Revolution and Civil War

1. Revolution and Civil War

2. “Revolution” of 1905 • Russia at the turn of the 20th. Century • Economically dismal situation • Severe food shortages • Workers crammed into the cities living inmiserable conditions • 1894 – Installation of Czar Nicholas II • 1904-1905 war with Japan • Russia suffered as many as 70,000 dead, mostly conscripted peasants • Result: the “Revolution” of 1905 • Peasants had been given half the land – now they demand all • Workers in the cities strike, demand food, higher wages, improved conditions • Czar responds with repressions, creating outrage and eliminating support • Czar tries to mend fences by creating a “legislature” – the Duma. But he manipulates its membership and retains the final word • Conditions create an opening for emerging socialist parties Bloody Sunday, 2½ mis.http://youtu.be/RIgU0homwBU

3. World War I • 1914 – WWI breaks out, enmeshes Russia. In 2½ yearsmore than 8 million soldiers, mostly peasants, arewounded, captured or killed. • By 1915 hunger and despair renews revolutionary fervor • February 1917 – millions of soldiers in the front, ashattered economy. Food and fuel shortages,bread lines, starvation. • Army, police and the “intelligentsia” abandonthe Czar • Crowds surge through the streets. Workers stage ageneral strike. • The once pliant Duma demands all power from the Czar • He refuses and abdicates in favor of his brother Michael. But Michael refuses. • A “Provisional Government” comprised of landowners, wealthy merchants and liberals takes over. It is beset by dissension and ideological attacks from radicals. http://youtu.be/1W1b6j8U46k http://youtu.be/B-qxWWRcN-4 Russia Land of the Czars 19, 2020 min. TT

4. Socialism and Communism • Socialism • Goals: Fair distribution of goods and services • Means: Government takes lead role in planning, regulatingand directing key service and economic sectors • Decision-making: Achieved and advanced democratically, through the vote. Political parties compete democratically to implement their agendas. • Communism • Goals: Eliminate the exploitation of the working class (i.e., the proletariat); provide goods and services based on need. • Means: Abolish class distinctions; place means of production under government control. • Decision-making: One-party system, supposedly with democracy within. In a truly communist society there is no “state,” government or concept of class. Marx said this can only be reached in stages, with a “vanguard” leading the proletariat from capitalism to socialism, then to communism.It was assumed that capitalists would ultimately have to be forced out.

5. February 1917: The“February Revolution” • Heavy war losses prompt replay of 1905 • Paralyzing strikes and food riots • This time the military and police refuse to move in • Czar abdicates, Provisional Government of non-socialist liberals takes over • Comprised of privileged persons, lacks backing of workers and soldiers • Powerless to address issues of war, land reform and the “nationalities” issue • Government allows socialist groups (“Soviets”) to form in workplaces and the military • Three socialist factions. Bolsheviks and Mensheviks were both Marxist – believers in a passed-in revolution, with capitalism a necessary preliminary step. • Bolsheviks, led by Lenin, were the smallest faction, also the best organized and most ideologically trenchant. Championed workers (“peasants do not make a revolution”), refused to compromise, wanted Russia out of WW-I • Mensheviks were more moderate, cooperated with Provisional Government • The third socialist faction, the Party of Socialist Revolutionaries (SR), opposed the Bolsheviks. Its ideology was “populist,” mostly concerned with the peasants. • SR’s wanted to fight Germany to the death “Russian Revolution Part I,” 10 mis.http://youtu.be/f0c5Tyw7LDE

6. Main issues: WW I, land reform,“nationalities” • Clashes between government and people over the war • Liberals running the Provisional Government and theofficer corps are committed to alliance with the West andwar against Germany • Socialist members of the Soviets not interested in anything beyondRussia’s borders • Workers and peasants, the bulk of the army, want out of the war • Clashes over land reform • Peasant communes, the main authority in the countryside, seize landlordestates and illegally redistribute the land • Not enough land for everyone, nor the ability during wartime to reallocate it • Government fears that if peasants get land they would abandon the army • Tensions between Russia and minority populations – the “nationalities question” • Expansion through conquest meant that 50% of the population is not Russian • Disorder feeds nationalist sentiments. Ukraine set up its own parliament.

7. Lenin returns: the 1917“October Revolution” • April 1917: Lenin returns from exile, presses forimmediate revolution • End to war; nationalize land; all power to soviets;workers to control industry • Poor economy radicalizes workers, who flock to Bolsheviks • Prominent socialists Leon Trotsky, Lev Kamenev,Gregory Zinoviev join in • Bolsheviks gain control of Soviets in factories andmilitary units in Petrograd and Moscow • October 1917 Revolution • Lenin convinces Bolshevik central committee that time ripefor revolt • In a journal article Kamenev and Zinoviev argue against it • Bolshevik vanguard supported by military mutineers and some workers takes over key installations throughout Petrograd and Moscow • Mostly peaceful. Government officials and soldiers abandon their posts. • Coincides with Congress of Soviets. Some Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries walk out. • Provisional Government dissolved, replaced by Council of Commissars “October 1917,” 10 mis.http://youtu.be/qoZcpeZm0jw Russia Land of the Czars 18 – 10 mis.http://youtu.be/P-x4VcmHfxU

8. Coup’s Aftermath:a dictatorship by Lenin • Top-down dictatorship by Lenin and hiscommissars, each in charge of a government function • At first all are Bolsheviks, then a few others are let in • Non-Bolshevik commissars soon leave or are dismissed • Land nationalized, but implementation spotty • Rich peasants emerge who rent land to others; real distribution is limited • November 1917: Constituent Assembly elections proceed as previously scheduled • Socialist revolutionaries take the provinces; Bolsheviks get only ¼ of the vote • Lenin disbands the assembly, moves against a free press • Justice system • First Commissar, Isaac Steinberg, socialist revolutionary, leaves in disgust • Regular courts disbanded, replaced by troikas (three-judge panels) • Lenin creates “Cheka,” forerunner of KGB, forms revolutionary tribunals to deal with “counter-revolutionaries” • Cadet Party declared “enemy of the people,” members arrested, imprisoned

9. Civil War • March 1918: Lenin makes peace with Germany,gives up territory • Nikolai Bukharin and other left-leaningBolsheviks see it as a mistake, splitting the socialists • Former Provisional Government officials, Czarist generals and Russian officers gather in provinces to form “White” army • Whites get little popular support, and none from the peasants • Whites depend on well-off landholders for whom peasants still toil • Czarist past, can’t articulate an appealing political vision to ordinary people • Bolsheviks promise freedoms to non-Russian nationalities • Bolsheviks control the two major cities – Petrograd and Moscow • Trotsky builds a huge army with a large administration and supply corps • “War Communism” • Reds and Whites both use terror, but the Reds’ Cheka (political police) proves fierce • Reds nationalize commerce and industry and forcibly expropriate grain • Arms production improves; workers and residents of cities are fed • By 1920 the war is won. Surviving White leaders self-exile to Europe.

10. Thought questions • Compare causes and consequences of the 1905 and 1917 revolutions • What factors led the liberal Provisional Government to fail? • How did the October 1917 Revolution (Marxist takeover) come about? • Why did Lenin and his outnumbered Bolsheviks succeed?