whereas Lenin and Trotsky were hardened revolutionaries convinced that what they were doing was absolutely necessary for the success of communism.
Lenin instituted NEP before his brain rotting due to progressing syphilis. So - Lenin at least was capable of changing his mind.
Trotsky - it’s complex, his ideology is in theory as far from vegetarian as Stalin’s, but it involved wide participation and equality. Not what Stalin’s regime did.
I think Trotsky wouldn’t have built heavy industries at the cost of hunger and repressions. I’m not sure what the implications of that would be for WWII (would it even happen if what Germans saw to the East weren’t Stalin’s “imperial” USSR, but Trotsky’s “Bolshevik republic aiming for spreading the revolution and unification of mankind and all that”?).
Soviet attempts at reforms during the Thaw were in “vibes” (what people involved talked about publicly and in diaries\memoirs, the action taken) similar to Trotsky’s ideas.
Stalin’s regime was notoriously bloody and cruel, just saying “Trotsky would have done the same” doesn’t deliver IMHO. One can call him the person responsible for the “military communism” policies, but it’s in the name. Maybe peacetime policies would be different.
Lenin instituted NEP before his brain rotting due to progressing syphilis. So - Lenin at least was capable of changing his mind.
Trotsky - it’s complex, his ideology is in theory as far from vegetarian as Stalin’s, but it involved wide participation and equality. Not what Stalin’s regime did.
I think Trotsky wouldn’t have built heavy industries at the cost of hunger and repressions. I’m not sure what the implications of that would be for WWII (would it even happen if what Germans saw to the East weren’t Stalin’s “imperial” USSR, but Trotsky’s “Bolshevik republic aiming for spreading the revolution and unification of mankind and all that”?).
Soviet attempts at reforms during the Thaw were in “vibes” (what people involved talked about publicly and in diaries\memoirs, the action taken) similar to Trotsky’s ideas.
Stalin’s regime was notoriously bloody and cruel, just saying “Trotsky would have done the same” doesn’t deliver IMHO. One can call him the person responsible for the “military communism” policies, but it’s in the name. Maybe peacetime policies would be different.