Leadership candidates 1924 - Communist Russia

Leadership candidates 1924 - Communist Russia

1. Leon Trotsky - Organised the October 1917 takeover; created the Red Army; hero of the civil war, member of Sovnarkom; regarded by Lenin as the 'most able' believed in permanent revolution; joined the Bolsheviks in the summer of 1917; a Jew; bourgeois background

2. Joseph Stalin - Old Bolshevik but not senior member until 1912; member of Sovnarkom; General Secretary of Communist Party from 1922; positions in Orgburo and Secretariat; peasant background

3. Nikolai Bukharin - Joined Bolsheviks in 1906; not a senior member until 1922; theorist; described by Lenin as the 'golden boy'; some support in Moscow and among youth; son of a school master

4. Grigorii Zinoviev - Founder member of Bolshevik party; close associate of Lenin 1903-17; joined Kamenev to oppose timing of October revolution; not a member of Sovnarkom; powerbase in Leningrad; a Jew; bourgeois background

5. Lev Kamenev - Old Bolshevik and close associate of Lenin; had opposed timing of October revolution; not a member of Sovnarkom; powerbase in Moscow; a Jew; bourgeois background