Russian Civil War

Question 1

Causes of War events

Answer 1

1917 - Nov 6-7 Bolsheviks take power
- Dec 15 - Temporary armistice with Germany, White armies form
1918 - Jan 5 - Constituent army broken up
- Mar 3 - Brest-Litovsk
- Mar 13 - Trotsky becomes commissar for war
- conscription

Question 2

Causes of War stats/significance/quotes

Answer 2

• Great Big Change Creates Terrible War
• revolution “easy as picking up a feather”-Lenin
• 1918, 33 sovereign governments, 2 assassination attempts
• Approximately 200k die in the red terror
• “Lenin was prepared for a Civil War and … welcomed it as a chance to build his party’s power base.”- Figes
• “Red army … grew faster than the devastated soviet economy was able to supply” - Figes

Question 3

Practices of War events

Answer 3

1918 - Czech Legion makes for Mosow, encourages others
1920 - Apr- Polish whites invade Russia
- Bolsheviks drive whites back
- Nov - Last evacuation of white forces

Question 4

Practices of War stats/significance/quotes

Answer 4

• Lenin started by 3m, 5m by end
• “Politburo [had]… effective leadership during the civil war”-Lee
• South ‘volunteer army’ under Deniken, gets 320km from Moscow
• Siberian Adm. Kolchak, the “Supreme ruler of Russia”, has 140k, no plan
• Estonia Yudenich - has 15k that get to Peterograd in 1919
• Allies fighting Ge, France invested millions and couldn’t risk it

Question 5

Effects of War events

Answer 5

1921 - March - Military uprising
- Mar 8 - Congress meets, NEP

Question 6

Effects of War stats/significance/quotes

Answer 6

• Whites were not aligned or connected
• The army is turning into “a bunch of tradesmen and profiteers”- Gen. Wrangel under Deniken
• “Made no attempt to … appeal to the peasants… or the national minorities”-Figes
• Reds unified, had the railway, Trotsky, peasant support due to land reforms
• Cheka killed 300k between 1918-20
• “It is possible that more people were murdered by the Cheka than died in the Civil war.”-Figes