# data[].attributes.body
Debates on Socialism

# data[].attributes.body
Tsar Alexander II started his reign

# data[].attributes.body
Serfs were emancipated

# data[].attributes.body
Alexander II was assassinated

# data[].attributes.body
Vladimir Lenin was exiled

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Lenin's father, Ilya Nikolayevich Ulyanov, was from a family of serfs; his ethnic origins remain unclear, with suggestions being made that he was Russian, Chuvash, Mordvin, or Kalmyk. Despite this lower-class background he had risen to middle-class status, studying physics and mathematics at Kazan Imperial University before teaching at the Penza Institute for the Nobility.

# data[].attributes.body
Coronation of Tsar Nicholas II

# data[].attributes.body
Formation of Social Democratic Labour Party

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party ( RSDLP; Russian: Российская социал-демократическая рабочая партия (РСДРП), Rossiyskaya sotsial-demokraticheskaya rabochaya partiya (RSDRP)), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a revolutionary socialist political party founded in Minsk, Belarus.

Formed to unite the various revolutionary organizations of the Russian Empire into one party in 1898, the RSDLP later split into Bolsheviks (majority) and Mensheviks (minority) factions, with the Bolshevik faction eventually becoming the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The Interdistrictites, known as the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (Internationalists), were also formed from this party.

The RSDLP was not the first Russian Marxist group (the Emancipation of Labour group had been formed in 1883). The RSDLP was created to oppose the Narodniks revolutionary populism, which was later represented by the Socialist Revolutionary Party (SRs). Formed at an underground conference in Minsk in 1898 by 15 delegates representing the Jewish Labour Bund, Robochaya Gazeta (both formed a year earlier in 1897) and the St. Petersburg League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class, the RSDLP program was based on the theories of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, namely that despite Russia's agrarian nature at the time, the true revolutionary potential lay with the industrial working class. The RSDLP was illegal for most of its existence as at the end of the 1st Party Congress in March 1898 all nine delegates were arrested by the Imperial Russian Police. At this time, there were 3 million Russian industrial workers, just 3% of the population.

Before the 2nd Party Congress, a young intellectual named Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov joined the party, better known by his pseudonym- Vladimir Lenin. In 1902, he had published What Is To Be Done?, outlining his view of the party's task and methodology-to form "the vanguard of the proletariat". He advocated a disciplined, centralized party of committed activists who sought to fuse the underground struggle for political freedom with the class struggle of the proletariat.

In 1903, the 2nd Party Congress met in exile in Brussels to attempt to create a united force. However, after unprecedented attention from the Belgian authorities the Congress moved to London, meeting on 11 August in a chapel in Tottenham Court Road. At the Congress, the party split into two irreconcilable factions on 17 November: the Bolsheviks (derived from bolshinstvo- Russian for "majority"), headed by Lenin; and the Mensheviks (from menshinstvo-Russian for "minority"), headed by Julius Martov. Confusingly, the Mensheviks were actually the larger faction, but the names Menshevik and Bolshevik were taken from a vote held at the 1903 Party Congress for the editorial board of the party newspaper, ( Spark), with the Bolsheviks being the majority and the Mensheviks being the minority.[citation needed ] These were the names used by the factions for the rest of the party Congress and these are the names retained after the split at the 1903 Congress.[citation needed ] Lenin's faction later ended up in the minority and remained smaller than the Mensheviks until the Russian Revolution.[citation needed ]

A central issue at the Congress was the question of the definition of party membership. Martov proposed the following formulation: "A member of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party is one who accepts the Party's programme, supports the Party financially, and renders it regular personal assistance under the direction of one of its organizations". On the other hand, Lenin proposed a more strict definition: "A member of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party is one who accepts its programme and who supports the Party both financially and by personal participation in one of the Party organizations". Martov won the vote and the Bolsheviks accepted it as part of the adopted organizational rules.

Despite a number of attempts at reunification, the split proved permanent. As time passed, ideological differences emerged in addition to the original organizational differences. The main difference that emerged in the years after 1903 was that the Bolsheviks believed that only the workers, backed up by the peasantry, could carry out the bourgeois-democratic revolutionary tasks in Russia, which would then provide incentive to socialist revolution in Germany, France and Britain, while the Mensheviks believed that the workers and peasants must seek out enlightened people from the liberal bourgeoisie to carry out the bourgeois-democratic revolutionary tasks in Russia. The two warring factions both agreed that the coming revolution would be "bourgeois-democratic" within Russia, but while the Mensheviks viewed the liberals as the main ally in this task, the Bolsheviks opted for an alliance with the peasantry as the only way to carry out the bourgeois-democratic revolutionary tasks while defending the interests of the working class. Essentially, the difference was that the Bolsheviks considered that in Russia the tasks of the bourgeois democratic revolution would have to be carried out without the participation of the bourgeoisie. The 3rd Party Congress was held separately by the Bolsheviks.

The 4th Party Congress was held in Stockholm, Sweden and saw a formal reunification of the two factions (with the Mensheviks in the majority), but the discrepancies between Bolshevik and Menshevik views became particularly clear during the proceedings.

The 5th Party Congress was held in London, England, in 1907. It consolidated the supremacy of the Bolshevik faction and debated strategy for communist revolution in Russia. Joseph Stalin never later referred to his stay in London.

The Social Democrats (SDs) boycotted elections to the First Duma (April-July 1906), but they were represented in the Second Duma (February-June 1907). With the SRs, they held 83 seats. The Second Duma was dissolved on the pretext of the discovery of an SD conspiracy to subvert the army. Under new electoral laws, the SD presence in the Third Duma (1907-1912) was reduced to 19. From the Fourth Duma (1912-1917), the SDs were finally and fully split. The Mensheviks had five members in the Duma and the Bolsheviks had seven, including Roman Malinovsky, who was later uncovered as an Okhrana agent.

In the years of Tsarist repression that followed the defeat of the 1905 Russian Revolution, both the Bolshevik and Menshevik factions faced splits, causing further splits in the RSDLP, which manifested themselves from late 1908 and the years immediately following. The Mensheviks split into the "Pro-Party Mensheviks" led by Georgi Plekhanov, who wished to maintain illegal underground work as well as legal work; and the "Liquidators", whose most prominent advocates were Pavel Axelrod, Fyodor Dan, Nikolai Aleksandrovich Rozhkov and Nikolay Chkheidze, who wished to pursue purely legal activities and who now repudiated illegal and underground work.

The Bolsheviks split threeways into the Proletary group led by Lenin, Grigory Zinoviev and Lev Kamenev, who waged a fierce struggle against the liquidators, ultimatists and recallists; the Ultimatist group led by Grigory Aleksinsky, who wished to issue ultimatums to the RSDLP Duma deputies to follow the party line or to resign immediately; and the Recallist group led by Alexander Bogdanov and Anatoly Lunacharsky and supported by Maxim Gorky, who called for the immediate recall of all RSDLP Duma deputies and a boycott of all legal work by the RSDLP, in favour of increased radical underground and illegal work.

There was also a non-faction group led by Leon Trotsky, who denounced all the "factionalism" in the RSDLP, pushed for "unity" in the party and focused more strongly on the problems of Russian workers and peasants on the ground. The Menshevik Julius Martov was formally considered a liquidator partly because most of his closest political friends were liquidators.

In January 1912, Lenin's Proletary Bolshevik group called a conference in Prague and expelled the liquidators, ultimatists and recallists from the RSDLP, which officially led to the creation of a separate party, known as the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (Bolshevik). In August 1912, Trotsky's group tried to reunite all the RSDLP factions into the same party at a conference in Vienna, but he was largely rebuffed by the Bolsheviks. The Bolsheviks seized power during the October Revolution in 1917 when all political power was transferred to the soviets and in 1918 changed their name to the All-Russian Communist Party. They banned the Mensheviks after the Kronstadt rebellion of 1921.

In 1902, the Tallinn organization of the RSDLP was founded, which in 1904 was converted into the Tallinn Committee of the party. In November, a parallel (that is, also directly under the CC of RSDLP) Narva Committee was created. Amongst other radicals, the Estonian RSDLP cadres were active in the 1905 Revolution. At the conference of the Estonian RSDLP organizations in Terijoki, Finland in March 1907, the Bolshevik supporters came into serious conflict with the Mensheviks.

At the 4th (Unity) Congress of the RSDLP in 1906, the Latvian Social Democratic Workers Party entered the RSDLP as a territorial organisation. After the Congress, its name was changed Social-Democracy of the Latvian Territory.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party ( RSDLP; Russian: Российская социал-демократическая рабочая партия (РСДРП), Rossiyskaya sotsial-demokraticheskaya rabochaya partiya (RSDRP)), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a revolutionary socialist political party founded in Minsk, Belarus.

# data[].attributes.body
Formation of Socialist Revolutionary Party

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Socialist Revolutionary Party, or Party of Socialist-Revolutionaries (the SRs or Esers; Russian: Партия социалистов-революционеров, ПСР or эсеры, esery) was a major political party in late Imperial Russia, and both phases of the Russian Revolution and early Soviet Russia.

The SRs were agrarian socialists and supporters of a democratic socialist Russian republic. The ideological heirs of the Narodniks, the SRs won a mass following among the Russian peasantry by endorsing the overthrow of the Tsar and the redistribution of land to the peasants. The SRs boycotted the elections to the First Duma following the Revolution of 1905 alongside the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, but chose to run in the elections to the Second Duma and received the majority of the few seats allotted to the peasantry. Following the 1907 coup, the SRs boycotted all subsequent Dumas until the fall of the Tsar in the February Revolution of March 1917. Controversially, the party leadership endorsed the Russian Provisional Government and participated in multiple coalitions with liberal and social-democratic parties, while a radical faction within the SRs rejected the Provisional Government's authority in favor of the Congress of Soviets and began to drift towards the Bolsheviks. These divisions would ultimately result in the party splitting over the course of the summer of 1917 into the Right and Left SRs. Meanwhile, Alexander Kerensky, one of the leaders of the February Revolution and the second and last head of the Provisional Government (July-November 1917) was a nominal member of the SR party but in practice acted independently of its decisions.

By November 1917, the Provisional Government had been widely discredited by its failure to withdraw from World War I, implement land reform or convene a Constituent Assembly to draft a Constitution, leaving the soviets in de facto control of the country. The Bolsheviks thus moved to hand power to the 2nd Congress of Soviets in the October Revolution. After a few weeks of deliberation, the Left SRs ultimately formed a coalition government with the Bolsheviks - the Council of People's Commissioners - from November 1917 to March 1918 while the Right SRs boycotted the Soviets and denounced the Revolution as an illegal coup. The SRs obtained a majority in the subsequent elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly, with most of the party's seats going to the Right faction. Citing outdated voter-rolls which did not acknowledge the party split, and the Assembly's conflicts with the Congress of Soviets, the Bolshevik-Left SR government moved to dissolve the Constituent Assembly by force in January 1918.

The Left SRs left their coalition with the Bolsheviks in March 1918 in protest against the signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. An uprising against the Bolsheviks by the leadership of the Left SRs in July 1918 resulted in the immediate arrest of most of the party's members. Most of the Left SRs who opposed the uprising were gradually freed and allowed to keep their government positions, but were unable to organize a new central organ and gradually splintered into multiple pro-Bolshevik parties, which would all ultimately merge with the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) by 1921. The Right SRs supported the Whites during the Russian Civil War of 1917-1922, but the White movement's anti-socialist leadership increasingly marginalized and ultimately purged them. A small Right-SR remnant, still calling itself the Socialist Revolutionary Party, continued to operate in exile from 1923 to 1940 as a member of the Labour and Socialist International. Almost all of the SRs who stayed in the Soviet Union were executed under Joseph Stalin.

The party's ideology was built upon the philosophical foundation of Russia's Narodnik- populist movement of the 1860s-1870s and its worldview developed primarily by Alexander Herzen and Pyotr Lavrov. After a period of decline and marginalisation in the 1880s, the Narodnik-populist school of thought about social change in Russia was revived and substantially modified by a group of writers and activists known as neonarodniki (neo-populists), particularly Viktor Chernov. Their main innovation was a renewed dialogue with Marxism and integration of some of the key Marxist concepts into their thinking and practice. In this way, with the economic spurt and industrialisation in Russia in the 1890s, they attempted to broaden their appeal in order to attract the rapidly growing urban workforce to their traditionally peasant-oriented programme. The intention was to widen the concept of the people so that it encompassed all elements in society that opposed the Tsarist regime.

The party was established in 1902 out of the Northern Union of Socialist Revolutionaries (founded in 1896), bringing together many local socialist revolutionary groups established in the 1890s, notably the Workers' Party of Political Liberation of Russia created by Catherine Breshkovsky and Grigory Gershuni in 1899. As primary party theorist emerged Viktor Chernov, the editor of the first party organ, Revolutsionnaya Rossiya ( Revolutionary Russia). Later party periodicals included Znamia Truda ( Labour's Banner), Delo Naroda ( People's Cause) and Volia Naroda ( People's Will). Party leaders included Grigori Gershuni, Catherine Breshkovsky, Andrei Argunov, Nikolai Avksentiev, Mikhail Gots, Mark Natanson, Rakitnikov (Maksimov), Vadim Rudnev, Nikolay Rusanov, Ilya Rubanovich and Boris Savinkov.

The party's programme was democratic and socialist - it garnered much support among Russia's rural peasantry, who in particular supported their programme of land-socialization as opposed to the Bolshevik programme of land-nationalization-division of land into peasant tenants rather than collectivization into authoritarian state management. The party's policy platform differed from that of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) - both Bolshevik and Menshevik - in that it was not officially Marxist (though some of its ideologues considered themselves such). The SRs agreed with Marx's analysis of capitalism, but not with his proposed solution. The SRs believed that both the labouring peasantry as well as the industrial proletariat were revolutionary classes in Russia. Whereas RSDLP defined class membership in terms of ownership of the means of production, Chernov and other SR theorists defined class membership in terms of extraction of surplus value from labour. On the first definition, small-holding subsistence farmers who do not employ wage labour are - as owners of their land - members of the petty bourgeoisie, whereas on the second definition, they can be grouped with all who provide rather than purchase labour-power, and hence with the proletariat as part of the labouring class. Chernov considered the proletariat as vanguard and the peasantry as the main body of the revolutionary army.

The party played an active role in the 1905 Russian Revolution and in the Moscow and Saint Petersburg Soviets. Although the party officially boycotted the first State Duma in 1906, 34 SRs were elected while 37 were elected to the second Duma in 1907. The party also boycotted both the third Duma (1907-1912) and fourth Duma (1912-1917). In this period, party membership drastically declined and most of its leaders emigrated from Russia.

A distinctive feature of party tactics until about 1909 was its heavy reliance on assassinations of individual government officials. These tactics were inherited from SRs' predecessor in the populist movement, Narodnaya Volya ("People's Will"), a conspiratorial organisation of the 1880s. They were intended to embolden the "masses" and intimidate ("terrorise") the Tsarist government into political concessions. The SR Combat Organisation (SRCO), responsible for assassinating government officials, was initially led by Gershuni and operated separately from the party so as not to jeopardise its political actions. SRCO agents assassinated two Ministers of the Interior, Dmitry Sipyagin and Vyacheslav von Plehve, Grand Duke Sergei Aleksandrovich, the Governor of Ufa N. M. Bogdanovich and many other high-ranking officials.

In 1903, Gershuni was betrayed by his deputy, Yevno Azef, an agent of the Okhrana secret police, arrested, convicted of terrorism and sentenced to life at hard labour, managing to escape, flee overseas and go into exile. Azef became the new leader of the SRCO and continued working for both the SRCO and the Okhrana, simultaneously orchestrating terrorist acts and betraying his comrades. Boris Savinkov ran many of the actual operations, notably the assassination attempt on Admiral Fyodor Dubasov.

However, terrorism was controversial for the party from the beginning. At its 2nd Congress in Imatra in 1906, the controversy over terrorism was one of the main reasons for the split between the SR Maximalists and the Popular Socialists. The Maximalists endorsed not only attacks on political and government targets, but also economic terror (i.e. attacks on landowners, factory owners and so on) whereas the Popular Socialists rejected all terrorism. Other issues also divided the defectors from the PSR as Maximalists disagreed with the SRs' strategy of a two-stage revolution as advocated by Chernov, the first stage being popular-democratic and the second labour-socialist. To Maximalists, this seemed like the RSDLP distinction between bourgeois-democratic and proletarian-socialist stages of revolution. Maximalism stood for immediate socialist revolution. Meanwhile, the Popular Socialists disagreed with the party's proposal to socialise the land (i.e. turn it over to collective peasant ownership) and instead wanted to nationalise it (i.e. turn it over to the state). They also wanted landowners to be compensated while the PSR rejected indemnities). Many SRs held a mixture of these positions.

In late 1908, a Russian Narodnik and amateur spy hunter Vladimir Burtsev suggested that Azef might be a police spy. The party's Central Committee was outraged and set up a tribunal to try Burtsev for slander. At the trial, Azef was confronted with evidence and was caught lying, therefore he fled and left the party in disarray. The party's Central Committee, most of whose members had close ties to Azef, felt obliged to resign. Many regional organisations, already weakened by the revolution's defeat in 1907, collapsed or became inactive. Savinkov's attempt to rebuild the SRCO failed and it was suspended in 1911. Gershuni had defended Azef from exile in Zürich until his death there. The Azef scandal contributed to a profound revision of SR tactics that was already underway. As a result, it renounced assassinations (" individual terror") as a means of political protest.

With the start of World War I, the party was divided on the issue of Russia's participation in the war. Most SR activists and leaders, particularly those remaining in Russia, chose to support the Tsarist government mobilisation against Germany. Together with the like-minded members of the Menshevik Party, they became known as oborontsy ("defensists"). Many younger defensists living in exile joined the French Army as Russia's closest ally in the war. A smaller group, the internationalists, which included Chernov, favoured the pursuit of peace through cooperation with socialist parties in both military blocs. This led them to participate in the Zimmerwald and Kienthal conferences with Bolshevik emigres led by Lenin. This fact was later used against Chernov and his followers by their right-wing opponents as alleged evidence of their lack of patriotism and Bolshevik sympathies.

The February Revolution allowed the SRs to return to an active political role. Party leaders, including Chernov, returned to Russia. They played a major role in the formation and leadership of the soviets, albeit in most cases playing second fiddle to the Mensheviks. One member, Alexander Kerensky, joined the Provisional Government in March 1917 as Minister of Justice, eventually becoming the head of a coalition socialist-liberal government in July 1917, although his connection with the party was tenuous. He had served in the Duma with the social democratic Trudoviks, breakaway SRs that defied the party's refusal to participate in the Duma.

After the fall of the first coalition in April-May 1917 and the reshuffling of the Provisional Government, the party played a larger role. Its key government official at the time was Chernov who joined the government as Minister of Agriculture. Chernov also tried to play a larger role, particularly in foreign affairs, but he soon found himself marginalised and his proposals of far-reaching agrarian reform blocked by more conservative members of the government. After the failed Bolshevik uprising of July 1917, Chernov found himself on the defensive as allegedly soft on the Bolsheviks and was excluded from the revamped coalition in August 1917. The party was now represented in the government by Nikolai Avksentiev, a defensist, as Minister of the Interior.

This weakening of the party's position intensified the growing divide within it between supporters of the pluralistic Constituent Assembly, and those inclined toward more resolute, unilateral action. In August 1917, Maria Spiridonova advocated scuttling the Constituent Assembly and forming an SR-only government, but she was not supported by Chernov and his followers. This spurred the formation a small breakaway faction of the SR party known as the "Left SRs". The Left SRs were willing to temporarily cooperate with the Bolsheviks. The Left SRs believed that Russia should withdraw immediately from World War I and they were frustrated that the Provisional Government wanted to postpone addressing the land question until after the convocation of the Russian Constituent Assembly instead of immediately confiscating the land from the landowners and redistributing it to the peasants.

Left SRs and Bolsheviks referred to the mainstream SR party as the "Right SR" party whereas mainstream SRs referred to the party as just "SR" and reserved the term "Right SR" for the right-wing faction of the party led by Catherine Breshkovsky and Avksentiev. The primary issues motivating the split were participation in the war and the timing of land redistribution.

At the Second Congress of Soviets on 25 October, when the Bolsheviks proclaimed the deposition of the Provisional government, the split within the SR party became final. The Left SR stayed at the Congress and were elected to the permanent All-Russian Central Executive Committee executive (while initially refusing to join the Bolshevik government) while the mainstream SR and their Menshevik allies walked out of the Congress. In late November, the Left SRs joined the Bolshevik government, obtaining three ministries.

In the election to the Russian Constituent Assembly held two weeks after the Bolsheviks took power, the party still proved to be by far the most popular party across the country, gaining 37.6% of the popular vote as opposed to the Bolsheviks' 24%. However, the Bolsheviks disbanded the Assembly in January 1918 and after that the SR lost political significance. The Left SRs became the coalition partner of the Bolsheviks in the Soviet government, although they resigned their positions after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (the peace treaty with the Central Powers that ended Russia's participation in World War I). Both wings of the SR party were ultimately suppressed by the Bolsheviks through imprisoning some of its leaders and forcing others into emigration. A few Left SRs like Yakov Grigorevich Blumkin joined the Communist Party.

Dissatisfied with the large concessions granted to Germany by the Bolsheviks in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, two Chekists who were left SRs assassinated the German ambassador to Russia, Count Wilhelm Mirbach early in the afternoon on 6 July. Following the assassination, the left SRs attempted a " Third Russian Revolution" against the Bolsheviks on 6-7 July, but it failed and led to the arrest, imprisonment, exile and execution of party leaders and members. In response, some SRs turned again to violence. A former SR, Fanny Kaplan, tried to assassinate Lenin on 30 August. Many SRs fought for the Whites or Greens in the Russian Civil War alongside some Mensheviks and other banned socialist elements. The Tambov Rebellion against the Bolsheviks was led by an SR, Aleksandr Antonov. In Ufa the SRs' Provisional All-Russian Government was formed. However, after Admiral Kolchak was installed by the Whites as "Supreme Leader" in November 1918, he expelled all Socialists from the ranks. As a result, some SRs placed their organisation behind White lines at the service of the Red Guards and the Cheka.

Following Lenin's instructions, a trial of SRs was held in Moscow in 1922, which led to protests by Eugene V. Debs, Karl Kautsky, and Albert Einstein among others. Most of the defendants were found guilty, but they did not plead guilty like the defendants in the later show trials in the Soviet Union in the late 1920s and the 1930s.

The party continued its activities in exile. A Foreign Delegation of the Central Committee was established and based in Prague. The party was a member of the Labour and Socialist International between 1923 and 1940.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Socialist Revolutionary Party - Wikipedia

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Socialist Revolutionary Party, or Party of Socialist-Revolutionaries (the SRs or Esers; Russian: Партия социалистов-революционеров, ПСР or эсеры, esery) was a major political party in late Imperial Russia, and both phases of the Russian Revolution and early Soviet Russia. The SRs were agrarian socialists and supporters of a democratic socialist Russian republic.

# data[].attributes.body
Russia and Japan War

# data[].attributes.body
First Revolution of Russia

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Russian Revolution of 1905 was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire, some of which was directed at the government. It included worker strikes, peasant unrest, and military mutinies.

# data[].attributes.body
Bloody Sunday in St. Petersburg

# data[].attributes.body
October Manifesto Issued

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The October Manifesto was a vague but insincere promise of political reform, issued by Tsar Nicholas II at the height of the 1905 Revolution.

# data[].attributes.body
First State Duma

# data[].attributes.body
Rasputin was killed

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The death of Rasputin has been a subject of fascination since the hour of his murder due to his stubborn, nearly superhuman refusal to die.

The death of Grigori Rasputin, a man who proved to be seemingly unkillable, is one of the most astounding stories in human history. On the night of December 29, 1916, a group of nobles who feared the powerful holy man's influence with Russia's royal family summoned him to the home of conspirator Prince Felix Yusupov and began to execute their murderous scheme.

First, they poisoned him with tea and cakes that had been laced with cyanide, but he showed no signs of distress. Then he drank three glasses of wine, which had also been poisoned, and yet he carried on unfazed. By 2:30 AM, his dumbfounded killers huddled up in astonishment to figure out a new plan.

Yusupov then took out a revolver, told Rasputin to "say a prayer," and shot him in the chest before leaving him for dead. When the assassins returned to the body later on, Rasputin suddenly sprang up and attacked Yusupov before chasing his entire band of attackers into the courtyard where they bludgeoned him and shot him several more times - but still he wasn't dead.

Finally, they had to wrap him up and toss him into a freezing river where he eventually succumbed to hypothermia. And that's not even the whole story of how Rasputin died.

Grigori Rasputin's Rise To Power

Born in 1869 in relative obscurity to a peasant family in Siberia, Grigori Rasputin didn't show much inclination to religion early on. His spiritual awakening came after visiting a monastery at 23.

Though he never took the holy orders, he rose to prominence as a mystical religious figure; more like an Old Testament prophet than a Russian Orthodox priest.

Dressed in dirty monk's robes and unconcerned with personal hygiene, Rasputin would be the last person you would expect to be invited to attend the aristocratic events of St. Petersburg's elite, but he was a singularly unique figure in the then-capital of the Russian Empire.

Employing a legendary force of will - some called Rasputin's personality hypnotic, while others thought he wielded some dark, sinister magic - Rasputin climbed his way up the social ladder very quickly.

After Rasputin managed to charm some of the extended relations of the ruling Romanov family, he then used these connections to be introduced to the Tsar and Tsarina themselves, beginning a relationship with the Romanovs that would help bring down the Russian Empire and continue to affect events long after Rasputin's death.

Rasputin Bewitches The Romanovs

When Tsarina Alexandra gave birth to her only son, Alexei, doctors discovered that he was a severe hemophiliac. The Russian people - already hostile to the German-born Tsarina - learned of the new heir's debilitating condition and blamed the Tsarina for the boy's affliction, causing the Tsarina considerable mental and emotional distress for the rest of her life.

Unable to find doctors who could cure her son's condition, or even alleviate his symptoms, the Tsarina put her faith in Rasputin when he stepped forward and promised that he could treat the sickly child's symptoms through prayer and faith-healing.

To this day, no one knows what Rasputin did to treat Alexei. Whether it was folk medicine, magic, or some sort of placebo effect, it appeared to work. While Alexei's condition wasn't cured, Rasputin - and only Rasputin - was able to moderate the boy's symptoms.

Rasputin's ability to treat Alexei's hemophilia made him indispensable to the Romanovs and Rasputin knew it, exploiting his position to gain greater control over them.

Anxiety Grows Among Russia's Aristocracy

As enthralled as the Romanovs were, the Russian people were not, and soon pinned every calamity on Rasputin's scheming - and it was largely justified. Rasputin had no idea how to run a country and the advice he gave to the Romanovs was dutifully followed as if it were religious instructions, which usually ended in disaster.

It wasn't long before rumors were published in the press that Rasputin was the Tsarina's lover and that he was bewitching the Romanovs with some form of dark magic.

Soon, the Tsar's nephew-by-marriage, Prince Felix Yusupov, came to the conclusion that only Rasputin's death would end his control of the Romanovs and restore the legitimacy of the Russian monarchy, which was quickly being destroyed by Rasputin's actions.

Conspiring with other prominent monarchists - including the Tsar's cousin, Grand Duke Dimitri Pavlovich, and Vladimir Purishkevich, a deputy in the Duma, Russia's powerless legislative body - Yusupov set out to kill Rasputin and save the Russian monarchy from collapse.

The Death Of Grigori Rasputin

In a memoir written many years after the fact, Yusupov provides a riveting first-hand account of the protracted assassination of Rasputin at his estate in St. Petersburg.

Having arranged to meet together for pastries and wine at his estate, Yusupov picked up Rasputin from his home and brought him to his palace.

To justify eating in the cellar, which had been soundproofed for the occasion, his hidden co-conspirators played records in a closed-off room on the main floor to convince Rasputin that Yusupov's wife was hosting a small party.

This ruse worked, and the two went down to a furnished cellar to eat, drink, and converse about politics.

Yusupov offered Rasputin pastries and soon Rasputin began gorging himself on cakes that had been laced with cyanide, chosen specifically because they were known to be Rasputin's favorite so were the most likely to be eaten by him.

Worried that the cyanide, which typically kills almost instantly, didn't seem to be working, Yusupov invited Rasputin to have a glass of Madeira, pouring the wine into one of several glasses that had also been laced with cyanide.

Rasputin declined the glass at first, but Rasputin's gluttony for wine quickly won out and he drank several glasses of wine from poisoned glasses.

One of Yusupov's co-conspirators, a doctor, had prepared each dose of cyanide very carefully to ensure that everyone was strong enough to kill not just one but several men.

Yusupov began to panic as Rasputin appeared to consume enough cyanide to kill scores of men while. As Rasputin started to have some difficulty swallowing his wine, Yusupov feigned concern and asked Rasputin if he was feeling ill.

"Yes, my head is heavy and I've a burning sensation in my stomach," Rasputin replied, before saying that more wine would be an adequate cure.

Using a noise upstairs as an opportunity to excuse himself, Yusupov left the cellar to confer with his co-conspirators who were shocked that Rasputin had resisted the effects of the poison.

Though they offered to go down as a group in order to overpower and strangle Rasputin to death, Yusupov decided that he should return alone and shoot Rasputin with a revolver instead.

Upon returning, Yusupov found Rasputin slumping in his chair and struggling to breathe. Soon, however, Rasputin appeared to recover and become more energetic.

Fearing that the poison had failed, Yusupov stood up and paced the room to work up the nerve to shoot Rasputin. Rasputin stood up as well and appeared to admire the furnishing that Yusupov had brought down into the cellar.

Seeing Yusupov stare at a crystal crucifix on the wall, Rasputin commented on the cross, then turned away to look at an ornate cabinet on the other side of the room.

Yusupov told Rasputin, "You'd far better look at the crucifix and say a prayer."

At this, Rasputin turned to Yusupov for several tense moments of silence.

"He came quite close to me and looked me full in the face," Yusupov recalled. "It was as though he had at last read something in my eyes, something he had not expected to find. I realized that the hour had come. 'O Lord,' I prayed, 'give me the strength to finish it.'"

Yusupov pulled out the revolver and firing one shot, hitting Rasputin in the chest. Rasputin cried out and collapsed onto the floor, where he laid in a growing pool of blood but did not move.

Alerted by the gunshot, Yusupov's co-conspirators rushed downstairs. The doctor checked for Rasputin's pulse and found none, confirming that Rasputin was dead, shot close enough to his heart to be immediately fatal.

After A Long Night, This Is Finally How Rasputin Died

The conspirators quickly set about establishing their cover story and separated into two groups, with Yusupov staying at Moika with the Duma deputy, Purishkevich.

Before long, however, Yusupov started feeling uneasy. He excused himself and went back down into the basement to check on Rasputin's body.

It laid motionless exactly where they had left it, but Yusupov wanted to be sure. He shook the body and didn't see any signs of life - at first.

Then, Rasputin's eyelids start to twitch, just before Rasputin opened them. "I then saw both eyes," Yusupov wrote, "the green eyes of a viper - staring at me with an expression of diabolical hatred."

Rasputin lunged at Yusupov, snarling like an animal and digging his fingers into Yusupov's neck. Yusupov was able to fight Rasputin off and push him away. Yusupov ran up the stairs to the first floor, yelling up to Purishkevich, to whom he had earlier given the revolver, "Quick, quick, come down! ... He's still alive!"

Reaching the landing on the first floor, Purishkevich joined him, revolver in hand. Looking down the steps, they saw Rasputin clawing his way up the stairs on his hands and knees, heading toward a side door leading out into the courtyard.

"This devil who was dying of poison, who had a bullet in his heart, must have been raised from the dead by the powers of evil," Yusupov wrote. "There was something appalling and monstrous in his diabolical refusal to die."

Rasputin shoved the door open and ran out into the courtyard. Terrified of what would happen if Rasputin got away and returned to the Tsarina, the two men gave chase.

Purishkevich was the first out the door, and he immediately fired two shots at the fleeing Rasputin. He missed, but then Purishkevich chased down the wounded Rasputin and from just feet away, fired two more shots.

One of the shots struck Rasputin in the head and he collapsed to the ground.

Yusupov had two loyal servants wrap Rasputin's body in heavy carpets and tied with heavy chains. The conspirators then brought the body to a bridge over the Neva River and dumped it into an unfrozen patch of water below. After everything that had happened, he ultimately died of hypothermia in the freezing water.

The Fallout From Rasputin's Death And The End Of The Russian Monarchy

Shortly before he was shot in Yusupov's cellar, Rasputin - maybe knowing he was about to die or maybe just boasting - told Yusupov that he would ultimately prevail against his enemies who were plotting to kill him.

"The aristocrats can't get used to the idea that a humble peasant should be welcome at the Imperial Palace ... they are consumed with envy and fury ... but I'm not afraid of them. ...Disaster will come to anyone who lifts a finger against me."

Rasputin's words would be prophetic.

In the hours after the assassination, Yusupov was filled with hope. Rasputin's death was being openly celebrated in the press, violating the emergency censorship restrictions barring mention of the murder, and publicly celebrated in the streets.

"The country was with us, full of confidence in the future," Yusupov wrote, "The papers published enthusiastic articles, in which they claimed that Rasputin's death meant the defeat of the powers of evil and held out golden hopes for the future."

The Tsarina knew that Yusupov, Pavlovich, and Purishkevich had killed Rasputin - even before Rasputin's body was found, confirming that he was actually dead - but she couldn't prove it. With their connections to the Imperial family, the Tsarina's suspicions weren't enough to prosecute the men. All the Tsarina could do was convince the Tsar to exile the Yusupov and Pavlovich from St. Petersburg.

Yusupov soon grew disillusioned, however, when the restoration that Rasputin's death was supposed to inspire never materialized.

"For many years," he realized, "Rasputin had by his intrigues demoralized the better elements in the Government, and had sown skepticism and distrust in the hearts of the people. Nobody wanted to take a decision, for nobody believed that any decision would be of any use."

Without Rasputin to blame for the mismanagement and failures of the Russian state, the public could only blame the one person who was ultimately responsible for their suffering: Tsar Nicholas II.

When the Russian people finally rose up in March 1917, it would not be in patriotic defense of the Tsar, as Yusupov has anticipated. Instead, it was to reject the very idea that there should be a Tsar at all.
After reading about how Grigori Rasputin died, read about Rasputin's daughter, Maria Rapsutin, who became a dancer and a lion tamer in the Untied States. Then, check out these other theories about Rasputin's place in the royal family.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
He Was Poisoned, Shot, And Left For Dead, But Rasputin Refused To Die

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The death of Grigori Rasputin, a man who proved to be seemingly unkillable, is one of the most astounding stories in human history. On the night of December 29, 1916, a group of nobles who feared the powerful holy man's influence with Russia's royal family summoned him to the home of conspirator Prince Felix Yusupov and began to execute their murderous scheme.

# data[].attributes.body
February Revolution

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The February Revolution ( Russian: Февра́льская револю́ция, IPA: [fʲɪvˈralʲskəjə rʲɪvɐˈlʲutsɨjə], tr. Fevrálʹskaya revolyútsiya), known in Soviet historiography as the February Bourgeois Democratic Revolution and sometimes as the March Revolution, was the first of two revolutions which took place in Russia in 1917.

# data[].attributes.body
Abdication of Tsar Nicholas

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The centenary of the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
David Moon, Anniversary Professor in History at the University of York, looks back at the career of Russia’s last emperor.

# data[].attributes.body
Russian Revolution

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social change in the Russian Empire, starting in 1917. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and adopt a socialist form of government following two successive revolutions and a bloody civil war. The Russian Revolution can also be seen as the precursor for the other European revolutions that occurred during or in the aftermath of World War I, such as the German Revolution of 1918-1919.

The Russian Revolution was inaugurated with the February Revolution in early 1917. With major defeats on the front and increasing logistical problems that affected both the front and the rear, shortages of bread and grain, the Russian Army was steadily losing morale and signs of a potential, large scale mutiny were present. High ranking officials were convinced that if Tsar Nicholas II abdicated, the unrest would subside. Nicholas agreed and stepped down, ushering in a new provisional government led by the Russian Duma.

During the civil unrest Soviets were formed by the locals in Petrograd that initially did not oppose the new Provisional Government; however, the Soviets did insist on a prerogative in order to influence the government and to control various militias. By March, Russia was locked in a dual power. The Provisional Government held state power in areas such as military and international affairs, whereas the network of Soviets held more power concerning domestic affairs. Critically, the Soviets held the allegiance of the working class, as well as the growing urban middle class.

During this chaotic period, there were frequent mutinies, protests and strikes. Many socialist and other leftist political organizations were engaged in daily struggle and vied for influence within the Provisional Government and the Soviets. Notable factions include the Social-Democrats or Mensheviks, the Social Revolutionaries, Anarchists and the Bolsheviks, a far-left party led by Vladimir Lenin.

Initially the Bolsheviks were a marginalized faction; however, that changed following a series of developments including the use of their slogan, peace, land, and bread which promised to cease war with Germany, give land to the peasantry, and end the famine caused by Russia's involvement in WWI. These slogans had a direct effect on the growing Bolshevik popularity. Despite the virtual universal disdain towards the war effort, the Provisional Government chose to continue fighting anyway, giving the Bolsheviks and other socialist factions a justification to advance the revolution further. The Bolsheviks merged various workers' militias loyal to them into Red Guards, which would be capable of revolution.

The volatile situation in Russia reached its climax with the October Revolution, which was a Bolshevik armed insurrection by workers and soldiers in Petrograd that successfully overthrew the Provisional Government, transferring all its authority to the Bolsheviks. Vested with state power, the Bolsheviks, within the Soviets established their own government, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). Under pressure from German military offensives, the Bolsheviks soon relocated the national capital to Moscow. The RSFSR began the process of reorganizing the former empire into the world's first socialist state, to practice soviet democracy on a national and international scale. Their promise to end Russia's participation in the First World War was fulfilled when the Bolshevik leaders signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany in March 1918. To further secure the new state, the Bolsheviks established the Cheka, a secret police that functioned as a revolutionary security service to weed out, execute, or punish those considered to be " enemies of the people" in campaigns called the Red Terror, consciously modeled on those of the French Revolution.

Although the Bolsheviks held large support in urban areas, they had many enemies both foreign and domestic that refused to recognize their government. As a result, Russia erupted into a bloody civil war, which pitted the "Reds" (Bolsheviks), against the enemies of the Bolshevik regime collectively referred to as the White Army. The White Army consisted of: independence movements, monarchists, liberals, and anti-Bolshevik socialist parties. In response, Leon Trotsky began ordering workers' militias loyal to the Bolsheviks to begin merging and formed the Red Army. While many notable historical events occurred in Moscow and Petrograd, there were also major changes in cities throughout the state, and among national minorities throughout the empire and in the rural areas, where peasants took over and redistributed land.

As the war progressed, the RSFSR began establishing Soviet power in the newly independent republics that seceded from the Russian Empire. The RSFSR initially focused its efforts on the newly independent republics of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, and Ukraine. Wartime cohesion and intervention from foreign powers prompted the RSFSR to begin unifying these nations under one flag and created the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). Historians generally consider the end of the revolutionary period to be in 1923 when the Russian Civil War concluded with the defeat of the White Army and all rival socialist factions, leading to mass emigration from Russia. The victorious Bolshevik Party reconstituted itself into the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and would remain in power for the next 68 years.

Background

Soldiers blocking Narva Gate on Bloody Sunday

The Russian Revolution of 1905 was a major factor contributing to the cause of the Revolutions of 1917. The events of Bloody Sunday triggered nationwide protests and soldier mutinies. A council of workers called the St. Petersburg Soviet was created in this chaos. While the 1905 Revolution was ultimately crushed, and the leaders of the St. Petersburg Soviet were arrested, this laid the groundwork for the later Petrograd Soviet and other revolutionary movements during the leadup to 1917. The 1905 Revolution also led to the creation of a Duma (parliament) that would later form the Provisional Government following February 1917.

Russia's poor performance in 1914-1915 prompted growing complaints directed at Tsar Nicholas II and the Romanov family. A short wave of patriotic nationalism ended in the face of defeats and poor conditions on the Eastern Front of World War I. The Tsar made the situation worse by taking personal control of the Imperial Russian Army in 1915, a challenge far beyond his skills. He was now held personally responsible for Russia's continuing defeats and losses. In addition, Tsarina Alexandra, left to rule in while the Tsar commanded at the front, was German born, leading to suspicion of collusion, only to be exacerbated by rumors relating to her relationship with the controversial mystic Grigori Rasputin. Rasputin's influence led to disastrous ministerial appointments and corruption, resulting in a worsening of conditions within Russia.

The conditions during the war resulted in a devastating loss of morale within the Russian army and the general population of Russia itself. This was particularly apparent in the cities, owing to a lack of food in response to the disruption of agriculture. Food scarcity had become a considerable problem in Russia, but the cause of this did not lie in any failure of the harvests, which had not been significantly altered during wartime. The indirect reason was that the government, in order to finance the war, printed millions of rouble notes, and by 1917, inflation had made prices increase up to four times what they had been in 1914. Farmers were consequently faced with a higher cost of living, but with little increase in income. As a result, they tended to hoard their grain and to revert to subsistence farming. Thus the cities were constantly short of food. At the same time, rising prices led to demands for higher wages in the factories, and in January and February 1916, revolutionary propaganda, in part aided by German funds, led to widespread strikes. This resulted in a growing criticism of the government, including an increased participation of workers in revolutionary parties.

All these factors had given rise to a sharp loss of confidence in the regime, even within the ruling class, growing throughout the war. Early in 1916, Guchkov discussed with senior army officers and members of the Central War Industries Committee about a possible coup to force the abdication of the Tsar. In December, a small group of nobles assassinated Rasputin, and in January 1917 the Tsar's cousin, Grand Duke Nicholas, was asked indirectly by Prince Lvov whether he would be prepared to take over the throne from his nephew, Tsar Nicholas II. None of these incidents were in themselves the immediate cause of the February Revolution, but they do help to explain why the monarchy survived only a few days after it had broken out.

Meanwhile, Socialist Revolutionary leaders in exile, many of them living in Switzerland, had been the glum spectators of the collapse of international socialist solidarity. French and German Social Democrats had voted in favour of their respective governments' war efforts. Georgi Plekhanov in Paris had adopted a violently anti-German stand, while Alexander Parvus supported the German war effort as the best means of ensuring a revolution in Russia. The Mensheviks largely maintained that Russia had the right to defend herself against Germany, although Julius Martov (a prominent Menshevik), now on the left of his group, demanded an end to the war and a settlement on the basis of national self-determination, with no annexations or indemnities.

It was these views of Martov that predominated in a manifesto drawn up by Leon Trotsky (at the time a Menshevik) at a conference in Zimmerwald, attended by 35 Socialist leaders in September 1915. Inevitably Vladimir Lenin, supported by Zinoviev and Radek, strongly contested them. Their attitudes became known as the Zimmerwald Left. Lenin rejected both the defence of Russia and the cry for peace. Since the autumn of 1914, he had insisted that "from the standpoint of the working class and of the labouring masses the lesser evil would be the defeat of the Tsarist Monarchy"; the war must be turned into a civil war of the proletarian soldiers against their own governments, and if a proletarian victory should emerge from this in Russia, then their duty would be to wage a revolutionary war for the liberation of the masses throughout Europe.

Economic and social changes

Provisional Government's volunteer soldiers secure Petrograd's Palace Square with the Austin Armoured Car, summer 1917.

An elementary theory of property, believed by many peasants, was that land should belong to those who work on it. At the same time, peasant life and culture was changing constantly. Change was facilitated by the physical movement of growing numbers of peasant villagers who migrated to and from industrial and urban environments, but also by the introduction of city culture into the village through material goods, the press, and word of mouth.

Workers also had good reasons for discontent: overcrowded housing with often deplorable sanitary conditions, long hours at work (on the eve of the war, a 10-hour workday six days a week was the average and many were working 11-12 hours a day by 1916), constant risk of injury and death from poor safety and sanitary conditions, harsh discipline (not only rules and fines, but foremen's fists), and inadequate wages (made worse after 1914 by steep wartime increases in the cost of living). At the same time, urban industrial life had its benefits, though these could be just as dangerous (in terms of social and political stability) as the hardships. There were many encouragements to expect more from life. Acquiring new skills gave many workers a sense of self-respect and confidence, heightening expectations and desires. Living in cities, workers encountered material goods they had never seen in villages. Most importantly, workers living in cities were exposed to new ideas about the social and political order.

The rapid industrialization of Russia also resulted in urban overcrowding and poor conditions for urban industrial workers (as mentioned above). Between 1890 and 1910, the population of the capital, Saint Petersburg, swelled from 1,033,600 to 1,905,600, with Moscow experiencing similar growth. This created a new 'proletariat' which, due to being crowded together in the cities, was much more likely to protest and go on strike than the peasantry had been in previous times. In one 1904 survey, it was found that an average of 16 people shared each apartment in Saint Petersburg, with six people per room. There was also no running water, and piles of human waste were a threat to the health of the workers. The poor conditions only aggravated the situation, with the number of strikes and incidents of public disorder rapidly increasing in the years shortly before World War I. Because of late industrialization, Russia's workers were highly concentrated. By 1914, 40% of Russian workers were employed in factories of 1,000+ workers (32% in 1901). 42% worked in 100-1,000 worker enterprises, 18% in 1-100 worker businesses (in the US, 1914, the figures were 18, 47 and 35 respectively).

World War I added to the chaos. Conscription across Russia resulted in unwilling citizens being sent off to war. The vast demand for factory production of war supplies and workers resulted in many more labor riots and strikes. Conscription stripped skilled workers from the cities, who had to be replaced with unskilled peasants. When famine began to hit due to the poor railway system, workers abandoned the cities in droves seeking food. Finally, the soldiers themselves, who suffered from a lack of equipment and protection from the elements, began to turn against the Tsar. This was mainly because, as the war progressed, many of the officers who were loyal to the Tsar were killed, being replaced by discontented conscripts from the major cities who had little loyalty to the Tsar.

Political issues

The Petrograd Soviet Assembly meeting in 1917

Many sections of the country had reason to be dissatisfied with the existing autocracy. Nicholas II was a deeply conservative ruler and maintained a strict authoritarian system. Individuals and society in general were expected to show self-restraint, devotion to community, deference to the social hierarchy and a sense of duty to the country. Religious faith helped bind all of these tenets together as a source of comfort and reassurance in the face of difficult conditions and as a means of political authority exercised through the clergy. Perhaps more than any other modern monarch, Nicholas II attached his fate and the future of his dynasty to the notion of the ruler as a saintly and infallible father to his people.

This vision of the Romanov monarchy left him unaware of the state of his country. With a firm belief that his power to rule was granted by Divine Right, Nicholas assumed that the Russian people were devoted to him with unquestioning loyalty. This ironclad belief rendered Nicholas unwilling to allow the progressive reforms that might have alleviated the suffering of the Russian people. Even after the 1905 Revolution spurred the Tsar to decree limited civil rights and democratic representation, he worked to limit even these liberties in order to preserve the ultimate authority of the crown.

Despite constant oppression, the desire of the people for democratic participation in government decisions was strong. Since the Age of Enlightenment, Russian intellectuals had promoted Enlightenment ideals such as the dignity of the individual and the rectitude of democratic representation. These ideals were championed most vociferously by Russia's liberals, although populists, Marxists, and anarchists also claimed to support democratic reforms. A growing opposition movement had begun to challenge the Romanov monarchy openly well before the turmoil of World War I.

Dissatisfaction with Russian autocracy culminated in the huge national upheaval that followed the Bloody Sunday massacre of January 1905, in which hundreds of unarmed protesters were shot by the Tsar's troops. Workers responded to the massacre with a crippling general strike, forcing Nicholas to put forth the October Manifesto, which established a democratically elected parliament (the State Duma). Although the Tsar accepted the 1906 Fundamental State Laws one year later, he subsequently dismissed the first two Dumas when they proved uncooperative. Unfulfilled hopes of democracy fueled revolutionary ideas and violent outbursts targeted at the monarchy.

One of the Tsar's principal rationales for risking war in 1914 was his desire to restore the prestige that Russia had lost amid the debacles of the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905). Nicholas also sought to foster a greater sense of national unity with a war against a common and old enemy. The Russian Empire was an agglomeration of diverse ethnicities that had demonstrated significant signs of disunity in the years before the First World War. Nicholas believed in part that the shared peril and tribulation of a foreign war would mitigate the social unrest over the persistent issues of poverty, inequality, and inhumane working conditions. Instead of restoring Russia's political and military standing, World War I led to the slaughter of Russian troops and military defeats that undermined both the monarchy and Russian society to the point of collapse.

The outbreak of war in August 1914 initially served to quiet the prevalent social and political protests, focusing hostilities against a common external enemy, but this patriotic unity did not last long. As the war dragged on inconclusively, war-weariness gradually took its toll. Although many ordinary Russians joined anti-German demonstrations in the first few weeks of the war, hostility toward the Kaiser and the desire to defend their land and their lives did not necessarily translate into enthusiasm for the Tsar or the government.

Russia's first major battle of the war was a disaster; in the 1914 Battle of Tannenberg, over 30,000 Russian troops were killed or wounded and 90,000 captured, while Germany suffered just 12,000 casualties. However, Austro-Hungarian forces allied to Germany were driven back deep into the Galicia region by the end of the year. In the autumn of 1915, Nicholas had taken direct command of the army, personally overseeing Russia's main theatre of war and leaving his ambitious but incapable wife Alexandra in charge of the government. Reports of corruption and incompetence in the Imperial government began to emerge, and the growing influence of Grigori Rasputin in the Imperial family was widely resented.

In 1915, things took a critical turn for the worse when Germany shifted its focus of attack to the Eastern Front. The superior German Army - better led, better trained, and better supplied - was quite effective against the ill-equipped Russian forces, driving the Russians out of Galicia, as well as Russian Poland during the Gorlice-Tarnów Offensive campaign. By the end of October 1916, Russia had lost between 1,600,000 and 1,800,000 soldiers, with an additional 2,000,000 prisoners of war and 1,000,000 missing, all making up a total of nearly 5,000,000 men.

These staggering losses played a definite role in the mutinies and revolts that began to occur. In 1916, reports of fraternizing with the enemy began to circulate. Soldiers went hungry, lacked shoes, munitions, and even weapons. Rampant discontent lowered morale, which was further undermined by a series of military defeats.

Casualty rates were the most vivid sign of this disaster. By the end of 1914, only five months into the war, around 390,000 Russian men had lost their lives and nearly 1,000,000 were injured. Far sooner than expected, inadequately trained recruits were called for active duty, a process repeated throughout the war as staggering losses continued to mount. The officer class also saw remarkable changes, especially within the lower echelons, which were quickly filled with soldiers rising up through the ranks. These men, usually of peasant or working-class backgrounds, were to play a large role in the politicization of the troops in 1917.

The army quickly ran short of rifles and ammunition (as well as uniforms and food), and by mid-1915, men were being sent to the front bearing no arms. It was hoped that they could equip themselves with arms recovered from fallen soldiers, of both sides, on the battlefields. The soldiers did not feel as if they were valuable, rather they felt as if they were expendable.

The war did not only devastate soldiers. By the end of 1915, there were manifold signs that the economy was breaking down under the heightened strain of wartime demand. The main problems were food shortages and rising prices. Inflation dragged incomes down at an alarmingly rapid rate, and shortages made it difficult for an individual to sustain oneself. These shortages were a problem especially in the capital, St. Petersburg, where distance from supplies and poor transportation networks made matters particularly worse. Shops closed early or entirely for lack of bread, sugar, meat, and other provisions, and lines lengthened massively for what remained. Conditions became increasingly difficult to afford food and physically obtain it.

Strikes increased steadily from the middle of 1915, and so did crime, but, for the most part, people suffered and endured, scouring the city for food. Working-class women in St. Petersburg reportedly spent about forty hours a week in food lines, begging, turning to prostitution or crime, tearing down wooden fences to keep stoves heated for warmth, and continued to resent the rich.

Government officials responsible for public order worried about how long people's patience would last. A report by the St. Petersburg branch of the security police, the Okhrana, in October 1916, warned bluntly of "the possibility in the near future of riots by the lower classes of the empire enraged by the burdens of daily existence."

Tsar Nicholas was blamed for all of these crises, and what little support he had left began to crumble. As discontent grew, the State Duma issued a warning to Nicholas in November 1916, stating that, inevitably, a terrible disaster would grip the country unless a constitutional form of government was put in place. Nicholas ignored these warnings and Russia's Tsarist regime collapsed a few months later during the February Revolution of 1917. One year later, the Tsar and his entire family were executed.

February Revolution

Soldiers marching in Petrograd, March 1917

At the beginning of February, Petrograd workers began several strikes and demonstrations. On 7 March [ O.S. 22 February], workers at Putilov, Petrograd's largest industrial plant was closed by a strike. The next day, a series of meetings and rallies were held for International Women's Day, which gradually turned into economic and political gatherings. Demonstrations were organised to demand bread, and these were supported by the industrial working force who considered them a reason for continuing the strikes. The women workers marched to nearby factories bringing out over 50,000 workers on strike. By 10 March [ O.S. 25 February], virtually every industrial enterprise in Petrograd had been shut down, together with many commercial and service enterprises. Students, white-collar workers, and teachers joined the workers in the streets and at public meetings.

To quell the riots, the Tsar looked to the army. At least 180,000 troops were available in the capital, but most were either untrained or injured. Historian Ian Beckett suggests around 12,000 could be regarded as reliable, but even these proved reluctant to move in on the crowd, since it included so many women. It was for this reason that on 11 March [ O.S. 26 February], when the Tsar ordered the army to suppress the rioting by force, troops began to revolt. Although few actively joined the rioting, many officers were either shot or went into hiding; the ability of the garrison to hold back the protests was all but nullified, symbols of the Tsarist regime were rapidly torn down around the city, and governmental authority in the capital collapsed - not helped by the fact that Nicholas had prorogued the Duma that morning, leaving it with no legal authority to act. The response of the Duma, urged on by the liberal bloc, was to establish a Temporary Committee to restore law and order; meanwhile, the socialist parties established the Petrograd Soviet to represent workers and soldiers. The remaining loyal units switched allegiance the next day.

The Tsar directed the royal train back towards Petrograd, which was stopped on 14 March [ O.S. 1 March], by a group of revolutionaries at Malaya Vishera. When the Tsar finally arrived at in Pskov, the Army Chief Nikolai Ruzsky, and the Duma deputies Alexander Guchkov and Vasily Shulgin suggested in unison that he abdicate the throne. He did so on 15 March [ O.S. 2 March], on behalf of himself, and then, having taken advice on behalf of his son, the Tsarevich. Nicholas nominated his brother, the Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich, to succeed him. But the Grand Duke realised that he would have little support as ruler, so he declined the crown on 16 March [ O.S. 3 March], stating that he would take it only if that was the consensus of democratic action. Six days later, Nicholas, no longer Tsar and addressed with contempt by the sentries as "Nicholas Romanov", was reunited with his family at the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoye Selo. He was placed under house arrest with his family by the Provisional Government.

The immediate effect of the February Revolution was a widespread atmosphere of elation and excitement in Petrograd. On 16 March [ O.S. 3 March], a provisional government was announced. The center-left was well represented, and the government was initially chaired by a liberal aristocrat, Prince Georgy Yevgenievich Lvov, a member of the Constitutional Democratic Party (KD). The socialists had formed their rival body, the Petrograd Soviet (or workers' council) four days earlier. The Petrograd Soviet and the Provisional Government competed for power over Russia.

The effective power of the Provisional Government was challenged by the authority of an institution that claimed to represent the will of workers and soldiers and could, in fact, mobilize and control these groups during the early months of the revolution - the Petrograd Soviet Council of Workers' Deputies. The model for the Soviets were workers' councils that had been established in scores of Russian cities during the 1905 Revolution. In February 1917, striking workers elected deputies to represent them and socialist activists began organizing a citywide council to unite these deputies with representatives of the socialist parties. On 27 February, socialist Duma deputies, mainly Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries, took the lead in organizing a citywide council. The Petrograd Soviet met in the Tauride Palace, room 13, permitted by the Provisional Government.

The leaders of the Petrograd Soviet believed that they represented particular classes of the population, not the whole nation. They also believed Russia was not ready for socialism. They viewed their role as limited to pressuring hesitant " bourgeoisie" to rule and to introduce extensive democratic reforms in Russia (the replacement of the monarchy by a republic, guaranteed civil rights, a democratic police and army, abolition of religious and ethnic discrimination, preparation of elections to a constituent assembly, and so on). They met in the same building as the emerging Provisional Government not to compete with the Duma Committee for state power, but to best exert pressure on the new government, to act, in other words, as a popular democratic lobby.

The relationship between these two major powers was complex from the beginning and would shape the politics of 1917. The representatives of the Provisional Government agreed to "take into account the opinions of the Soviet of Workers' Deputies", though they were also determined to prevent interference which would create an unacceptable situation of dual power. In fact, this was precisely what was being created, though this "dual power" (dvoyevlastiye) was the result less of the actions or attitudes of the leaders of these two institutions than of actions outside their control, especially the ongoing social movement taking place on the streets of Russia's cities, factories, shops, barracks, villages, and in the trenches.

A series of political crises - see the chronology below - in the relationship between population and government and between the Provisional Government and the Soviets (which developed into a nationwide movement with a national leadership). The All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets (VTsIK) undermined the authority of the Provisional Government but also of the moderate socialist leaders of the Soviets. Although the Soviet leadership initially refused to participate in the "bourgeois" Provisional Government, Alexander Kerensky, a young, popular lawyer and a member of the Socialist Revolutionary Party (SRP), agreed to join the new cabinet, and became an increasingly central figure in the government, eventually taking leadership of the Provisional Government. As minister of war and later Prime Minister, Kerensky promoted freedom of speech, released thousands of political prisoners, continued the war effort, even organizing another offensive (which, however, was no more successful than its predecessors). Nevertheless, Kerensky still faced several great challenges, highlighted by the soldiers, urban workers, and peasants, who claimed that they had gained nothing by the revolution:

Other political groups were trying to undermine him.

Heavy military losses were being suffered on the front.

The soldiers were dissatisfied and demoralised and had started to defect. (On arrival back in Russia, these soldiers were either imprisoned or sent straight back into the front.)

There was enormous discontent with Russia's involvement in the war, and many were calling for an end to it.

There were great shortages of food and supplies, which was difficult to remedy because of the wartime economic conditions.

The political group that proved most troublesome for Kerensky, and would eventually overthrow him, was the Bolshevik Party, led by Vladimir Lenin. Lenin had been living in exile in neutral Switzerland and, due to democratization of politics after the February Revolution, which legalized formerly banned political parties, he perceived the opportunity for his Marxist revolution. Although return to Russia had become a possibility, the war made it logistically difficult. Eventually, German officials arranged for Lenin to pass through their territory, hoping that his activities would weaken Russia or even - if the Bolsheviks came to power - lead to Russia's withdrawal from the war. Lenin and his associates, however, had to agree to travel to Russia in a sealed train: Germany would not take the chance that he would foment revolution in Germany. After passing through the front, he arrived in Petrograd in April 1917.

On the way to Russia, Lenin prepared the April Theses, which outlined central Bolshevik policies. These included that the Soviets take power (as seen in the slogan "all power to the Soviets") and denouncing the liberals and social revolutionaries in the Provisional Government, forbidding co-operation with it. Many Bolsheviks, however, had supported the Provisional Government, including Lev Kamenev.

With Lenin's arrival, the popularity of the Bolsheviks increased steadily. Over the course of the spring, public dissatisfaction with the Provisional Government and the war, in particular among workers, soldiers and peasants, pushed these groups to radical parties. Despite growing support for the Bolsheviks, buoyed by maxims that called most famously for "all power to the Soviets", the party held very little real power in the moderate-dominated Petrograd Soviet. In fact, historians such as Sheila Fitzpatrick have asserted that Lenin's exhortations for the Soviet Council to take power were intended to arouse indignation both with the Provisional Government, whose policies were viewed as conservative, and the Soviets themselves, which were viewed as subservients to the conservative government. By some other historians' accounts, Lenin and his followers were unprepared for how their groundswell of support, especially among influential worker and soldier groups, would translate into real power in the summer of 1917.

On 18 June, the Provisional Government launched an attack against Germany that failed miserably. Soon after, the government ordered soldiers to go to the front, reneging on a promise. The soldiers refused to follow the new orders. The arrival of radical Kronstadt sailors - who had tried and executed many officers, including one admiral - further fueled the growing revolutionary atmosphere. Sailors and soldiers, along with Petrograd workers, took to the streets in violent protest, calling for "all power to the Soviets". The revolt, however, was disowned by Lenin and the Bolshevik leaders and dissipated within a few days. In the aftermath, Lenin fled to Finland under threat of arrest while Trotsky, among other prominent Bolsheviks, was arrested. The July Days confirmed the popularity of the anti-war, radical Bolsheviks, but their unpreparedness at the moment of revolt was an embarrassing gaffe that lost them support among their main constituent groups: soldiers and workers.

The Bolshevik failure in the July Days proved temporary. The Bolsheviks had undergone a spectacular growth in membership. Whereas, in February 1917, the Bolsheviks were limited to only 24,000 members, by September 1917 there were 200,000 members of the Bolshevik faction. Previously, the Bolsheviks had been in the minority in the two leading cities of Russia-St. Petersburg and Moscow behind the Mensheviks and the Socialist Revolutionaries, by September the Bolsheviks were in the majority in both cities. Furthermore, the Bolshevik-controlled Moscow Regional Bureau of the Party also controlled the Party organizations of the 13 provinces around Moscow. These 13 provinces held 37% of Russia's population and 20% of the membership of the Bolshevik faction.

In August, poor and misleading communication led General Lavr Kornilov, the recently appointed Supreme Commander of Russian military forces, to believe that the Petrograd government had already been captured by radicals, or was in serious danger thereof.[dubious ] In response, he ordered troops to Petrograd to pacify the city. To secure his position, Kerensky had to ask for Bolshevik assistance. He also sought help from the Petrograd Soviet, which called upon armed Red Guards to "defend the revolution". The Kornilov Affair failed largely due to the efforts of the Bolsheviks, whose influence over railroad and telegraph workers proved vital in stopping the movement of troops. With his coup failing, Kornilov surrendered and was relieved of his position. The Bolsheviks' role in stopping the attempted coup further strengthened their position.

In early September, the Petrograd Soviet freed all jailed Bolsheviks and Trotsky became chairman of the Petrograd Soviet. Growing numbers of socialists and lower-class Russians viewed the government less as a force in support of their needs and interests. The Bolsheviks benefited as the only major organized opposition party that had refused to compromise with the Provisional Government, and they benefited from growing frustration and even disgust with other parties, such as the Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries, who stubbornly refused to break with the idea of national unity across all classes.

A revolutionary meeting of Russian soldiers in March 1917 in Dalkarby of Jomala, Åland

In Finland, Lenin had worked on his book State and Revolution and continued to lead his party, writing newspaper articles and policy decrees. By October, he returned to Petrograd (present-day St. Petersburg), aware that the increasingly radical city presented him no legal danger and a second opportunity for revolution. Recognising the strength of the Bolsheviks, Lenin began pressing for the immediate overthrow of the Kerensky government by the Bolsheviks. Lenin was of the opinion that taking power should occur in both St. Petersburg and Moscow simultaneously, parenthetically stating that it made no difference which city rose up first. The Bolshevik Central Committee drafted a resolution, calling for the dissolution of the Provisional Government in favor of the Petrograd Soviet. The resolution was passed 10-2 ( Lev Kamenev and Grigory Zinoviev prominently dissenting) promoting the October Revolution.

October Revolution

The October Revolution, which unfolded on Wednesday 7 November 1917 according to the Gregorian calendar and on Wednesday 25 October according to the Julian calendar in use under tsarist Russia, was organized by the Bolshevik party. Lenin did not have any direct role in the revolution and due to his personal safety he was hiding.[citation needed ] The Revolutionary Military Committee established by the Bolshevik party was organizing the insurrection and Leon Trotsky was the chairman. However, Lenin played a crucial role in the debate in the leadership of the Bolshevik party for a revolutionary insurrection as the party in the autumn of 1917 received a majority in the soviets. An ally in the left fraction of the Revolutionary-Socialist Party, with huge support among the peasants who opposed Russia's participation in the war, supported the slogan 'All power to the Soviets'.

Liberal and monarchist forces, loosely organized into the White Army, immediately went to war against the Bolsheviks' Red Army, in a series of battles that would become known as the Russian Civil War. This did not happen in 1917. The Civil War began in early 1918 with domestic anti-Bolshevik forces confronting the nascent Red Army. In autumn of 1918 Allied countries needed to block German access to Russian supplies. They sent troops to support the "Whites" with supplies of weapons, ammunition and logistic equipment being sent from the main Western countries but this was not at all coordinated. Germany did not participate in the civil war as it surrendered to the Allied.

The provisional government with its second and third coalition was led by a right wing fraction of the Socialist-Revolutionary party, SR. This non-elected provisional government faced the revolutionary situation and the growing mood against the war by avoiding elections to the state Duma. However, the October revolution forced the political parties behind the newly dissolved provisional government to move and move fast for immediate elections. All happened so fast that the left SR fraction did not have time to reach out and be represented in ballots of the SR party which was part of the coalition in the provisional government. This non-elected government supported continuation of the war on the side of the allied forces. The elections to the State Duma 25 November 1917 therefore did not mirror the true political situation among peasants even if we don't know how the outcome would be if the anti-war left SR fraction had a fair chance to challenge the party leaders. In the elections the Bolshevik party received 25% of the votes and the Socialist-Revolutionaries as much as 58%. It is possible the left SR had a good chance to reach more than 25% of the votes and thereby legitimate the October revolution but we can only guess.

Lenin did not believe that a socialist revolution necessarily presupposed a fully developed capitalist economy. A semi-capitalist country would suffice and Russia had a working class base of 5% of the population.

Though Lenin was the leader of the Bolshevik Party, it has been argued that since Lenin was not present during the actual takeover of the Winter Palace, it was really Trotsky's organization and direction that led the revolution, merely spurred by the motivation Lenin instigated within his party. Critics on the Right have long argued that the financial and logistical assistance of German intelligence via their key agent, Alexander Parvus was a key component as well, though historians are divided, since there is little evidence supporting that claim.

The dissolution of the Constituent Assembly on 6 January 1918. The Tauride Palace is locked and guarded by Trotsky, Sverdlov, Zinoviev and Lashevich.

Soviet membership was initially freely elected, but many members of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, anarchists, and other leftists created opposition to the Bolsheviks through the Soviets themselves. The elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly took place 25 November 1917. The Bolsheviks gained 25% of the vote. When it became clear that the Bolsheviks had little support outside of the industrialized areas of Saint Petersburg and Moscow, they simply barred non-Bolsheviks from membership in the Soviets. The Bolsheviks dissolved the Constituent Assembly in January 1918.

Russian Civil War

The Russian Civil War, which broke out in 1918 shortly after the October Revolution, resulted in the deaths and suffering of millions of people regardless of their political orientation. The war was fought mainly between the Red Army ("Reds"), consisting of the uprising majority led by the Bolshevik minority, and the "Whites" - army officers and cossacks, the "bourgeoisie", and political groups ranging from the far Right, to the Socialist Revolutionaries who opposed the drastic restructuring championed by the Bolsheviks following the collapse of the Provisional Government, to the Soviets (under clear Bolshevik dominance). The Whites had backing from other countries such as the United Kingdom, France, the United States, and Japan, while the Reds possessed internal support, proving to be much more effective. Though the Allied nations, using external interference, provided substantial military aid to the loosely knit anti-Bolshevik forces, they were ultimately defeated.

The Bolsheviks firstly assumed power in Petrograd, expanding their rule outwards. They eventually reached the Easterly Siberian Russian coast in Vladivostok, four years after the war began, an occupation that is believed to have ended all significant military campaigns in the nation. Less than one year later, the last area controlled by the White Army, the Ayano-Maysky District, directly to the north of the Krai containing Vladivostok, was given up when General Anatoly Pepelyayev capitulated in 1923.

Several revolts were initiated against the Bolsheviks and their army near the end of the war, notably the Kronstadt Rebellion. This was a naval mutiny engineered by Soviet Baltic sailors, former Red Army soldiers, and the people of Kronstadt. This armed uprising was fought against the antagonizing Bolshevik economic policies that farmers were subjected to, including seizures of grain crops by the Communists. This all amounted to large-scale discontent. When delegates representing the Kronstadt sailors arrived at Petrograd for negotiations, they raised 15 demands primarily pertaining to the Russian right to freedom. The Government firmly denounced the rebellions and labelled the requests as a reminder of the Social Revolutionaries, a political party that was popular among Soviets before Lenin, but refused to cooperate with the Bolshevik Army. The Government then responded with an armed suppression of these revolts and suffered ten thousand casualties before entering the city of Kronstadt. This ended the rebellions fairly quickly, causing many of the rebels to flee seeking political exile.

During the Civil War, Nestor Makhno led a Ukrainian anarchist movement. Makhno's Insurgent Army allied to the Bolsheviks thrice, with one of the powers ending the alliance each time. However, a Bolshevik force under Mikhail Frunze destroyed the Makhnovshchina, when the Makhnovists refused to merge into the Red Army. In addition, the so-called " Green Army" (peasants defending their property against the opposing forces) played a secondary role in the war, mainly in Ukraine.

Revolutionary tribunals

Revolutionary tribunals were present during both the Revolution and the Civil War, intended for the purpose of combatting forces of counter-revolution. At the Civil War's zenith, it is reported that upwards of 200,000 cases were investigated by approximately 200 tribunals. These tribunals established themselves more so from the Cheka as a more moderate force that acted under the banner of revolutionary justice, rather than a utilizer of strict brute force as the former did. However, these tribunals did come with their own set of inefficiencies, such as responding to cases in a matter of months and not having a concrete definition of " counter-revolution" that was determined on a case-by-case basis. The "Decree on Revolutionary Tribunals" used by the People's Commissar of Justice, states in article 2 that "In fixing the penalty, the Revolutionary Tribunal shall be guided by the circumstances of the case and the dictates of the revolutionary conscience." Revolutionary tribunals ultimately demonstrated that a form of justice was still prevalent in Russian society where the Russian Provisional Government failed. This, in part, triggered the political transition of the October Revolution and the Civil War that followed in its aftermath.

Murder of the imperial family

Murder of the Romanov family, Le Petit Journal

The Bolsheviks executed the Tsar and his family on 16 July 1918. In early March, the Provisional Government had placed Nicholas and his family under house arrest in the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoye Selo, 24 kilometres (15 mi) south of Petrograd. But in August 1917, they evacuated the Romanovs to Tobolsk in the Urals to protect them from the rising tide of revolution. After the Bolsheviks came to power in October 1917, the conditions of their imprisonment grew stricter and talk of putting Nicholas on trial increased. In April and May 1918, the looming civil war led the Bolsheviks to move the family to the stronghold of Yekaterinburg.

During the early morning of 16 July, Nicholas, Alexandra, their children, their physician, and several servants were taken into the basement and shot. According to Edvard Radzinsky and Dmitrii Volkogonov, the order came directly from Lenin and Yakov Sverdlov in Moscow. However, this claim has never been confirmed. The execution may have been carried out on the initiative of local Bolshevik officials, or it may have been an option pre-approved in Moscow as White troops were rapidly approaching Yekaterinburg. Radzinsky noted that Lenin's bodyguard personally delivered the telegram ordering the execution and that he was ordered to destroy the evidence.

Soviet painting Vladimir Lenin, by Isaac Brodsky

The Russian Revolution became the site for many instances of symbolism, both physical and non-physical. Communist symbolism is perhaps the most notable of this time period, such as the debut of the iconic hammer and sickle as a representation of the October Revolution in 1917, eventually becoming the official symbol of the USSR in 1924, and later the symbol of Communism as a whole. Although the Bolsheviks did not have extensive political experience, their portrayal of the revolution itself as both a political and symbolic order resulted in Communism's portrayal as a messianic faith, formally known as communist messianism. Portrayals of notable revolutionary figures such as Lenin were done in iconographic methods, equating them similarly to religious figures, though religion itself was banned in the USSR and groups such as the Russian Orthodox Church were persecuted.

The revolution and the world

The revolution ultimately led to the establishment of the future Soviet Union as an ideocracy; however, the establishment of such a state came as an ideological paradox, as Marx's ideals of how a socialist state ought to be created were based on the formation being natural and not artificially incited (i.e. by means of revolution). Leon Trotsky said that the goal of socialism in Russia would not be realized without the success of the world revolution. A revolutionary wave caused by the Russian Revolution lasted until 1923, but despite initial hopes for success in the German Revolution of 1918-19, the short-lived Hungarian Soviet Republic, and others like it, no other Marxist movement at the time succeeded in keeping power in its hands.

This issue is subject to conflicting views on communist history by various Marxist groups and parties. Joseph Stalin later rejected this idea, stating that socialism was possible in one country.

The confusion regarding Stalin's position on the issue stems from the fact that, after Lenin's death in 1924, he successfully used Lenin's argument - the argument that socialism's success needs the support of workers of other countries in order to happen - to defeat his competitors within the party by accusing them of betraying Lenin and, therefore, the ideals of the October Revolution.

Historiography

Few events in historical research have been as conditioned by political influences as the October Revolution. The historiography of the Revolution generally divides into three schools of thought: the Soviet-Marxist view, the Western Totalitarian view, and the Revisionist (Trotskyist) view. Since the fall of Communism (and the USSR) in Russia in 1991, the Western-Totalitarian view has again become dominant and the Soviet-Marxist view has practically vanished in mainstream political analysis.

Following the death of Vladimir Lenin, the Bolshevik government was thrown into a crisis. Lenin failed to designate who his successor would be or how they would be chosen. A power struggle broke out in the party between Leon Trotsky and his enemies. Trotsky was defeated by the anti-Trotsky bloc by the mid 1920s and his hopes for party leadership was dashed. Among Trotsky's opponents, Joseph Stalin would rise to assume unchallenged party leadership by 1928. In 1927 Trotsky was expelled from the party and in 1929 he lost his citizenship and was sent into exile. While in exile he began honing his own interpretation of Marxism called Trotskyism. The schism between Trotsky and Stalin is the focal point where the Revisionist view comes into existence. Trotsky traveled across the world denouncing Stalin and the Soviet Union under his leadership. He specifically focused his criticism on Stalin's doctrine, Socialism in One Country, claiming that it was incongruent with the ideology of the revolution. Eventually, Trotsky settled in Mexico City and began a base of operations for him and his supporters. In 1937 at the height of the Great Purge, he published The Revolution Betrayed which outlined his ideological contradictions with Stalin, and how Stalin was guilty of subverting and debasing the 1917 revolution. He continued to vocally criticize Stalin and Stalinism until his assassination in 1940 on Stalin's orders.

The Soviet-Marxist interpretation is the belief that the Russian Revolution under the Bolsheviks was a proud and glorious effort of the working class which saw the removal of the Tsar, nobility, and capitalists from positions of power. The Bolsheviks and later the Communist Party took the first steps in liberating the proletariat and building a workers' state that practiced equality. Outside of Eastern Europe this view was heavily criticized as following the death of Lenin the Soviet Union became more authoritarian. Even though the Soviet Union no longer exists, the Soviet-Marxist view is still interpreted in academia today. Both academics and Soviet supporters acknowledge this view is bolstered by several key events. First, the RSFSR made substantial advancements to women's' rights. It was the first country to decriminalize abortion and allowed women to be educated, which was forbidden under the Tsar. Furthermore, the RSFSR decriminalized homosexuality between consenting adults which was seen as radical for the time period. The Bolshevik government also actively recruited working class citizens into positions of party leadership, thereby ensuring the proletariat had a voice in policymaking. One of the most important aspects to this view was the Bolshevik victory in the Russian Civil War. On paper, the Bolsheviks should have been defeated in part due to the broad international support their enemies were receiving. Britain, France, the United States, Japan, and other countries sent aid to the White Army and expedition forces against the Bolsheviks. The Bolsheviks were further at a disadvantage due to factors such as: the small land area under their control, lack of professional officers, and supply shortages. In spite of this, the Red Army prevailed. The Red Army unlike many White factions maintained a high morale among their troops and civilians throughout the duration of the civil war. This was in part due to their skillful use propaganda. Bolshevik propaganda portrayed the Red Army as liberators and stewards of the poor and downtrodden. Bolshevik support was further elevated by Lenin's initiatives to distribute land to the peasantry, and ending the war with Germany. During the civil war, the Bolsheviks were able to raise an army numbering around 5 million active soldiers. Domestic support and patriotism played a decisive role in the Russian Civil War. By 1923 the Bolsheviks had controlled the last of the White Army holdouts and the Russian Civil War concluded with a Bolshevik victory. This victory ultimately influenced how the Soviet Union interpreted its own ideology and the October Revolution itself. Starting in 1919, the Soviets would commemorate the event with a military parade and a public holiday. This tradition lasted up until the collapse of the Soviet Union. As time went on the Soviet-Marxist interpretation evolved with an " anti-Stalinist" version of it. This subsection attempts to draw a distinction between the "Lenin period" (1917-24) and the "Stalin period" (1928-53).

Nikita Khrushchev, Stalin's successor, argued that Stalin's regime differed profusely from the leadership of Lenin in his " Secret Speech", delivered in 1956. He was critical of the cult of the individual which was constructed around Stalin whereas Lenin stressed "the role of the people as the creator of history". He also emphasized that Lenin favored a collective leadership which relied on personal persuasion and recommended the removal of Stalin from the position of General Secretary. Khrushchev contrasted this with the "despotism" of Stalin which require absolute submission to his position and he also highlighted that many of the people who were later annihilated as "enemies of the party", "had worked with Lenin during his life". He also contrasted the "severe methods" used by Lenin in the "most necessary cases" as a "struggle for survival" during the Civil War with the extreme methods and mass repressions used by Stalin even when the Revolution was "already victorious".

Views from the west were mixed. Socialists and labor organizations tended to support the October Revolution and the Bolshevik seizure of power. On the other hand, western governments were mortified. Western leaders, and later some academics concluded that the Russian Revolution only replaced one form of tyranny, (Tsarism) with another (communism). Initially, the Bolsheviks were tolerant of opposing political factions. Upon seizing state power, they organized a parliament, the Russian Constituent Assembly. On November 25, an election was held. Despite the Bolsheviks being the party that overthrew the Provisional Government and organizing the assembly, they lost the election. Rather than govern as a coalition, the Bolsheviks banned all political opposition. Historians point to this as the start of communist authoritarianism. Conservative historian, Robert Service, states, "he (Lenin) aided the foundations of dictatorship and lawlessness. He had consolidated the principle of state penetration of the whole society, its economy and its culture. Lenin had practiced terror and advocated revolutionary amoralism." Lenin allowed for certain disagreement and debate but only within the highest organs of the Bolshevik party, and practicing democratic centralism. The RSFSR and later the Soviet Union continued to practice political repression until its dissolution in 1991.

Trotskyist theoreticians have disputed the view that a one-party state was a natural outgrowth of the Bolshevik's actions. George Novack stressed the initial efforts by the Bolsheviks to form a government with the Left Socialist Revolutionaries and bring other parties such as the Mensheviks into political legality. Tony Cliff argued the Bolshevik-Left Socialist Revolutionary coalition government dissolved the Constituent Assembly due to a number of reasons. They cited the outdated voter-rolls which did not acknowledge the split among the Socialist Revolutionary party and the assemblies conflict with the Congress of the Soviets as an alternative democratic structure. Trotskyist historian Vadim Rogovin believed Stalinism had "discredited the idea of socialism in the eyes of millions of people throughout the world". Rogovin also argued that the Left Opposition, led by Leon Trotsky, was a political movement "which offered a real alternative to Stalinism, and that to crush this movement was the primary function of the Stalinist terror".

Cultural portrayal

Literature

The White Guard by Mikhail Bulgakov, 1925. Partially autobiographical novel, portraying the life of one family torn apart by uncertainty of the Civil War times

The Life of Klim Samgin (1927-1931) by Maxim Gorky. A novel that portrays the decline of Russian intelligentsia from the start of the 1870s and the assassination of Alexander II to the Revolution

Mikhail Sholokhov's novel Quiet Flows the Don (1928-1940) describes the lives of Don Cossacks during the World War I, the Revolution, and the Civil War

George Orwell's classic novella Animal Farm (1945) is an allegory of the Russian Revolution and its aftermath. It describes the dictator Joseph Stalin as a big Berkshire boar named, "Napoleon". Trotsky is represented by a pig called Snowball who is a brilliant talker and makes magnificent speeches. However, Napoleon overthrows Snowball as Stalin overthrew Trotsky and Napoleon takes over the farm the animals live on. Napoleon becomes a tyrant and uses force and propaganda to oppress the animals, while culturally teaching them that they are free

Doctor Zhivago (1957) by Boris Pasternak describes the fate of Russian intelligentsia; the events take place between the Revolution of 1905 and World War II

The Red Wheel (1984-1991) by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. A cycle of novels that describes the fall of the Russian Empire and the establishment of the Soviet Union

The Russian Revolution has been portrayed in or served as backdrop for many films. Among them, in order of release date:

The End of Saint Petersburg. 1927. Directed by Vsevolod Pudovkin and Mikhail Doller, USSR

October: Ten Days That Shook the World. 1927. Directed by Sergei Eisenstein and Grigori Aleksandrov. Soviet Union. Black and White. Silent

Scarlet Dawn, a 1932 Pre-Code American romantic drama starring Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. and Nancy Carroll caught up in the fallout of the Russian Revolution

Knight Without Armour. 1937. A British historical drama starring Marlene Dietrich and Robert Donat, with Dietrich as an imperiled aristocrat on the eve of the Russian Revolution

Lenin in 1918. 1939. Directed by Mikhail Romm, E. Aron, and I. Simkov. Historical-revolutionary film about Lenin's activities in the first years of Soviet power

Doctor Zhivago. 1965. A drama-romance-war film directed by David Lean, filmed in Europe with a largely European cast, loosely based on the famous novel of the same name by Boris Pasternak

. 1981. Directed by Warren Beatty, it is based on the book Ten Days that Shook the World

. 1997. An American animated feature, directed by Don Bluth and Gary Goldman

References

Further reading

Acton, Edward, Vladimir Cherniaev, and William G. Rosenberg, eds. A Critical Companion to the Russian Revolution, 1914-1921 (Bloomington, 1997).

Ascher, Abraham. The Russian Revolution: A Beginner's Guide (Oneworld Publications, 2014)

Brenton, Tony. Was Revolution Inevitable?: Turning Points of the Russian Revolution (Oxford UP, 2017).

Cambridge History of Russia, vol. 2-3, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-81529-0 (vol. 2) ISBN 0-521-81144-9 (vol. 3).

Chamberlin, William Henry. The Russian Revolution, Volume I: 1917-1918: From the Overthrow of the Tsar to the Assumption of Power by the Bolsheviks; The Russian Revolution, Volume II: 1918-1921: From the Civil War to the Consolidation of Power (1935), famous classic online

Daly, Jonathan and Leonid Trofimov, eds. "Russia in War and Revolution, 1914-1922: A Documentary History." (Indianapolis and Cambridge, MA: Hackett Publishing Company, 2009). ISBN 978-0-87220-987-9.

Fitzpatrick, Sheila. The Russian Revolution. 199 pages. Oxford University Press; (2nd ed. 2001). ISBN 0-19-280204-6.

Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi. The February Revolution, Petrograd, 1917: The End of the Tsarist Regime and the Birth of Dual Power (Brill, 2017).

Lincoln, W. Bruce. Passage Through Armageddon: The Russians in War and Revolution, 1914-1918. (New York, 1986).

Marples, David R. Lenin's Revolution: Russia, 1917-1921 (Routledge, 2014).

Mawdsley, Evan. Russian Civil War (2007). 400p.

Palat, Madhavan K., Social Identities in Revolutionary Russia, ed. (Macmillan, Palgrave, UK, and St Martin's Press, New York, 2001).

Piper, Jessica. Events That Changed the Course of History: The Story of the Russian Revolution 100 Years Later (Atlantic Publishing Company, 2017).\

Pipes, Richard. The Russian Revolution (New York, 1990) online

Pipes, Richard. A concise history of the Russian Revolution (1995) online

Rabinowitch, Alexander. The Bolsheviks in power: the first year of Soviet rule in Petrograd (Indiana UP, 2008). online; also audio version

Rappaport, Helen. Caught in the Revolution: Petrograd, Russia, 1917-A World on the Edge (Macmillan, 2017).

Riasanovsky, Nicholas V. and Mark D. Steinberg A History of Russia (7th ed.) (Oxford University Press 2005).

Rubenstein, Joshua. (2013) Leon Trotsky: A Revolutionary's Life (2013) excerpt

Service, Robert (2005). Stalin: A Biography. Cambridge: Belknap Press. ISBN 0-674-01697-1 online

Service, Robert. Lenin: A Biography (2000); one vol edition of his three volume scholarly biography online

Service, Robert (2005). A history of modern Russia from Nicholas II to Vladimir Putin. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-01801-3.

Harold Shukman, ed. The Blackwell Encyclopedia of the Russian Revolution (1998) articles by over 40 specialists online

Smele, Jonathan. The 'Russian' Civil Wars, 1916-1926: Ten Years That Shook the World (Oxford UP, 2016).

Steinberg, Mark. The Russian Revolution, 1905-1921 (Oxford UP, 2017). audio version

Stoff, Laurie S. They Fought for the Motherland: Russia's Women Soldiers in World War I & the Revolution (2006) 294pp

Swain, Geoffrey. Trotsky and the Russian Revolution (Routledge, 2014)

White, James D. Lenin: The Practice & Theory of Revolution (2001) 262pp

Wolfe, Bertram D. (1948) Three Who Made a Revolution: A Biographical History of Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin (1948) online free to borrow

Yarmolinsky, Avrahm (1959). Road to Revolution: A Century of Russian Radicalism. Macmillan Company.

Historiography

Gatrell, Peter. "Tsarist Russia at War: The View from Above, 1914-February 1917" Journal of Modern History 87#4 (2015) 668-700 online

Haynes, Mike and Jim Wolfreys, (eds). History and Revolution: Refuting Revisionism. Verso Books, 2007. ISBN 978-1844671502

Lyandres, Semion, and Andrei Borisovich Nikolaev. "Contemporary Russian Scholarship on the February Revolution in Petrograd: Some Centenary Observations." Revolutionary Russia 30.2 (2017): 158-181.

Smith, S. A. "The historiography of the Russian revolution 100 years on." Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 16.4 (2015): 733-749.

Smith, Steve. "Writing the History of the Russian Revolution after the Fall of Communism." Europe‐Asia Studies 46.4 (1994): 563-578.

Suny, Ronald Grigor, ed. Red Flag Unfurled: History, Historians, and the Russian Revolution (New York: Verso, 2017) excerpt

Tereshchuk, Andrei V. "The Last Autocrat Reassessing Nicholas II" Russian Studies in History 50#4 (2012) pp. 3-6. DOI 10.2753/RSH1061-1983500400

Volkogonov, Dmitri (1994). Lenin: A New Biography. Translated by Shukman, Harold. London: HarperCollins. ISBN 978-0-00-255123-6.

Wade, Rex A. "The Revolution at One Hundred: Issues and Trends in the English Language Historiography of the Russian Revolution of 1917." Journal of Modern Russian History and Historiography 9.1 (2016): 9-38.

Warth, Robert D. "On the Historiography of the Russian Revolution." Slavic Review 26.2 (1967): 247-264.

Participants' accounts

Reed, John. Ten Days that Shook the World. 1919, 1st Edition, published by BONI & Liveright, Inc. for International Publishers. Transcribed and marked by David Walters for John Reed Internet Archive. Penguin Books; 1st edition. 1 June 1980. ISBN 0-14-018293-4. Retrieved 14 May 2005.

Serge, Victor. Year One of the Russian Revolution. L'An l de la revolution russe, 1930. Year One of the Russian Revolution, Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. Translation, editor's Introduction, and notes © 1972 by Peter Sedgwick. Reprinted on Victor Serge Internet Archive by permission. ISBN 0-86316-150-2. Retrieved 14 May 2005.

Steinberg, Mark, Voices of Revolution, 1917. Yale University Press, 2001

Trotsky, Leon. The History of the Russian Revolution. Translated by Max Eastman, 1932. ISBN 0-913460-83-4.

Primary sources

Ascher, Abraham, ed. The Mensheviks in the Russian Revolution (Ithaca, 1976).

Browder, Robert Paul and Alexander F. Kerensky, eds., The Russian Provisional Government, 1917: Documents. 3 volumes (Stanford, 1961).

Bunyan, James and H. H. Fisher, eds. The Bolshevik Revolution, 1917-1918: Documents and Materials (Stanford, 1961; first ed. 1934).

Daly, Jonathan and Leonid Trofimov, eds. "Russia in War and Revolution, 1914-1922: A Documentary History." (Indianapolis and Cambridge, MA: Hackett Publishing Company, 2009). ISBN 978-0-87220-987-9. Includes private letters, press editorials, government decrees, diaries, philosophical tracts, belles-lettres, and memoirs; 416pp.

Golder, Frank Alfred. Documents Of Russian History 1914-1917 (1927), 680pp online

Miller, Martin A., ed. Russian Revolution: The Essential Readings (2001) 304pp

Steinberg, Mark D. Voices of Revolution, 1917. In the series "Annals of Communism", Yale University Press, 2001. 404pp On-line publication of these texts in the Russian original: Golosa revoliutsii, 1917 g. (Yale University Press, 2002)

Zeman, Z. A. B. ed. Germany and the Revolution in Russia, 1915-1918: Documents from the Archives of the German Foreign Ministry (1958)

External links

Read, Christopher: Revolutions (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Brudek, Paweł: Revolutions (East Central Europe), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Sumpf, Alexandre: Russian Civil War, in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Mawdsley, Evan: International Responses to the Russian Civil War (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Melancon, Michael S.: Social Conflict and Control, Protest and Repression (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Sanborn, Joshua A.: Russian Empire, in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Gaida, Fedor Aleksandrovich: Governments, Parliaments and Parties (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Albert, Gleb: Labour Movements, Trade Unions and Strikes (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Gatrell, Peter: Organization of War Economies (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Marks, Steven G.: War Finance (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Orlando Figes's free educational website on the Russian Revolution and Soviet history, May 2014

Soviet history archive at www.marxists.org

Archival footage of the Russian Revolution // Net-Film Newsreels and Documentary Films Archive

Précis of Russian Revolution A summary of the key events and factors of the 1917 Russian Revolution.

Kevin Murphy's Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize lecture Can we Write the History of the Russian Revolution, which examines historical accounts of 1917 in the light of newly accessible archive material.

Thanks to Trotsky, the 'insurrection' was bloodless

Violence and Revolution in 1917. Mike Haynes for . 17 July 2017.

The Bolsheviks and workers' control: the state and counter-revolution - Maurice Brinton

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social change in the Russian Empire, starting in 1917. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and adopt a socialist form of government following two successive revolutions and a bloody civil war.

# data[].attributes.body
Return of Lenin from Exile and April Thesis

# data[].attributes.body
Formation of new provisional government

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Provisional Government was a collection of Duma ministers and notable figures, assembled to manage Russia’s transition from tsarism to democratic state.

# data[].attributes.body
October Revolution

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The October Revolution, officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution under the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Coup, the Bolshevik Revolution, the October Uprising, the October Coup or Red October, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was instrumental in the larger Russian Revolution of 1917-1923. It was the second revolutionary change of government in Russia in 1917. It took place through an armed insurrection in Petrograd (now Saint Petersburg) on 7 November 1917 [ O.S. 25 October]. It was the precipitating event of the Russian Civil War.

The October Revolution followed and capitalized on the February Revolution earlier in the year. The February Revolution had overthrown the Tsarist autocracy, resulting in a provisional government. The provisional government had taken power after being proclaimed by Grand Duke Michael, Tsar Nicholas II's younger brother, who declined to take power after the Tsar stepped down. During this time, urban workers began to organize into councils ( soviets) wherein revolutionaries criticized the provisional government and its actions. The provisional government's popularity imploded largely due to their decision to remain in World War I. To prevent further insurrections the Provisional Government began ruling with an iron fist throughout the summer which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of protesters in the July Days.

The July Days coupled with widespread anti-war sentiment contributed to the Bolshevik's rising popularity. Using this popularity, the Bolsheviks pressured the Directorate, led by the left-wing Socialist Revolutionary Party, to give into their demands. When this approach failed, the Bolsheviks began spreading calls for a military uprising. On 10 October 1917 (O.S.; 23 October, N.S.), the Petrograd Soviet, led by Trotsky, voted to back a military uprising. On 24 October (O.S.; 6 November, N.S.) the government shut down numerous newspapers and closed the city of Petrograd in an attempt to forestall the revolution; minor armed skirmishes broke out. The next day a full scale uprising erupted, as a fleet of Bolshevik sailors entered the harbor and tens of thousands of soldiers rose up in support of the Bolsheviks. Bolshevik Red Guards forces under the Military-Revolutionary Committee began the occupation of government buildings on 25 October (O.S.; 7 November, N.S.), 1917. The following day, the Winter Palace (the seat of the Provisional government located in Petrograd, then capital of Russia) was captured.

As the Revolution was not universally recognized, the country descended into civil war, which would last until 1923. The Bolsheviks having won the civil war, reconstituted the former Russian Empire into the Soviet Union in late 1922. Historiographical descriptions of the event have been widely varied since 1917. The victorious Bolsheviks viewed it as a validation of their ideology, and the triumph of the worker over capitalism. On the other hand, the Western powers saw it as a coup, where the Bolsheviks replaced the democratically controlled workers' Soviets with a totalitarian dictatorship.

During Soviet times, revolution day was made a national holiday, marking its importance in the country's founding story. The event inspired many cultural works, and ignited communist movements across Europe and globally. Many Marxist-Leninist parties around the world still celebrate revolution day. Contemporary Russia distanced itself from its Soviet past by removing the October Revolution as a national holiday.

Despite occurring in November of the Gregorian calendar, the event is most commonly known as the "October Revolution" (Октябрьская революция ) because at the time Russia still used the Julian calendar. The event is sometimes known as the "November Revolution", after the Soviet Union modernized its calendar. To avoid confusion, both O.S and N.S. dates have been given for events. For more details see Old Style and New Style dates.

At first, the event was referred to as the "October Coup" (Октябрьский переворот ) or the "Uprising of the 3rd," as seen in contemporary documents (for example, in the first editions of Lenin's complete works).

The February Revolution had toppled Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and replaced his government with the Russian Provisional Government. However, the provisional government was weak and riven by internal dissension. It continued to wage World War I, which became increasingly unpopular. There was a nationwide crisis affecting social, economic, and political relations. Disorder in industry and transport had intensified, and difficulties in obtaining provisions had increased. Gross industrial production in 1917 decreased by over 36% of what it had been in 1914. In the autumn, as much as 50% of all enterprises in the Urals, the Donbas, and other industrial centers were closed down, leading to mass unemployment. At the same time, the cost of living increased sharply. Real wages fell to about 50% of what they had been in 1913. By October 1917, Russia's national debt had risen to 50 billion rubles. Of this, debts to foreign governments constituted more than 11 billion rubles. The country faced the threat of financial bankruptcy.

Unrest by workers, peasants, and soldiers

Throughout June, July, and August 1917, it was common to hear working-class Russians speak about their lack of confidence in the Provisional Government. Factory workers around Russia felt unhappy with the growing shortages of food, supplies, and other materials. They blamed their managers or foremen and would even attack them in the factories. The workers blamed many rich and influential individuals for the overall shortage of food and poor living conditions. Workers saw these rich and powerful individuals as opponents of the Revolution, and called them "bourgeois", "capitalist", and "imperialist".

In September and October 1917, there were mass strike actions by the Moscow and Petrograd workers, miners in the Donbas, metalworkers in the Urals, oil workers in Baku, textile workers in the Central Industrial Region, and railroad workers on 44 railway lines. In these months alone, more than a million workers took part in strikes. Workers established control over production and distribution in many factories and plants in a social revolution. Workers organized these strikes through factory committees. The factory committees represented the workers and were able to negotiate better working conditions, pay, and hours. Even though workplace conditions may have been increasing in quality, the overall quality of life for workers was not improving. There were still shortages of food and the increased wages workers had obtained did little to provide for their families.

By October 1917, peasant uprisings were common. By autumn, the peasant movement against the landowners had spread to 482 of 624 counties, or 77% of the country. As 1917 progressed, the peasantry increasingly began to lose faith that the land would be distributed to them by the Social Revolutionaries and the Mensheviks. Refusing to continue living as before, they increasingly took measures into their own hands, as can be seen by the increase in the number and militancy of the peasant's actions. From the beginning of September to the October Revolution there were over a third as many peasant actions than since March. Over 42% of all the cases of destruction (usually burning down and seizing property from the landlord's estate) recorded between February and October occurred in October. While the uprisings varied in severity, complete uprisings and seizures of the land were not uncommon. Less robust forms of protest included marches on landowner manors and government offices, as well as withholding and storing grains rather than selling them. When the Provisional Government sent punitive detachments, it only enraged the peasants. In September, the garrisons in Petrograd, Moscow, and other cities, the Northern and Western fronts, and the sailors of the Baltic Fleet declared through their elected representative body Tsentrobalt that they did not recognize the authority of the Provisional Government and would not carry out any of its commands.

Soldiers' wives were key players in the unrest in the villages. From 1914 to 1917, almost 50% of healthy men were sent to war, and many were killed on the front, resulting in many females being head of the household. Often-when government allowances were late and were not sufficient to match the rising costs of goods-soldiers' wives sent masses of appeals to the government, which went largely unanswered. Frustration resulted, and these women were influential in inciting "subsistence riots"-also referred to as "hunger riots," " pogroms," or "baba riots." In these riots, citizens seized food and resources from shop owners, who they believed to be charging unfair prices. Upon police intervention, protesters responded with "rakes, sticks, rocks, and fists."

In a diplomatic note of 1 May, the minister of foreign affairs, Pavel Milyukov, expressed the Provisional Government's desire to continue the war against the Central Powers "to a victorious conclusion", arousing broad indignation. On 1-4 May, about 100,000 workers and soldiers of Petrograd, and, after them, the workers and soldiers of other cities, led by the Bolsheviks, demonstrated under banners reading "Down with the war!" and "All power to the soviets!" The mass demonstrations resulted in a crisis for the Provisional Government. 1 July saw more demonstrations, as about 500,000 workers and soldiers in Petrograd demonstrated, again demanding "all power to the soviets," "down with the war," and "down with the ten capitalist ministers." The Provisional Government opened an offensive against the Central Powers on 1 July, which soon collapsed. The news of the offensive's failure intensified the struggle of the workers and the soldiers. A new crisis in the Provisional Government began on 15 July.[citation needed ]

On 16 July, spontaneous demonstrations of workers and soldiers began in Petrograd, demanding that power be turned over to the soviets. The Central Committee of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party provided leadership to the spontaneous movements. On 17 July, over 500,000 people participated in what was intended to be a peaceful demonstration in Petrograd, the so-called July Days. The Provisional Government, with the support of Socialist-Revolutionary Party- Menshevik leaders of the All-Russian Executive Committee of the Soviets, ordered an armed attack against the demonstrators, killing hundreds.

A period of repression followed. On 5-6 July, attacks were made on the editorial offices and printing presses of and on the Palace of Kshesinskaya, where the Central Committee and the Petrograd Committee of the Bolsheviks were located. On 7 July, the government ordered the arrest and trial of Vladimir Lenin, who was forced to go underground, as he had done under the Tsarist regime. Bolsheviks were arrested, workers were disarmed, and revolutionary military units in Petrograd were disbanded or sent to the war front. On 12 July, the Provisional Government published a law introducing the death penalty at the front. The second coalition government was formed on 24 July, chaired by Alexander Kerensky.

In response to a Bolshevik appeal, Moscow's working class began a protest strike of 400,000 workers. They were supported by strikes and protest rallies by workers in Kiev, Kharkov, Nizhny Novgorod, Ekaterinburg, and other cities.

In what became known as the Kornilov affair, General Lavr Kornilov, who had been Commander-in-Chief since 18 July, with Kerensky's agreement directed an army under Aleksandr Krymov to march toward Petrograd to restore order. Details remain sketchy, but Kerensky appeared to become frightened by the possibility that the army would stage a coup, and reversed the order. By contrast, historian Richard Pipes has argued that the episode was engineered by Kerensky. On 27 August, feeling betrayed by the government, Kornilov pushed on towards Petrograd. With few troops to spare at the front, Kerensky turned to the Petrograd Soviet for help. Bolsheviks, Mensheviks, and Socialist Revolutionaries confronted the army and convinced them to stand down. The Bolsheviks' influence over railroad and telegraph workers also proved vital in stopping the movement of troops. Right-wingers felt betrayed, and the left-wing was resurgent. The first direct consequence of Kornilov's failed coup was the formal abolition of the monarchy and the proclamation of the Russian Republic on 1 September.

With Kornilov defeated, the Bolsheviks' popularity in the soviets grew significantly, both in the central and local areas. On 31 August, the Petrograd Soviet of Workers and Soldiers Deputies-and, on 5 September, the Moscow Soviet Workers Deputies-adopted the Bolshevik resolutions on the question of power. The Bolsheviks won a majority in the soviets of Briansk, Samara, Saratov, Tsaritsyn, Minsk, Kiev, Tashkent, and other cities.

Vladimir Lenin, who had been living in exile in Switzerland, with other dissidents organized a plan to negotiate a passage for them through Germany, with whom Russia was then at war. Recognizing that these dissidents could cause problems for their Russian enemies, the German government agreed to permit 32 Russian citizens, among them Lenin and his wife, to travel in a sealed train carriage through their territory. According to Deutsche Welle:

On November 7, 1917, a coup d'état went down in history as the October Revolution. The interim government was toppled, the Soviets seized power, and Russia later terminated the Triple Entente military alliance with France and Britain. For Russia, it was effectively the end of the war. Kaiser Wilhelm II had spent around half a billion euros ($582 million) in today's money to weaken his wartime enemy.

On 10 October 1917 (O.S.; 23 October, N.S.), the Bolsheviks' Central Committee voted 10-2 for a resolution saying that "an armed uprising is inevitable, and that the time for it is fully ripe." At the Committee meeting, Lenin discussed how the people of Russia had waited long enough for "an armed uprising," and it was the Bolsheviks' time to take power. Lenin expressed his confidence in the success of the planned insurrection. His confidence stemmed from months of Bolshevik buildup of power and successful elections to different committees and councils in major cities such as Petrograd and Moscow.

The Bolsheviks created a revolutionary military committee within the Petrograd soviet, led by the soviet's president, Trotsky. The committee included armed workers, sailors, and soldiers, and assured the support or neutrality of the capital's garrison. The committee methodically planned to occupy strategic locations through the city, almost without concealing their preparations: the Provisional Government's president Kerensky was himself aware of them; and some details, leaked by Lev Kamenev and Grigory Zinoviev, were published in newspapers.

In the early morning of 24 October (O.S.; 6 November N.S.), a group of soldiers loyal to Kerensky's government marched on the printing house of the Bolshevik newspaper, Rabochiy put ( Worker's Path), seizing and destroying printing equipment and thousands of newspapers. Shortly thereafter, the government announced the immediate closure of not only Rabochiy put but also the left-wing Soldat, as well as the far-right newspapers Zhivoe slovo and Novaia Rus. The editors and contributors of these newspapers were seen to be calling for insurrection and were to be prosecuted on criminal charges.

In response, at 9a.m. the Bolshevik Military-Revolutionary Committee issued a statement denouncing the government's actions. At 10a.m., Bolshevik-aligned soldiers successfully retook the Rabochiy put printing house. Kerensky responded at approximately 3p.m. that afternoon by ordering the raising of all but one of Petrograd's bridges, a tactic used by the government several months earlier during the July Days. What followed was a series of sporadic clashes over control of the bridges, between Red Guard militias aligned with the Military-Revolutionary Committee and military units still loyal to the government. At approximately 5p.m. the Military-Revolutionary Committee seized the Central Telegraph of Petrograd, giving the Bolsheviks control over communications through the city.

On 25 October (O.S.; 7 November, N.S.) 1917, the Bolsheviks led their forces in the uprising in Petrograd (now St. Petersburg, then capital of Russia) against the Provisional Government. The event coincided with the arrival of a pro-Bolshevik flotilla-consisting primarily of five destroyers and their crews, as well as marines-in Petrograd harbor. At Kronstadt, sailors announced their allegiance to the Bolshevik insurrection. In the early morning, from its heavily guarded and picketed headquarters in Smolny Palace, the Military-Revolutionary Committee designated the last of the locations to be assaulted or seized. The Red Guards systematically captured major government facilities, key communication installations, and vantage points with little opposition. The Petrograd Garrison and most of the city's military units joined the insurrection against the Provisional Government. The insurrection was timed and organized to hand state power to the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, which began on this day.

Kerensky and the Provisional Government were virtually helpless to offer significant resistance. Railways and railway stations had been controlled by Soviet workers and soldiers for days, making rail travel to and from Petrograd impossible for Provisional Government officials. The Provisional Government was also unable to locate any serviceable vehicles. On the morning of the insurrection, Kerensky desperately searched for a means of reaching military forces he hoped would be friendly to the Provisional Government outside the city and ultimately borrowed a Renault car from the American embassy, which he drove from the Winter Palace, along with a Pierce Arrow. Kerensky was able to evade the pickets going up around the palace and to drive to meet approaching soldiers.

As Kerensky left Petrograd, Lenin wrote a proclamation To the Citizens of Russia, stating that the Provisional Government had been overthrown by the Military-Revolutionary Committee. The proclamation was sent by telegraph throughout Russia, even as the pro-Soviet soldiers were seizing important control centers throughout the city. One of Lenin's intentions was to present members of the Soviet congress, who would assemble that afternoon, with a fait accompli and thus forestall further debate on the wisdom or legitimacy of taking power.

A final assault against the Winter Palace -against 3,000 cadets, officers, cossacks, and female soldiers-was not vigorously resisted. The Bolsheviks delayed the assault because they could not find functioning artillery At 6:15p.m., a large group of artillery cadets abandoned the palace, taking their artillery with them. At 8:00p.m., 200 cossacks left the palace and returned to their barracks.

While the cabinet of the provisional government within the palace debated what action to take, the Bolsheviks issued an ultimatum to surrender. Workers and soldiers occupied the last of the telegraph stations, cutting off the cabinet's communications with loyal military forces outside the city. As the night progressed, crowds of insurgents surrounded the palace, and many infiltrated it. At 9:45p.m, the cruiser Aurora fired a blank shot from the harbor. Some of the revolutionaries entered the palace at 10:25p.m. and there was a mass entry 3 hours later.

By 2:10a.m. on 26 October, Bolshevik forces had gained control. The Cadets and the 140 volunteers of the Women's Battalion surrendered rather than resist the 40,000 strong attacking force. After sporadic gunfire throughout the building, the cabinet of the Provisional Government surrendered, and were imprisoned in Peter and Paul Fortress. The only member who was not arrested was Kerensky himself, who had already left the palace.

With the Petrograd Soviet now in control of government, garrison, and proletariat, the Second All Russian Congress of Soviets held its opening session on the day, while Trotsky dismissed the opposing Mensheviks and the Socialist Revolutionaries (SR) from Congress.

Dybenko's disputed role

Some sources contend that as the leader of Tsentrobalt, Pavlo Dybenko played a crucial role in the revolt and that the ten warships that arrived at the city with ten thousand Baltic Fleet mariners were the force that took the power in Petrograd and put down the Provisional Government. The same mariners then dispersed by force the elected parliament of Russia, and used machine-gun fire against demonstrators in Petrograd,[citation needed ] killing about 100 demonstrators and wounding several hundred.[citation needed ] Dybenko in his memoirs mentioned this event as "several shots in the air". These are disputed by various sources, such as Louise Bryant, who claims that news outlets in the West at the time reported that the unfortunate loss of life occurred in Moscow, not Petrograd, and the number was much less than suggested above. As for the "several shots in the air", there is little evidence suggesting otherwise.

While the seizure of the Winter Palace happened almost without resistance, Soviet historians and officials later tended to depict the event in dramatic and heroic terms. The historical reenactment titled The Storming of the Winter Palace was staged in 1920. This reenactment, watched by 100,000 spectators, provided the model for official films made later, which showed fierce fighting during the storming of the Winter Palace, although, in reality, the Bolshevik insurgents had faced little opposition.

Later accounts of the heroic "storming of the Winter Palace" and "defense of the Winter Palace" were propaganda by Bolshevik publicists. Grandiose paintings depicting the "Women's Battalion" and photo stills taken from Sergei Eisenstein's staged film depicting the "politically correct" version of the October events in Petrograd came to be taken as truth.

The Second Congress of Soviets consisted of 670 elected delegates: 300 were Bolshevik and nearly 100 were Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, who also supported the overthrow of the Alexander Kerensky government. When the fall of the Winter Palace was announced, the Congress adopted a decree transferring power to the Soviets of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies, thus ratifying the Revolution.

The transfer of power was not without disagreement. The center and right wings of the Socialist Revolutionaries, as well as the Mensheviks, believed that Lenin and the Bolsheviks had illegally seized power and they walked out before the resolution was passed. As they exited, they were taunted by Trotsky who told them "You are pitiful isolated individuals; you are bankrupts; your role is played out. Go where you belong from now on-into the dustbin of history!"

The following day, 26 October, the Congress elected a new cabinet of Bolsheviks, pending the convocation of a Constituent Assembly. This new Soviet government was known as the Council (Soviet) of People's Commissars ( Sovnarkom), with Lenin as a leader. Lenin allegedly approved of the name, reporting that it "smells of revolution". The cabinet quickly passed the Decree on Peace and the Decree on Land. This new government was also officially called "provisional" until the Assembly was dissolved.

That same day, posters were pinned on walls and fences by the right-wing Socialist Revolutionaries, describing the takeover as a "crime against the motherland" and "revolution"; this signaled the next wave of anti-Bolshevik sentiment. The next day, the Mensheviks seized power in Georgia and declared it an independent republic; the Don Cossacks also claimed control of their government. The Bolshevik strongholds were in the cities, particularly Petrograd, with support much more mixed in rural areas. The peasant-dominated Left SR party was in coalition with the Bolsheviks. There were reports that the Provisional Government had not conceded defeat and were meeting with the army at the Front.

Anti-Bolshevik sentiment continued to grow as posters and newspapers started criticizing the actions of the Bolsheviks and refuted their authority. The Executive Committee of Peasants Soviets "[refuted] with indignation all participation of the organized peasantry in this criminal violation of the will of the working class". This eventually developed into major counter-revolutionary action, as on 30 October (O.S., 12 November, N.S.) when Cossacks, welcomed by church bells, entered Tsarskoye Selo on the outskirts of Petrograd with Kerensky riding on a white horse. Kerensky gave an ultimatum to the rifle garrison to lay down weapons, which was promptly refused. They were then fired upon by Kerensky's cossacks, which resulted in 8 deaths. This turned soldiers in Petrograd against Kerensky as being the Tsarist regime. Kerensky's failure to assume authority over troops was described by John Reed as a "fatal blunder" that signaled the final end of his government. Over the following days, the battle against the anti-Bolsheviks continued. The Red Guard fought against cossacks at Tsarskoye Selo, with the cossacks breaking rank and fleeing, leaving their artillery behind. On 31 October 1917 (13 November, N.S), the Bolsheviks gained control of Moscow after a week of bitter street-fighting. Artillery had been freely used, with an estimated 700 casualties. However, there was continued support for Kerensky in some of the provinces.

After the fall of Moscow, there was only minor public anti-Bolshevik sentiment, such as the newspaper Novaya Zhizn, which criticized the Bolsheviks' lack of manpower and organization in running their party, let alone a government. Lenin confidently claimed that there is "not a shadow of hesitation in the masses of Petrograd, Moscow and the rest of Russia" in accepting Bolshevik rule.

On 10 November 1917 (23 November, N.S.), the government applied the term "citizens of the Russian Republic" to Russians, whom they sought to make equal in all possible respects, by the nullification of all "legal designations of civil inequality, such as estates, titles, and ranks."

The long-awaited Constituent Assembly elections were held on 12 November (O.S., 25 November, N.S.) 1917. In contrast to their majority in the Soviets, the Bolsheviks only won 175 seats in the 715-seat legislative body, coming in second behind the Socialist Revolutionary Party, which won 370 seats, although the SR Party no longer existed as a whole party by that time, as the Left SRs had gone into coalition with the Bolsheviks from October 1917 to March 1918 (a cause of dispute of the legitimacy of the returned seating of the Constituent Assembly, as the old lists, were drawn up by the old SR Party leadership, and thus represented mostly Right SRs, whereas the peasant soviet deputies had returned majorities for the pro-Bolshevik Left SRs). The Constituent Assembly was to first meet on 28 November (O.S.) 1917, but its convocation was delayed until 5 January (O.S.; 18 January, N.S.) 1918 by the Bolsheviks. On its first and only day in session, the Constituent Assembly came into conflict with the Soviets, and it rejected Soviet decrees on peace and land, resulting in the Constituent Assembly being dissolved the next day by order of the Congress of Soviets.

On 16 December 1917 (29 December, N.S.), the government ventured to eliminate hierarchy in the army, removing all titles, ranks, and uniform decorations. The tradition of saluting was also eliminated.

On 20 December 1917 (2 January 1918, N.S.), the Cheka was created by Lenin's decree. These were the beginnings of the Bolsheviks' consolidation of power over their political opponents. The Red Terror began in September 1918, following a failed assassination attempt on Lenin. The French Jacobin Terror was an example for the Soviet Bolsheviks. Trotsky had compared Lenin to Maximilien Robespierre as early as 1904.

The Decree on Land ratified the actions of the peasants who throughout Russia had taken private land and redistributed it among themselves. The Bolsheviks viewed themselves as representing an alliance of workers and peasants signified by the Hammer and Sickle on the flag and the coat of arms of the Soviet Union. Other decrees:

5 November 1917: Tallinn.

7 November 1917: Petrograd, Minsk, Novgorod, Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Tartu

8 November 1917: Ufa, Kazan, Yekaterinburg, and Narva; (failed in Kiev)

9 November 1917: Vitebsk, Yaroslavl, Saratov, Samara, and Izhevsk

10 November 1917: Rostov, Tver, and Nizhny Novgorod

12 November 1917: Voronezh, Smolensk, and Gomel

13 November 1917: Tambov

14 November 1917: Orel and Perm

15 November 1917: Pskov, Moscow, and Baku

27 November 1917: Tsaritsyn

1 December 1917: Mogilev

8 December 1917: Vyatka

10 December 1917: Kishinev

11 December 1917: Kaluga

14 December 1917: Novorossisk

15 December 1917: Kostroma

20 December 1917: Tula

24 December 1917: Kharkov (invasion of Ukraine by the Muravyov Red Guard forces, the establishment of Soviet Ukraine and hostilities in the region)

29 December 1917: Sevastopol (invasion of Crimea by the Red Guard forces, the establishment of the Taurida Soviet Socialist Republic)

4 January 1918: Penza

11 January 1918: Yekaterinoslav

17 January 1918: Petrozavodsk

19 January 1918: Poltava

22 January 1918: Zhitomir

26 January 1918: Simferopol

27 January 1918: Nikolayev

29 January 1918: (failed again in Kiev)

31 January 1918: Odessa and Orenburg (establishment of the Odessa Soviet Republic)

7 February 1918: Astrakhan

8 February 1918: Kiev and Vologda (defeat of the Ukrainian government)

17 February 1918: Arkhangelsk

25 February 1918: Novocherkassk

Bolshevik-led attempts to gain power in other parts of the Russian Empire were largely successful in Russia proper-although the fighting in Moscow lasted for two weeks-but they were less successful in ethnically non-Russian parts of the Empire, which had been clamoring for independence since the February Revolution. For example, the Ukrainian Rada, which had declared autonomy on 23 June 1917, created the Ukrainian People's Republic on 20 November, which was supported by the Ukrainian Congress of Soviets. This led to an armed conflict with the Bolshevik government in Petrograd and, eventually, a Ukrainian declaration of independence from Russia on 25 January 1918. In Estonia, two rival governments emerged: the Estonian Provincial Assembly, established in April 1917, proclaimed itself the supreme legal authority of Estonia on 28 November 1917 and issued the Declaration of Independence on 24 February 1918; but Soviet Russia recognized the Executive Committee of the Soviets of Estonia as the legal authority in the province, although the Soviets in Estonia controlled only the capital and a few other major towns.

After the success of the October Revolution transformed the Russian state into a soviet republic, a coalition of anti-Bolshevik groups attempted to unseat the new government in the Russian Civil War from 1918 to 1922. In an attempt to intervene in the civil war after the Bolsheviks' separate peace with the Central Powers, the Allied Powers (the United Kingdom, France, Italy, the United States, and Japan) occupied parts of the Soviet Union for over two years before finally withdrawing. The United States did not recognize the new Russian government until 1933. The European powers recognized the Soviet Union in the early 1920s and began to engage in business with it after the New Economic Policy (NEP) was implemented.[citation needed ]

Historical research into few events has been as influenced by the researcher's political outlook as that of the October Revolution. The historiography of the Revolution generally divides into three camps: Soviet-Marxist, Western-Totalitarian, and Revisionist.

Soviet historiography of the October Revolution is intertwined with Soviet historical development. Many of the initial Soviet interpreters of the Revolution were themselves Bolshevik revolutionaries. After the initial wave of revolutionary narratives, Soviet historians worked within "narrow guidelines" defined by the Soviet government. The rigidity of interpretive possibilities reached its height under Stalin.

Soviet historians of the Revolution interpreted the October Revolution as being about establishing the legitimacy of Marxist ideology and the Bolshevik government. To establish the accuracy of Marxist ideology, Soviet historians generally described the Revolution as the product of class struggle and that it was the supreme event in a world history governed by historical laws. The Bolshevik Party is placed at the center of the Revolution, as it exposes the errors of both the moderate Provisional Government and the spurious "socialist" Mensheviks in the Petrograd Soviet. Guided by Lenin's leadership and his firm grasp of scientific Marxist theory, the Party led the "logically predetermined" events of the October Revolution from beginning to end. The events were, according to these historians, logically predetermined because of the socio-economic development of Russia, where monopolistic industrial capitalism had alienated the masses. In this view, the Bolshevik party took the leading role in organizing these alienated industrial workers, and thereby established the construction of the first socialist state.

Although Soviet historiography of the October Revolution stayed relatively constant until 1991, it did undergo some changes. Following Stalin's death, historians such as E. N. Burdzhalov and P. V. Volobuev published historical research that deviated significantly from the party line in refining the doctrine that the Bolshevik victory "was predetermined by the state of Russia's socio-economic development". These historians, who constituted the "New Directions Group", posited that the complex nature of the October Revolution "could only be explained by a multi-causal analysis, not by recourse to the mono-causality of monopoly capitalism". For them, the central actor is still the Bolshevik party, but this party triumphed "because it alone could solve the preponderance of 'general democratic' tasks the country faced" (such as the struggle for peace and the exploitation of landlords).

During the late Soviet period, the opening of select Soviet archives during glasnost sparked innovative research that broke away from some aspects of Marxism-Leninism, though the key features of the orthodox Soviet view remained intact.

Following the turn of the 21st century, some Soviet historians began to implement an "anthropological turn" in their historiographical analysis of the Russian Revolution. This method of analysis focuses on the average person's experience of day-to-day life during the revolution, and pulls the analytical focus away from larger events, notable revolutionaries, and overarching claims about party views. In 2006, S. V. Iarov employed this methodology when he focused on citizen adjustment to the new Soviet system. Iarov explored the dwindling labor protests, evolving forms of debate, and varying forms of politicization as a result of the new Soviet rule from 1917 to 1920. In 2010, O. S. Nagornaia took interest in the personal experiences of Russian prisoners-of-war taken by Germany, examining Russian soldiers and officers' ability to cooperate and implement varying degrees of autocracy despite being divided by class, political views, and race. Other analyses following this "anthropological turn" have explored texts from soldiers and how they used personal war-experiences to further their political goals, as well as how individual life-structure and psychology may have shaped major decisions in the civil war that followed the revolution.

During the Cold War, Western historiography of the October Revolution developed in direct response to the assertions of the Soviet view. As a result, Western historians exposed what they believed were flaws in the Soviet view, thereby undermining the Bolsheviks' original legitimacy, as well as the precepts of Marxism.

These Western historians described the revolution as the result of a chain of contingent accidents. Examples of these accidental and contingent factors they say precipitated the Revolution included World War I's timing, chance, and the poor leadership of Tsar Nicholas II as well as that of liberal and moderate socialists. According to Western historians, it was not popular support, but rather a manipulation of the masses, ruthlessness, and the party discipline of the Bolsheviks that enabled their triumph. For these historians, the Bolsheviks' defeat in the Constituent Assembly elections of November-December 1917 demonstrated popular opposition to the Bolsheviks' revolution, as did the scale and breadth of the Civil War.

Western historians saw the organization of the Bolshevik party as proto-totalitarian. Their interpretation of the October Revolution as a violent coup organized by a proto-totalitarian party reinforced for them the idea that totalitarianism was an inherent part of Soviet history. The democratic promise of the February Revolution came to an end with the forced dissolution of the Constituent Assembly. Thus, Stalinist totalitarianism developed as a natural progression from Leninism and the Bolshevik party's tactics and organization.

The dissolution of the Soviet Union affected historical interpretations of the October Revolution. Since 1991, increasing access to large amounts of Soviet archival materials has made it possible to re‑examine the October Revolution. Though both Western and Russian historians now have access to many of these archives, the effect of the dissolution of the USSR can be seen most clearly in the work of the latter. While the disintegration essentially helped solidify the Western and Revisionist views, post-USSR Russian historians largely repudiated the former Soviet historical interpretation of the Revolution. As Stephen Kotkin argues, 1991 prompted "a return to political history and the apparent resurrection of totalitarianism, the interpretive view that, in different ways...revisionists sought to bury".

The October Revolution marks the inception of the first communist government in Russia, and thus the first large-scale and constitutionally ordained socialist state in world history. After this, the Russian Republic became the Russian SFSR, which later became part of the Soviet Union.

The October Revolution also made the ideology of communism influential on a global scale in the 20th century. Communist parties would start to form in many countries after 1917.

Ten Days That Shook the World, a book written by American journalist John Reed and first published in 1919, gives a firsthand exposition of the events. Reed died in 1920, shortly after the book was finished.

Dmitri Shostakovich wrote his Symphony No. 2 in B major, Op. 14, and subtitled it To October, for the 10th anniversary of the October Revolution. The choral finale of the work, "To October", is set to a text by Alexander Bezymensky, which praises Lenin and the revolution. The Symphony No. 2 was first performed on 5 November 1927 by the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra and the Academy Capella Choir under the direction of Nikolai Malko.

Sergei Eisenstein and Grigori Aleksandrov's film October: Ten Days That Shook the World, first released on 20 January 1928 in the USSR and on 2 November 1928 in New York City, describes and glorifies the revolution, having been commissioned to commemorate the event.

The term "Red October" (Красный Октябрь, Krasnyy Oktyabr) has been used to signify the October Revolution. "Red October" was given to a steel factory that was made notable by the Battle of Stalingrad, a Moscow sweets factory that is well known in Russia, and a fictional Soviet submarine in both Tom Clancy's 1984 novel The Hunt for Red October and the 1990 film adaptation of the same name.

7 November, the anniversary of the October Revolution according to the Gregorian Calendar, was the official national day of the Soviet Union from 1918 onward and still is a public holiday in Belarus and the breakaway territory of Transnistria. Communist parties both in and out of power celebrate November 7 as the date Marxist parties began to take power.

Acton, Edward (1997). Critical Companion to the Russian Revolution.

Ascher, Abraham (2014). The Russian Revolution: A Beginner's Guide. Oneworld Publications.

Bone, Ann (trans.) (1974). The Bolsheviks and the October Revolution: Central Committee Minutes of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party (Bolsheviks) August 1917-February 1918. Pluto Press. ISBN 0-902818546.

Bunyan, James; Fisher, Harold Henry (1934). The Bolshevik Revolution, 1917-1918: Documents and Materials. Palo Alto: Stanford University Press. OCLC 253483096.

Chamberlin, William Henry (1935). The Russian Revolution. Vol. I: 1917-1918: From the Overthrow of the Tsar to the Assumption of Power by the Bolsheviks. online vol 1; also online vol 2

online free to borrow

Guerman, Mikhail (1979). Art of the October Revolution.

Kollontai, Alexandra (1971). "The Years of Revolution". The Autobiography of a Sexually Emancipated Communist Woman. New York: Herder and Herder. OCLC 577690073.

Krupskaya, Nadezhda (1930). "The October Days". Reminiscences of Lenin. Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House. OCLC 847091253.

Luxemburg, Rosa (1940) [1918]. The Russian Revolution. Translated by Bertram Wolfe. New York City: Workers Age. OCLC 579589928.

Mandel, David (1984). The Petrograd Workers and the Soviet seizure of power. London: MacMillan. ISBN 9780312603953.

Radek, Karl (1995) [First published 1922 as "Wege der Russischen Revolution"]. "The Paths of the Russian Revolution". In Bukharin, Nikolai; Richardson, Al (eds.). In Defence of the Russian Revolution: A Selection of Bolshevik Writings, 1917-1923. London: Porcupine Press. pp. 35-75. ISBN 1899438017. OCLC 33294798.

Read, Christopher (1996). From Tsars to Soviets.

Reed, John (1997) [1919]. Ten Days that Shook the World. New York: St. Martin's Press.

Serge, Victor (1972) [1930]. Year One of the Russian Revolution. London: Penguin Press. OCLC 15612072.

Service, Robert (1998). A history of twentieth-century Russia. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-40347-9.

Shukman, Harold, ed. (1998). The Blackwell Encyclopedia of the Russian Revolution. articles by over 40 specialists

Swain, Geoffrey (2014). Trotsky and the Russian Revolution. Routledge.

Trotsky, Leon (1930). "XXVI: From July to October". My Life. London: Thornton Butterworth. OCLC 181719733.

Trotsky, Leon (1932). The History of the Russian Revolution. Vol. III. Translated by Max Eastman. London: Gollancz. OCLC 605191028.

Wade, Rex A. "The Revolution at One Hundred: Issues and Trends in the English Language Historiography of the Russian Revolution of 1917." Journal of Modern Russian History and Historiography 9.1 (2016): 9-38. doi:10.1163/22102388-00900003

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The October Revolution, officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution under the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Coup, the Bolshevik Revolution, the October Uprising, the October Coup or Red October, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was instrumental in the larger Russian Revolution of 1917-1923.

# data[].attributes.body
Civil War Broke Out

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Russian Civil War

Part of the Russian Revolution, the aftermath of World War I, and the interwar period

Clockwise from top left:

Date

7 November 1917 - 16 June 1923[l][2]
(5 years, 7 months, 1 week and 2 days)

Location

Result

Bolshevik victory:

Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland gained independence

Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Moldavia and many other nations of the former Russian Empire are either annexed by the Bolsheviks or by other nations

Bolshevik puppet states in Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland defeated

Territorial
changes

Main belligerents

Commanders and leaders

Vladimir Lenin
Leon Trotsky
Yakov Sverdlov †
Jukums Vācietis
Sergey Kamenev
Nikolai Podvoisky
Nikolai Krylenko
Joseph Stalin
Yukhym Medvedev
Vilhelm Knorin
Alexander Krasnoshchyokov

Alexander Kerensky Alexander Kolchak

Lavr Kornilov †
Anton Denikin
Pyotr Wrangel
Nikolai Yudenich
Grigory Semyonov
Yevgeny Miller
Mikhail Diterikhs
Pyotr Krasnov
Roman von Ungern-Sternberg

Józef Piłsudski C.G.E. Mannerheim

Symon Petliura S. Bułak-Bałachowicz

Konstantin Päts
Antanas Smetona Jānis Čakste

Ion Inculeț
Noe Zhordania
A. Khatisian
Nasib Yusifbeyli
Enver Pasha †

Vladimir Volsky
Maria Spiridonova
Nykyfor Hryhoriv †
Nestor Makhno
Stepan Petrichenko
...and others

Otani Kikuzo
Edmund Ironside
William S. Graves
Radola Gajda
Maurice Janin
Ludomir Junosza-Stępowski †
and others
H. von Eichhorn †
Nuri Pasha
Jan Sierada
Pavlo Skoropadskyi
P. Bermondt-Avalov
... and others

Strength

Ottoman Army:
20,000 (peak)

Casualties and losses

548,857 wounded/frostbitten[o]

6,500 killed

938+ killed[9]

57,000 killed

113,000 wounded

50,000 POWs

3,500 killed

1,650 executed/dead

~3,000 killed

1,444 killed

7,000,000-12,000,000 total casualties, including
civilians and non-combatants

1-2 million refugees outside Russia

The Russian Civil War (7 November 1917 - 16 June 1923) was a multi-party civil war in the former Russian Empire sparked by the overthrowing of the social-democratic Russian Provisional Government in the October Revolution, as many factions vied to determine Russia's political future. It resulted in the formation of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and later the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in most of its territory. Its finale marked the end of the Russian Revolution, which was one of the key events of the 20th century.

The Russian monarchy ended with the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II during the February Revolution, and Russia was in a state of political flux. A tense summer culminated in the Bolshevik-led October Revolution, overthrowing the Provisional Government of the new Russian Republic. Bolshevik seizure of power was not universally accepted, and the country descended into civil war. The two largest combatants were the Red Army, fighting for the establishment of a Bolshevik-led socialist state headed by Vladimir Lenin, and the loosely allied forces known as the White Army, which functioned as a political big tent for right- and left-wing opposition to Bolshevik rule. In addition, rival militant socialists, notably the Ukrainian anarchists of the Makhnovshchina and Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, were involved in conflict against the Bolsheviks. They, as well as non-ideological green armies, opposed the Bolsheviks, the Whites and the foreign interventionists. Thirteen foreign nations intervened against the Red Army, notably the Allied intervention, whose primary goal was re-establishing the Eastern Front of World War I. Three foreign nations of the Central Powers also intervened, rivaling the Allied intervention with the main goal of retaining the territory they had received in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Soviet Russia.

The Bolsheviks initially consolidated control over most of the former empire. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was an emergency peace with the German Empire, who had captured vast swathes of the Russian territory during the chaos of the revolution. In May 1918, the Czechoslovak Legion in Russia revolted in Siberia. In reaction, the Allies began their North Russian and Siberian interventions. That, combined with the creation of the Provisional All-Russian Government, saw the reduction of Bolshevik-controlled territory to most of European Russia and parts of Central Asia. In 1919, the White Army launched several offensives from the east in March, the south in July, and west in October. The advances were later checked by the Eastern Front counteroffensive, the Southern Front counteroffensive, and the defeat of the Northwestern Army.

By 1919, the White armies were in retreat and by the start of 1920 were defeated on all three fronts. Although the Bolsheviks were victorious, the territorial extent of the Russian state had been reduced, for many non-Russian ethnic groups had used the disarray to push for national independence. In March 1921, during a related war against Poland, the Peace of Riga was signed, splitting disputed territories in Belarus and Ukraine between the Republic of Poland and Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia sought to re-conquer all newly independent nations of the former Empire, although their success was limited. Estonia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania all repelled Soviet invasions, while Ukraine, Belarus (as a result of the Polish-Soviet War), Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia were occupied by the Red Army. By 1921, Soviet Russia had defeated the Ukrainian national movements and occupied the Caucasus, although anti-Bolshevik uprisings in Central Asia lasted until the late 1920s.

The armies under Kolchak were eventually forced on a mass retreat eastward. Bolshevik forces advanced east, despite encountering resistance in Chita, Yakut and Mongolia. Soon the Red Army split the Don and Volunteer armies, forcing evacuations in Novorossiysk in March and Crimea in November 1920. After that, anti-Bolshevik resistance was sporadic for several years until the collapse of the White Army in Yakutia in June 1923, but continued on with the Muslim Basmachi movement in Central Asia and Khabarovsk Krai until 1934. There were an estimated 7 to 12 million casualties during the war, mostly civilians.

The Russian Empire fought in World War I from 1914 alongside France and the United Kingdom ( Triple Entente) against Germany, Austria-Hungary and later the Ottoman Empire ( Central Powers).

The February Revolution of 1917 resulted in the abdication of Emperor Nicholas II of Russia. As a result, the social-democratic Russian Provisional Government was established, and soviets, elected councils of workers, soldiers, and peasants, were organized throughout the country, leading to a situation of dual power. Russia was proclaimed a republic in September of the same year.

The Provisional Government, led by Socialist Revolutionary Party politician Alexander Kerensky, was unable to solve the most pressing issues of the country, most importantly to end the war with the Central Powers. A failed military coup by General Lavr Kornilov in September 1917 led to a surge in support for the Bolshevik party, who bolshevized the soviets, which until then had been controlled by the Socialist Revolutionaries. Promising an end to the war and "all power to the Soviets", the Bolsheviks then ended dual power by overthrowing the Provisional Government in late October, on the eve of the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets, in what would be the second Revolution of 1917. Despite the Bolsheviks' seizure of power, they lost to the Socialist Revolutionary Party in the 1917 Russian Constituent Assembly election, and the Constituent Assembly was dissolved by the Bolsheviks in retaliation. The Bolsheviks soon lost the support of other far-left allies, such as the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, after their acceptance of the terms of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk presented by the German Empire.

From mid-1917 onwards, the Russian Army, the successor-organisation of the old Imperial Russian Army, started to disintegrate; the Bolsheviks used the volunteer-based Red Guards as their main military force, augmented by an armed military component of the Cheka (the Bolshevik state secret police). In January 1918, after significant Bolshevik reverses in combat, the future Russian People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs Leon Trotsky headed the reorganization of the Red Guards into a Workers' and Peasants' Red Army in order to create a more effective fighting force. The Bolsheviks appointed political commissars to each unit of the Red Army to maintain morale and to ensure loyalty.

In June 1918, when it had become apparent that a revolutionary army composed solely of workers would not suffice, Trotsky instituted mandatory conscription of the rural peasantry into the Red Army. The Bolsheviks overcame opposition of rural Russians to Red Army conscription units by taking hostages and shooting them when necessary in order to force compliance. The forced conscription drive had mixed results, successfully creating a larger army than the Whites, but with members indifferent towards communist ideology.

The Red Army also utilized former Tsarist officers as "military specialists" ( voenspetsy); sometimes their families were taken hostage in order to ensure their loyalty. At the start of the civil war, former Tsarist officers formed three-quarters of the Red Army officer-corps. By its end, 83% of all Red Army divisional and corps commanders were ex-Tsarist soldiers.

The White movement (Russian: pre-1918 Бѣлое движеніе / post-1918 Белое движение , Beloye dvizheniye, IPA: [ˈbʲɛləɪdvʲɪˈʐenʲɪɪ]) also known as the Whites (Бѣлые / Белые, Beliye), was a loose confederation of anti-communist forces that fought the communist Bolsheviks, also known as the Reds, in the Russian Civil War and that to a lesser extent continued operating as militarized associations of rebels both outside and within Russian borders in Siberia until roughly World War II (1939-1945). The movement's military arm was the White Army (Бѣлая армія / Белая армия, Belaya armiya), also known as the White Guard (Бѣлая гвардія / Белая гвардия, Belaya gvardiya) or White Guardsmen (Бѣлогвардейцы / Белогвардейцы, Belogvardeytsi).

During the Russian Civil War, the White movement functioned as a big-tent political movement representing an array of political opinions in Russia united in their opposition to the Bolsheviks-from the republican-minded liberals and Kerenskyite social-democrats on the left through monarchists and supporters of a united multinational Russia to the ultra-nationalist Black Hundreds on the right.

Dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, early Constituent Assembly rebellions

The Constituent Assembly had been a demand of the Bolsheviks against the Provisional Government, which kept delaying it. After the October Revolution the elections were run by the body appointed by the previous Provisional Government. It was based on universal suffrage, but used party lists from before the Left-Right SR split. The anti-Bolshevik Right SRs won the elections with the majority of the seats, after which Lenin's Theses on the Constituent Assembly argued in that formal democracy was impossible because of class conflicts, conflicts with Ukraine and the Kadet-Kaledin uprising. He argued the Constituent Assembly must unconditionally accept sovereignty of the soviet government or it would be dealt with "by revolutionary means".

On December 30, 1917, the SR Nikolai Avksentiev and some followers were arrested for organizing a conspiracy. This was the first time Bolsheviks used this kind of repression against a socialist party. said the arrest was not related to his membership in the Constituent Assembly.

On January 4, 1918, the VTsIK made a resolution saying the slogan "all power to the constituent assembly" was counterrevolutionary and equivalent to "down with the soviets".

The Constituent Assembly met on January 18, 1918. The Right SR Chernov was elected president defeating the Bolshevik supported candidate, the Left SR Maria Spiridonova (she would later break with the Bolsheviks and after the decades of gulag, she was shot on Stalin's orders in 1941). The Bolsheviks subsequently disbanded the Constituent Assembly and proceeded to rule the country as a one-party state with all opposition parties outlawed. A simultaneous demonstration in favor of the Constituent Assembly was dispersed with force, but there was little protest afterwards.

The Union of Regeneration was founded in Moscow in April 1918 as an underground agency organizing democratic resistance to the Bolshevik dictatorship, composed of the Popular Socialists, Right Socialist Revolutionaries, and Defensists, among others. They were tasked with propping up anti-Bolshevik forces and to create a Russian state system based on civil liberties, patriotism, and state-consciousness with the goal to liberate the country from the "Germano-Bolshevik" yoke.

On May 7, 1918, the Eighth Party Council of the Party of Socialist Revolutionaries commenced in Moscow and recognized the Union's leading role, putting aside political ideology and class for the purpose of Russia's salvation. They decided to start an uprising against the Bolsheviks with the goal of reconvening the Russian Constituent Assembly. While preparations were under way, the Czechoslovak Legions overthrew Bolshevik rule in Siberia, the Urals and the Volga region in late May-early June 1918 and the center of SR activity shifted there. On June 8, 1918, five Constituent Assembly members formed the All-Russian Committee of Members of the Constituent Assembly ( Komuch) in Samara and declared it the new supreme authority in the country. The Social Revolutionary Provisional Government of Autonomous Siberia came to power on June 29, 1918, after the uprising in Vladivostok.

According to historian Marcel Liebman, Lenin's wartime measures such as banning opposition parties was prompted by the fact that several political parties either took up arms against the new Soviet government, or participated in sabotage, collaboration with the deposed Tsarists, or made assassination attempts against Lenin and other Bolshevik leaders. Liebman noted that opposition parties such as the Cadets and Mensheviks who were democratically elected to the Soviets in some areas, then proceeded to use their mandate to welcome in Tsarist and foreign capitalist military forces. In one incident in Baku, the British military, once invited in, proceeded to execute members of the Bolshevik Party who had peacefully stood down from the Soviet when they failed to win the elections. As a result, the Bolsheviks banned each opposition party when it turned against the Soviet government. In some cases, bans were lifted. This banning of parties did not have the same repressive character as later bans enforced under the Stalinist regime.

From early 1918, the Bolsheviks started physical elimination of opposition, other socialist and revolutionary fractions. Anarchists were among the first:

Of all the revolutionary elements in Russia it is the Anarchists who now suffer the most ruthless and systematic persecution. Their suppression by the Bolsheviki began already in 1918, when - in the month of April of that year - the Communist Government attacked, without provocation or warning, the Anarchist Club of Moscow and by the use of machine guns and artillery "liquidated" the whole organisation. It was the beginning of Anarchist hounding, but it was sporadic in character, breaking out now and then, quite planless, and frequently self-contradictory.

Comrades! The kulak uprising in your five districts must be crushed without pity ... You must make example of these people.

(1) Hang (I mean hang publicly, so that people see it) at least 100 kulaks, rich bastards, and known bloodsuckers.

(2) Publish their names.

(3) Seize all their grain.

(4) Single out the hostages per my instructions in yesterday's telegram.

Do all this so that for miles (versts) around people see it all, understand it, tremble, and tell themselves that we are killing the bloodthirsty kulaks and that we will continue to do so ...

Yours, Lenin.

P.S. Find tougher people.

In a mid-August 1920 letter, having received information that in Estonia and Latvia, with which Soviet Russia had concluded peace treaties, volunteers were being enrolled in anti-Bolshevik detachments, Lenin wrote to E. M. Sklyansky, deputy chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic:

Great plan! Finish it with Dzerzhinsky. While pretending to be the "greens" (we will blame them later), we will advance by 10-20 miles (versts) and hang kulaks, priests, landowners. Prize: 100.000 rubles for each hanged man.

Vladimir Pchelin's depiction of the assassination attempt on Lenin

On August 30, Socialist Revolutionary Fanny Kaplan unsuccessfully attempted to assassinate Vladimir Lenin. and sought to eliminate political dissent, opposition, and any other threat to Bolshevik power. More broadly, the term is usually applied to Bolshevik political repression throughout the Civil War (1917-1922),

During interrogation by the Cheka, she made the following statement:

"My name is Fanya Kaplan. Today I shot Lenin. I did it on my own. I will not say from whom I obtained my revolver. I will give no details. I had resolved to kill Lenin long ago. I consider him a traitor to the Revolution. I was exiled to Akatui for participating in an assassination attempt against a Tsarist official in Kiev [now Kyiv]. I spent 11 years at hard labour. After the Revolution, I was freed. I favoured the Constituent Assembly and am still for it".

Kaplan referenced the Bolsheviks' growing authoritarianism, citing their forcible shutdown of the Constituent Assembly in January 1918, the elections to which they had lost. When it became clear that Kaplan would not implicate any accomplices, she was executed in Alexander Garden. The order was carried out by the commander of the Kremlin, the former Baltic sailor P. D. Malkov and a group of Latvian Bolsheviks[page needed ][non-primary source needed ] on September 3, 1918, with a bullet to the back of the head. Her corpse was bundled into a barrel and set alight. The order came from Yakov Sverdlov, who only six weeks earlier had ordered the murder of the Tsar and his family.

These events persuaded the government to heed Dzerzhinsky's lobbying for greater terror against opposition. The campaign of mass repressions would officially begin thereafter. The Red Terror is considered to have officially begun between 17 and 30 August 1918.

Protests against grain requisitioning of the peasantry were a major component of the Tambov rebellion and similar uprisings; Lenin's New Economic Policy was introduced as a concession.

The policies of "food dictatorship" proclaimed by the Bolsheviks in May 1918 sparked violent resistance in numerous districts of European Russia: revolts and clashes between the peasants and the Red Army were reported in Voronezh, Tambov, Penza, Saratov and in the districts of Kostroma, Moscow, Novgorod, Petrograd, Pskov and Smolensk. The revolts were bloodily crushed by the Bolsheviks: in the Voronezh Oblast, the Red Guards killed sixteen peasants during the pacification of the village, while another village was shelled with artillery in order to force the peasants to surrender and in the Novgorod Oblast the rebelling peasants were dispersed with machine-gun fire from a train sent by a detachment of Latvian Red Army soldiers. While the Bolsheviks immediately denounced the rebellion as orchestrated by the SRs, there is actually no evidence that they were involved into peasant violence, which they deemed as counterproductive.

The Western Allies armed and supported opponents of the Bolsheviks. They were worried about a possible Russo-German alliance, the prospect of the Bolsheviks making good on their threats to default on Imperial Russia's massive foreign loans and the possibility that Communist revolutionary ideas would spread (a concern shared by many Central Powers). Hence, many of the countries expressed their support for the Whites, including the provision of troops and supplies. Winston Churchill declared that Bolshevism must be "strangled in its cradle". The British and French had supported Russia during World War I on a massive scale with war materials.

After the treaty, it looked like much of that material would fall into the hands of the Germans. To meet that danger, the Allies intervened with Great Britain and France sending troops into Russian ports. There were violent clashes with the Bolsheviks. Britain intervened in support of the White forces to defeat the Bolsheviks and prevent the spread of communism across Europe.

Polish anti-Soviet poster depicting Lev Trotsky. Small caption in the lower right corner reads:
The Bolsheviks promised:
We'll give you peace
We'll give you freedom
We'll give you land
Work and bread
Despicably they cheated
They started a war
With Poland
Instead of freedom they brought
The fist
Instead of land - confiscation
Instead of work - misery
Instead of bread - famine.

The German Empire created several short-lived satellite buffer states within its sphere of influence after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk: the United Baltic Duchy, Duchy of Courland and Semigallia, Kingdom of Lithuania, Kingdom of Poland, the Belarusian People's Republic, and the Ukrainian State. Following Germany's Armistice in World War I in November 1918, the states were abolished.

Finland was the first republic that declared its independence from Russia in December 1917 and established itself in the ensuing Finnish Civil War between pro-independence White Guards and pro-Russian Bolshevik Red Guards from January-May 1918. The Second Polish Republic, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia formed their own armies immediately after the abolition of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty and the start of the Soviet westward offensive and subsequent Polish-Soviet War in November 1918.

In the European part of Russia the war was fought across three main fronts: the eastern, the southern and the northwestern. It can also be roughly split into the following periods.

The first period lasted from the Revolution until the Armistice. Already on the date of the Revolution, Cossack General Alexey Kaledin refused to recognize it and assumed full governmental authority in the Don region, where the Volunteer Army began amassing support. The signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk also resulted in direct Allied intervention in Russia and the arming of military forces opposed to the Bolshevik government. There were also many German commanders who offered support against the Bolsheviks, fearing a confrontation with them was impending as well.

During the first period, the Bolsheviks took control of Central Asia out of the hands of the Provisional Government and White Army, setting up a base for the Communist Party in the Steppe and Turkestan, where nearly two million Russian settlers were located.

Most of the fighting in the first period was sporadic, involved only small groups and had a fluid and rapidly-shifting strategic situation. Among the antagonists were the Czechoslovak Legion, the Poles of the 4th and 5th Rifle Divisions and the pro-Bolshevik Red Latvian riflemen.

The second period of the war lasted from January to November 1919. At first the White armies' advances from the south (under Denikin), the east (under Kolchak) and the northwest (under Yudenich) were successful, forcing the Red Army and its allies back on all three fronts. In July 1919 the Red Army suffered another reverse after a mass defection of units in the Crimea to the anarchist Insurgent Army under Nestor Makhno, enabling anarchist forces to consolidate power in Ukraine. Leon Trotsky soon reformed the Red Army, concluding the first of two military alliances with the anarchists. In June the Red Army first checked Kolchak's advance. After a series of engagements, assisted by an Insurgent Army offensive against White supply lines, the Red Army defeated Denikin's and Yudenich's armies in October and November.

The third period of the war was the extended siege of the last White forces in the Crimea. General Wrangel had gathered the remnants of Denikin's armies, occupying much of the Crimea. An attempted invasion of southern Ukraine was rebuffed by the Insurgent Army under Makhno's command. Pursued into Crimea by Makhno's troops, Wrangel went over to the defensive in the Crimea. After an abortive move north against the Red Army, Wrangel's troops were forced south by Red Army and Insurgent Army forces; Wrangel and the remains of his army were evacuated to Constantinople in November 1920.

European theatre of the Russian Civil War

In the October Revolution, the Bolshevik Party directed the Red Guard (armed groups of workers and Imperial army deserters) to seize control of Petrograd (Saint Petersburg) and immediately began the armed takeover of cities and villages throughout the former Russian Empire. In January 1918 the Bolsheviks dissolved the Russian Constituent Assembly and proclaimed the Soviets (workers' councils) as the new government of Russia.

The first attempt to regain power from the Bolsheviks was made by the Kerensky-Krasnov uprising in October 1917. It was supported by the Junker Mutiny in Petrograd but was quickly put down by the Red Guard, notably including the Latvian Rifle Division.

The initial groups that fought against the Communists were local Cossack armies that had declared their loyalty to the Provisional Government. Kaledin of the Don Cossacks and General Grigory Semenov of the Siberian Cossacks were prominent among them. The leading Tsarist officers of the Imperial Russian Army also started to resist. In November, General Mikhail Alekseev, the Tsar's Chief of Staff during the First World War, began to organize the Volunteer Army in Novocherkassk. Volunteers of the small army were mostly officers of the old Russian army, military cadets and students. In December 1917, Alekseev was joined by General Lavr Kornilov, Denikin and other Tsarist officers who had escaped from the jail, where they had been imprisoned following the abortive Kornilov affair just before the Revolution. On 9 December, the Military Revolutionary Committee in Rostov rebelled, with the Bolsheviks controlling the city for five days until the Alekseev Organization supported Kaledin in recapturing the city. According to Peter Kenez, "The operation, begun on December 9, can be regarded as the beginning of the Civil War."

Having stated in the November 1917 " Declaration of Rights of Nations of Russia" that any nation under imperial Russian rule should be immediately given the power of self-determination, the Bolsheviks had begun to usurp the power of the Provisional Government in the territories of Central Asia soon after the establishment of the Turkestan Committee in Tashkent. In April 1917 the Provisional Government set up the committee, which was mostly made up of former Tsarist officials. The Bolsheviks attempted to take control of the Committee in Tashkent on 12 September 1917 but it was unsuccessful, and many leaders were arrested. However, because the Committee lacked representation of the native population and poor Russian settlers, they had to release the Bolshevik prisoners almost immediately because of a public outcry, and a successful takeover of that government body took place two months later in November. The Leagues of Mohammedam Working People (which Russian settlers and natives who had been sent to work behind the lines for the Tsarist government in 1916 formed in March 1917) had led numerous strikes in the industrial centers throughout September 1917. However, after the Bolshevik destruction of the Provisional Government in Tashkent, Muslim elites formed an autonomous government in Turkestan, commonly called the "Kokand autonomy" (or simply Kokand). The White Russians supported that government body, which lasted several months because of Bolshevik troop isolation from Moscow. In January 1918 the Soviet forces, under Lt. Col. Muravyov, invaded Ukraine and invested Kiev, where the Central Council of the Ukrainian People's Republic held power. With the help of the Kiev Arsenal Uprising, the Bolsheviks captured the city on 26 January.

The Bolsheviks decided to immediately make peace with the Central Powers, as they had promised the Russian people before the Revolution. Vladimir Lenin's political enemies attributed that decision to his sponsorship by the Foreign Office of Wilhelm II, German Emperor, offered to Lenin in hope that, with a revolution, Russia would withdraw from World War I. That suspicion was bolstered by the German Foreign Ministry's sponsorship of Lenin's return to Petrograd. However, after the military fiasco of the summer offensive (June 1917) by the Russian Provisional Government had devastated the structure of the Russian Army, it became crucial that Lenin realize the promised peace. Even before the failed summer offensive the Russian population was very skeptical about the continuation of the war. Western socialists had promptly arrived from France and from the UK to convince the Russians to continue the fight, but could not change the new pacifist mood of Russia.

On 16 December 1917 an armistice was signed between Russia and the Central Powers in Brest-Litovsk and peace talks began. As a condition for peace, the proposed treaty by the Central Powers conceded huge portions of the former Russian Empire to the German Empire and the Ottoman Empire, greatly upsetting nationalists and conservatives. Leon Trotsky, representing the Bolsheviks, refused at first to sign the treaty while continuing to observe a unilateral cease-fire, following the policy of "No war, no peace".

Therefore, on 18 February 1918, the Germans began Operation Faustschlag on the Eastern Front, encountering virtually no resistance in a campaign that lasted 11 days. Signing a formal peace treaty was the only option in the eyes of the Bolsheviks because the Russian Army was demobilized, and the newly formed Red Guard could not stop the advance. They also understood that the impending counterrevolutionary resistance was more dangerous than the concessions of the treaty, which Lenin viewed as temporary in the light of aspirations for a world revolution. The Soviets acceded to a peace treaty, and the formal agreement, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, was ratified on 3 March. The Soviets viewed the treaty as merely a necessary and expedient means to end the war.

February 1918 article from The New York Times showing a map of the Russian Imperial territories claimed by the Ukrainian People's Republic at the time, before the annexation of the Austro-Hungarian lands of the West Ukrainian People's Republic

In Ukraine the German- Austrian Operation Faustschlag had by April 1918 removed the Bolsheviks from Ukraine. The German and Austro-Hungarian victories in Ukraine were caused by the apathy of the locals and the inferior fighting skills of Bolsheviks troops to their Austro-Hungarian and German counterparts.

Under Soviet pressure, the Volunteer Army embarked on the epic Ice March from Yekaterinodar to Kuban on 22 February 1918, where they joined with the Kuban Cossacks to mount an abortive assault on Yekaterinodar. The Soviets recaptured Rostov on the next day. Kornilov was killed in the fighting on 13 April, and Denikin took over command. Fighting off its pursuers without respite, the army succeeded in breaking its way through back towards the Don by May, where the Cossack uprising against the Bolsheviks had started.

The Baku Soviet Commune was established on 13 April. Germany landed its Caucasus Expedition troops in Poti on 8 June. The Ottoman Army of Islam (in coalition with Azerbaijan) drove them out of Baku on 26 July 1918. Subsequently, the Dashanaks, Right SRs and Mensheviks started negotiations with Gen. Dunsterville, the commander of the British troops in Persia. The Bolsheviks and their Left SR allies were opposed to it, but on 25 July the majority of the Soviets voted to call in the British and the Bolsheviks resigned. The Baku Soviet Commune ended its existence and was replaced by the Central Caspian Dictatorship.

The revolt of the Czechoslovak Legion broke out in May 1918, and proceeded to occupy the Trans-Siberian Railway from Ufa to Vladivostok. Uprisings overthrew other Bolshevik towns. On 7 July, the western portion of the legion declared itself to be a new eastern front, anticipating allied intervention. According to William Henry Chamberlin, "Two governments emerged as a result of the first successes of the Czechs: the West Siberian Commissariat and the Government of the Committee of Members of the Constituent Assembly in Samara." On 17 July, shortly before the fall of Yekaterinburg, the former Tsar Nicholas II, and his family were murdered.

The Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries supported peasants fighting against Soviet control of food supplies. In May 1918, with the support of the Czechoslovak Legion, they took Samara and Saratov, establishing the Committee of Members of the Constituent Assembly-known as the "Komuch". By July the authority of the Komuch extended over much of the area controlled by the Czechoslovak Legion. The Komuch pursued an ambivalent social policy, combining democratic and socialist measures, such as the institution of an eight-hour working day, with "restorative" actions, such as returning both factories and land to their former owners. After the fall of Kazan, Vladimir Lenin called for the dispatch of Petrograd workers to the Kazan Front: "We must send down the maximum number of Petrograd workers: (1) a few dozen 'leaders' like Kayurov; (2) a few thousand militants 'from the ranks'".

After a series of reverses at the front, the Bolsheviks' War Commissar, Trotsky, instituted increasingly harsh measures in order to prevent unauthorised withdrawals, desertions, and mutinies in the Red Army. In the field, the Cheka Special Investigations Forces (termed the Special Punitive Department of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combat of Counter-Revolution and Sabotage or Special Punitive Brigades) followed the Red Army, conducting field tribunals and summary executions of soldiers and officers who deserted, retreated from their positions, or failed to display sufficient offensive zeal. The Cheka Special Investigations Forces were also charged with the detection of sabotage and counter-revolutionary activity by Red Army soldiers and commanders. Trotsky extended the use of the death penalty to the occasional political commissar whose detachment retreated or broke in the face of the enemy. In August, frustrated at continued reports of Red Army troops breaking under fire, Trotsky authorised the formation of barrier troops - stationed behind unreliable Red Army units and given orders to shoot anyone withdrawing from the battle line without authorisation.

In September 1918, the Komuch, the Siberian Provisional Government, and other anti-Bolshevik Russians agreed during the State Meeting in Ufa to form a new Provisional All-Russian Government in Omsk, headed by a Directory of five: two Socialist-Revolutionaries. Nikolai Avksentiev and Vladimir Zenzinov, the Kadet lawyer V. A. Vinogradov, Siberian Premier Vologodskii, and General Vasily Boldyrev.

By the fall of 1918, anti-Bolshevik White forces in the east included the People's Army ( Komuch), the Siberian Army (of the Siberian Provisional Government) and insurgent Cossack units of Orenburg, the Urals, Siberia, Semirechye, Baikal, and Amur and Ussuri Cossacks, nominally under the orders of Gen. V.G. Boldyrev, Commander-in-Chief, appointed by the Ufa Directorate.

On the Volga, Col. Kappel's White detachment captured Kazan on 7 August, but Red Forces recaptured the city on 8 September 1918 following a counteroffensive. On the 11th Simbirsk fell, and on 8 October Samara. The Whites fell back eastwards to Ufa and Orenburg.

In Omsk, the Russian Provisional Government quickly came under the influence and later the dominance of its new War Minister, Rear-Admiral Kolchak. On 18 November a coup d'état established Kolchak as supreme leader. Two members of the Directory were arrested, and subsequently deported, while Kolchak was proclaimed "Supreme Ruler", and "Commander-in-Chief of all Land and Naval Forces of Russia." By mid-December 1918, the White armies had to leave Ufa, but they balanced that failure with a successful drive towards Perm, which they took on 24 December.

In the Red Army of the Russian SFSR and later the Soviet Union, the concept of barrier troops first arose in August 1918 with the formation of the заградительные отряды ( zagraditelnye otriady), translated as "blocking troops" or "anti-retreat detachments" ( Russian: заградотряды, заградительные отряды, отряды заграждения). The barrier troops comprised personnel drawn from the Cheka secret police punitive detachments or from regular Red Army infantry regiments.

The first use of the barrier troops by the Red Army occurred in the late summer and fall of 1918 in the Eastern front during the Russian Civil War, when People's Commissar of Military and Naval Affairs (War Commissar) Leon Trotsky of the Communist Bolshevik government authorized Mikhail Tukhachevsky, the commander of the 1st Army, to station blocking detachments behind unreliable Red Army infantry regiments in the 1st Red Army, with orders to shoot if front-line troops either deserted or retreated without permission.

In December 1918, Trotsky ordered that detachments of additional barrier troops be raised for attachment to each infantry formation in the Red Army. On December 18 he cabled:

How do things stand with the blocking units? As far as I am aware they have not been included in our establishment and it appears they have no personnel. It is absolutely essential that we have at least an embryonic network of blocking units and that we work out a procedure for bringing them up to strength and deploying them.

The barrier troops were also used to enforce Bolshevik control over food supplies in areas controlled by the Red Army as part of Lenin's war communism policies, a role which soon earned them the hatred of the Russian civilian population. These policies led to the Russian famine of 1921-1922, which killed about five million people.

London Geographical Institute's 1919 map of Europe after the treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Batum and before the treaties of Tartu, Kars, and Riga

In February 1918 the Red Army overthrew the White Russian-supported Kokand Autonomy of Turkestan. Although that move seemed to solidify Bolshevik power in Central Asia, more troubles soon arose for the Red Army as the Allied Forces began to intervene. British support of the White Army provided the greatest threat to the Red Army in Central Asia during 1918. Britain sent three prominent military leaders to the area. One was Lieutenant Colonel Frederick Marshman Baile, who recorded a mission to Tashkent, from where the Bolsheviks forced him to flee. Another was General Wilfrid Malleson, leading the Malleson Mission, who assisted the Mensheviks in Ashkhabad (now the capital of Turkmenistan) with a small Anglo-Indian force. However, he failed to gain control of Tashkent, Bukhara and Khiva. The third was Major General Dunsterville, who was driven out by the Bolsheviks of Central Asia only a month after his arrival in August 1918. Despite setbacks as a result of British invasions during 1918, the Bolsheviks continued to make progress in bringing the Central Asian population under their influence. The first regional congress of the Russian Communist Party convened in the city of Tashkent in June 1918 in order to build support for a local Bolshevik Party.

On 6 July 1918, two Left Socialist-Revolutionaries and Cheka employees, Yakov Blumkin and Nikolai Andreyev, assassinated the German ambassador, Count Mirbach. In Moscow a Left SR uprising was put down by the Bolsheviks, mass arrests of Socialist-Revolutionaries followed, and executions became more frequent. Chamberlin noted, "The time of relative leniency toward former fellow-revolutionists was over. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries, of course, were no longer tolerated as members of the Soviets; from this time the Soviet regime became a pure and undiluted dictatorship of the Communist Party." Similarly, Boris Savinkov's surprise attacks were suppressed, with many of the conspirators being executed, as "Mass Red Terror" became a reality.

Estonia cleared its territory of the Red Army by January 1919. Baltic German volunteers captured Riga from the Red Latvian Riflemen on 22 May, but the Estonian 3rd Division defeated the Baltic Germans a month later, aiding the establishment of the Republic of Latvia.

That rendered possible another threat to the Red Army, from General Yudenich, who had spent the summer organizing the Northwestern Army in Estonia with local and British support. In October 1919, he tried to capture Petrograd in a sudden assault with a force of around 20,000 men. The attack was well-executed, using night attacks and lightning cavalry maneuvers to turn the flanks of the defending Red Army. Yudenich also had six British tanks, which caused panic whenever they appeared. The Allies gave large quantities of aid to Yudenich, but he complained of receiving insufficient support.

By 19 October, Yudenich's troops had reached the outskirts of the city. Some members of the Bolshevik central committee in Moscow were willing to give up Petrograd, but Trotsky refused to accept the loss of the city and personally organized its defenses. Trotsky himself declared, "It is impossible for a little army of 15,000 ex-officers to master a working-class capital of 700,000 inhabitants." He settled on a strategy of urban defense, proclaiming that the city would "defend itself on its own ground" and that the White Army would be lost in a labyrinth of fortified streets and there "meet its grave".

Trotsky armed all available workers, men and women, and ordered the transfer of military forces from Moscow. Within a few weeks, the Red Army defending Petrograd had tripled in size and outnumbered Yudenich three to one. Yudenich, short of supplies, then decided to call off the siege of the city and withdrew. He repeatedly asked permission to withdraw his army across the border to Estonia. However, units retreating across the border were disarmed and interned by orders of the Estonian government, which had entered into peace negotiations with the Soviet Government on 16 September and had been informed by the Soviet authorities of their 6 November decision that if the White Army was allowed to retreat into Estonia, it would be pursued across the border by the Reds. In fact, the Reds attacked Estonian army positions and fighting continued until a ceasefire went into effect on 3 January 1920. After the Treaty of Tartu, most of Yudenich's soldiers went into exile. Former Imperial Russian and then Finnish General Mannerheim planned an intervention to help the Whites in Russia capture Petrograd. However, he did not gain the necessary support for the endeavour. Lenin considered it "completely certain, that the slightest aid from Finland would have determined the fate of [the city]".

At the beginning of March 1919, the general offensive of the Whites on the eastern front began. Ufa was retaken on 13 March; by mid-April, the White Army stopped at the Glazov- Chistopol- Bugulma- Buguruslan-Sharlyk line. Reds started their counteroffensive against Kolchak's forces at the end of April. The Red 5th Army, led by the capable commander Tukhachevsky, captured Elabuga on 26 May, Sarapul on 2 June and Izevsk on the 7th and continued to push forward. Both sides had victories and losses, but by the middle of summer the Red Army was larger than the White Army and had managed to recapture territory previously lost.

Following the abortive offensive at Chelyabinsk, the White armies withdrew beyond the Tobol. In September 1919 a White offensive was launched against the Tobol Front, the last attempt to change the course of events. However, on 14 October the Reds counterattacked, and thus began the uninterrupted retreat of the Whites to the east. On 14 November 1919 the Red Army captured Omsk. Adm. Kolchak lost control of his government shortly after the defeat; White Army forces in Siberia had essentially ceased to exist by December. Retreat of the eastern front by White armies lasted three months, until mid-February 1920, when the survivors, after crossing Lake Baikal, reached the Chita area and joined Ataman Semenov's forces.

Anti-Bolshevik propaganda poster "For united Russia" representing Soviet Russia as a fallen communist dragon and the White Cause as a crusading knight

Denikin's military strength continued to grow in 1919, with significant munitions supplied by the British. In January, Denikin's Armed Forces of South Russia (AFSR) completed the elimination of Red forces in the northern Caucasus and moved north, in an effort to protect the Don district.

On 18 December 1918, French forces landed in Odessa (now Odesa) and then the Crimea, but evacuated Odessa on 6 April 1919, and the Crimea by the end of the month. According to Chamberlin, "But France gave far less practical aid to the Whites than did England; its sole independent venture in intervention, at Odessa, ended in a complete fiasco."

Denikin then reorganized the Armed Forces of South Russia under the leadership of Vladimir May-Mayevsky, Vladimir Sidorin, and Pyotr Wrangel. On 22 May, Wrangel's Caucasian army defeated the 10th Army (RSFSR) in the battle for Velikoknyazheskaya, and then captured Tsaritsyn on 1 July. Sidorin advanced north toward Voronezh, increasing his army's strength in the process. On 25 June, May-Mayevsky captured Kharkov, and then Ekaterinoslav on 30 June, which forced the Reds to abandon Crimea. On 3 July, Denikin issued his Moscow directive, in which his armies would converge on Moscow.

Although Britain had withdrawn its own troops from the theatre, it continued to give significant military aid (money, weapons, food, ammunition and some military advisers) to the White Armies during 1919. Major Ewen Cameron Bruce of the British Army had volunteered to command a British tank mission assisting the White Army. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for his bravery during the June 1919 Battle of Tsaritsyn for single-handedly storming and capturing the fortified city of Tsaritsyn, under heavy shell fire in a single tank, which led to the capture of over 40,000 prisoners. The fall of Tsaritsyn is viewed "as one of the key battles of the Russian Civil War" and greatly helped the White Russian cause. The notable historian Sir Basil Henry Liddell Hart comments that Bruce's tank action during the battle is to be seen as "one of the most remarkable feats in the whole history of the Tank Corps".

Denikin's forces constituted a real threat and for a time threatened to reach Moscow. The Red Army, stretched thin by fighting on all fronts, was forced out of Kiev on 30 August. Kursk and Orel were taken, on 20 September and 14 October, respectively. The latter, only 205 miles (330 km) from Moscow, was the closest the AFSR would come to its target. The Cossack Don Army under the command of General Vladimir Sidorin continued north towards Voronezh, but Semyon Budyonny's cavalrymen defeated them there on 24 October. That allowed the Red Army to cross the Don River, threatening to split the Don and Volunteer Armies. Fierce fighting took place at the key rail junction of Kastornoye, which was taken on 15 November. Kursk was retaken two days later.

Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge, a famous Bolshevik Constructivist propaganda poster by artist El Lissitsky uses abstract symbolism to depict the defeat of the Whites by the Red Army.

Kenez states, "In October Denikin ruled more than forty million people and controlled the economically most valuable parts of the Russian Empire." Yet, "The White armies, which had fought victoriously during the summer and early fall, fell back in disorder in November and December." Denikin's front line was overstretched, while his reserves dealt with Makhno's anarchists in the rear. Between September and October, the Reds mobilized one hundred thousand new soldiers and adopted the Trotsky- Vatsetis strategy with the Ninth and Tenth armies forming V. I. Shorin's Southeastern Front between Tsaritsyn and Bobrov, while the Eighth, Twelfth, Thirteenth, and Fourteenth armies formed A.I. Egorov's Southern Front between Zhitomir and Bobrov. Sergey Kamenev was in overall command of the two fronts. On Denikin's left was Abram Dragomirov, while in his center was Vladimir May-Mayevsky's Volunteer Army, Vladimir Sidorin's Don Cossacks were further east, with Pyotr Wrangel's Caucasian army at Tsaritsyn, and an additional was in the Northern Caucasus attempting to capture Astrakhan. On 20 October, May-Mayevsky was forced to evacuate Orel during the Orel-Kursk operation. On 24 October, Semyon Budyonny captured Voronezh, and Kursk on 15 November, during the Voronezh-Kastornoye operation (1919). On 6 January, the Reds reached the Black Sea at Mariupol and Taganrog, and On 9 January, they reached Rostov. According to Kenez, "The Whites had now lost all the territories which they had captured in 1919, and held approximately the same area in which they had started two years before."

By February 1919 the British government had pulled its military forces out of Central Asia. Despite the success for the Red Army, the White Army's assaults in European Russia and other areas broke communication between Moscow and Tashkent. For a time Central Asia was completely cut off from Red Army forces in Siberia. Although the communication failure weakened the Red Army, the Bolsheviks continued their efforts to gain support for the Bolshevik Party in Central Asia by holding a second regional conference in March. During the conference, a regional bureau of Muslim organisations of the Russian Bolshevik Party was formed. The Bolshevik Party continued to try to gain support among the native population by giving it the impression of better representation for the Central Asian population and throughout the end of the year could maintain harmony with the Central Asian people.

Communication difficulties with Red Army forces in Siberia and European Russia ceased to be a problem by mid-November 1919. Red Army successes north of Central Asia caused communication with Moscow to be re-established and the Bolsheviks to claim victory over the White Army in Turkestan.

In the Ural-Guryev operation of 1919-1920, the Red Turkestan Front defeated the Ural Army. During winter 1920, Ural Cossacks and their families, totaling about 15,000 people, headed south along the eastern coast of the Caspian Sea towards Fort Alexandrovsk. Only a few hundred of them reached Persia in June 1920. The Orenburg Independent Army was formed from Orenburg Cossacks and others troops who rebelled against the Bolsheviks. During the winter 1919-20, the Orenburg Army retreated to Semirechye in what is known as the Starving March, as half of the participants perished. In March 1920 her remnants crossed the border into the Northwestern region of China.

Tambov Rebellion was one of the largest and best-organised peasant rebellions challenging the Bolshevik regime.

After the defeat of Wrangel, the Red Army immediately repudiated its 1920 treaty of alliance with Nestor Makhno and attacked the anarchist Insurgent Army; the campaign to liquidate Makhno and the Ukrainian anarchists began with an attempted assassination of Makhno by Cheka agents. Anger at continued repression by the Bolshevik Communist government and at its liberal use of the Cheka to put down anarchist elements led to a naval mutiny at Kronstadt in March 1921, followed by peasant revolts, all of which were put down by the Bolsheviks. The outset of the year was marked by strikes and demonstrations - in both Moscow and Petrograd, as well as the countryside - due to discontent with the results of policies that made up war communism. The Bolsheviks, in response to the protests, enacted martial law and sent the Red Army to disperse the workers. This was followed up by mass arrests executed by the Cheka. Repression and minor concessions only temporarily quelled the discontent as Petrograd protests continued that year in March. This time the factory workers were joined by sailors stationed on the nearby island-fort of Kronstadt. Disappointed in the direction of the Bolshevik government, the rebels demanded a series of reforms including: reduction in Bolshevik privileges, newly elected soviet councils to include socialist and anarchist groups, economic freedom for peasants and workers, dissolution of the bureaucratic governmental organs created during the civil war, and the restoration of worker rights for the working class. The workers and sailors of the Kronstadt rebellion were promptly crushed by Red Army forces, with a thousand rebels killed in battle and another thousand executed the following weeks, with many more fleeing abroad and to the countryside. These events coincided with the 10th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks). There, Lenin argued that the soviets and the principle of democratic centralism within the Bolshevik party still assured democracy. However, faced with support for Kronstadt within Bolshevik ranks, Lenin also issued a "temporary" ban on factions in the Russian Communist Party. This ban remained until the revolutions of 1989 and, according to some critics, made the democratic procedures within the party an empty formality, and helped Stalin to consolidate much more authority under the party. Soviets were transformed into the bureaucratic structure that existed for the rest of the history of the Soviet Union and were completely under the control of party officials and the politburo. Red Army attacks on the anarchist forces and their sympathisers increased in ferocity throughout 1921.

In Siberia, Admiral Kolchak's army had disintegrated. He himself gave up command after the loss of Omsk and designated Gen. Grigory Semyonov as the new leader of the White Army in Siberia. Not long afterward, Kolchak was arrested by the disaffected Czechoslovak Legion as he traveled towards Irkutsk without the protection of the army and was turned over to the socialist Political Centre in Irkutsk. Six days later, the regime was replaced by a Bolshevik-dominated Military-Revolutionary Committee. On 6-7 February Kolchak and his prime minister Victor Pepelyaev were shot and their bodies were thrown through the ice of the frozen Angara River, just before the arrival of the White Army in the area.

Remnants of Kolchak's army reached Transbaikalia and joined Semyonov's troops, forming the Far Eastern army. With the support of the Japanese army it was able to hold Chita, but after the withdrawal of Japanese soldiers from Transbaikalia, Semenov's position became untenable, and in November 1920 he was driven by the Red Army from Transbaikalia and took refuge in China. The Japanese, who had plans to annex the Amur Krai, finally pulled their troops out as Bolshevik forces gradually asserted control over the Russian Far East. On 25 October 1922 Vladivostok fell to the Red Army, and the Provisional Priamur Government was extinguished.

In Central Asia, Red Army troops continued to face resistance into 1923, where (armed bands of Islamic guerrillas) had formed to fight the Bolshevik takeover. The Soviets engaged non-Russian peoples in Central Asia, like Magaza Masanchi, commander of the Dungan Cavalry Regiment, to fight against the Basmachis. The Communist Party did not completely dismantle the group until 1934.

General Anatoly Pepelyayev continued armed resistance in the Ayano-Maysky District until June 1923. The regions of Kamchatka and Northern Sakhalin remained under Japanese occupation until their treaty with the Soviet Union in 1925, when their forces were finally withdrawn.

Street children during the Russian Civil War

The results of the civil war were momentous. Soviet demographer Boris Urlanis estimated that 300,000 men were killed in action during the Civil War and Polish-Soviet War (125,000 in the Red Army, 175,500 White armies and Poles) and the total number of military personnel from both sides dead from disease as 450,000. Boris Sennikov estimated the total losses among the population of Tambov region in 1920 to 1922 resulting from the war, executions, and imprisonment in concentration camps as approximately 240,000.

As many as 10 million lives were lost as a result of the Russian Civil War, and the overwhelming majority of these were civilian casualties. There is no consensus among the Western historians on the number of deaths from the Red Terror. One source gives estimates of 28,000 executions per year from December 1917 to February 1922. Estimates for the number of people shot during the initial period of the Red Terror are at least 10,000. Estimates for the whole period go for a low of 50,000 to highs of 140,000 and 200,000 executed. Most estimations for the number of executions in total put the number at about 100,000. According to Vadim Erlikhman's investigation, the number of the Red Terror's victims is at least 1,200,000 people. According to Robert Conquest, a total of 140,000 people were shot in 1917-1922, but Jonathan D. Smele estimates they were considerably fewer, "perhaps less than half that many". Candidate of Historical Sciences Nikolay Zayats states that the number of people shot by the Cheka in 1918-1922 is about 37,300 people, shot in 1918-1921 by the verdicts of the tribunals - 14,200, i.e. about 50,000-55,000 people in total, although executions and atrocities were not limited to the Cheka, having been organized by the Red Army as well. In 1924, an anti-Bolshevik Popular Socialist Sergei Melgunov (1879-1956) published a detailed account on the Red Terror in Russia, where he cited Professor Charles Saroléa's estimates of 1,766,188 deaths from the Bolshevik policies. He questioned the accuracy of the figures, but endorsed Saroléa's "chracterisation of terror in Russia", stating it matches reality. Modern historian Sergei Volkov, assessing the Red Terror as the entire repressive policy of the Bolsheviks during the years of the Civil War (1917-1922), estimates the direct death toll of the Red Terror at 2 million people. Volkov's calculations, however, do not appear to have been confirmed by other major scholars.

Some 10,000-500,000 Cossacks were killed or deported during Decossackization, out of a population of around three million. An estimated 100,000 Jews were killed in Ukraine. Punitive organs of the All Great Don Cossack Host sentenced 25,000 people to death between May 1918 and January 1919. Kolchak's government shot 25,000 people in Ekaterinburg province alone. The White Terror, as it would become known, killed about 300,000 people in total.

At the end of the Civil War the Russian SFSR was exhausted and near ruin. The droughts of 1920 and 1921, as well as the 1921 famine, worsened the disaster still further, killing roughly 5 million people. Disease had reached pandemic proportions, with 3,000,000 dying of typhus throughout the war. Millions more also died of widespread starvation, wholesale massacres by both sides and pogroms against Jews in Ukraine and southern Russia. By 1922, there were at least 7,000,000 street children in Russia as a result of nearly ten years of devastation from World War I and the civil war.

Another one to two million people, known as the White émigrés, fled Russia, many with General Wrangel, some through the Far East and others west into the newly independent Baltic countries. The émigrés included a large percentage of the educated and skilled population of Russia.

The civil war had a devastating impact on the Russian economy. A black market emerged in Russia, despite the threat of martial law against profiteering. The ruble collapsed, with barter increasingly replacing money as a medium of exchange and, by 1921, heavy industry output had fallen to 20% of 1913 levels. 90% of wages were paid with goods rather than money. 70% of locomotives were in need of repair[citation needed ], and food requisitioning, combined with the effects of seven years of war and a severe drought, contributed to a famine that caused between 3 and 10 million deaths. Coal production decreased from 27.5 million tons (1913) to 7 million tons (1920), while overall factory production also declined from 10,000 million roubles to 1,000 million roubles. According to the noted historian David Christian, the grain harvest was also slashed from 80.1 million tons (1913) to 46.5 million tons (1920).

War communism saved the Soviet government during the Civil War, but much of the Russian economy had ground to a standstill. Some peasants responded to food requisitions by refusing to till the land. By 1921, cultivated land had shrunk to 62% of the pre-war area, and the harvest yield was only about 37% of normal. The number of horses declined from 35 million in 1916 to 24 million in 1920 and cattle from 58 to 37 million. The exchange rate with the US dollar declined from two roubles in 1914 to 1,200 Rbls in 1920.

With the end of the war, the Communist Party no longer faced an acute military threat to its existence and power. However, the perceived threat of continued popular discontent, combined with the failure of socialist revolutions in other countries-most notably the German Revolution-contributed to the continued militarisation of Soviet society. Although Russia experienced extremely rapid economic growth in the 1930s, the combined effect of World War I and the Civil War left a lasting scar on Russian society and had permanent effects on the development of the Soviet Union.

Allworth, Edward (1967). Central Asia: A Century of Russian Rule. New York: Columbia University Press. OCLC 396652.

Avrich, Paul (2004). Kronstadt, 1921 (in Spanish). Buenos Aires: Libros de Anarres. ISBN 9872087539.

Andrew, Christopher; Mitrokhin, Vasili (1999). The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB. New York: Basic Books. p. 28. ISBN 978-0465003129. kgb cheka executions probably numbered as many as 250,000.

Bullock, David (2008). The Russian Civil War 1918-22. Oxford: Osprey Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84603-271-4. Archived from the original on 28 July 2020.

Calder, Kenneth J. (1976). Britain and the Origins of the New Europe 1914-1918. International Studies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521208970.

Chamberlin, William (1935). The Russian Revolution, 1917-1921, Volume Two. New York: The Macmillan Company.

Chamberlin, William Henry (1987). The Russian Revolution, Volume II: 1918-1921: From the Civil War to the Consolidation of Power. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-1400858705. Archived from the original on 27 December 2017 - via Project MUSE.

Coates, W. P.; Coates, Zelda K. (1951). Soviets in Central Asia. New York: Philosophical Library. OCLC 1533874.

Daniels, Robert V. (December 1951). "The Kronstadt Revolt of 1921: A Study in the Dynamics of Revolution". American Slavic and East European Review. 10 (4): 241-254. doi:10.2307/2492031. ISSN 1049-7544. JSTOR 2492031.

Eidintas, Alfonsas; Žalys, Vytautas; Senn, Alfred Erich (1999), Lithuania in European Politics: The Years of the First Republic, 1918-1940 (Paperback ed.), New York: St. Martin's Press, ISBN 0-312-22458-3

Gellately, Robert (2007). Lenin, Stalin, and Hitler: The Age of Social Catastrophe. New York: Knopf. ISBN 978-1-4000-4005-6.

Grebenkin, I.N. (2017). "The Disintegration of the Russian Army in 1917: Factors and Actors in the Process". Russian Studies in History. 56 (3): 172-187. doi:10.1080/10611983.2017.1392213. S2CID 158643095.

Kenez, Peter (1977). Civil War in South Russia, 1919-1920: The Defeat of the Whites. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520033467.

Krivosheev, G. F. (1997). Soviet Casualties and Combat Losses in the Twentieth Century. London: Greenhill Books. ISBN 978-1-85367-280-4.

Rakowska-Harmstone, Teresa (1970). Russia and Nationalism in Central Asia: The Case of Tadzhikistan. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press. ISBN 978-0801810213.

Rosenthal, Reigo (2006). Loodearmee [Northwestern Army] (in Estonian). Tallinn: Argo. ISBN 9949-415-45-4.

Ryan, James (2012). Lenin's Terror: The Ideological Origins of Early Soviet State Violence. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-138-81568-1. Archived from the original on 11 November 2020.

Smith, David A.; Tucker, Spencer C. (2014). "Faustschlag, Operation". World War I: The Definitive Encyclopedia and Document Collection. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO. pp. 554-555. ISBN 978-1851099658. Archived from the original on 15 February 2017.

Wheeler, Geoffrey (1964). The Modern History of Soviet Central Asia. New York: Frederick A. Praeger. OCLC 865924756.

Acton, Edward, V. et al. eds. Critical companion to the Russian Revolution, 1914-1921 (Indiana UP, 1997).

Brovkin, Vladimir N. (1994). Behind the Front Lines of the Civil War: Political Parties and Social Movements in Russia, 1918-1922. Princeton UP. excerpt Archived 28 July 2020 at the Wayback Machine

Dupuy, T. N. The Encyclopedia of Military History (many editions) Harper & Row Publishers.

Ford, Chris. "Reconsidering the Ukrainian Revolution 1917-1921: The Dialectics of National Liberation and Social Emancipation." Debatte 15.3 (2007): 279-306.

Peter Kenez. Civil War in South Russia, 1918: The First Year of the Volunteer Army (U of California Press, 1971).

Lincoln, W. Bruce. Red victory: A history of the Russian Civil War (1989).

Luckett, Richard. The White Generals: An Account of the White Movement and the Russian Civil War (Routledge, 2017).

Marples, David R. Lenin's Revolution: Russia, 1917-1921 (Routledge, 2014).

Moffat, Ian, ed. The Allied Intervention in Russia, 1918-1920: The Diplomacy of Chaos (2015)

Polyakov, Yuri. The Civil War in Russia: Its Causes and Significance (Novosti, 1981).

Serge, Victor. Year One of the Russian Revolution (Haymarket, 2015).

Smele, Jonathan D. "Still Searching for the 'Third Way': Geoffrey Swain's Interventions in the Russian Civil Wars". Europe-Asia Studies 68.10 (2016): 1793-1812. doi:10.1080/09668136.2016.1257094.

Smele, Jonathan D. "'If Grandma had Whiskers...': Could the Anti-Bolsheviks have won the Russian Revolutions and Civil Wars? Or, the Constraints and Conceits of Counterfactual History." Revolutionary Russia (2020): 1-32. doi:10.1080/09546545.2019.1675961.

Stewart, George. The White Armies of Russia: A Chronicle of Counter-Revolution and Allied Intervention (2008) excerpt Archived 27 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine

Stone, David R. "The Russian Civil War, 1917-1921," in The Military History of the Soviet Union.

Swain, Geoffrey (2015). The Origins of the Russian Civil War excerpt Archived 28 July 2020 at the Wayback Machine

Butt, V. P., et al., eds. The Russian Civil War: Documents from the Soviet Archives (Springer, 2016).

McCauley, Martin, ed. The Russian Revolution and the Soviet State 1917-1921: Documents (Springer, 1980).

Murphy, A. Brian, ed. The Russian Civil War: Primary Sources (Springer, 2000) online review Archived 27 June 2020 at the Wayback Machine

Newsreels about Russian Civil War // Net-Film Newsreels and Documentary Films Archive

Sumpf, Alexandre: Russian Civil War, in: 1914-1918 online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Mawdsley, Evan: International Responses to the Russian Civil War (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918 online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Read, Christopher: Revolutions (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918 online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Peeling, Siobhan: War Communism, in: 1914-1918 online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Beyrau, Dietrich: Post-war Societies (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918 online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Brudek, Pawe³: Revolutions (East Central Europe), in: 1914-1918 online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Melancon, Michael S.: Social Conflict and Control, Protest and Repression (Russian Empire), in: 1914-1918 online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.

Russian Revolution and Civil War archive at libcom.org/library Archived 7 September 2014 at the Wayback Machine

"BBC History of the Russian Revolution" (3 February 2007)

"Russian Civil War" (Spartacus History, downloaded 3 January 2006)

"Russian Civil War 1918-1920" (On War website, downloaded 4 January 2006)

"Civil War of 1917-1922 at Encyclopedia of Russian History (3 February 2007)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Russian Civil War Part of the Russian Revolution, the aftermath of World War I, and the interwar period Clockwise from top left: Date 7 November 1917 - 16 June 1923 [l] [2] (5 years, 7 months, 1 week and 2 days) Location Result Bolshevik victory: Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and

# data[].attributes.body
The Communist International or Third International was formed

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Communist International published a namesake theoretical magazine in a variety of European languages from 1919 to 1943.

The Communist International ( Comintern), also known as the Third International, was an international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism, and which was led and controlled by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The Comintern resolved at its Second Congress in 1920 to "struggle by all available means, including armed force, for the overthrow of the international bourgeoisie and the creation of an international Soviet republic as a transition stage to the complete abolition of the state". The Comintern was preceded by the dissolution of the Second International in 1916.

The Comintern held seven World Congresses in Moscow between 1919 and 1935. During that period, it also conducted thirteen Enlarged Plenums of its governing Executive Committee, which had much the same function as the somewhat larger and more grandiose Congresses. Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, dissolved the Comintern in 1943 to avoid antagonizing his allies in the later years of World War II, the United States and the United Kingdom. It was succeeded by the Cominform in 1947.

Differences between the revolutionary and reformist wings of the workers' movement had been increasing for decades, but the outbreak of World War I was the catalyst for their separation. The Triple Alliance comprised two empires, while the Triple Entente was formed by three. Socialists had historically been anti-war and internationalist, fighting against what they perceived as militarist exploitation of the proletariat for bourgeois states. A majority of socialists voted in favor of resolutions for the Second International to call upon the international working class to resist war if it were declared.

But after the beginning of World War I, many European socialist parties announced support for the war effort of their respective nations. Exceptions were the British Labour Party[citation needed ] and the socialist parties of the Balkans[which? ]. To Vladimir Lenin's surprise, even the Social Democratic Party of Germany voted in favor of war. After influential anti-war French Socialist Jean Jaurès was assassinated on 31 July 1914, the socialist parties hardened their support in France for their government of national unity.

Socialist parties in neutral countries mostly supported neutrality, rather than totally opposing the war. On the other hand, during the 1915 Zimmerwald Conference, Lenin, then a Swiss resident refugee, organized an opposition to the " imperialist war" as the Zimmerwald Left, publishing the pamphlet Socialism and War where he called socialists collaborating with their national governments social chauvinists, i.e. socialists in word, but nationalists in deed.

The Second International divided into a revolutionary left-wing, a moderate center-wing, and a more reformist right-wing. Lenin condemned much of the center as "social pacifists" for several reasons, including their vote for war credits despite publicly opposing the war. Lenin's term "social pacifist" aimed in particular at Ramsay MacDonald, leader of the Independent Labour Party in Britain, who opposed the war on grounds of pacifism but did not actively fight against it.

Discredited by its apathy towards world events, the Second International dissolved in 1916. In 1917, after the February Revolution overthrew the Romanov Dynasty, Lenin published the April Theses which openly supported revolutionary defeatism, where the Bolsheviks hoped that Russia would lose the war so that they could quickly cause a socialist insurrection.

The Bolshevik by Boris Kustodiev, 1920

The victory of the Russian Communist Party in the Bolshevik Revolution of November 1917 was felt throughout the world and an alternative path to power to parliamentary politics was demonstrated. With much of Europe on the verge of economic and political collapse in the aftermath of the carnage of World War I, revolutionary sentiments were widespread. The Russian Bolsheviks headed by Lenin believed that unless socialist revolution swept Europe, they would be crushed by the military might of world capitalism just as the Paris Commune had been crushed by force of arms in 1871. The Bolsheviks believed that this required a new international to foment revolution in Europe and around the world.

During this early period (1919-1924), known as the First Period in Comintern history, with the Bolshevik Revolution under attack in the Russian Civil War and a wave of revolutions across Europe, the Comintern's priority was exporting the October Revolution. Some communist parties had secret military wings. One example is the M-Apparat of the Communist Party of Germany.

The Comintern was involved in the revolutions across Europe in this period, starting with the Hungarian Soviet Republic in 1919. Several hundred agitators and financial aid were sent from the Soviet Union and Lenin was in regular contact with its leader Béla Kun. The next attempt was the March Action in Germany in 1921, including an attempt to dynamite the express train from Halle to Leipzig. After this failed, the Communist Party of Germany expelled its former chairman Paul Levi from the party for publicly criticising the March Action in a pamphlet, which was ratified by the Executive Committee of the Communist International prior to the Third Congress. A new attempt was made at the time of the Ruhr crisis in spring and then again in selected parts of Germany in the autumn of 1923. The Red Army was mobilized, ready to come to the aid of the planned insurrection. Resolute action by the German government cancelled the plans, except due to miscommunication in Hamburg, where 200-300 communists attacked police stations, but were quickly defeated. In 1924, there was a failed coup in Estonia by the Communist Party of Estonia.

The Comintern was founded at a Congress held in Moscow on 2-6 March 1919. It opened with a tribute to Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, recently murdered by the Freikorps during the Spartacist Uprising, against the backdrop of the Russian Civil War. There were 52 delegates present from 34 parties. They decided to form an Executive Committee with representatives of the most important sections and that other parties joining the International would have their own representatives. The Congress decided that the Executive Committee would elect a five-member bureau to run the daily affairs of the International. However, such a bureau was not formed and Lenin, Leon Trotsky and Christian Rakovsky later delegated the task of managing the International to Grigory Zinoviev as the Chairman of the Executive. Zinoviev was assisted by Angelica Balabanoff, acting as the secretary of the International, Victor L. Kibaltchitch and Vladmir Ossipovich Mazin. Lenin, Trotsky and Alexandra Kollontai presented material. The main topic of discussion was the difference between bourgeois democracy and the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The following parties and movements were invited to the Founding Congress:

Of these, the following attended (see list of delegates of the 1st Comintern congress): the communist parties of Russia, Germany, German Austria, Hungary, Poland, Finland, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, Byelorussia, Estonia, Armenia, the Volga German region; the Swedish Social Democratic Left Party (the opposition), Balkan Revolutionary People's of Russia; Zimmerwald Left Wing of France; the Czech, Bulgarian, Yugoslav, British, French and Swiss Communist Groups; the Dutch Social-Democratic Group; Socialist Propaganda League and the Socialist Labor Party of America; Socialist Workers' Party of China; Korean Workers' Union, Turkestan, Turkish, Georgian, Azerbaijanian and Persian Sections of the Central Bureau of the Eastern People's and the Zimmerwald Commission.

Zinoviev served as the first Chairman of the Comintern's Executive Committee from 1919 to 1926, but its dominant figure until his death in January 1924 was Lenin, whose strategy for revolution had been laid out in What Is to Be Done? (1902). The central policy of the Comintern under Lenin's leadership was that communist parties should be established across the world to aid the international proletarian revolution. The parties also shared his principle of democratic centralism (freedom of discussion, unity of action), namely that parties would make decisions democratically, but uphold in a disciplined fashion whatever decision was made. In this period, the Comintern was promoted as the general staff of the world revolution.

Second Congress of the Communist International

Painting by Boris Kustodiev representing the festival of the Comintern II Congress on the Uritsky Square (former Palace square) in Petrograd

Ahead of the Second Congress of the Communist International, held in July through August 1920, Lenin sent out a number of documents, including his Twenty-one Conditions to all socialist parties. Congress adopted the 21 conditions as prerequisites for any group wanting to become affiliated with the International. The 21 Conditions called for the demarcation between communist parties and other socialist groups and instructed the Comintern sections not to trust the legality of the bourgeois states. They also called for the build-up of party organisations along democratic centralist lines in which the party press and parliamentary factions would be under the direct control of the party leadership.

Regarding the political situation in the colonized world, the Second Congress of the Communist International stipulated that a united front should be formed between the proletariat, peasantry, and national bourgeoisie in the colonial countries. Amongst the twenty-one conditions drafted by Lenin ahead of the congress was the 11th thesis which stipulated that all communist parties must support the bourgeois-democratic liberation movements in the colonies. Notably, some of the delegates opposed the idea of an alliance with the bourgeoisie and preferred giving support to communist movements in these countries instead. Their criticism was shared by the Indian revolutionary M. N. Roy, who attended as a delegate of the Mexican Communist Party. The Congress removed the term bourgeois-democratic in what became the 8th condition.

Many European socialist parties were divided because of the adhesion issue. The French Section of the Workers International (SFIO) thus broke away with the 1920 Tours Congress, leading to the creation of the new French Communist Party (initially called French Section of the Communist International - SFIC). The Communist Party of Spain was created in 1920, the Communist Party of Italy was created in 1921, the Belgian Communist Party in September 1921, and so on.

The Third Congress of the Communist International was held between 22 June-12 July 1921 in Moscow.

The Fourth Congress, held in November 1922, at which Trotsky played a prominent role, continued in this vein.

In 1924, the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party joined the Comintern. At first, in China both the Chinese Communist Party and the Kuomintang were supported. After the definite break with Chiang Kai-shek in 1927, Joseph Stalin sent personal emissaries to help organize revolts which at this time failed.

The Fourth World Congress was coincidentally held within days of the March on Rome by Benito Mussolini and his PNF in Italy. Karl Radek lamented the proceedings in Italy as the "largest defeat suffered by socialism and communism since the beginning of the period of world revolution", and Zinoviev programmatically announced the similarities between fascism and social democracy, laying the groundwork for the later social fascism theory.

Fifth to Seventh World Congresses: 1925-1935

Second Period

The Comintern membership card of Karl Kilbom

Lenin died in 1924 and the next year saw a shift in the organization's focus from the immediate activity of world revolution towards a defence of the Soviet state. In that year, Joseph Stalin took power in Moscow and upheld the thesis of socialism in one country, detailed by Nikolai Bukharin in his brochure Can We Build Socialism in One Country in the Absence of the Victory of the West-European Proletariat? (April 1925). The position was finalized as the state policy after Stalin's January 1926 article On the Issues of Leninism. Stalin made the party line clear: "An internationalist is one who is ready to defend the USSR without reservation, without wavering, unconditionally; for the USSR it is the base of the world revolutionary movement, and this revolutionary movement cannot be defended and promoted without defending the USSR".

The dream of a world revolution was abandoned after the failures of the Spartacist uprising in Germany and of the Hungarian Soviet Republic and the failure of all revolutionary movements in Europe such as in Italy, where the fascist squadristi broke the strikes during the Biennio Rosso and quickly assumed power following the 1922 March on Rome. This period up to 1928 was known as the Second Period, mirroring the shift in the Soviet Union from war communism to the New Economic Policy.

At the Fifth World Congress of the Comintern in July 1924, Zinoviev condemned both Marxist philosopher Georg Lukács's History and Class Consciousness, published in 1923 after his involvement in Béla Kun's Hungarian Soviet Republic, and Karl Korsch's Marxism and Philosophy. Zinoviev himself was dismissed in 1926 after falling out of favor with Stalin. Bukharin then led the Comintern for two years until 1928, when he too fell out with Stalin. Bulgarian communist leader Georgi Dimitrov headed the Comintern in 1934 and presided until its dissolution.

Geoff Eley summed up the change in attitude at this time as follows:

By the Fifth Comintern Congress in July 1924 [...] the collapse of Communist support in Europe tightened the pressure for conformity. A new policy of "Bolshevization" was adopted, which dragooned the CPs toward stricter bureaucratic centralism. This flattened out the earlier diversity of radicalisms, welding them into a single approved model of Communist organization. Only then did the new parties retreat from broader Left arenas into their own belligerent world, even if many local cultures of broader cooperation persisted. Respect for Bolshevik achievements and defense of the Russian Revolution now transmuted into dependency on Moscow and belief in Soviet infallibility. Depressing cycles of "internal rectification" began, disgracing and expelling successive leaderships, so that by the later 1920s many founding Communists had gone. This process of coordination, in a hard-faced drive for uniformity, was finalized at the next Congress of the Third International in 1928.

The Comintern was a relatively small organization, but it devised novel ways of controlling communist parties around the world. In many places, there was a communist subculture, founded upon indigenous left-wing traditions which had never been controlled by Moscow. The Comintern attempted to establish control over party leaderships by sending agents who bolstered certain factions, by judicious use of secret funding, by expelling independent-minded activists and even by closing down entire national parties (such as the Communist Party of Poland in 1938). Above all, the Comintern exploited Soviet prestige in sharp contrast to the weaknesses of local parties that rarely had political power.

Communist front organizations

Communist front organizations were set up to attract non-members who agreed with the party on certain specific points. Opposition to fascism was a common theme in the popular front era of the mid 1930s. The well-known names and prestige of artists, intellectuals and other fellow travelers were used to advance party positions. They often came to the Soviet Union for propaganda tours praising the future. Under the leadership of Zinoviev, the Comintern established fronts in many countries in the 1920s and after. To coordinate their activities, the Comintern set up international umbrella organizations linking groups across national borders, such as the Young Communist International (youth), Profintern (trade unions), Krestintern (peasants), International Red Aid (humanitarian aid), Sportintern (organized sports), and more. Front organizations were especially influential in France, which in 1933 became the base for communist front organizer Willi Münzenberg. These organizations were dissolved in the late 1930s or early 1940s.

Third Period

In 1928, the Ninth Plenum of the Executive Committee began the so-called Third Period, which was to last until 1935. The Comintern proclaimed that the capitalist system was entering the period of final collapse and therefore all communist parties were to adopt an aggressive and militant ultra-left line. In particular, the Comintern labelled all moderate left-wing parties social fascists and urged the communists to destroy the moderate left. With the rise of the Nazi Party in Germany after the 1930 federal election, this stance became controversial.

The Sixth World Congress also revised the policy of united front in the colonial world. In 1927 in China, the Kuomintang had turned on the Chinese Communist Party, which led to a review of the policy on forming alliances with the national bourgeoisie in the colonial countries. The Congress did make a differentiation between the character of the Chinese Kuomintang on one hand and the Indian Swaraj Party and the Egyptian Wafd Party on the other, considering the latter as an unreliable ally yet not a direct enemy. The Congress called on the Indian Communists to utilize the contradictions between the national bourgeoisie and the British imperialists.

Nguyễn Thị Minh Khai's Delegates' Card at the 1935 Comintern's 7th Congress as she was a delegate representing the Indochinese Communist Party

The Seventh and last Congress of the Comintern was held between 25 July and 20 August 1935. It was attended by representatives of 65 communist parties. The main report was delivered by Dimitrov, other reports were delivered by Palmiro Togliatti, Wilhelm Pieck, and Dmitry Manuilsky. The Congress officially endorsed the popular front against fascism. This policy argued that communist parties should seek to form a popular front with all parties that opposed fascism and not limit themselves to forming a united front with those parties based in the working class. There was no significant opposition to this policy within any of the national sections of the Comintern. In France and Spain, it would have momentous consequences with Léon Blum's 1936 election which led to the Popular Front government.

Stalin's purges of the 1930s affected Comintern activists living in both the Soviet Union and overseas. At Stalin's direction, the Comintern was thoroughly infused with Soviet secret police and foreign intelligence operatives and informers working under Comintern guise. One of its leaders, Mikhail Trilisser, using the pseudonym Mikhail Aleksandrovich Moskvin, was in fact chief of the foreign department of the Soviet OGPU (later the NKVD). Numerous Comintern officials were also targeted by the dictator and became victims of show trials and political persecution, such as Grigory Zinoviev and Nikolai Bukharin. At Stalin's orders, 133 out of 492 Comintern staff members became victims of the Great Purge. Several hundred German communists and antifascists who had either fled from Nazi Germany or were convinced to relocate in the Soviet Union were liquidated, and more than a thousand were handed over to Germany. Wolfgang Leonhard, who experienced this period in Moscow as a contemporary witness, wrote about it in his political autobiography, which was published in the 1950s: "The foreign communists living in the Soviet Union were particularly affected. In a few months, more functionaries of the Comintern apparatus were arrested than had been put together by all bourgeois governments in twenty years. Just listing the names would fill entire pages." Fritz Platten died in a labor camp and the leaders of the Indian ( Virendranath Chattopadhyaya or Chatto), Korean, Mexican, Iranian, and Turkish communist parties were executed. Out of 11 Mongolian Communist Party leaders, only Khorloogiin Choibalsan survived. Leopold Trepper recalled these days: "In house, where the party activists of all the countries were living, no-one slept until 3 o'clock in the morning. [...] Exactly 3 o'clock the car lights began to be seen [...] we stayed near the window and waited [to find out], where the car stopped".

Among those persecuted were many KPD functionaries, such as members of the KPD Central Committee, who believed they had found safe asylum in the Soviet Union after Adolf Hitler's rise to power. Among them was Hugo Eberlein, who had been present at the 1919 Comintern founding congress.

Trotsky, who was also marginalized and persecuted by Stalin, and other communists founded the Fourth International in 1938 as an oppositional alternative to the Stalin-dominated Comintern. In the years that followed, however, their sections rarely got beyond the status of the smallest cadre or splinter parties.

Although the General Association of German Anti-Communist Associations had existed in Berlin since 1933 as part of the Nazi government's propaganda against the Soviet Union and the Comintern, a treaty of assistance was concluded between Germany and Japan in 1936, the Anti-Comintern Pact. In it, the two states agreed to fight the Comintern and assured each other that they would not sign any treaties with the Soviet Union that would contradict the anti-communist spirit of the agreement. However, this did not prevent Hitler from signing the Nazi-Soviet Pact with Stalin in August 1939, which in turn meant the end of the Popular Front policy and, in fact, that of the Comintern as well.

The German-Soviet non-aggression treaty contained far-reaching agreements on spheres of interest, which the two totalitarian powers implemented over the next two years using military means. On 3 September 1939, France and the United Kingdom declared war on Germany after its invasion of Poland, beginning World War II in Europe. The Comintern sections now found themselves in the politically suicidal situation of having to support, for example, the Soviet invasion and subsequent annexation of Eastern Poland. The Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov declared on October 31 that it was not Hitler's Germany but rather Britain and France that were to be regarded as the aggressors[citation needed ]. The weakened and decimated Comintern was forced to officially adopt a policy of non-intervention, declaring on November 6 that the conflict was an imperialist war between various national ruling classes on both sides, much like World War I had been, and that the main culprits were Britain and France.

This period, during which the Comintern enabled Hitlerite fascism[citation needed ], only ended on 22 June 1941 with the invasion of the Soviet Union, when the Comintern changed its position to one of active support for the Allies. During these two years, many communists turned their backs on their Comintern sections, and the organization lost its political credibility and relevance. On 15 May 1943, a declaration of the Executive Committee was sent out to all sections of the International, calling for the dissolution of the Comintern. The declaration read:

The historical role of the Communist International, organized in 1919 as a result of the political collapse of the overwhelming majority of the old pre-war workers' parties, consisted in that it preserved the teachings of Marxism from vulgarisation and distortion by opportunist elements of the labor movement. But long before the war it became increasingly clear that, to the extent that the internal as well as the international situation of individual countries became more complicated, the solution of the problems of the labor movement of each individual country through the medium of some international centre would meet with insuperable obstacles.

Concretely, the declaration asked the member sections to approve:

To dissolve the Communist International as a guiding centre of the international labor movement, releasing sections of the Communist International from the obligations ensuing from the constitution and decisions of the Congresses of the Communist International.

After endorsements of the declaration were received from the member sections, the International was dissolved. The dissolution was interpreted as Stalin wishing to calm his World War II allies (particularly Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill) and to keep them from suspecting the Soviet Union of pursuing a policy of trying to foment revolution in other countries.

The Research Institutes 100 and 205 worked for the International and later were moved to the International Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, founded at roughly the same time that the Comintern was abolished in 1943, although its specific duties during the first several years of its existence are unknown.

Following the June 1947 Paris Conference on Marshall Aid, Stalin gathered a grouping of key European communist parties in September and set up the Cominform, or Communist Information Bureau, often seen as a substitute to the Comintern. It was a network made up of the communist parties of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, France, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Romania, the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia (led by Josip Broz Tito and expelled in June 1948). The Cominform was dissolved in 1956 following Stalin's 1953 death and the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

While the communist parties of the world no longer had a formal international organization, they continued to maintain close relations with each other through a series of international forums. In the period directly after the Comintern's dissolution, periodical meetings of communist parties were held in Moscow. Moreover, World Marxist Review, a joint periodical of the communist parties, played an important role in coordinating the communist movement up to the break-up of the Eastern Bloc in 1989-1991.

British historian Jonathan Haslam reports that even after in Moscow archives:

all references to the Communist International and later the international department of the central committee, which drove the revolutionary side of foreign policy, were removed from published diplomatic documents, in order to fit in with the prevailing dogma established by Vladimir Lenin that the Soviet Government had nothing to do with Comintern. I gave up co-editing a series of documents on Russo-American relations because my Russian colleague could not or would not get over that hurdle....Even today [2020], when the Russians are more liberal in their censorship of documentary publications, one has to verify where possible through other sources independent of Moscow. And although Comintern's archives are available on the web, most of it them are still closed to the reader, even though officially declassified, and much of it is in German only. One always has to ask, what has been cut out deliberately?

Several international organizations were sponsored by the Comintern in this period:

The OMS ( Russian: Отдел международной связи, otdel mezhdunarodnoy svyazi, ), also known in English as the International Liaison Department (1921-1939), was the most secret department of the Comintern. It has also been translated as the Illegal Liaison Section and Foreign Liaison Department.

Historian Thomas L. Sakmyster describes:

The OMS was the Comintern's department for the coordination of subversive and conspiratorial activities. Some of its functions overlapped with those of the main Soviet intelligence agencies, the OGPU and the GRU, whose agents sometimes were assigned to the Comintern. But the OMS maintained its own set of operations and had its own representative on the central committees of each Communist party abroad.

In 2012, historian David McKnight stated:

The most intense practical application of the conspiratorial work of the Comintern was carried out by its international liaison service, the OMS. This body undertook clandenstine courier activities and work which supported underground political activities. These included the transport of money and letters, the manufacture of passports and other false documents and technical support to underground parties, such as managing "safe houses" and establishing businesses overseas as cover activities.

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it.

Barrett, James R. "What Went Wrong? The Communist Party, the US, and the Comintern." American Communist History 17.2 (2018): 176-184.

Belogurova, Anna. "Networks, Parties, and the" Oppressed Nations": The Comintern and Chinese Communists Overseas, 1926-1935." Cross-Currents: East Asian History and Culture Review 6.2 (2017): 558-582. online

Belogurova, Anna. The Nanyang Revolution: The Comintern and Chinese Networks in Southeast Asia, 1890-1957 (Cambridge UP, 2019). focus on Malaya

Caballero, Manuel. Latin America and the Comintern, 1919-1943 (Cambridge University Press, 2002)

Carr, E.H. Twilight of the Comintern, 1930-1935. New York: Pantheon Books, 1982. online free to borrow

Chase, William J. Enemies within the Gates? The Comintern and the Stalinist Repression, 1934-1939. (Yale UP, 2001).

Dobronravin, Nikolay. "The Comintern, 'Negro Self-Determination' and Black Revolutions in the Caribbean." Interfaces Brasil/Canadá 20 (2020): 1-18. online

Drachkovitch, M. M. ed. The Revolutionary Internationals (Stanford UP, 1966).

Drachewych, Oleksa. "The Comintern and the Communist Parties of South Africa, Canada, and Australia on Questions of Imperialism, Nationality and Race, 1919-1943" (PhD dissertation, McMaster University, 2017) online.

Dullin, Sabine, and Brigitte Studer. "Communism+ transnational: the rediscovered equation of internationalism in the Comintern years." Twentieth Century Communism 14.14 (2018): 66-95.

Gankin, Olga Hess and Harold Henry Fisher. The Bolsheviks and the World War: The Origin of the Third International. (Stanford UP, 1940) online.

Gupta, Sobhanlal Datta. Comintern and the Destiny of Communism in India: 1919-1943 (2006) online

Haithcox, John Patrick. Communism and nationalism in India: MN Roy and Comintern policy, 1920-1939 (1971). online

Hallas, Duncan. The Comintern: The History of the Third International. London: Bookmarks, 1985.

Hopkirk, Peter. Setting the East Ablaze: Lenin's Dream of a Empire in Asia 1984 (1984).

Ikeda, Yoshiro. "Time and the Comintern: Rethinking the Cultural Impact of the Russian Revolution on Japanese Intellectuals." in Culture and Legacy of the Russian Revolution: Rhetoric and Performance-Religious Semantics-Impact on Asia (2020): 227+.

James, C.L.R., World Revolution 1917-1936: The Rise and Fall of the Communist International. (1937). online

Jeifets, Víctor, and Lazar Jeifets. "The Encounter between the Cuban Left and the Russian Revolution: The Communist Party and the Comintern." Historia Crítica 64 (2017): 81-100.

Kennan, George F. Russia and the West Under Lenin and Stalin (1961) pp. 151-93. online

Lazitch, Branko and Milorad M. Drachkovitch. Biographical dictionary of the Comintern (2nd ed. 1986).

McDermott, Kevin. "Stalin and the Comintern during the 'Third Period', 1928-33." European history quarterly 25.3 (1995): 409-429.

McDermott, Kevin. "The History of the Comintern in Light of New Documents", in Tim Rees and Andrew Thorpe (eds.), International Communism and the Communist International, 1919-43. Manchester, England: Manchester University Press, 1998.

McDermott, Kevin, and J. Agnew. The Comintern: a History of International Communism from Lenin to Stalin. Basingstoke, 1996.

Melograni, Piero. Lenin and the Myth of World Revolution: Ideology and Reasons of State 1917-1920, Humanities Press, 1990.

Priestland, David. The Red Flag: A History of Communism. 2010.

Riddell, John. "The Comintern in 1922: The Periphery Pushes Back." Historical Materialism 22.3-4 (2014): 52-103. online

Smith, S. A. (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of the History of Communism (2014), ch 10: "The Comintern".

Taber, Mike (ed.), The Communist Movement at a Crossroads: Plenums of the Communist International's Executive Committee, 1922-1923. John Riddell, trans. Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2019.

Ulam, Adam B. Expansion and Coexistence: Soviet Foreign Policy, 1917-1973. (2nd ed. Praeger Publishers, 1974). online

Valeva, Yelena. The CPSU, the Comintern, and the Bulgarians (Routledge, 2018).

Worley, Matthew et al. (eds.) Bolshevism, Stalinism and the Comintern: Perspectives on Stalinization, 1917-53. (2008).

The Comintern and its Critics (Special issue of Revolutionary History Volume 8, no 1, Summer 2001).

Drachewych, Oleksa. "The Communist Transnational? Transnational studies and the history of the Comintern." History Compass 17.2 (2019): e12521.

McDermott, Kevin. "Rethinking the Comintern: Soviet Historiography, 1987-1991", Labour History Review, 57#3 (1992), pp. 37-58.

McIlroy, John, and Alan Campbell. "Bolshevism, Stalinism and the Comintern: A historical controversy revisited." Labor History 60.3 (2019): 165-192. online

Redfern, Neil. "The Comintern and Imperialism: A Balance Sheet." Journal of Labor and Society 20.1 (2017): 43-60.

Banac, I. ed. The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov 1933-1949 (Yale UP, 2003).

Davidson, Apollon, et al. (eds.) South Africa and the Communist International: A Documentary History. 2 vol. 2003.

Degras, Jane T. The Communist International, 1919-43 (3 Vols. 1956); documents; online vol 1 1919-22; vol 2 1923-28 vol 3 1929-43 (PDF).

Firsov, Fridrikh I., Harvey Klehr, and John Earl Haynes, eds. Secret Cables of the Comintern, 1933-1943. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2014. online review

Gruber, Helmut. International Communism in the Era of Lenin: A Documentary History (Cornell University Press, 1967)

Kheng, Cheah Boon, ed. From PKI to the Comintern, 1924-1941 (Cornell University Press, 2018). on China

Riddell, John (ed.): The Communist International in Lenin's Time, Vol. 1: Lenin's Struggle for a Revolutionary International: Documents: 1907-1916: The Preparatory Years. New York: Monad Press, 1984.

Riddell, John (ed.): The Communist International in Lenin's Time, Vol. 2: The German Revolution and the Debate on Soviet Power: Documents: 1918-1919: Preparing the Founding Congress. New York: Pathfinder Press, 1986.

Riddell, John (ed.) The Communist International in Lenin's Time, Vol. 3: Founding the Communist International: Proceedings and Documents of the First Congress: March 1919. New York: Pathfinder Press, 1987.

Riddell, John (ed.) The Communist International in Lenin's Time: Workers of the World and Oppressed Peoples Unite! Proceedings and Documents of the Second Congress, 1920. In Two Volumes. New York: Pathfinder Press, 1991.

Riddell, John (ed.) The Communist International in Lenin's Time: To See the Dawn: Baku, 1920: First Congress of the Peoples of the East. New York: Pathfinder Press, 1993.

Riddell, John (ed.) Toward the United Front: Proceedings of the Fourth Congress of the Communist International, 1922. Lieden, NL: Brill, 2012.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Communist International ( Comintern), also known as the Third International, was an international organization founded in 1919 that advocated world communism, and which was led and controlled by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

# data[].attributes.body
Formation of Soviet Union

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Soviet Union, in full Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.), Russian Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik or Sovetsky Soyuz, former northern Eurasian empire (1917/22-1991) stretching from the Baltic and Black seas to the Pacific Ocean and, in its final years, consisting of 15 Soviet Socialist Republics (S.S.R.'s): Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belorussia (now Belarus), Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kirgiziya (now Kyrgyzstan), Latvia, Lithuania, Moldavia (now Moldova), Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. The capital was Moscow, then and now the capital of Russia.

During the period of its existence, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was by area the world's largest country. It was also one of the most diverse, with more than 100 distinct nationalities living within its borders. The majority of the population, however, was made up of East Slavs (Russians, Ukrainians, and Belorussians); these groups together made up more than two-thirds of the total population in the late 1980s.

At its greatest extent, between 1946 and 1991 (the figures and descriptions given below refer to this period), the U.S.S.R. covered some 8,650,000 square miles (22,400,000 square kilometres), seven times the area of India and two and one-half times that of the United States. The country occupied nearly one-sixth of the Earth's land surface, including the eastern half of Europe and roughly the northern third of Asia.

The U.S.S.R. extended more than 6,800 miles (10,900 kilometres) from east to west, covering 11 of the world's 24 time zones. The most westerly point was on the Baltic Sea, near Kaliningrad; the easternmost was Cape Dezhnev on the Bering Strait, nearly halfway around the world. From north to south the U.S.S.R. extended some 2,800 miles from Cape Chelyuskin to Kushka on the Afghan border. Nearly half the territory of the U.S.S.R. was north of 60° N, at the same latitude as Alaska, Baffin Island, and Greenland.

In addition to having the world's longest coastline, the U.S.S.R. had the longest frontiers. To the north the country was bounded by the seas of the Arctic Ocean, and to the east were the seas of the Pacific. On the south the U.S.S.R. was bordered by North Korea, Mongolia, China, Afghanistan, Iran, and Turkey. On the southern frontier there were three seas: the Caspian Sea, the world's largest inland sea, as well as the almost completely landlocked Black Sea and Sea of Azov. Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Finland, and Norway lay to the west.

The U.S.S.R. was the successor to the Russian Empire of the tsars. Following the 1917 Revolution, four socialist republics were established on the territory of the former empire: the Russian and Transcaucasian Soviet Federated Socialist Republics and the Ukrainian and Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republics. On December 30, 1922, these constituent republics established the U.S.S.R. Additional union republics (Soviet Socialist Republics) were set up in subsequent years: the Turkmen and Uzbek S.S.R.'s in 1924, the Tadzhik S.S.R. in 1929, and the Kazakh and Kirgiz S.S.R.'s in 1936. In that year the Transcaucasian Republic was abolished and its territory was divided between three new republics: the Armenian, Azerbaijan, and Georgian S.S.R.'s. In 1940 the Karelo-Finnish, Moldavian, Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian S.S.R.'s were established. The Karelo-Finnish S.S.R. became an autonomous republic in 1956, leaving a total of 15 union republics ( soyuznye respubliki). In addition to these, the U.S.S.R. as of 1990 was made up of 20 autonomous republics ( avtonomnye respubliki), 8 autonomous provinces ( avtonomnye oblasti), 10 autonomous districts ( avtonomnye okruga), 6 regions ( kraya), and 114 provinces ( oblasti).

Under the constitution adopted in the 1930s and modified down to October 1977, the political foundation of the U.S.S.R. was formed by the Soviets (Councils) of People's Deputies. These existed at all levels of the administrative hierarchy, with the Soviet Union as a whole under the nominal control of the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R., located in Moscow. This body had two chambers-the Soviet of the Union, with 750 members elected on a single-member constituency basis; and the Soviet of Nationalities, with 750 members representing the various political divisions: 32 from each union republic, 11 from each autonomous republic, 5 from each autonomous region, and 1 from each autonomous district. In elections to these bodies, the voters were rarely given any choice of candidate other than those presented by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), which, until the amendment of Article 6 of the constitution in March 1990, was the "leading and guiding force of Soviet society and the nucleus of its political system." In theory, all legislation required the approval of both chambers of the Supreme Soviet; in practice, all decisions were made by the small group known as the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, itself strongly influenced by the Politburo of the CPSU, and were unanimously approved by the deputies. The role of the soviets in the individual republics and other territories was primarily to put into effect the decisions made by the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R.

The political system was thus authoritarian and highly centralized, and this also applied to the economic system. The economic foundation of the U.S.S.R. was "Socialist ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange," and the economy of the entire country was controlled by a series of five-year plans that set targets for all forms of production.

Dramatic changes, both political and economic, occurred during the late 1980s and early '90s, ushered in by the adoption of perestroika ("restructuring") and glasnost ("openness"). On the economic side the planned, highly centralized command economy was to be replaced by the progressive introduction of elements of a market economy, a change that proved difficult to achieve and was accompanied by declining production in many sectors and increasing distribution problems. In the political sphere, amendments to the constitution in 1988 replaced the old Supreme Soviet with the Congress of People's Deputies of the U.S.S.R. The new congress had 2,250 members; one-third of these were elected on a constituency basis, one-third represented the political territories (as in the old Supreme Soviet), and the remaining third came from "all-union social organizations" such as the trade unions, the CPSU, and the Academy of Sciences. Voters were presented with a choice of candidates, and many non-Communists were elected. The Congress of People's Deputies elected a new Supreme Soviet of 542 members and also chose the chairman of that body, who was to be the executive president of the U.S.S.R. Congresses of People's Deputies were also established in each republic.

These congresses could be legitimately described as parliaments, and they engaged in vigorous debate over the economic and political future of the country. From 1989, conflicts developed between the parliament of the U.S.S.R. and those of the individual republics, mainly over the respective powers of the centre (the U.S.S.R. government) and the republics. These conflicts were exacerbated by the resurgence of ethnic nationalism and increasing demands for autonomy and even for full independence. Following the abortive coup of August 1991, in which the CPSU was heavily implicated, the party itself was abolished.

By December 1991 the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics had virtually ceased to exist, and the future of its territories and peoples was uncertain. Three republics-Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania-had achieved complete independence and were internationally recognized as sovereign states, and several others were demanding independence. Attempts were made, led by Mikhail Gorbachev, the president of the Soviet Union, to establish a new "Union of Sovereign States" with some degree of integration in foreign policy, defense, and economic affairs, but agreement among the remaining 12 republics was not achieved. Whatever the legal position, the union republics had begun to act as if they were sovereign states and were negotiating with each other, bypassing the vestigial central government. This process culminated on December 8, 1991, in the signing of an agreement between the three Slav republics of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus for the establishment of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), with an agreed common policy for foreign affairs and defense. The CIS later came to include all the remaining republics except Georgia, but great difficulty was experienced in arriving at agreed policies. The future thus remained uncertain, but there could be no disagreement with the statement by the leaders of the Commonwealth that "the U.S.S.R. has ceased to exist as a geopolitical reality."

This article contains a history of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics from 1917 to 1991. For the geography and history of the former Soviet Socialist republics, see the articles Moldova, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Russia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Ukraine.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Soviet Union | History, Leaders, Flag, Map, & Anthem

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Soviet Union (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; U.S.S.R.), former northern Eurasian empire (1917/22-1991) stretching from the Baltic and Black seas to the Pacific Ocean and, in its final years, consisting of 15 Soviet Socialist Republics. The capital was Moscow, then and now the capital of Russia.

# data[].attributes.body
Vladimir Lenin Died

# data[].attributes.body
Stalin introduced collectivization

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Collectivization in the Soviet Union - Wikipedia

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Soviet Union enforced the collectivization ( Russian: Коллективизация) of its agricultural sector between 1928 and 1940 during the ascendancy of Joseph Stalin. It began during and was part of the first five-year plan. The policy aimed to consolidate individual landholdings and labour into collective farms: mainly and .

# data[].attributes.body
Dissolution of Soviet Union