Why Stalin, and not Trotsky, Emerged as Lenin's Successor

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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

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