Even though he had inherited the possibility of a personal dictatorship from Lenin, Stalin went through significant psychological ordeals in the struggle to be acclaimed as Lenin’s successor. It had taken Stalin years of angling and stress to rid himself of Trotsky, a bitter rivalry that had ensued already in 1917, intensified during the civil war into near obsession, and dominated the inner life of the party after the onset of Lenin’s fatal illness. The Trotsky struggle had exerted a deep influence on Stalin’s character. No less profound an impact came in Stalin’s struggle with Lenin’s
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