Richard Pipes conducts a succinct inquest, asking: Why did tsarism fall virtually overnight? Why did the Bolsheviks - the smallest of the three main Russian radical parties - triumph? Why did Stalin succeed Lenin? In answering these questions, Pipes gives us our clearest picture yet of the vulnerability of the tsarist system as well as of the ruthless opportunism that enabled Lenin to seize the reins of power. Dispelling years of revisionist mythology, Pipes demonstrates the extent to which Stalin was the logical heir to a party that had assumed control over every aspect of Russian life.