'hire and fire', thus creating a party owing their membership and loyalty to him. Stalin could therefore rely on their support to outvote and out manoeuvre opponents.
             "No other contender came anywhere near matching Stalin in his hold on the party machine" Lynch
             Lenin's Enrolment further increased this power over the party machine as the new members, numbering three hundred thousand, were loyal to Stalin since he had the power to fire them, thus increasing Stalin's grip on party votes. The attack on factionalism would provide Stalin with the ability to resist challenges to his new authority. Stalin was able to exercise such powers in the decisive votes against the proposals of Trotsky and the left and to defeat their proposals and eventually remove Trotsky from his position as Commissar for War in 1925. Stalin's also defeated the subsequent challenge by the 'United Opposition' through his control of the party machine, and was thus able to rid the party of the opposition which they had formed by relieving Kamenev and Zinoviev of their positions as Soviet Chairmen, and having Trotsky removed from the party.
             Stalin's political skills were influential in his rise to power as he used them to great effect at key stages throughout the leadership battle. Stalin, quite astutely, began to take on the 'leg
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