Transcript Fall of the Czar

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Russia at the turn of the 20th. Century
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Economically dismal situation
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Severe food shortages
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Workers crammed into the cities living in
miserable conditions
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1894 – Installation of Czar Nicholas II
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1904-1905 war with Japan
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Bloody Sunday, 2½ mis.
http://youtu.be/RIgU0homwBU
Russia suffered as many as 70,000 dead, mostly conscripted peasants
Result: the “Revolution” of 1905
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Peasants had been given half the land – now they demand all
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Workers in the cities strike, demand food, higher wages, improved conditions
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Czar responds with repressions, creating outrage and eliminating support
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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
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1914 – WWI breaks out, enmeshes Russia. In 2½ years
more than 8 million soldiers, mostly peasants, are
wounded, captured or killed.
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By 1915 hunger and despair renews revolutionary fervor
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February 1917 – millions of soldiers in the front, a
shattered economy. Food and fuel shortages,
bread lines, starvation.
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Crowds surge through the streets. Workers stage a
general strike.
http://youtu.be/B-qxWWRcN-4
Russia Land of the Czars 19, 20
20 min. TT
The once pliant Duma demands all power from the Czar
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Army, police and the “intelligentsia” abandon
the Czar
http://youtu.be/1W1b6j8U46k
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.
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Socialism
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Goals: Fair distribution of goods and services
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Means: Government takes lead role in planning, regulating
and directing key service and economic sectors
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Decision-making: Achieved and advanced democratically, through the vote. Political
parties compete democratically to implement their agendas.
Communism
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Goals: Eliminate the exploitation of the working class (i.e., the proletariat); provide
goods and services based on need.
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Means: Abolish class distinctions; place means of production under government control.
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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.
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Heavy war losses prompt replay of 1905
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Paralyzing strikes and food riots
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This time the military and police refuse to move in
“Russian Revolution Part I,” 10 mis.
http://youtu.be/f0c5Tyw7LDE
Czar abdicates, Provisional Government of non-socialist liberals takes over
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Comprised of privileged persons, lacks backing of workers and soldiers
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Powerless to address issues of war, land reform and the “nationalities” issue
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Government allows socialist groups (“Soviets”) to form in workplaces and the military
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Three socialist factions. Bolsheviks and Mensheviks were both Marxist – believers in a passedin revolution, with capitalism a necessary preliminary step.
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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
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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.
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SR’s wanted to fight Germany to the death
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Clashes between government and people over the war
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Liberals running the Provisional Government and the
officer corps are committed to alliance with the West and
war against Germany
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Socialist members of the Soviets not interested in anything beyond
Russia’s borders
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Workers and peasants, the bulk of the army, want out of the war
Clashes over land reform
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Peasant communes, the main authority in the countryside, seize landlord
estates and illegally redistribute the land
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Not enough land for everyone, nor the ability during wartime to reallocate it
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Government fears that if peasants get land they would abandon the army
Tensions between Russia and minority populations – the “nationalities question”
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Expansion through conquest meant that 50% of the population is not Russian
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Disorder feeds nationalist sentiments. Ukraine set up its own parliament.
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April 1917: Lenin returns from exile, presses for
immediate revolution
“October 1917,” 10 mis.
http://youtu.be/qoZcpeZm0jw
 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 and
military units in Petrograd and Moscow
October 1917 Revolution
Russia Land of the Czars 18 – 10 mis.
 Lenin convinces Bolshevik central committee that time ripe
http://youtu.be/P-x4VcmHfxU
for 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
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Top-down dictatorship by Lenin and his
commissars, each in charge of a government function
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At first all are Bolsheviks, then a few others are let in
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Non-Bolshevik commissars soon leave or are dismissed
Land nationalized, but implementation spotty
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Rich peasants emerge who rent land to others; real distribution is limited
November 1917: Constituent Assembly elections proceed as previously scheduled
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Socialist revolutionaries take the provinces; Bolsheviks get only ¼ of the vote
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Lenin disbands the assembly, moves against a free press
Justice system
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First Commissar, Isaac Steinberg, socialist revolutionary, leaves in disgust
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Regular courts disbanded, replaced by troikas (three-judge panels)
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Lenin creates “Cheka,” forerunner of KGB, forms revolutionary tribunals to deal with
“counter-revolutionaries”
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Cadet Party declared “enemy of the people,” members arrested, imprisoned
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March 1918: Lenin makes peace with Germany,
gives up territory
 Nikolai Bukharin and other left-leaning
Bolsheviks 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.
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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?