Stalin had used his opponents mercilessly, siding with Bukharin over the N.E.P. (New Economic Policy). Even though he did not agree with it (he was going to disagree with it after he gets voted in.). He only did this so that he could get his support over Trotsky, afterwards when he had got Trotsky out of the way he disagreed with Bukharin over the N.E.P.(he said the same things Trotsky’s arguments).
Stalin also had a premium responsibility in the communist party (Bolshevik’s). In the role of being the party’s general secretary, so he was one responsible for giving people high-ranking jobs in the party. So if some one was going to vote for him to be the next successor, he would have probably would have given them the high job, so that they could persuade other people to vote for him.
Stalin had also put around a few photographs of himself in the company of Lenin, how ever many of these photographs were said to be fakes. So that Stalin could pretend to be in companionship (pretend to be friends with Lenin) with Lenin to fool people, so he could be voted to be Lenin’s successor. And to show he was a loyal friend.
Kamenev and Zinoview (these people were other candidates that running for the vote.) they made certain Lenin’s will was published, because it criticised Stalin, so if his will was published then Stalin would have lost votes then most of the Bolshevik voters would know that many of the photographs Stalin put around were fakes then everyone would know that Stalin was a liar, and to show he was not a loyal friend of Lenin, but Kamenev and Zinoview, did this (published his will), because they did not like Trotsky.
Trotsky refused to compete for leadership. He was absent at Lenin’s funeral saying that Stalin had told him the wrong date he told him it was on the 26th when really it was on 27th January 1924, because Trotsky was in the south of Russia, and he could not get to the funeral on the 26th but could get there for the 27th. Stalin did this, because he wanted to fool Trotsky, and to fool other people, in to showing that Trotsky did not care about Lenin that is why Stalin did it (Trotsky did not appear).
Trotsky was the man who was most feared by the other senior members in the USSR and in the Bolshevik party. People were afraid that Trotsky would involve the USSR into new conflicts, and because he thought (agued) that the future of the USSR lay in trying to spread permanent revolution across Europe and the world until the whole was communist, because he was so arrogant. But Stalin argued in approval of ‘‘socialism in one country’’ which he was saying the opposite of what Trotsky was saying.
People were afraid of Trotsky (disliked him) by most of the senior members
of the communist party he failed to realise that he needed them to support him when they voted for one of them for a new successor. He also suffered, because he was highly educated and he was a he was very bright person unlike most of the people in Russia. Also was a Jewish person, and Russia was anti-semetic