Yury M. Goland The Death of M.V. Frunze in the Context of the Struggle for Power in the Communist Party Leadership (on the centenary of M.V. Frunze’s death)

Abstract
The article is dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the death of the chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council (RMC) and People’s Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs of the USSR M.V. Frunze. He died at the age of 40 two days after an unsuccessfully performed operation for a peptic ulcer disease from which he had long suffered. The decision on the operation was made during the disagreements in the doctors’ council. General Secretary of the Communist Party I. Stalin insisted on the operation, despite being warned about its risks. He justified his demand by the need to completely cure Frunze so that he could work to his full capacity.

The article considers other possible motives for Stalin’s insistence that had previously been suggested and offers a new explanation. It is based on the author’s conversation with former party leadership member A.I. Mikoyan and several memoirs, as well as archival documents, and advances the hypothesis that Frunze was an alternative candidate to Stalin for the post of general secretary. He was distinguished by a rare combination of strong will and humanity, tactfulness and the ability to get along with people of different views.

Opponents of Stalin in the Politburo, G. Zinoviev and L. Kamenev, in early 1925 proposed that the general secretary be transferred to the post of chairman of the RMC and that Frunze, then deputy chairman of the RMC, become general secretary. Because of Stalin’s objections, this proposal was not accepted. However, Stalin remembered this proposal and, insisting on the serious operation, aimed to remove Frunze from active political life for a long period and to prevent him from taking part in the party congress scheduled for December 1925 and the first organizational session of the new Central Committee, where he could have been elected to the Politburo. This would have changed the balance of forces in this high organ and, perhaps, prevented the implementation of Stalin’s plans for the defeat of opponents in the party leadership and the gradual achievement of uncontrolled power.

The article concludes that Frunze’s death meant the loss of the opportunity to unite around the strong and charming personality all those in party leadership who disagreed with Stalin’s plans. This could have made it possible to implement an alternative to Stalin’s course.

Keywords:
Surgery; Peritonitis; Revolutionary Military Council; Politburo; General Secretary

For citation:
Yury M. Goland. The death of M.V. Frunze in the context of the power struggle in the leadership of the Communist Party (on the 100th anniversary of his death) // The Historical Reporter. 2026. Vol. 57. P. 198–235. DOI:

Yury M. Goland
PhD (Economics), Leading Researcher at the Institute of Economics of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Moscow, Russian Federation.
e-mail: golandyury@yandex.ru
SPIN-code: 1910-4590
AuthorID: 704219
ORCID: 0000-0002-6270-0163

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