To be fair, from an economic standpoint, Trotsky would have been disastrous for the USSR.

Trotsky thought that FDR’s New Deal would bankrupt America lol. And this is the guy who advocated for a rapid, planned industrialization while criticizing the NEP, but also believe that you cannot run large deficit for rapid expansion of industrial base while maintaining full employment.

Stalin, on the other hand, figured out exactly how to do that without relying on foreign capital or lowering workers wages (as Deng’s reform did) with his Five Year Plans, in a country torn apart by a devastating civil war with much of their wealth already looted.

One could even argue that without Stalin’s timely FYPs that started in 1929, it would be unlikely for the USSR to industrialize in time to resist Nazi invasion. In fact, the Germans themselves were surprised by how fast the Soviets could churn out entire mechanized divisions during the invasion itself.

I always joke that if Deng, by chance or by life circumstances, had arrived at the USSR just a few years later in 1930-31, so instead of witnessing the NEP, he would have seen what the first, early stage of FYP looked like, his later reform in China could very well have taken a radically different turn.