Leon Trotsky Leon Trotsky Leon Trotsky (; born Lev Davidovich Bronstein; – 21 August 1940) was a Russian revolutionary, Marxist theorist, and Soviet politician whose particular strain of Marxist thought is known as Trotskyism. Initially supporting the Menshevik Internationalists faction within the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, he joined the Bolsheviks ("majority") just before the 1917 October Revolution, immediately becoming a leader within the Communist Party. He would go on to become one of the seven members of the first Politburo, founded in 1917 to manage the Bolshevik Revolution. During the early days of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) and
Lev Zadov swing them out" and "I'm Leva Zadov, I'll speak and you'll fear" attributed to him by Tolstoy, became part of Russian slang. It is proven today that Tolstoy used a pamphlet published in 1924 in Kiev for his information on Zadov. Lev Zadov Lev Nikolaevich Zadov (Zinkovsky) () April 11, 1893 - September 25, 1938, Kiev was chief of military intelligence of the Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine, and later an OGPU operative. Born Lev Zadov, he changed his last name to Zinkovsky. Lev Zadov was born in the Russian Jewish agricultural colony Veselaya. About 1898-1900 his family fell on