Alexander II
February 1855 - 1881
Secret committee considers serf emancipation
January 1857
Alexander II tours Russia giving pro-emancipation speeches - landlord prepare inventories of peasant holdings
1858-1859
von Reutern set up state bank in:
1860
Emancipation Edict proclaimed
October 1860
Dmitri Milutyn (Minister of War → Minister of Defence)
1861-1881 → from 1862
Emancipation Edict
March 1861
von Reutern promoted municipal banks in:
1862
Reform of education - University Statue passed
1863
Zemstva law passed, reform of judiciary, Secondary Education Statute passed
1864
Greater freedom of publication and press permitted, Elementary Education Statute passed
1865
Attempted assasination of Alexander II
1866
the Kingdom of Poland was destroyed and it became the Vistula Region of the Empire
by 1866
reform of municipal government creates town dumas
1870
military reforms
1874 - 1875
Assassination of Alexander II by People’s Will
March 1881
Alexander III
1881-1894
Nikolai Bunge (first finance minister)
1882-1887
Ivan Vyshnegradsky (Finance Minister)
1887-1892
Medeleev Tariff Act of _ _ _ _
1891
Great Famine in:
1891
Sergei Witte (Minister of Finance)
1892-1903
Nicholas II
1894-1917
Witte put rouble on the gold standard and stablised it
1897
Russo-Japanese War
February 1904 - August 1905
Japanese attack on Port Arthur
February 1904
Russian commander of the sea (the most popular and successful) Admiral Makarov died
April 1904
Baltic Fleet’s fail → Sent their Baltic fleet on 29000 km journey halfway around the world to challenge Japanese
Started in October 1904, arrived in spring of 1905
Bloody Sunday
January 1905
Port Arthur was eventually forced to surrender to the Japanese
January 1905
Treaty of Portsmouth
August 1905
Nicholas II signs October Manifesto
October 1905
Vladimir Lenin
1917 -1924
Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets creates government, Soviet of People's Commissars, led by Lenin
26 October 1917
Armistice negotiated with Germans - Cheka is formed, Decree on Church
December 1917
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
March 1918
Murder of the tsar and his family
July 1918
Part Secretariat and Politburo established, Comintern founded
March 1919
all White attacks defeated
November 1919
NEP (New Economic Policy)
1921 -
Lenin banned ‘factionalism’ within the Party. → this meant that discussion would be allowed, but once a decision had been taken, all sections of the Party had to stick to it.
1921
Stalin became General Secretary
March-April 1922
Treaty of Rapallo
April 1922
USSR formed
December 1922
The triumvirs’ campaign against Trotsky began in:
April 1923
Lenin’s funeral
January 1924
Lenin’s widow revealed his Testament to Central Committee and senior Congress delegates
May 1924
Trotsky’s Lessons of October was published —> Stalin formally revealed ‘socialism in one country’
November 1924
the triumvirs removed Trotsky from his position as a commissar of war
January 1925
Stalin succeeded in having Trotsky and Zinoviev expelled from Communist Party, and Kamenev expelled from CC
November 1927
Bukharin was removed from the Politburo
November 1929
Joseph Stalin
1929-1953
Ryutin Affair
1932
USSR in League of Nations
September 1934 - December 1939
Kirov Assassination
December 1934
Trial of the Sixteen - Zinoviev, Kamenev & 14 others were accused of the conspiracy against Stalin (all 16 were found guilty and executed)
August 1936
Trial of the Seventeen - 17 communist leaders were accused of plotting with Trotsky to carry out assassinations etc. → 13 were sentenced to death
January 1937
Trial of the 21 - Bukharin and 20 others, who were accused of membership of a ‘Trotskyist– Rightist Bloc’ → most of the accused ‘confessed’, but not Bukharin. The court returned the desired verdict, and Bukharin, Rykov, and 15 others were sentenced to death.
March 1938
Nazi-Soviet Pact [Ribbentrop-Mołotov Pact]
23 August 1939
Hitler invaded the USSR. Stalin was brought into IIWW
17 September 1941
COMECON (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance)
1949 - 1991
Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance (signed by Mao and Stalin)
1950
Nikita Khrushchev
1953-1964
Virgin Lands policy/scheme (utilising farming land which was previously not used for agriculture (corn was planted mainly in Kazakhstan and in Siberia - young people worked there)
January 1954
USSR-GDR (German Democratic Republic = East) treaty was drawn up, giving East Germany full powers to conduct its own foreign policy
1955
Khrushchev and Bulganin’s tour through various Western countries, Yugoslavia and China (part of peaceful coexistence)
1955
Khrushchev visited Tito in Belgrade
May 1955
Warsaw Pact
May 1955 - July 1991
Secondary education was extended for all (Khrushchev)
1956
Hungarian Revolt
1956
Sixth Five-Year Plan
January 1956 - revised 1957 - January 1959
Khrushchev’s secret speech
February 1956
establishing 105 regional ministries based on existing administrative structures (under Khrushchev)
May 1956
Introduction of minimum wages for urban and rural workers in an attempt to reduce wage differentials between jobs and professions
September 1956
Sputnik 1 (the world’s first artificial satellite)
1957
Khrushchev carried out reform of Gosplan
February & March 1957
Politburo members voted 7:4 to dismiss him, but Khrushchev insisted that the full Central Committee would have to agree before he would resign
June 1957
Khruschev is both First Secretary of CPSu and premier
by 1958
Khrushchev’s Notes’ accused the West of using West Berlin ‘as a springboard for espionage and anti-Soviet acts’ and said that the West had 6 months to recognise East Germany
November 1958
New Criminal Code (during Khrushchev) - Citizens could no longer be tried by emergency or military courts & certain ‘crimes’ were abolished
December 1958
summit meeting , during which, when the West refused to comply with Khrushchev’s ultimatum, he withdrew it and, at accepted the right of the West in West Berlin
March 1959
Khrushchev’s meeting with President Eisenhower at Camp David, which improved East-West relations and is known as the ‘spirit of Camp David’ [Eisenhower denied that the US used spy planes over USSR]
September 1959
USSR’s rocket lands on the moon
1959
Seven Year Plan
1959- October 1961
Paris Summing (the positive spirit ended during it evoked by controversy around shooting down the US U-2 reconnaissance spy plane over USSR → Eisenhower refused to apologise for the plane and the summit broke up)
May 1960
China openly attacked Soviet foreign policy
June 1960
Yuri Gagarin is the first person to travel in space
1961
Meeting with Kennedy during which Khrushchev renewed the earlier ultimatum → that the West had 6 months to settle the question of Germany, or they would be required to leave West Berlin
June 1961
Berlin Wall
July 1961 (approved) - August 1961 (contructed)
Record Harvest under Khruschev
1962
Cuban Missile Crisis
October 1962
disastrous harvest under Khrushchev, as grain production dropped by 30%, creating an immense shortage in animal fodder and thus large amounts of North American and Australian grain had to be bought
1963
Valentina Tereshkova is the first woman to travel in space
1963
While Khrushchev was on holiday at the Black Sea, Politburo finally decided that he had to go
A special meeting of the Central Committee was held, and he was informed that:
he had ‘retired’ because of ill-health and age
his positions had been filled by Leonid Brezhnev and Alexei Kosygin
Realising, he had no allies Khrushchev went into obscure retirement
October 1964
Leonid Brezhnev
1964-1982
Brezhnev insisted on bigger allocation of resources for agriculture (more chemical fertilisers and advanced mechanical equipment) → to overcome grain shortages
March 1965
Eighth-Five-Year Plan
1965-1970
Alexei Kosygin resurrected Khrushchev’s 1962 plans to give greater autonomy to factory managers over certain decisions
September 1965
Warsaw Letter, warning Alexander Dubcek to stop reforms in Czechoslovakia by Eastern European countries
July 1968
Invasion of Czechoslovakia (Prague Spring)
August 1968