Page 315 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

1616 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

government was exceedingly reluctant to share political in the large cities and among workers and soldiers.Their
power with other groups in society. As a result, various program, drawn up by Lenin, was far closer to the mood
groups of revolutionaries emerged—many of them com- of the masses than that of the provisional government.
mitted to socialism. Their activities only worsened the It called for immediate peace, confiscation of land-
growing tensions of Russian society. However, the pres- owners’ estates, workers’ control in the factories, self-
sures of World War I—massive casualties and eco- determination for non-Russian nationalities, and “all
nomic breakdown—prompted mass demonstrations in power to the soviets,” which meant the overthrow of the
the capital, St. Petersburg. Women, workers, students, provisional government. Lenin insisted that the Bolshe-
and soldiers took to the streets in February 1917. Even viks seize formal state power from the increasingly
the czar’s most loyal supporters deserted him.These cir- unpopular provisional government. On the night of
cumstances caused Nicholas II to vacate the Russian October 24–25, Bolshevik-led armed forces took control
throne. of major centers in St. Petersburg, but they did so in the
name of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, which was
Social Upheaval then assembling in the city. Thus, the Bolsheviks pre-
When the Russian monarchy collapsed, power was sented their takeover as a defense of the revolution and
assumed by a provisional government, a coalition of lead- as a way of bringing a government of the soviets to
ing middle-class liberals from the Duma and representa- power. So unpopular had the provisional government
tives of several mainstream socialist parties, the become that people put up little initial resistance to
Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries. Although this what the Bolsheviks called the “October Revolution.”
new Russian government dismantled much of the old During the next several months Bolshevik-led soviets in
czarist state and promised a democratic constitution, its many other cities also seized power and joined the revo-
failure to end the economic chaos, to distribute land to lution, at some times peacefully and at other times
the peasants, and to remove Russia from World War I violently.
opened the gates to a massive social upheaval during the
summer and early autumn of 1917. Soldiers deserted in Civil War
growing numbers; peasants began to seize the estates of Few people thought that the radical Bolsheviks could
their landlords; urban workers created highly popular maintain power.Within six months the Bolsheviks found
grass-roots organizations called “soviets” to manage local themselves in a bitter civil war against a variety of
affairs and to challenge official state authorities; minor- enemies—supporters of the czarist regime, middle-class
ity ethnic groups demanded autonomy or independence. liberals who favored the provisional government, and
Russia was coming unglued and the provisional govern- even a number of socialists who were offended at the Bol-
ment increasingly discredited. sheviks’ unilateral seizure of power.Three years of bitter
fighting ensued before the Bolsheviks staggered to victory
The Bolshevik Takeover in 1921, their hold on Russia, soon to be renamed the
These circumstances created an opening for a small rad- “Soviet Union,” finally secure. Their opponents were
ical socialist party that was known as the “Bolsheviks” divided, and some of them—known generally as the
and that was led by the highly disciplined and ferociously “Whites”—wanted to restore lost properties to the land-
revolutionary Vladimir Ilich Lenin. As the only major lords. The Bolsheviks’ identification with the popular
socialist party that had not affiliated with the provi- soviets and their willingness to endorse peasant seizure
sional government, it alone was untainted by the failures of land gave them an edge in competing for mass sup-
of that government.Thus, the Bolsheviks grew rapidly in port. Their ability to integrate a number of lower-class
popularity and in numbers of party members, especially men into the newly formed Red Army and into new