ABSTRACT
Joseph Stalin's decision even turned out to be compatible with basic Nikolai Bukharin, for when the chips were down in 1929 Bukharin went along with the new "General Line" and served the leader devotedly for seven more years. Stalin, as General Secretary, chose the latter course as the only one compatible with maintaining the Party's monopoly of power. Leon Trotsky or some other ruthless Civil War commissar could well have filled Stalin's role and done the job of building socialism in his place. Moreover, Stalinist growth was extremely one-sided: all that grew was heavy industry to produce capital goods, to produce more capital goods, to produce more heavy industry, to produce, after 1937, equipment for the military. The system completed by Stalin in 1939 would have several long decades of success before the bill came due for living high on the Lie for so long.
