WI: Plausibility and Consequences of a Bukharin/Khrushchev/Zhukov Troika?

This scenario is going to make a lot of initial assumptions, so bear with me here:

To begin, say that Nikolai Bukharin somehow manages to survive Stalin's Great Purge in 1938 and continues to survive under Stalin's reign by keeping a low profile until Stalin's death in 1953.

Then, in the ensuing power struggle, Bukharin allies with Nikita Khrushchev and Georgy Zhukov thus forming a troika, with Khrushchev becoming First Secretary, Bukharin becoming Premier (instead of or after Nikolai Bulganin, whichever works), and Zhukov becoming Minister of Defense (alternatively, Bukharin becomes First Secretary while Khrushchev becomes Premier).

In any case, how would the Soviet Union turn out under their collective leadership up until the OTL date of 1964 for Khrushchev's removal as First Secretary?

Some additional points:

- In OTL, Zhukov would be removed as Defense Minister in 1957; to keep the troika scenario, say he somehow remains as Defense Minister until 1964, or, at the very latest, to his death in 1974?

- If Bukharin survived, he would be 76 years old by 1964; there's two divergences we can take here: we can have Bukharin die of old age in 1963 or 1964, in which case how would that effect Khrushchev's removal in this scenario; or we can have Bukharin continue living past 1964 after Khrushchev is removed, dying of old age in his late-80's/early-90's anywhere between 1976 (in which he would be 88) and 1980 (in which he would be 92), the very latest at 1988 (in which he would be 100 and be stretching plausibility as it is). How would the Soviet Union turn out under Bukharin this entire time period, and would he even still be in power at all past 1964?
 
Soviet troikas tend not to last very long. Sooner or later, one of these three would take full power and have the others "quietly retire". This is unlikely to be Zhukov, since he didn't seem to really want power, so that leaves Bukharin and Khrushchev as the contenders. I'd say that the winner is likely to be the one who gets the post of First Secretary, as happaned IOTL with Krushchev and Malenkov.
 
Anyway, it's certainly interesting to think about a scenario where Bukharin is influential in the Soviet Union after WWII. The 1950s and 60s would certainly be a far better time for market socialism in the Soviet Union than the 30s. A full-blown return to the NEP would probably be impossible, but maybe something like Titoism could come to gradually develop?
 
Even if somehow Stalin let Bukharin survive--something very implausible considering how many people were destroyed just for association with "Rightists"--I don't see him ever getting more than minor positions, even after Stalin's death. It was standard Soviet doctrine, even after Stalin's death, that Bukharin had been wrong in resisting mass collectivization and breakneck industrialization, and that the Soviet victory in the Great Patriotic War showed that Stalin's policies were basically right (even if the purges of 1937-8 were condemned after 1956--and notably Bukharin was not among the officially "rehabilitated" until well into the Gorbachev era [1]). To allow Bukharin back into power would be a denial of the foundations of the Soviet Union as the CPSU leaders saw it. Indeed, accusing one's enemies of Bukharinism is a practice that did not stop with Stalin's death--Khrushchev used it against Malenkov in January 1955. (The theory that heavy industry need no longer be given precedence over consumer goods was "a belching forth of the right deviation, a belching forth of views hostile to Leninism, which in their time were preached by Rykov, Bukharin, and their ilk." https://books.google.com/books?id=DxyF5gGdclUC&pg=PA128 It's a little bit unusual to give Rykov first place in a listing/denunciation of "Rightists" but Khrushchev was probably making the point that Rykov, like Malenkov, had been Prime Minister of the USSR...)

As for Zhukov, I'll repeat what I wrote previously: "BTW I think Zhukov's prospects for supreme power have been greatly exaggerated in this forum. There is no evidence that he ever plotted a coup, and the Bolshevik suspicion of giving too much power to a military man ("Bonapartism") would weigh against him. As of 1953, he had never held any Party position higher than alternate member of the Central Committee, and Stalin excluded him even from that. For most of 1948-53 he was commander of the not-very-important Urals Military District. Khrushchev used him first against Beria and years later against the so-called Anti-Party Group--and discarded him as soon as he was no longer needed." https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...rad-who-succeeds-stalin.442911/#post-16962517

[1] Unofficially, the CPSU by merely denouncing him after 1956 for his "anti-Leninist views" without mentioning that he was a spy and terrorist did implicitly acknowledge that he was not actually a criminal. Indeed, Pyotor Pospelov said at a conference of historians "Neither Bukharin nor Rykov was, of course, a spy or a terrorist." https://www.washingtonpost.com/arch...754-ae89-e70e1b2b29d4/?utm_term=.3120ee7f4508
But he was still not officially rehabilitated, and even if he were, it would have been with the understanding that of course his policy views were all wrong.
 
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Even if somehow Stalin let Bukharin survive--something very implausible considering how many people were destroyed just for association with "Rightists"--I don't see him ever getting more than minor positions, even after Stalin's death.

Perhaps Stalin gets distracted by a bigger target for purging, and this generates enough of a smokescreen for Bukharin to realize he's on Stalin's shit-list and save himself by sucking up to Stalin, or he just slips through the cracks as Stalin concentrates on other targets?

I had an alt-history scenario that had Mikhail Frunze survive his illness in 1925 and manages to serve into Stalin's reign and leads a volunteer group to fight in the Spanish Civil War, but is forced to return to the USSR after an assassination attempt on Trotsky in Barcelona happens (Trotsky living in Barcelona instead of Paris is another PoD of my alt-history scenario, but that's outside the scope of this thread's topic). Frunze returns home just in time to get caught up in the Great Purge, with Stalin furious that Frunze inadvertently foiled the NKVD's assassination attempt on Trotsky, and Frunze kicks up enough of a fuss that Bukharin, who was going to be Stalin's next target for purging, manages to escape that fate as a result. Bukharin quickly sucks up to Stalin by dropping any opposition to Stalin's policies and admitting he was wrong to do so, and remains quiet and obedient for the rest of Stalin's reign.

Yes, it's convoluted, but would that be enough of a distraction to save Bukharin?

FAUX-EDIT: Reading up on the subject of Bukharin, it seems like he was on Stalin's shit-list as early as 1928, and even after a brief period of rehabilitation in 1934-1936, he looked like he was marked for death by Stalin when he sent Bukharin to Paris for some business, and fell into Stalin's trap when he maintained contact with exiled Mensheviks while in Paris.

Seeing all of that, is it even somehow possible for Bukharin to survive Stalin to begin with? A point of divergence that allows Bukharin to survive seems to need to be pretty far back to even allow for it, and doing that renders the whole exercise redundant as the entire course of the early Soviet Union would be dramatically changed just because of that, as Stalin wouldn't even be guaranteed to come to power.
 

Anchises

Banned
Soviet troikas tend not to last very long. Sooner or later, one of these three would take full power and have the others "quietly retire". This is unlikely to be Zhukov, since he didn't seem to really want power, so that leaves Bukharin and Khrushchev as the contenders. I'd say that the winner is likely to be the one who gets the post of First Secretary, as happaned IOTL with Krushchev and Malenkov.

Depends. Brezhnev's leadership actually was a collective leadership in long stretches. Actual Troika's might be unstable, I agree there, but an an ATL where Kruschev never manages to stabilize his power enough to become the sole top dog doesn't seem that unlikely to me.
 
Honestly I would love to see a Bukharin USSR. It needs a bit of work, eg him realizing Stalin is remodeling the power base and outdoing him on that with a trusted subordinate that removes Stalin himself. Stalin was the worst thing to happen to Russia and the states of the USSR. OTL is a RussiaScrew overal.
 
Honestly I would love to see a Bukharin USSR. It needs a bit of work, e.g. him realizing Stalin is remodeling the power base and outdoing him on that with a trusted subordinate that removes Stalin himself.

The problem with that scenario is (from what I understand) that Bukharin himself wasn't really the type to engage in underhanded political schemes like that; Bukharin was never particularly interested in power, he was a people-person who preferred to be more in the background working diligently as an administrator. I don't see Bukharin being able to outmaneuver Stalin like that.
 
True, but then again he could have help. I don't think there is a guy that wants to be Bukharin's mouthpiece, so perhaps a guy that is convinced of his qualities that forces him into the light? They say the best leaders are the ones that don't want it.
 
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