Part 3 - Lenin and the Civil War

What problems did Lenin face when he took power in 1917?

• Met with hostility and opposition - civil servants went on strike

• State bank and treasury refused to give over money, took 10 days and armed forces to make bank staff open vaults

• Little control over rural areas

• Power base had only 200,000 members and disintegrating army that were unhappy with ongoing war

• Mensheviks controlled the railways

• Anarchy, drunken mobs and all previous problems still occurred.

How did Lenin deal with the problems he inherited after taking power?

• Establishment of the sovnarkom

• Early decrees

• Dealt with economy and state capitalism

• Dealt with opposition/set up the cheka (December 1917)

• Dissolved the constituent assembly

What was the sovnarkom?

• New governing body that consisted of commissariats led by commisars

• Set up on the 27th october

• Had 15 members made up of leading bolsheviks and a couple left wing SRs so it looked more democratic

• Lenin - chairman

• Trotsky - commissar for war

• Stalin - commissar for nationalists

• Membership of the sovnarkom was meant to come from local elections

• It was known as democratic centralism

Describe some of Lenin’s decrees

• October - decree on peace: immediate end to war, no compensation or loss of territory

• November - decree on land: free land, no compensation.

• decree on worker control- factory committees given the right to control production and suspend management 8hr day

• december - decree on equality and decree on nationalism: VESENKA established security, all foreign debts cancelled

• decree on religion- church and state separated

How did Lenin deal with the economy?

• Took control of the economy until it could be safely handed over to the proletariat (KNOWN AS STATE CAPITALISM)

• VESENKA set up to manage economy

• Nationalisation decree meant that small businesses (more than 10 workers) were nationalised

• by the mid 1970s most are nationalised

• However this caused much hostility

• VESENKA found it hard to deal with management and in nov 1918 council of labour and defence set up - chaired by Lenin

How did the cheka deal with opposition?

• Cheka set up in December 1917 and opposition press and all other newspapers except the bolsheviks were shut down

• Kadet party was outlawed and leading kadet ministers were arrested and 2 were brutally murdered

• SRs and Mensheviks were arrested

• Lenin actively encouraged class warfare and anyone suspected of being a bourgeoise was arrested

• Civil servants arrested

What happened to the constituent assembly when Lenin took power?

• Elections were planned for november, 40m vote. The bolsheviks only win 175 seats with the SRs winning 370.

• The first meeting of the assembly 5th jan was closed down due to the red guard

• Lenin claimed his government represented proletariat and dissolved the assembly

• crowds demonstrated

why were the bolsheviks divided over the end of war in 1918?

• Lenin- wanted immediate end to war even if terms were harsh

• Trotsky- Neither peace nor war. he wanted to open peace negotiations and have a temporary ceasefire

• Bukharin - wants a revolutionary war, wanted the russian soldiers to spread the socialist revolution into germany

What happened with the treaty of brest litovsk?

• Trotsky made long drawn out speeches

• The german army advance 150 miles in 5 days and were threatening petrograd

• 3rd march 1918 was signed. Russia lose poland, finland, latvia, lithuania, estonia and the ukraine.

• They lose 1/6 of the population, 27% farmland, 54% industry, 89% coal mines

• had to pay germany 6 billion

what were the reactions to the treaty of brest litovsk?

• Outrage

• anger at bolsheviks

• seen as shameful

• many join anti bolshevik forces

• meant that civil war was imminent

what are some reasons they reds won the civil war?

• geographical factors

• leadership

• unity and organisation

• support

• millitary

• propaganda

• foreign intervention

why did geographical factors help the reds win the civil war?

• whites were geographically dispersed

• they therefore couldn’t coordinate their actions and had to move on horseback as they had no telephone links

• the areas whites controlled were scarcely populated so they could not recruit

• reds help petrograd and moscow which were centres of industrial and armaments production

• reds controlled the railway in moscow

why did leadership help the red win?

• whites had no leafy that was a match for trotsky

• the whites had no coherent plan or analysis of tactic

• the reds had a unified command structure and trotsky reorganised the army and brought in more discipline

why did unity and organisation help the reds win the civil war?

• white leaders struggled to cooperate and coordinate their activities

• the whites were all fighting for different reasons and were split on their views of national minorities

• In the east the SRs and mensheviks couldn’t agree on how to govern - SRs stage revolts against kolchak

• The reds were unified in command structure and ranks were introduced

how did support help the reds win the civil war?

• whites were deeply antisemitic and killed 50,000 jews in pogroms

• whites identify with old tsarist order so fail to provide an attractive vision, they also antagonise national minorities

• denikin fails to get don cossacks support

• peasants more inclined to support the reds as land taken was reassured

• the reds were pragmatic about nationalists desire for independence

how did military help the red win?

• whites were indisciplined and corruption was rife, in omsk weapons and uniforms were sold on the black market

• the reds outnumbered the whites even though at one point there were 500,000 whites

• trotsky could assemble men to force yudenik to retreat

• discipline was harsh in red army - death penalty

how did foreign intervention help the reds win?

• the whites were dependant on foreign intervention but it was never enough to win, also made the reds look better

• reds used the foreign intervention as propaganda and tried to paint themselves as the protectors of russian soil

why was war communism introduced in summer 1918?

• problems in industry - workers committe incapable of running factories, consumer goods shrank in bolshevik held control areas, shortage of raw materials led to inflation, value of rouble collapsed

• problems in agriculture - sood shortages as peasants stop supplying food to cities as money was worthless, wheat production areas in ukraine were outside of the bolshevik control, feb 1918 bread ration in petrograd reached 50g per day

• problems in red army - workers flee to find food so no munitions, lack of food for them and shortage of weapons

key features of war communism

• grain requisitioning - may 1918 started, squads sent into countryside to force peasants for grain, brutal treatment, thousands arrested and sent to labour camps or hanged, short term success as workers received food and industrial producing rose however peasant resistance continued and grain was hidden, many also joined green armies

• banning of private trade - banned and full state control of industry introduced to ensure production was focused on meeting war demands, industry was not producing enough, black market grew

• nationalisation of industry - brought under state control under vesenka, worker committees replaced by specialists who were the old bourgeois managers, return of lower pay and longer hours leads to bitterness

• labour discipline - harsh worker discipline in factories, fines for lateness or abscenteenism, piecework rate introduced and workbooks which had to be stamped, internal passports to stop leaving, increased bitterness, but many motivated to work harder for bonuses

• rationing- class based and industrial labour force and red army were priority, smaller rations to civil service and least was given to the middle class, bitterness from some, many others were motivated to work

what was the wider impact of war communism?

• Black market grew as only 1/3 of peoples diet came from the state rations, workers travelled to countryside with goods to bargain for food, railways congested with bagmen that moved between cities.

• hardship, food was so scarce people ate horses, 2%wages of 1913 levels and ¾ workers income went on food. 1919-20 freezing winter and 3000 petrograd houses stripped of water so people used pumps which led to sewage and disease spreading

• destructions of old class hierarchy, palaces and townhouses of rich were taken over and divided up between poor, members of aristocracy made to clean the street and mc were discriminated against, many leave country

before the red terror, what measures were already introduced?

• suppression of press - censorship

• banning of political opposition

• establishment of cheka

• encouragement of class warfare

• purge of civil service - replaced by bolshevik officers

why was the red terror introduced?

• workers - angry and increasing opposition as a result of food shortages and harsh labour discipline. protests increasing and calls for new soviet elections and an overthrow of the sovnarkom

• peasants - refusing to give grain

• lefts SRs - angry at bolshevik for signing treaty of BL, turned to terrorism and shoot german ambassador july 1918, they shoot lenin august 1918 and murder 2 bolshevik leaders

what was the cheka and their aims and actions?

• formed december 1917

• led by felix dzerzhinsky

• aims were to terrify all hostile social groups

• their actions were arresting all social oppositions, used terror, fate was decided by class/origin/education/occupation , they want to wipe out mc completely

key features of the red terror

• arrests - terrifying and random, often based on hearsay or being an acquaintance of suspect, no right of appeal and lack of central control

• execution - became the rule, prisoners in cities and anyone accused of opposition was shot, between 1919 and 1920 300,000 deaths

• concentration and labour camps - set up by the cheka, rebellious peasants and mc bourgeois

• war against peasants - cheka helped grain requisition, left peasants starving, uprisings and peasants stop planting grain which leads to 1000’s being executed

• trotsky - ended trade unions and 1920 workers brought under millitary discipline on the same terms as soldiers, forbidden to ask questions or negotiate rates of pay, army reforms

• romanov family death - 17th july 1918 in ekaterinburg by a cheka detachment, lenin tried to distance himself to avoid being antagonised by foreign powers

what were the 1921 crises?

• economic problems - soviet economy in ruins and war communism could no longer be justified, transport system nearly collapsed and production fell to alarming levels, grain production low, large sectors not willing to put up w war time policies

• worker opposition - 22nd jan 1921 bread ration cut by 1/3 in cities, food demonstrations and soldiers refusing to fire on crowds, communist party spokesmen shouted down at worker meetings, workers mad at food shortages and political commisars spying on them

• famine - combination of requisitioning drought and war caused national famine, pravda admitted 1921 that 1 in 5 were starving, grain harvests in 1920 1921 produced less than half of 1913, bolsheviks accept foreign intervention from usa - american relief association - came too late , ½ factories shut out of 10 million

• peasant opposition - tambov region revolt 1920-21 for over a year the bolsheviks were cut off, attack red army requisitioning brigades and used guerilla warfare, green armies were hard for bolsheviks to defeat, by end of 1920, 8000 brigade members had been killed, took 100,000 to defeat tambov

• division in party - workers opposition led by alexandra kollontai want workers to take more control over their own affairs, they critique trotskys plan to make trade unions agencies of the state, trade union debate caused furious arguments within party, trotsky and bukharin wanted to continue policy of war communism, trotsky wanted to draft army into militarised labour force

what was the kronstadt rising and why was it significant?

• february 1921, thousands of sailors from kronstadt naval base mutinied and demonstrated for greater freedoms, lenin sends in team of political commisars but they are treated with opposition, march- the committee of sailors and workers produce kronstadt manifesto and ask for new elections, freedom of speech and press, right for trade unions, end of political parties being banned. this worried the bolsheviks as the kronstadt sailors had been loyal to them, trotsky offers red army to prepare to cross kronstadt. an ultimatum was refused so 60,000 storm baser and leaders were shot, rebels hunted down into labour camps

• significant as lenin responded by softening the war communism and march 1921 he introduced the New Economic Policy (NEP) but he was not able to make political concessions so made control even tighter

key features of the nep

• small workshops could be privately owned

• state control heavy industry

• grain requisitioning stopped and replaced by a tax

• peasants sell surplus grain

• ban lifted off private trade

• rationing ended

• return to foreign trade

how was the nep justified by lenin?

• temporary measure and bolsheviks still controlled the commanding heights of the economy ie the heavy industry

• shows pragmatism

• compared it to the treaty of BL - a temporary but necessary evil

• must appease peasants

how did the NEP cause divisions?

• trotsky and the left - feel worried by it as trotsky believed that war communism was the main way to deal with the issues, he described nep as the first sign of the degeneration of bolshevism

• bukharin and the right and kamenev and zinoviev - support it as a temporary measure but disagreed with it at first, believed that the greater amount of persons with money the more industry it accumulated

what was the economic impact of the nep?

• grain harvest inc from 37.6m tonnes 1921 to 51.4m 1924

• wages rose from 10.2 roubles 1921 to 20.8 roubles 1924

• nep produced an economic balance

• cities were fed and foreign trade inc and small scale private industries did well

• over 25,000 private traders in moscow by 1923

• by 1924 the industry had recovered

• high unemployment in urban areas

• trotsky speaks about scissor crisis caused by revival of agriculture as food prices dropped

• peasants sell at low prices

social impact of the nep?

• peasants do well

• corruption, bribery, crime

• grain prices fall in 1923

• wages remain low overall

• little protection for workers

political impact of nep?

• confrontation between the supporters and critics of nep was averted by the upturn in the economy

• reduction in peasant revolts

• trotsky declined to serve on a scissor committee, his argument was strengthened by the failure of gosplan to formulate a national economic party

• split into rightists and leftists after lenin’s death which ensured a power struggle

How did the bolsheviks become more centralised and less democratic between 1921 and 1924?

• early centralisation - sovnarkom

• party domination of government - politburo formed 1919 took precedence over key decision making, local soviets have ballot rigging and intimidation to ensure bolsheviks are in key positions

• party centralisation - politburo 7-9 members, lenin enrollment: new members often from peasant back groups recruited from 1920-22 they join to improve life chances and by 1919 39% of party were in the army. government membership was seen as a way to become socially mobile

• nomenclatura - ensure loyalty to centre and further control. list of 5500 key positions of pro bolshevik worker positions. keen to tow party line to gain promotions

what were the reasons and consequences for centralisation?

• reasons - divisions began to emerge in the party over nep, nature of gov and international revolution. civil war and recruiting chaos, emergency divisions needed to be made quick by a few people- continued after war. local areas needed to be brought under more control and not controlled buy a mafia or black marketeer who didnt listen to the centre

• consequences - by 1924, much more authoritarian and centralised and members were less likely to challenge, party detached itself from proletariat base and was mainly mc, party membership inc from 720,000 in 1921 to over a million by 1928. led to divisions and trotsky said the party had become too bureaucratised

evaluate lenin as a leader

• april thesis - shows he is pragmatic and opportunist

• october revolution - is able to portray kerenskys attack on newspapers as counter revolutionary and he then seizes power on 27th october. persuasive and opportunist

• creation of the one party state - jan 1918 elections result in bolsheviks getting 175 seats SRs get 370. shuts down the constituent assemble and shows he is power hungry, inflexible and unprincipled

• treaty of brest litovsk- humiliating terms led to a national outrage and many begin preparing for an armed uprising. shows he is pragmatic and unprincipled

• civil war - war communism was harsh, cheka brutal. shows lenin is cruel and harsh

• NEP - justified as being the only way to keep power. shows he is pragmatic and opportunist. he changes what he says accordingly

• government and constitutions - cruel, selfish, power hungry