Communist government in the USSR: Revolution and civil war Flashcards
(20 cards)
What was the year of Bolshevik founding?
1903
Who was the Tsar and when did he come to power?
1894 and Tsar Nicholas II
What were the aims of the Bolshevik party?
- To get rid of the upper and middle classes who had exploited the workers
- Wanted to secure a government to improve the working and living lives of people as a whole
- Lenin believed he could accelerate Marx’s stages of society
- Wanted to be a dictatorship of the proletariat to promote socialism through government control over economy
What is the definition of proletariat
- A term used by Karl Marx to label those forced into the working class by the industrial revolution
What is the definition of Bourgeoisie?
- Owners of factories, industries and shops (means of production/distribution/economy)
What is the definition of a dictatorship of the proletariat?
- A government that rules on behalf of the working class to ensure socialism instead of capitalism and exploitation
When was the October Revolution?
October 1917
When was the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk?
March 1918
When was the Russian Civil war?
1918-1921
The October Revolution 1917
- Bolsheviks seized power in October and forced the provisional government set up after the fall of the Tsarist regime to back down
- As a minority party the revolution was portrayed and made out in propaganda to be a grand uprising of the workers storming the Winter palace
How big was the Bolshevik party by the October revolution?
300,000
Could not lead a revolution through popularity so had to through force instead
Who were the opposition of the Bolsheviks?
- Other left wing groups denied power by the Bolsheviks - such as the Mensheviks and the Socialist revolutionaries
- Groups on the right such as Tsarist supporters and liberal groups
- Nationalist groups within Russia, who saw an opportunity for their independence following the revolution
- Supported by the West who feared communism and wanted the reinstatement of the Eastern front
How did the Bolsheviks deal with the other left wing groups?
- Lenin made it clear there would be no sharing of power, so many did join the Bolsheviks
- A vote on the constituent assembly was to be held, and in which the Social Revolutionaries won substantially
- After only one meeting Lenin dissolved this and replaced it with the All-Russian congress of soviets, where the Bolsheviks had more power
How did the Bolsheviks destroy other political parties?
- Removed the vote from “Bourgeois classes” which lessened opposition
- Restrictions imposed by the Bolsheviks made propaganda etc from the SR and Mensheviks harder to publish
- The SRs lost all power after walking out of government in March 1918 in protest to the decision to pull out of the war
- In March 1918 the Bolsheviks renamed themselves as the Communist party and by 1921 all other political parties were banned
- Waves of arrests of the SRs and the Mensheviks throughout 1921 and 1922, reduced to less than organised parties
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk 1918
- Took Russia out of the war at the cost of many Baltic states including Ukraine, Finland and Lithuania
- Angered the Russian conservatives who were pro-war, which was a factor in starting the civil war
- Pulled out of the war to concentrate on the consolidation of power
The Russian Civil War 1918-1921 and how did they win?
- Reds (Bolsheviks and its supporters) Vs Whites (Everyone else led by the Tsar’s military leaders)
- Victory achieved through better organisation in military, political and economic terms
- Whites were a mess of inefficiency, conflicting views and corruption
- By the end of 1920 the whites had been defeated and Bolshevik rule extended across the country
- Conscription introduced so that after the war the army was over 5,000,000 men
- War communism made sure no troops went without food and industry was directly controlled by the government, although peasants were angry at the requisition of food supplies
- Encouraged a highly authoritarian system of government
What was and when was the Land Decree?
1917
- Guaranteed peasants a portion of land through socialism
What were the key results of the civil war?
- Bolshevik state had become highly centralised, so power was now secured for the government and Politburo
- Terror had been a common feature of Bolshevik rule over the civil war, and had worked, which then set the standard for leaders
- Russian people of this generation were now used to war, hardship and terror - alongside the want for a strong authoritarian dictator
Tenth party congress 1921
- Called post civil war due to party membership now increasing to 730,000, which posed a threat to party stability
- Ban on formations of factions within the party (“On party unity”)
- Need for tightening power after the 1921 Kronstradt mutiny and the 1920-21 Tambrov uprising
When and what was the Tambrov uprising?
1921
- Previously strong supporters of the party, sailors stationed at Kronstradt naval base after receiving orders from their local Bolshevik soviet
