HISTORY - TSARIST, SOVIET, RUSSIA

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