Communist government in the USSR: Revolution and civil war

Question 1

What was the year of Bolshevik founding?

Answer 1

1903

Question 2

Who was the Tsar and when did he come to power?

Answer 2

1894 and Tsar Nicholas II

Question 3

What were the aims of the Bolshevik party?

Answer 3

• 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

Question 4

What is the definition of proletariat

Answer 4

• A term used by Karl Marx to label those forced into the working class by the industrial revolution

Question 5

What is the definition of Bourgeoisie?

Answer 5

• Owners of factories, industries and shops (means of production/distribution/economy)

Question 6

What is the definition of a dictatorship of the proletariat?

Answer 6

• A government that rules on behalf of the working class to ensure socialism instead of capitalism and exploitation

Question 7

When was the October Revolution?

Answer 7

October 1917

Question 8

When was the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk?

Answer 8

March 1918

Question 9

When was the Russian Civil war?

Answer 9

1918-1921

Question 10

The October Revolution 1917

Answer 10

• 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

Question 11

How big was the Bolshevik party by the October revolution?

Answer 11

300,000

Could not lead a revolution through popularity so had to through force instead

Question 12

Who were the opposition of the Bolsheviks?

Answer 12

• 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

Question 13

How did the Bolsheviks deal with the other left wing groups?

Answer 13

• 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

Question 14

How did the Bolsheviks destroy other political parties?

Answer 14

• 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

Question 15

Treaty of Brest-Litovsk 1918

Answer 15

• 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

Question 16

The Russian Civil War 1918-1921 and how did they win?

Answer 16

• 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

Question 17

What was and when was the Land Decree?

Answer 17

1917

• Guaranteed peasants a portion of land through socialism

Question 18

What were the key results of the civil war?

Answer 18

• 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

Question 19

Tenth party congress 1921

Answer 19

• 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

Question 20

When and what was the Tambrov uprising?

Answer 20

1921
- Previously strong supporters of the party, sailors stationed at Kronstradt naval base after receiving orders from their local Bolshevik soviet