WAYS THE BOLSHEVIKS CONSOLIDATED POWER
BREST-LITOVSK
lost Ukraine - breadbasket of Russia
lost Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Bessarabia, Georgia, Belarus
lost 2 million square km of land
lost a sixth of the population
lost 62 million people
lost 26% of Russian railway lines
lost 74% of its iron ore and coal supplies
had to pay 3 billion in war reperations - not a term but payment needed to get treaty in place
failure of Trotsky’s ‘no war no peace’
Russian black fleet disbanded
had to return 630,000 Prisoners of War
occurred as Germans had taken 63,000 prisoners and 2600 artillery pieces and 5,000 machine guns in under 2 weeks
Trotsky stalled in peace negotiations - replaced by Chicherin as Commissar for war
terms only agreed by a majority of 1 in the Sovnarkom so SRs disagree and walk out, now a 1 party state
officially become a communist party in March 1918
treaty is the third March 1918
initial slogan - peace, land and bread
Lenin described it as a ‘robber peace’ and people had to accept the ‘naked truth’
Hindenburg complained that Trotsky acted as though the Russians were the victors rather than the defeated party
Bolsheviks used propaganda to try and stir up mutiny in the German arny
ratified by an emergency Party Congress
only went through after Lenin threatened to resign twice, Bukharin, Kamenev and Dzerzinsky all vote aginst it and it only went through by a majority of 1
ESTABLISHING OF GOVERNMENT
Post Brest-Litovsk SRs walk out so Russia officially becomes a one party state
5th January 1918 - CA meets and never again
5th Jan - Kadets banned for expressing approval for Kaledin (a Cossack general who had begun a counter-revolutionary rebellion in the Don region
Bols propose that the meeting be chaired by left Wing SR Maria Spiridovna but overuled by the right wing who chose Chernov
CA forcibly closed
Lenin’s book - ‘the state and revolution’ he argued that a strong party was needed to ‘ptovide for the dictatorship of the proleteriat and crush and bourgoisie attitudes or values that remained after the revolution’
Lenin claims his government represented the people and a ‘higher form of democracy’
Previously - attacked Kerensky for postponing elections for a constituent assembly, Lenin permits them to go ahead in November 1917
41 million votes cast
Lenin ‘we must not be decieved by the election figures. Elections prove nothing’
Nov 2nd, Kerensky’s forces are defeated
Nov 3rd, Kremlin taken ending a 10 day battle for Moscow, Lenin issues an ultimatum to the Bol party to accept the new gov, Kamenev, Rykov and Zinoviev left and Sverdlov replaced Kamenev as Chairman of the Sovnarkom
July 1918 - first soviet constiturtion for the ‘Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic’, stated that the supreme power rested with the All-Russian Congress of soviets (which was made up of local elected Soviets), the Congress was also to be the ‘supreme order of power’ and elect the Sovnarkom
Limitations of the consitution - vote reserved for the ‘toiling masses’, wokers vote was weighted in proportion of 5 to 1 of the peasants vote, Sovnarkom officially appointed by the congress, in practice it was the CC, Congress only met at intervals so executive authority remained with the Sovnarkom, centralised
March 1918 - Capital is moved to Moscow
March 1918 (following BL) adopt the title of the ‘Communist Party’
The constitution welcomed non-russian nationalities that were are a part of the old russian empire, a sensitive issue because there were many people these groups who didn’t want to be a part of a russian controlled state, but whether or not they should be forced to join this new organisation pr not was a source of friction amongst the leading Bolsheviks (July 1918)
Sovnarkom est on the 27th OCT
27th OCT - adopted resolutions - transfer of power from provinces to local soviets, freeing of those imprisoned by the Provisional Government, abolition of the death penalty at the front, immediate arrest of Kerensky,
500 out of 670 delegates voted in favour of a socialist government
EARLY TERROR
January 1918 workers are put in charge of the railways
old red guard was demolished, new red army of workers and peasants
Trotsky is put in charge of the red guard from March 1918
volunteer red guard help with October revolution
red army - new professional force also led by Trotsky
oct 29th - army cadet rising in Petrograd against the Bolsheviks, was defeated by Trotsky’s red guard
oct 29th - Exec committee of Railway men demanded a united socialist government and refused to transport food, Lenin ignored the demand and protest died down
religous printing presses were closed
Feb 1918 - shift to the Gregorian Calender (statement against religious practices)
took 10 days and the threat of armed intervention for the state bank to hand over its reserves
Kerensky had set up a new HQ in Gatchina and rallied and army compromising 18 cossack regiments and a small army of SR cadets and officers
Many soldiers from the Petrograd garrison returned to their homes in the countryside immediately after the revolution and Lenin had no direct contact with troops and his forces were smaller in number - Bol position appeared weak
USE OF DECREES
PEACE - call for an immediate truce and ‘just peace; with not indemnities and annexations, aimed to pull Russia out of the war (26th OCT), an armstice followed in November, accompanied by an official demobilisation process in December
LAND - gave peasants the right to take over estates of the gentry, without compensation and to decide for themselves the best way to divide it up, land could no longer be bought, sold or rented and belonged to the ‘entire people’, called the policy of the ‘socialisation of land’ (27th OCT) reduced peasant support for the SRs
WORKERS CONTROL - factory committees given the right to control production and financial in the workplace and to ‘supervise’ management, only given to factory workers, not other groups eg Engineers
NATIONALITY - gave the right of self determination to the national minorities in the former Russian Empire, purely a paper measure as the Bolsheviks did not have control of the areas in which most of these people lived
SEPERATION - church and state were also seperated but religion was not banned, Russia became a secular state with the gov giving no further support to the Orthodox church, removed the church’s judicial powers and its right to own property and many of its assets were seized, religious printing presses were closed down and clergy disenfranchised and left without civil rights and subject to persecution. Some priests were drafted into the red army, including some prominent bishops and moved to the Gregorian calendar
WORKERS - established a max 8hr working day (Oct 1917)
PRESS - banned the opposition press (Oct 1917)
RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLE OF RUSSIA - abolished titles and class ranks
NEW ECONOMIC SYSTEM
Veshenka is established in December 1917
Golero established in 1920
LENIN - communism equals soviet power plus electrification
State Capitalism - halfway house between capitalism and communism
SC - only ran in 1918 (spring to summer)
1918 bread ration in Petrograd was 50g per person per day
typhus epidemic killed 3 million in 1920
5 million dead in civil war, 350k due to conflict
60% of Petrograd workforce left by April 1918
2/3 of workers used blackmarket for food
Jan 1917- Jan 1919 Russia’s urban proleteriat declined from 3.6 million to 1.4 million
KEY MISC DATES:
OCT 1917 - max 8hr day for workers, opposition press banned, decree on peace, social insurance introduced, decree on land
NOV 1917 - right to self determination granted to all parts of the former russian empire, abolition of titles and class distinctions, workers to control factories, abolition of justice system, women are equal to men and able to own their own property
DEC 1917 - Cheka est, banks nationalised, church land nationalised, marriage and divorce become civil matters, democatisation of army, army control army, officers elected, soviets, soldiers committees and abolitions of ranks
JAN 1918 - creation of red army