Why did the reds win the civil war

Question 1

What were the major factors for the reds civil war victory

Answer 1

• Weaknesses of the
  opposition e.g. reliance of foreign support
• Strengths of Reds e.g. Reds extremely effective
  leadership under Trotsky, Red Terror, control over cities,
  centralised leadership around Lenin

Question 2

How did the weaknesses of the opposition help contribute to the Red victory

Answer 2

- Opposition divided into two 
  sides, greens and whites 
- Both with different 
  ideologies and demands 
  for what they wanted out of 
  the war 
- Greens wanted 
  independence, they were 
  not interested in Russia and 
  often refused to fight 
  beyond their own borders 
- This created the immediate 
  challenge, they were 
  disorganised and had no 
  clear vision that they could 
  all fight under 
- They also didn't control the 
  major industrial cities, this 
   was where the power lay 
   and very little could come 
 from controlling the 
 countryside

Question 3

What was the difference between the whites and greens

Answer 3

-Whites who were made up of 
 largely the outcast political 
 parties after the dissolving of 
 the constituent assembly.
-These included the social 
 revolutionaries and the 
 liberals 
-The Greens were largely
 made up of ethnic minority 
 groups such as the 
 Ukrainians and the Czechs 
 who wanted independence 
 from Russia. These groups 
 were largely united as they 
 had all had a common goal 
 for independence.

Question 4

How did the oppositions heavy reliance on foreign intervention help lead to a Red victory

Answer 4

- The Brest-Litvosk 
  agreement had let to an 
  outcry from the British and 
  French who feared the 
  economic and military gains 
  the Germans would get as 
  a result
- The opposition forces were 
  funded and supplied by 
  them in response 
- This immediately placed the 
  opposition forces into a 
  state of disadvantage 
- They were basing their 
 military capabilities almost 
 entirely off an unreliable 
 source and only spelled 
 disaster

• The intervention forces, which included the French and
  British, did not have the stomach for another prolonged
  campaign after 4 years of war and there were serious
  threats of mutinies within their armies. Some trade
  unions even refused to transport military supplies bound
  for Russia
• The opposition became over-reliant on this source and
  by 1920 when all Western forces had left, they were left
  with nothing
• Was a propaganda win for the Reds as they could
  present themselves as the saviour of the nation from
  foreign conquest; all the interventions had been an
  imperialist invasion of Russia intent on overthrowing
  the revolution

Question 5

How did the effective leadership of Trotsky help the Reds win

Answer 5

• Trotsky brilliantly organised the Red army - his strategy
  was simple and direct

1. Defend the Red Army’s internal lines of communication
2. To deny the Whites the opportunity to concentrate
   large forces in any one location
3. To prevent the Whites maintaining regular supplies

• The basis of his strategy was control of Russia’s
  railways. Trotsky viewed the function of the railways as
  equivalent of the cavalry in former times. They were the
  means of transporting troops swiftly and in large
  numbers and were critical areas of defence or attack.

Question 6

How did Lenin’s central leadership help contribute to a Red victory (opposition weaknesses)

Answer 6

- The Red army had one 
 man to look up to and 
 follow orders from and that 
 was Lenin 
- He was a strong leader 
- For the Whites it was very 
  different 
- A number of figures 
 proclaimed themselves as 
 the leader of the White army, 
 there was no clear leader
- In fact what became evident 
 was that many of them were 
 in it simply out of their own 
 interest
- Admiral Kolchak, who led 
 the White army out of 
 Siberia, proclaimed himself 
 as the supreme ruler of 
 Russia

Question 7

What was the role of the Cheka

Answer 7

-Were incorporated in the ‘Red Terror’
-Played a critical role during the civil war
-Lenin was determined to impose absolute Bolshevik
rule by the suppressing of all political opposition
-The sole purpose of the Cheka during the civil war was
to ‘destroy counter-revolution and sabotage’
- Was granted unlimited powers of arrest, detain and
torture
-One of it’s most vital roles was keeping the peasants
and workers in order
-With the dire food shortages for the people as a result
of the policy of ‘War Communism’ the Cheka would
brutally crack down on workers abandoning the
factories and peasants not meeting their grain quotas
-It ensured that their was always a steady supply of food
to the troops
-Also created fear, people were less likely to protest to
the Red’s and therefore allowed Lenin to focus just on
the war rather than disturbances occurring in the
counties

Question 8

What were the main weaknesses of the Whites

Answer 8

• Various white armies fought as separate detachments
• Apart from their obvious desire to overthrow Bolsheviks,
  they were not bound together by a single aim
• The Whites were unwilling to sacrifice their individual
  interests in order to form a united anti-Bolshevik front.
  This allowed the Reds to pick off the White armies
  separately
• In the rare cases in which the Whites did consider
  combining, they were too widely scattered
  geographically to be able to bring sufficient pressure to
  bear on the enemy
• The Whites were too reliant on supplies from abroad, which seldom arrived in sufficient quantities, in the right places, at the right time.

Question 9

What were the main strengths of the Reds

Answer 9

• They remained in control of a concentrated central area
  of Western Russia, which they were able to defend by
  maintaining their inner communication and supply lines
• The two major cities, Petrograd and Moscow, the
  administrative centres of Russia, remained in their hands
  throughout the war, as did most of the railway network
• The Reds also possessed a key advantage in that the
  areas where they had their strongest hold were the
  industrial centres of Russia. This gave them access to
  munitions and resources denied to the whites
• The dependence of the Whites on supplies from abroad
  appeared to prove the Reds accusation that they were in
  the league with the foreign interventionists. The Civil
  War had produced a paradoxical situation in which the
  Reds were able to stand as champions of the Russian
  nation as well as proletarian revolutionaries

-The Red Army was brilliantly organised and led by
Trotsky