significance in the development of Russia, shown clearly through both his letters and documents, and the opinions of those close to Trotsky. The significance is obvious through his role in the build up to the October Revolution, his negotiations with Germany through the Brest-Litovsk Treaty, his contribution to Bolshevik success in the civil war and his attitude towards terror and his failure to out maneuver Stalin to succeed Lenin.
Isaac Murrin Mr. J. Pharion Freshman English 20 February 2013 The Similarities and Differences between Lenin and Stalin Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin were similar in what they claimed to be, but in actuality they were very different people. Although Stalin claimed that he followed Leninism, the philosophy that Lenin developed from Marxism, he often distorted it to follow what he wanted to do. While Lenin wanted to make a unified society without classes, with production in the hands of the people, while Stalin wanted to make Russia into a modern industrial powerhouse by using the government to control production. Lenin accomplished his goals through violence, because he thought achieving the Communist revolution was worth using violence, with a ‘The ends justify the means’ mentality. Stalin also used violence to accomplish his goals, however Stalin used much more violence than was often necessary to accomplish his goals.
Intro Lenin died in 1924, who was leader of Russia, therefore there was need to. be a new leader of Russia. Lenin was seen as a god-like figure. the Bolsheviks, who were now known as the Communist Party and had complete control of Russia, the two rivals who wanted to lead the communist party were Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin.
A power struggle for control of the Bolshevik party began after Vladimir Lenin's death in 1924. Among the several contenders, two of the most important names in this struggle were Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin. Ultimately, Stalin was able to secure power and vote out Trotsky. In the following essay I will discuss the reasons why Stalin rather than Trotsky emerged as the leader of the USSR in 1929.
Leon and Snowball were both disliked by their opponents or leaders that they had above them, and beside. The leaders didn’t only dislike them but exiled them. Snowball’s exile was terrible misfortune and near death. It started when “nine enormous dogs wearing brass – studded collars came bounding into the barn. They dashed straight for Snowball, who sprang from his place just in time to escape their snapping jaws” (Orwell, 57) which sent him to the outskirts of the farm and not seen from again. While Trotsky on the other hand decided to jump into leadership when there was no one else. When “Lenin fell ill and died, Trotsky was easily outmaneuvered by Stalin. In 1927, he was thrown out of the party.” (Leon Trotsky, 1) Where interior and formerly external banishment tailed. Before they were banished though they did have some advantages to staying in the party. They both had high intelligence and arrogance. The writing ability of Snowball for the commandments and in general was a great thing for the farm. While Trotsky’s intelligence allowed for a “decisive role in the communist take – over of power. “ (Leon Trotsky, 1) and a following arrogance that made it hard for him to make friends, let alone keep them.
Trotsky thought that Communism could not survive in the USSR alone. He argued that the capitalist countries of the West feared Communism and would try to destroy it. For this reason, he said, it was necessary to spread Communism to the countries of Western Europe and to their overseas colonies. This would be done by giving help to revolutionary groups and parties in Western Europe.
One of Lenin's ideas was 'International Socialism,' it was under this idea that he set up the Comintern with the purpose of spreading communism throughout the world. His successor, Josef Stalin, took a different approach in his ideas of 'Socialism in one country." Josef Stalin led the U.S.S.R. from the death of Lenin to his own in 1953. Stalin led the Soviets through the betrayal of the Germans in the Nazi-Soviet Pact, he turned back the Nazis on the Eastern front, and brought the U.S.S.R. out of the Second World War as one of the only two superpowers in the world. After the end of the World War Two Stalin spread the Soviet sphere of influence to include East Germany, Bulgaria, Hungary, Albania, Poland, and Czechoslovakia.
After the death of Lenin, his chief lieutenant Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin fought for control of the country. Stalin was able to win out over Trotsky and gain control of the Russian government. He felt that Lenin and Trotsky’s socialistic ideas were flawed in that they were to wait for other countries to revolt and become socialistic as well. Staling believed that a single country could make socialism .
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, inspired by Victor d'Hupay (a French philosopher and founder of early communism), wrote The Communist Manifesto in 1848, intending to fuel a society with a liberated working class and complete equality between all people. Nearly 70 years later, Vladimir Lenin used the principals found in The Communist Manifesto to overthrow the Tzar and bourgeoisie and turn the U.S.S.R. into a communist superpower. While Communism may have worked for a time, the easily corruptible and paranoia-causing position of Soviet dictator caused the leader after Lenin, Joseph Stalin, to create a totalitarian state, rather an a communist one. The U.S.S.R. became a country with extremely depleted resources, an unstable economy, and a hierarchical
Joseph Stalin became the czar of Russia in 1924. Stalin’s goals for Russia was to make Russia the model of a communist state and to expand communism; a community as a whole would all be equal with no social classes and share in fruits of labor internationally. In order to accomplish these goals, Stalin abolished all privately owned farmed and replaced them with collectives; government owned farms where hundreds of families worked at once. At the time Russia was not industrialzed, Stalin forced industrialization in Russia by using his “five-year plans”. During this transformation no one but the government had control over the economy. Russia did become the world’s second-largest industrial power however, it came with a human cost. Many citizens
Both of these men wanted Russia to move towards a Communist state. They both wanted to illuminate the bourgeoisie and make the entire country revolve around the working class: “From now on there is a new page in the history of Russia, and the present, third Russian revolution shall in its finest result lead to the victory of Socialism” (Sherman 211). Lenin, who was the predecessor of Stalin, treated the people of Russia as his close friends. In his April Theses, he made it clear that he wanted no support for the Provisional Government, as that was one of his decrees. The liberal Provisional Government favored capitalism over socialism. This was neither Lenin nor Stalin’s goal. Stalin went about reforming the Russian government differently after Lenin’s death. Stalin was focused on establishing his socialist envisions by any means necessary: “during the great Purges, Stalin ordered his secret police to arrest many foreign colleagues of Lenin. Anyone who opposed Stalin was considered a traitor and severely punished or executed. This is the opposite of what the Provisional Government