* Born Leyba Davidovich Bronstein, into a middle class, Jewish family. * Sent to study in Odessa – while completing his education, he was made aware of the theories of Marxism and thereafter helped form the South Russian Workers’ Union. * After being imprisoned for years in Siberia, and being exiled from Russia when Joseph Stalin became the new leader of Russia, Leon Trotsky started his political career when he became the leader of the October Revolution of 1917. He was later appointed the commissar of foreign affairs under Vladimir Ilich Lenin. His writings display his deep philosophical beliefs as a theorist for fundamental communism, but later he leaned towards social democratization. * 1928- Trotsky was exiled again and eventually ended up in Mexico, where he was assassinated according to Stalin’s plans. The Russian Revolution + Trotsky and Lenin
* Ruthless, pragmatic, paranoid, crushed opposition
* 1870- Birth of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, later known as Lenin, in Simbirsk, Russia. * 1887: arrested and expelled from the Kazan University, He was associated with revolutionary activities. * 1895: arrested and exiled to Siberia.
* 1898: formed the Social Democratic Party, Russia’s first Marxist political party * 1900: Lenin fled to Europe and met Plekhanov, another revolutionary. * 1900: First issue of newspaper “Iskra” published Lenin and Plekhanov. * 1905: Lenin in Finland for a Bolshevik conference, where he meets Stalin for the first time. * 1914: Outbreak of World War I (1914-1918); Lenin leaves Poland for Switzerland. * 1917: Lenin, helped by Germany, returns to Russia and led the Bolsheviks to control of the government (October Revolution) * 1918: Assassination attempt on Lenin by Fanya Kaplan.
* 1921: announces New Economic Policy- government's seizing of land from its owners and redistributing it to the peasants, forming a peace treaty with Germany,...