Supported by parties of right and left, the February Revolution topples the monarchy. Lenin uses charisma and inflammatory prpaganda to rally support for the Bolsheviks and the highly centralized war economy known as War Communism. Lenin's aspiring successors, Joseph Stalin and Leon Trotsky, debate the future of communism. In 1927 Trotsky is expelled from the party, later to be exiled and murdered. With his Five-Year Plan of 1928, Stalin takes iron fisted control of the economy.
Heavy industry is emphasized, along with massive public works projects.
Confiscated crops lead to famine, and millions starve. Millions more are slain or exiled. Dashing hopes of postwar harmony, Stalin pursues a hard line until his death in 1953. With Mao Zedong's victory over China's Nationalists the same year, the U.S.S.R. gains a formidable communist ally. The 1962 Cuban missile crisis gives the superpowers a close brush with mutal annihlation.