What happened to Trotsky after 1929?

• A. He fled the country in 1929, was isolated within the party, and was murdered in 1940.
• B. He escaped to the West and led an anti-Stalin resistance from exile.
• C. He remained in exile his entire life and had no involvement in Soviet politics.
• D. He was rehabilitated and returned to power in the 1930s.

Answer: (A)

After Lenin’s death, Stalin consolidated power and Trotsky was forced out of the Soviet Union in 1929. He spent the rest of his life in exile, living in several countries, continuing to critique Stalin and helping to organize international opposition (including the founding of the Fourth International in 1938). He never returned to power in the Soviet Union. In 1940, he was assassinated in Mexico City by an agent of the NKVD. This sequence—expulsion from the USSR, lifelong exile with ongoing opposition, and murder in 1940—best fits what happened to Trotsky after 1929.