Trotsky was the perfect choice, as it turned out -- an extraordinarily successful demagogue in his own right, early on he thought Lenin was a poser and spoke against him. Eventually he seemed to revere Lenin and his every word, and organized the original Red Army. In "
The Commissar Vanishes: The Falsification of Photographs & Art in the Soviet Union", author David King shows a series of increasingly doctored photos found in successive editions of Soviet publications distributed to commies worldwide. Nonpersons were cropped out, or airbrushed, or the photos themselves were superseded by sketches and drawings (often fairly crude) putting Stalin into scenes where in reality he'd been absent, or removing everyone except Stalin as he had comrades and rivals executed. Trotsky had his own publications, including a sort of class photo of Lenin's 1921 cabinet; under each cameo photo was the fate, including a number which just said "missing". Under his own photo was "in exile", and the overall caption was "Stalin the Executioner Alone Remains". During the WWII Trotsky was axe-murdered by one of Stalin's infiltrators. He actually hung around a couple of days, died, and his body incinerated.
