In 1990, Moscow playwright and historian Edvard Radzinsky announced the result of his detailed investigation into the murders. He unearthed the reminiscences of Lenin’s bodyguard, Alexei Akimov, who recounted how he personally delivered Lenin’s execution order to the telegraph office. The telegram was also signed by Soviet government chief Yakov Sverdlov. Akimov had saved the original telegraph tape as a record of the secret order. Radzinsky’s research confirmed what earlier evidence had already indicated. Leon Trotsky — one of Lenin’s closest colleagues — had revealed years earlier that Lenin and Sverdlov had together made the decision to put the Tsar and his family to death. Recalling a conversation in 1918, Trotsky wrote: My next visit to Moscow took place after the [temporary] fall of Ekaterinburg [to anti-Communist forces]. Speaking with Sverdlov, I asked in passing: “Oh yes, and where is the Tsar?” I asked no further questions and considered the matter closed “Finished,” he replied. “He has been shot.” “And where is the family?” “The family along with him.” “All of them?,” I asked, apparently with a trace of surprise. “All of them,” replied Sverdlov. “What about it?” He was waiting to see my reaction. I made no reply. “And who made the decision?,” I asked. “We decided it here. Ilyich [Lenin] believed that we shouldn’t leave the Whites a live banner to rally around, especially under the present difficult circumstances.” I asked no further questions and considered the matter closed https://nationalvanguard.org/2020/10/newly-updated-the-jewish-role-in-the-bolshevik-revolution-and-russias-early-soviet-regime-part-1/