Russia Flashcards
Reasons for discontent pre 1905
Nationalists - 70m pop not Russia
Bourgeosie no power
Aristocrats 25% of land but 1.5% pop
Redemption payments since 1861, 50% pop increases 1860-97 so less and less land for each family
workers 12-15hr days, 40% no water/sewage
Causes of 1905 revolution
1904 - embarassing Japan attack on Pacific Russian Fleet and Manchuria, defeated in Battle of Tsushima
Jan 1905 - Bloody Sunday - 200,000 peaceful protesters, 200 killed
1905 Revolution
Oct 1905 - General Strike + St Petersburg Soviet and 50 others set up (newspaper Ivestia)
June 1905 - Potemkin Mutiny - ended as mutineers sailed to Odessa and were killed by tsarist troops
Aftermath of 1905 rev
August 1905 - failed limited manifesto
Oct manifesto - ended Japan war by sep, removed redemption payments by nov
St Petersburg soviet taken Dec 1905
Nationalists under control 1905-6 - 250,000 troops sent to Poland for order
Growth of Opposition groups
1905 - Octobrists led by Rodzianko and Kadets led by Milyukov - both about Oct manifesto - Kadet more extreme
SR - 1901 Chernov - violent - 2000 assassinations between 1901-5
SD - mensheviks and bolsheviks - Bolsheviks less than 10,000 by 1914, only 25,000 by feb rev
Dumas + False Promises
Fundemental Laws April 1906 - Tsar = ultimate control
Stolypin’s Repression - 2500 hung on the spot
Newspaper’s censored despite 1905 freedom of press
1st - Feb-July 1906 - Major reforms demanded so repressions
2nd - 1907 - 4 months - similar to 1st
3rd - 80% of pop (peasants) elected 20% of duma - controlled and moderate 1907-12
4th - similar to 3rd - 1912 - Aug 1914
Agricultural reform
Land Bank gave loans
15% peasants did well - kulaks
1913 - record grain
Other 85% migrated - 4m to siberia
Worker Issues and Lena Goldfield
1904-14 double industrial output
Inflation 40%, wages only increased 7%
Lena Goldfield Mar 1912 - demanded 30% more pay, 8hr shifts, 6000 on strike
April 1912 - 270 killed
Wider strikes by 1914 - 1.34m in 3500 strikes
WW1
Aug 1914 - Duma closed itself for war (reopened 1915 due to war failures) - progressive bloc dismissed by Tsar after reopening
Aug 1915 - Tsar to front
Rasputin + Tsarina in charge - 1915-16: 4PM’s + 6 interior ministers- Rasputin killed Dec 1916
6m men but only of 5m rifles
Aug 1914 - Loss at Battle of Tannenberg, Sep 1914 - Loss of Battle of Mansurian Lakes
2m dead, 3m wounded, 3m prisoner
Feb rev
40,000 strikers at Putilov works
25th 200,000 on streets
26th 150,000 petrograd garrison strike
27th Duma with 12 deputies + Kerensky = prov gov
March - Tsar abdicates
Food production and winter of discontent
Food production fell - 15m ment to army
1914-17 400% inflation
Winter of discountent - eating of 1/4 of prewar, 1/3 of all fuel requirements fufuilled
Weaknesses of prov gov
Rations 1lb to 1/4lb of bread in 1917
No land reform
Didn’t end war - 60,000 killed in June Offensive
Order no 1 - dual power
July Days
Large demonstrations following June offensive
Turned to Bolsheviks to lead - they weren’t ready
Crushed 400 killed
Lenin fled to Finland
Prince Lvov resigned for Kerensky
Kornilov Coup
Aug 1917 - Kornilov military coup - cossack troops to Petrograd
Kerensky released Bolsheviks and armed them to help defend the city
They never reached Petrograd - 7000 arrested
Trotsky Chairman sep 1917 of soviet in Petrograd
Lenin - Ideas Man
April Thesis - “Peace, bread, land” - Transported by germans
All power to soviets
Oct 1917 returned to Petrograd - convinced central commitee for revolution (againsts Kamenev and Zinoviev)
Trotsky - Action Man
800,000 member of party, 10,000 in red guard
Oct 1917 - head of MRC in soviet to organise rev
Kornstadt Naval base aimed guns at city
23rd Oct - 15/18 units in city supported Bolsheviks
24th = key locations taken
25th - MRC took winter palace
Repression of Constituent Assembly
CPC made all decisions, all Bolsheviks
Cheka 1917-24, 250,000 kiled
SR 52% and Bolsheviks 25% after Nov 1917 elections
Met Jan 1918 and shut down by red guards
By 1918 all parties had been banned
Bolshevik Reforms
Nov 1917 - Land Decree (540m acreas given to peasants), Worker’s Decree (8hr day, 40hr week), Banks under CPC control Dec 1917
Pricey Peace
Dec 1917 - Negotiations started but dragged on for 9 weeks as Bolsheviks believed that rev would come in Germany
Germany resumed war Feb 1918
Brest-Litovsk signed Mar 1918
50m pop lost (1/3), 27% of agricultural land, 3bn reperations
Given back as part of eventual win of war
Civil War: Events
Initial white success - Nov 1918: Kolchak from Siberia - June 1919: 800km from Moscow
Oct 1919: Yudenich within 30 miles of Petrograd
Feb 1920: Kolchak handed over to reds and Trotsky counters
Nov 1920 - last major white army under Wrangel crushed
Civil War: Reasons for the dub
Range of parties (incl. 50,000 Czech Legion), geographical disadvantage, foreign support lacking (nov 1919)
Finland independence not recognized 1919
1/3 Peasant-seized land retaken by whites, army always < 650,000
Reds - 5m by 1920
1920 - Bolsheviks accepted independence of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania
2.5m rifles vs 850,000 for whites
50k tsar’s best officers hired
Amensty weeks - 1.5m returned Jul-Dec 1919
War Communism
Mar 1918 - rations 50g bread a day
Requisitions 1918 1m tonnes collected
5m died in famines
1921 grain = 1/2 1913 grain
Kronstadt Naval Mutiny
Mar 1921 - political comminssars sent to deal with uprising
Then crushed after 2 weeks General Tuchavesky, 60,000 troops and 20,000 other rebels slaughtered
Previously had been ‘Heroes of revolution’ as they helped in Oct Rev
NEP
Grain requistitions stopped = profits
Small businesses with up to 25 employees could be private
1922 - new rouble
Industrial Output: 1921 37.6m tonnes grain 1923 56.6m
1921 0.2m tonnes of steel 1923 0.7m
20,000 experts between 1920-25
NEP men took advantage of new laws to make huge profits
