Topic 3: The civil war and Lenin
The constituent Assembly
- bolsheviks hoped they would win the elections however they received fewer votes
than SR
- Lenin believed that the Bolsheviks would not be able to consolidate power through
future elections.
- Uses military force to end it
Lenin's Decrees
Decree on Peace issued an immediate truce and a peaceful settlement of WW
Important as it over the support of the SR
Decree on land
- Sanctioned a requisition f private land of peasants
Decree on workers' control
- An attempt to assert government authority over the factories which had been seized
by workers
The Civil War forces- strengthen and weakness
Causes of the Civil war
- Opposition to the bolsheviks united- religious groups, landowners and Tsar &
supporters into the White
- Foreign Troops from Britain, Japan, the USA and France invaded and supported the
whites - wanted Russia to fight among each other
A consequence of the Civil war
- Many civilians were killed by both Red and white terror- 21 million deaths
- Fighting affected agriculture and industry- 50% of land was farmed due to war
- 1921- serious famines- 5 million died
The whites and Foreign Intervention and the Greens
The Red Army's strengths and weaknesses
Red strengths
- Remained control of a concentrated central area of western Russia, maintained their
inner communication and supply lines
- Petrograd and Moscow remind in their hands throughout the war as did most of the
railways
- Red army was brilliantly organised and led by Trotsky
The reasons for victory- war communism and Terror- Red success/ white failures
- Summer 1918, Lenin introduced a series of harsh restrictive economic measures.
Were laws to help Bolsheviks win the Civil war
- War communism was a economic policy to ensure food supplies to the army
- All large factories were taken over by the government
- Production was planned and organised by the government
- Discipline for workers were strike and strikers could be shot
, - Peasants had to hand over food surpluses could be shot
Reasons why red won
- White armies were spread out over Russia- they were no co-ordination or united
attacks on the reds
- Leadership
- Trotsky was a very skilful leader motivating the troops and organising them into a
disciple force
- No white force leader matched trotsky strategy his tactics and ability yo sustain
morale in troops
- White leaders struggled to co-operate and to coordinate their activities. Purely due to
geographical drpstsrion and not having common aims
Strategy and Tactics
- Maintaining lines of communication within the red army, breaking supply lines to
white army groups preventing them from co-ordinating their activity
- Controlling and maintaining the railways -=
Resources
- Reds controlled the industrial centres in Russia and hence were able to quickly
produce munitions to support the army. White had to rely on foreign supply
- Whites did not have one aim- all wanted different things from the civil war some
wanted the Tsarist regime back
Reasons the Whites lost
- The tsar and his family were executed so the whites had no one to take over power
- White terror - White army killed over 100,000 Jews and many other civilians- made
people support communist
The murder of the Tsar
- Cheka was executed without trial of the Romanov family in July 1928
- Lenin wanted to ensure that there was no chance of a royal heir surviving to become
a figurehead in the counter-revolution
The red terror
- The Cheka was the secret police force that dealt with opposition to the revolution
- Clamming down on groups considered of displaying ‘bourgeois’ elements and
counter-revolutionary
- Cheka used terror to victimise people (under Trotsky and Dzerzhinsky)
- Cheka implemented the Red Terror
This involved
- Enforcing War communism
- Elimination of kulaks
- Administration of Gulag labour camps
- Militarisation of labour camps
The Kronstadt Rising
-Failure in economy because of war communism, created anti bolsheviks rising
- Two prominent Bolsheviks, Alexander Shlyapnikov, Alexandra Kollontai, led a workers
opposition movement against war communism
1921 thousands of petrograd workers crossed to the naval base on Kronstadt
- Demanded that workers should not be better, not worse, off than in the tsratist
regime
The constituent Assembly
- bolsheviks hoped they would win the elections however they received fewer votes
than SR
- Lenin believed that the Bolsheviks would not be able to consolidate power through
future elections.
- Uses military force to end it
Lenin's Decrees
Decree on Peace issued an immediate truce and a peaceful settlement of WW
Important as it over the support of the SR
Decree on land
- Sanctioned a requisition f private land of peasants
Decree on workers' control
- An attempt to assert government authority over the factories which had been seized
by workers
The Civil War forces- strengthen and weakness
Causes of the Civil war
- Opposition to the bolsheviks united- religious groups, landowners and Tsar &
supporters into the White
- Foreign Troops from Britain, Japan, the USA and France invaded and supported the
whites - wanted Russia to fight among each other
A consequence of the Civil war
- Many civilians were killed by both Red and white terror- 21 million deaths
- Fighting affected agriculture and industry- 50% of land was farmed due to war
- 1921- serious famines- 5 million died
The whites and Foreign Intervention and the Greens
The Red Army's strengths and weaknesses
Red strengths
- Remained control of a concentrated central area of western Russia, maintained their
inner communication and supply lines
- Petrograd and Moscow remind in their hands throughout the war as did most of the
railways
- Red army was brilliantly organised and led by Trotsky
The reasons for victory- war communism and Terror- Red success/ white failures
- Summer 1918, Lenin introduced a series of harsh restrictive economic measures.
Were laws to help Bolsheviks win the Civil war
- War communism was a economic policy to ensure food supplies to the army
- All large factories were taken over by the government
- Production was planned and organised by the government
- Discipline for workers were strike and strikers could be shot
, - Peasants had to hand over food surpluses could be shot
Reasons why red won
- White armies were spread out over Russia- they were no co-ordination or united
attacks on the reds
- Leadership
- Trotsky was a very skilful leader motivating the troops and organising them into a
disciple force
- No white force leader matched trotsky strategy his tactics and ability yo sustain
morale in troops
- White leaders struggled to co-operate and to coordinate their activities. Purely due to
geographical drpstsrion and not having common aims
Strategy and Tactics
- Maintaining lines of communication within the red army, breaking supply lines to
white army groups preventing them from co-ordinating their activity
- Controlling and maintaining the railways -=
Resources
- Reds controlled the industrial centres in Russia and hence were able to quickly
produce munitions to support the army. White had to rely on foreign supply
- Whites did not have one aim- all wanted different things from the civil war some
wanted the Tsarist regime back
Reasons the Whites lost
- The tsar and his family were executed so the whites had no one to take over power
- White terror - White army killed over 100,000 Jews and many other civilians- made
people support communist
The murder of the Tsar
- Cheka was executed without trial of the Romanov family in July 1928
- Lenin wanted to ensure that there was no chance of a royal heir surviving to become
a figurehead in the counter-revolution
The red terror
- The Cheka was the secret police force that dealt with opposition to the revolution
- Clamming down on groups considered of displaying ‘bourgeois’ elements and
counter-revolutionary
- Cheka used terror to victimise people (under Trotsky and Dzerzhinsky)
- Cheka implemented the Red Terror
This involved
- Enforcing War communism
- Elimination of kulaks
- Administration of Gulag labour camps
- Militarisation of labour camps
The Kronstadt Rising
-Failure in economy because of war communism, created anti bolsheviks rising
- Two prominent Bolsheviks, Alexander Shlyapnikov, Alexandra Kollontai, led a workers
opposition movement against war communism
1921 thousands of petrograd workers crossed to the naval base on Kronstadt
- Demanded that workers should not be better, not worse, off than in the tsratist
regime
