page_title: Alexei Rykov
section_title: Rise of Stalin and demise (1927–38)
hierarchical_section_title: Alexei Rykov / Biography / Rise of Stalin and demise (1927–38)
caption_attribution_description: English: Alexey Rykov, head of the Soviet Government, Joseph Stalin, General Secretary of the Communist Party and Klim Voroshilov, Soviet Minister of Defense. The photo date Feb 23 1928. Red Square celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Red Army. Українська: Голова Радянського уряду Олексій Риков, Генеральний Cекретар Комуністичної партії Йосип Сталін та Міністр Оборони СРСР Клім Ворошилов. 23 лютого 1928р. Святкування 10й річниці створення Червоної Армії.
context_page_description: Alexei Ivanovich Rykov was a Russian Bolshevik revolutionary and a Soviet politician most prominent as Premier of Russia and the Soviet Union from 1924 to 1929 and 1924 to 1930 respectively. He was one of the accused in Joseph Stalin's show trials during the Great Purge.
  Rykov joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in 1898, and after it split into Bolshevik and Menshevik factions in 1903, he joined the Bolsheviks—led by Vladimir Lenin. He played an active part in the 1905 Russian Revolution. Months prior to the October Revolution of 1917, he became a member of the Petrograd and Moscow Soviets, and was elected to the Bolshevik Party Central Committee in July–August of the same year, during the Sixth Congress of the Bolshevik Party. Rykov, a moderate, often came into political conflict with Lenin and more radical Bolsheviks, but nonetheless proved influential when the October Revolution finally did overthrow the Russian Provisional Government, and as such served many roles in the new government, starting October–November as People's Commissar for Internal Affairs on the first roster of the Council of People's Commissars, which was chaired by Lenin.
context_section_description: Rykov's Premiership encompassed drastic change in the power structure of the Soviet Union. From 1924 to 1930 the role of the Communist Party—informally led by Stalin who, as General Secretary, controlled Party membership—increasingly usurped powers from the legitimate governmental structures. Although an exact date cannot be given for Stalin's rise to power, the United Opposition—which consisted of Kamenev, Zinoviev, and Trotsky—was defeated and its followers were expelled from the Party by December 1927.
  After the defeat of the United Opposition, Stalin adopted more radical policies and came into conflict with the moderate wing of the party. The two factions maneuvered behind the scenes throughout 1928. In February–April 1929 the conflict came to a head and the moderates, branded the Right Opposition, or "Rightists", were defeated and forced to "admit their mistakes" in November 1929. Rykov lost his position as Premier of the Russian SFSR to Sergei Syrtsov on 18 May 1929, but retained his other two posts. On 19 December 1930, after admitting another round of "mistakes", he was replaced by Vyacheslav Molotov as both Soviet Premier and Chairman of the Council of Labor and Defense. Two days later, Rykov was expelled from the Politburo, taking with him any chance of political advancement.
  On 30 May 1931, Rykov was appointed People's Commissar of Posts and Telegraphs, a position that he continued to occupy after the Commissariat was reorganized as People's Commissariat for Communications of the USSR in January 1932. On 10 February 1934, he was demoted to a candidate (non-voting) member of the Party's Central Committee. On 26 September 1936, in the wake of accusations made at the first Moscow Show Trial of Kamenev and Zinoviev and Tomsky's suicide, Rykov lost his position as People's Commissar of Communications, but retained his membership in the Central Committee.
  Expecting the worst, Rykov nearly decided to follow the example of his close friend Mikhail Tomsky and preempt arrest by committing suicide, but was convinced otherwise by his family. As Stalin's Great Purge intensified in early 1937, Rykov and Bukharin were expelled from the Communist Party and arrested at the February–March 1937 meeting of the Central Committee on 27 February. On 13 March 1938, at the Trial of the Twenty-One, Rykov, Bukharin, Nikolai Krestinsky, Christian Rakovsky, Genrikh Yagoda, and sixteen other Soviet officials were found guilty of treason (having plotted with Trotsky against Stalin) and sentenced to death by the Soviet Military Board. Rykov wrote a letter to the Soviet Military board requesting clemency but was unsuccessful in convincing them to overturn the verdict. On 15 March, most of them were executed. Rakovsky was executed in 1941.
  The Soviet government annulled the verdict in 1988 and reinstated him during perestroika.
caption: Alexey Rykov, Joseph Stalin and Klim Voroshilov, February 1928.
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