Editing Leon Trotsky (section)

=== World War I (1914–1917) ===
World War I caused a sudden realignment within the RSDLP and other European social democratic parties over issues of war, revolution, pacifism, and internationalism. The RSDLP split into "defeatists" and "defencists". Lenin, Trotsky, and Martov advocated various internationalist anti-war positions, viewing defeat for their own country's ruling class as a "lesser evil" and opposing all imperialists in the war. "Defencists" like Plekhanov supported the Russian government to some extent. Trotsky's former colleague Parvus, now a defencist, sided so strongly against Russia that he wished for a German victory. In Switzerland, Trotsky briefly worked with the [[Swiss Socialist Party]], prompting it to adopt an internationalist resolution. He wrote ''The War and the International,''<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1914-war/index.htm |title=Marxists.org, ''The War and the International'' |access-date=31 August 2005 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051120092354/http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/works/1914-war/index.htm |archive-date=20 November 2005 |url-status=live}}</ref> opposing the war and the pro-war stance of European social democratic parties, especially the German party.
[[File:Trotskynina1915.jpg|thumb|upright|Leon Trotsky with his daughter Nina in 1915]]

As a war correspondent for ''Kievskaya Mysl'', Trotsky moved to France on 19 November 1914. In January 1915 in Paris, he began editing ''[[Nashe Slovo]]'' ("Our Word"), an internationalist socialist newspaper, initially with Martov (who soon resigned as the paper moved left). He adopted the slogan "peace without indemnities or annexations, peace without conquerors or conquered." Lenin advocated Russia's defeat and demanded a complete break with the [[Second International]].<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Life of Lenin|last=Fischer|first=Louis|publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson History|year=2001|isbn=978-1-84212-230-3|location=UK}}</ref>

Trotsky attended the [[Zimmerwald Conference]] of anti-war socialists in September 1915, advocating a middle course between those like Martov, who would stay in the Second International, and those like Lenin, who would break from it and form a [[Third International]]. The conference adopted Trotsky's proposed middle line. Lenin, initially opposed, eventually voted for Trotsky's resolution to avoid a split among anti-war socialists.<ref>Gus Fagan. [http://www.marxists.org/archive/rakovsky/biog/biog2.htm Christian Rakovsky biography] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060619133845/http://www.marxists.org/archive/rakovsky/biog/biog2.htm |date=19 June 2006}}, marxists.org; accessed 31 January 2018.</ref>

In September 1916,{{sfn|Rubenstein|2011|p=75}} Trotsky was deported from France to Spain for his anti-war activities. Spanish authorities, not wanting him, deported him to the United States on 25 December 1916. He arrived in New York City on 13 January 1917, staying for over two months at 1522 Vyse Avenue in [[The Bronx]]. In New York, he wrote articles for the local [[Russian language|Russian-language]] socialist newspaper ''[[Novy Mir (1916 magazine)|Novy Mir]]'' and, in translation, for the Yiddish-language daily [[The Jewish Daily Forward|''Der Forverts'']] ("Forward"). He also gave speeches to Russian émigrés.<ref name=":5" />

Trotsky was in New York City when the [[February Revolution]] of 1917 led to the abdication of [[Tsar Nicholas II]]. He left New York aboard SS ''Kristianiafjord'' on 27 March 1917, but his ship was intercepted by the [[Royal Navy]] at [[Halifax, Nova Scotia]]. Trotsky was arrested and detained for a month at the [[Amherst Internment Camp]] in [[Nova Scotia]]. In the camp, he befriended workers and sailors among his fellow inmates, describing his month there as "one continual mass meeting".<ref name="ns1758.ca">[http://ns1758.ca/quote/trotsky1917.html ''Leon Trotsky: My Life – In a Concentration Camp''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150508001344/http://ns1758.ca/quote/trotsky1917.html |date=8 May 2015}}, ns1758.ca; accessed 31 January 2018.</ref> His speeches and agitation angered German inmates, who complained to the camp commander, Colonel Morris, about Trotsky's "anti-patriotic" attitude.<ref name="ns1758.ca" /> Morris subsequently forbade Trotsky from making public speeches, leading to 530 prisoners protesting and signing a petition against the decision.<ref name="ns1758.ca" /> In Russia, after initial hesitation and under pressure from workers' and peasants' Soviets, Foreign Minister [[Pavel Milyukov]] demanded Trotsky's release as a Russian citizen. The British government freed him on 29 April 1917.<ref name="ns1758.ca" />
[[File:Leo Trotzki 1917.jpg|thumb|left|Trotsky arriving in Petrograd by train in May 1917]]

He reached Russia on 17 May 1917. Upon his return, Trotsky largely agreed with the Bolshevik position but did not immediately join them. Russian social democrats were split into at least six groups, and the Bolsheviks awaited the next party Congress to decide on mergers. Trotsky temporarily joined the [[Mezhraiontsy]], a regional social democratic organization in [[Petrograd]], becoming one of its leaders. At the First [[All-Russian Congress of Soviets|Congress of Soviets]] in June, he was elected a member of the first [[All-Russian Central Executive Committee]] (VTsIK) from the Mezhraiontsy faction.<ref>{{cite web|title=Leon Trotsky {{!}} Biography, Books, Assassination, & Facts|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Leon-Trotsky|website=Encyclopedia Britannica|language=en|access-date=26 May 2020}}</ref>

After an unsuccessful pro-Bolshevik uprising in Petrograd in July (the [[July Days]]), Trotsky was arrested on 7 August 1917. He was released 40 days later following the failed counter-revolutionary [[Kornilov affair|uprising by Lavr Kornilov]]. After the Bolsheviks gained a majority in the [[Petrograd Soviet]], Trotsky was elected its chairman on {{OldStyleDate|8 October|1917|25 September}}.<ref name="Wade p. xxi">{{harvnb|Wade|2004|p=xxi}}</ref> He sided with Lenin against [[Grigory Zinoviev]] and [[Lev Kamenev]] when the Bolshevik Central Committee discussed staging an armed uprising, and he led the efforts to overthrow the [[Russian Provisional Government]] headed by socialist [[Aleksandr Kerensky]].

[[Joseph Stalin]] wrote the following summary of Trotsky's role in 1917 in ''Pravda'' on 6 November 1918:<ref name="NI26">[https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/ni/vol02/no06/quote.htm In One And The Same Issue] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180715133106/https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/newspape/ni/vol02/no06/quote.htm |date=15 July 2018}} New International, Vol. 2 No. 6, October 1935, p. 208.</ref>
{{Blockquote|All practical work in connection with the organization of the uprising was done under the immediate direction of Comrade Trotsky, the President of the Petrograd Soviet. It can be stated with certainty that the Party is indebted primarily and principally to Comrade Trotsky for the rapid going over of the garrison to the side of the Soviet and the efficient manner in which the work of the [[Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee|Military Revolutionary Committee]] was organized.}}
Although this passage was quoted in Stalin's book ''The October Revolution'' (1934),<ref name="NI26" /> it was expunged from Stalin's ''Works'' (1949).<ref>{{cite web | author = J. V. Stalin | title = The October Revolution and the National Question | url = https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1918/11/19.htm | website = Internet Marxists Archive | volume = 4}}</ref>

After the success of the [[October Revolution]] on 7–8 November 1917, Trotsky led efforts to repel a [[Kerensky–Krasnov uprising|counter-attack]] by [[Cossacks]] under General [[Pyotr Krasnov]] and other troops loyal to the overthrown Provisional Government at [[Gatchina]]. Allied with Lenin, he defeated attempts by other Bolshevik Central Committee members (Zinoviev, Kamenev, [[Alexei Rykov|Rykov]], etc.) to share power with other moderate socialist parties. Trotsky advocated for a predominantly Bolshevik government and was reluctant to recall Mensheviks as partners after their voluntary withdrawal from the Congress of Soviets. However, he released several socialist ministers from prison. Neither Trotsky nor his colleagues in 1917 initially wished to suppress these parties entirely; the Bolsheviks reserved vacant seats in the Soviets and the [[All-Russian Central Executive Committee|Central Executive Committee]] for these parties in proportion to their vote share at the Congress.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Deutscher |first1=Isaac |title=The Prophet Armed Trotsky 1879-1921 (1954) |date=1954 |publisher=Oxford University Press. |pages=330–336 |url=https://archive.org/details/dli.ernet.507702/page/335/mode/1up?view=theater}}</ref> Concurrently, prominent [[Left Socialist-Revolutionaries|Left Socialist Revolutionaries]] assumed positions in Lenin's government, leading commissariats such as agriculture ([[Andrei Kolegayev]]), property ([[Vladimir Karelin]]), justice ([[Isaac Steinberg]]), posts and telegraphs ([[Prosh Proshian]]), and local government (Vladimir Trutovsky).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Abramovitch |first1=Raphael R. |title=The Soviet Revolution, 1917-1939 |date=1985 |publisher=International Universities Press |page=130 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=L_q1WAmv7XkC&q=Steinberg+became+the+People%27s+Commissar+of+Justice,+Proshyan+became+the+People%27s+Commissar+for+Posts+and+Telegraphs |language=en}}</ref> According to Deutscher, Menshevik and Social Revolutionary demands for a coalition government included disarming Bolshevik detachments and excluding Lenin and Trotsky, which was unacceptable even to moderate Bolshevik negotiators like Kamenev and [[Grigori Sokolnikov|Sokolnikov]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Deutscher |first1=Isaac |title=The Prophet Armed Trotsky 1879-1921 (1954) |date=1954 |publisher=Oxford University Press. |page=331 |url=https://archive.org/details/dli.ernet.507702/page/330/mode/1up?view=theater}}</ref> By the end of 1917, Trotsky was unquestionably the second most powerful man in the Bolshevik Party after Lenin, overshadowing Zinoviev, who had been Lenin's top lieutenant for the previous decade.