ABSTRACT
The Red Army as it emerged from the turbulent period of the early 1920's combined traits of the professional army with characteristics that had been grafted onto it by Stalin owing to his antimilitarist bias. The former were introduced during the time of the "Military Reforms" under the leadership of M. V. Frunze; the latter were at least partly the vestiges of the revolutionary period. In 1925, Frunze died while undergoing surgery, and the responsibility for the military amalgam inherited from Trotsky fell to Voro shilov. In the short time that he was in office, Frunze had left his mark on the Red Army. The inauguration of the first Five Year Plan was one of the three important dates of the postrevolutionary period. Its impact on the army can hardly be overestimated, for it meant the beginning of a large-scale military industry, including such automotive products as airplane engines and various types of motor vehicles.
