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Advanced Higher History

From Tsarism toFrom Tsarism to StalinismStalinism1914-451914-45

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GLOSSARY

Central Committee Policy making body of Communist Party, elected by Party Congress, which then elects Politburo

Central Executive Committee

Policy making body of Soviet Government 1917-1936, elected by Congress of Soviets

Cheka Secret police 1917-1922

Chistka Purge of party membership

Cominform Communist Information Bureau, successor to Comintern from 1947-1955

Comintern Communist International, Moscow-based organisation of foreign communist parties, 1919-1943

Congress Annual meeting of party delegates

Council of Ministers Successor to Sovnarkom from 1946

Ezhovshchina The ‘Great Purge’ or ‘time of Ezhov’, head of NKVD

Gosplan State General Planning Commission on economy

GPU State Political Administration, secret police 1922-23

Gulag Chief Administration for Corrective Labour Camps from 1930, Soviet labour camp system

Kolkhoz Collective farm

Kulak Better off peasant who owned land

MGB Ministry of State Security, secret police 1946-53

MTS Machine Tractor Station

MVD Ministry of Internal Affairs from 1946

NEP New Economic Policy, replaced War Communism, 1921-29

NKVD Secret police 1934-46

OGPU Secret police 1923-34

From Tsarism to Stalinism, 1914-45From Tsarism to Stalinism, 1914-451

Orgburo Organisational Bureau of CC to 1952

Politburo Political Bureau, inner cabinet of CC

RSDLP Russian Social-Democratic Workers’ Party, Marxist party formed in Russia in 1898, split into Bolsheviks and Mensheviks in 1903

RSFRS Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic, 1918

Secretariat Body elected by Central Committee for administrative work of Communist Party

Soviet Elected council of soldiers, workers and peasants

Supreme Soviet Bicameral legislature, the Soviet of the Union and the Soviet of Nationalities, from 1936

Sovnarkom Council of People’s Commissars, government of RSFSR and USSR, from 1917

TsGAOR Central State Archive of the October Revolution, for primary Soviet state sources

TsPA IML Central Archive of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism, for primary Communist party sources

USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics

VSNKh Supreme Council of the National Economy

War Communism Political economy of the Civil War period 1918-1921

Zhdanovshchina Drive for ideological purity after 1946, ‘the time of Zhdanov’, secretary of the Central Committee


HISTORIANS AND EVIDENCEThere are five main periods in the development of Soviet approaches to historical writing on the history of the Russian revolution and Soviet regime.

1918-1931By 1920 the Bolshevik government had a virtual monopoly of source materials on the history of the Russian revolution and the establishment of Soviet power. Sources such as documents and memoirs were made available as and when it suited the government. These publications contained historical interpretations which suited the Soviet authorities at a given time. Nevertheless, 1918-1931 marks the formative period in Soviet historical writing, before Stalin imposed extremely strict controls in 1931. It was characterised by the relative freedom that was allowed in the publication of both primary and secondary works. Most of the material used by the first Western historians of the Russian revolution were published in this period.

Within the period there are several political landmarks which determined what Soviet historians wrote and what materials were published: Until 1920 the Soviet state was under threat by internal and external opponents.

The first historical works on the Russian revolution tried to emphasise that the Bolsheviks had seized power only in response to popular demand. This is the interpretation found in Trotsky’s The History of the Russian Revolution to Brest-Litovsk (1918) and John Reid’s Ten Days That Shook the World (1919).

By 1920 the Soviet regime had consolidated itself and had formed the Comintern to try to spread revolution throughout the rest of the world. The prestige of the Russian Communist party rested on the fact that it had carried out the first successful proletarian revolution. From 1920, therefore, the emphasis in Soviet historical writing on the Russian revolution was on how the Bolshevik party had planned and led the uprising in October 1917. Soviet historians contrasted the planning and leadership of the October revolution with the spontaneity of the revolution in February, at which none of the people then in power in the Soviet Union had been present.

Lenin’s death in 1924 marked the intensification of the Lenin cult. Lenin’s personal role in the Russian revolution was then stressed. One’s political standing in the Soviet hierarchy came to depend on having been a supporter of Lenin. Lenin’s Collected Works were published and became the framework for interpreting the history of the revolution.

Until 1923 Trotsky had been a revered figure in Soviet writing on the Russian revolution. His attacks on the Soviet leadership from 1923 onwards brought an end to this situation. After his political defeat in 1927, Trotsky was almost never mentioned in Soviet publications, so that his name all but disappeared from the historical record.

1931-1956This is the period in which Stalin dominated the field of Soviet historical writing and publication. In October 1931 Stalin sent a letter to the editorial board of the leading Soviet historical journal. It effectively put an end to all serious research and


publication on the modern history of Russia. In 1938 Stalin encouraged the publication of the book The History of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks). A Short Course, which outlined the history of the Russian revolutionary movement and the Soviet Union as Stalin wished it presented. No historian was allowed to write anything which conflicted with the interpretation of history contained in The Short Course. Nor could any historian mention anyone who was classed as an ‘enemy of the people’, i.e. a victim of the purges, or cite any work written by such a person. Access to state and party archives such as those in TsGAOR and TsPAIML, was severely restricted. The Stalin era was therefore a barren one for historians of Russian and Soviet history.

Western historians have made use of the following sources: Stalin’s collected works The communist press such as Pravda and Izvestiia, which were strictly censored

and contained a high content of propaganda The Smolensk Archive, which became availabe to Western historians after the

Second World War. It was abandoned by the Soviet authorities to the invading Nazis in June 1941, taken to Germany, then taken to the USA in 1945. It covers the years 1917-41

The Trotsky papers which were left by Trotsky to Harvard University The evidence of those who had fled from the brutalities of Stalin’ government.

There were the memoirs of emigres such as Trotskyists or Mensheviks, or defectors, such as the ex-NKVD officer, Alexander Orlov

Samizdat writings, by historians and writers living in the USSR. They did not conform to the official Communist Party version of events. Some suffered persecution. Their writings, though illegal, were read in the USSR, and circulated outside Russia.

Evidence from people who were outside the government, with no access to official documents needs to be treated with caution. Some interpretations tended to be biased against Communist rule under Stalin. However such evidence is still valuable. It gives an insight into the way government policy affected the lives of the people, and the viewpoints of people living at the time.

1956-1985This is the period beginning with Khrushchev’s ‘Secret Speech’ and ending with the reforms introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev. The worst restrictions imposed upon Soviet historians in the Stalin era were removed, allowing them to produce genuine work of historical research. Many areas still remained about which it was impossible to write or publish. Nevertheless, many works on the Russian revolution and the history of the USSR appeared at this time. In the west, Khrushchev’s own taped memoirs became available, and the work of dissident historians like Roy Medvedev and the oral history of Solzhenitsyn. There was also limited access to archives by Western historians. Many important works by Western historians were also published in this period.


1985-1991A fundamental change occurred in 1985 when Mikhail Gorbachev came to power. His policy of ‘glasnost’ allowed Soviet historians to investigate areas of Soviet history which had hitherto been forbidden, such as the murder of the tsar and his family in 1917, and the purges. A great deal of documentary material was published and new journals appeared specialising in making archival material public. Some of Trotsky’s works were re-published. Restrictions maintained were those designed to preserve the authority of the Communist party, and uphold its legitimacy to rule.

1991-Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, access to archives became relatively unrestricted for both Russian and foreign scholars. In the post-Communist period, materials which discredited the Communist past were widely circulated. The obstacles to publication of historical materials have now become largely financial as subsidies were ended and market relations introduced into the world of publishing.

Reassessments Every aspect of Russian and Soviet history, from political, economic and social

history to foreign policy is being re-examined at present. There are reassessments of the late Tsarist era in the light of new material. Soviet

officials went to great lengths to preserve Tsarist documents. Access to archives in the 1980s and the collapse of Leninism in the former Soviet

Union have led to a reassessment of Lenin. Documentation of his genealogy, his financial operations – German involvement in the funding of Bolshevik activity during the First World War and Soviet funding of foreign Communist Parties after it, his personal live, and the effects of his illness on his political judgement, are some aspects under consideration.

Evidence from records of the Politburo and Central Committee for 1928-53, Stalin’s personal archives and those of the NKVD secret police shed new light on Stalin’s leadership. State archives give valuable information on population statistics. The opening of the republican and provincial archives has provided new evidence on the nationalities question. The unearthing of mass graves has shed new light in the terror.


SECTION 1: THE BOLSHEVIK RISE TO POWER

The material in this part deals with the first content area in the syllabus:

The Bolshevik rise to power, including: the condition of Russian society in the years immediately before Revolution the February Revolution and Bolshevik reactions to it the nature and immediate consequences of the October Revolution.

Suggested reading (selected sample from full SCCC bibliography)

Hutchinson, J.F., Late Imperial Russia, 1890-1917, London: Longman 1999.

Lynch, Michael, Reaction and Revolutions: Russia 1881-1924, London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1999.

Williams, Beryl, Lenin, London: Longman, 2000.

Wood, Alan, The Origins of the Russian Revolution 1961-1917, London: Routledge, 1993.

Wood, Anthony, The Russian Revolution, London: Longman, 1999.

Issues for investigation/research The February Revolution: long and short term causes of discontent; importance of

the First World War; economic factors; weaknesses of the autocracy; nature of the revolution; ease with which the monarchy was overthrown; role of the Duma, liberals and socialists; role of the revolutionary parties; role of the army.

The Bolshevik reaction: factors in the decline of the Provisional Government; importance of the July Days and Kornilov revolt; role of Lenin; growth of support for the Bolsheviks.

The nature and immediate consequences of the October Revolution: coup d’etat or popular uprising; roles of Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin; the relatively bloodless nature; consolidation of power 1917 to early 1918.

Comparisons between the two revolutions: similarities and differences; roles of the armed forces, urban working class and peasantry.

The wider context: Soviet view of 1917 as part of an inevitable scientific process, theory of the betrayal of 1917 by Lenin’s successors.


TimelineRussians used the old-style Julian Calendar until February 1918. This was thirteen days behind the Western (Gregorian) calendar in the 20th century. Care must be taken to establish which calendar a particular source is using.

Date Event

1894 Nicholas II becomes Tsar

1898 Russian Social Democratic Party Labour Party formed

1903 RSDLP split into Bolsheviks and Mensheviks

1904-05 Russo-Japanese War

1905 Revolution

Tsar grants October Manifesto

1906 First Duma

1914 August: Russia enters the First World War

1915 September: Nicholas II takes command of the Russian armies

1916 May: Brusilov offensive

December: murder of Rasputin

1917 23 February: demonstrations in Petrograd

25 February: general strike

27 February: last Tsarist government resigns; army mutiny

27 February: Petrograd Soviet and Duma committee formed

2 March: Provisional Government formed

2 March: Nicholas II abdicates

3 March: Romonov monarchy replaced by republic

April: Lenin returns to Russia; April Theses put forward

June: Kerensky’s attack fails

3-5 July: July Days uprising fails

8 July: Kerensky becomes Prime Minister

26 August: Kornilov revolt fails

September: Bolsheviks gain majorities in Petrograd and Moscow soviets; Trotky becomes chairman of Petrograd Soviet

10 October: Lenin wins over Bolshevik Central Committee for rising

24-26 October: Bolsheviks overthrow Provisional Government

26 October: Lenin issues decree on land and peace; Soviet government formed; Stalin becomes Chairman for Nationalities in Sovnarkom

November: elections to constituent assembly held

December: armistice signed; Cheka created


The condition of Russian society in the years immediately before RevolutionA study of life in Russia before 1917 is important to an understanding of the events of 1917, in particular the causes and nature of the February Revolution. However students should avoid an in-depth study of the background period which will not be examined in itself. A possible framework for note-taking is given below.

Geography consult a map of the Russian Empire about 1900 to be found in most texts. size climate land use transport population

People nationalities peasants town workers church nobility Romanovs

Economic development development of industry problems of the urban working class impact of Word War One on town workers and peasants

Political developments Tsarist autocracy under Nicholas II rise of revolutionary groups; biographies of Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin to 1917 Russo-Japanese War 1905 Revolution October Manifesto development of the Dumas rise of opposition parties Stolypin’s reforms.

World War One reasons for Russian involvement military defeats 1914-17 role of the Tsar and Tsarina changing attitudes towards the war and mounting discontent.


The February Revolution and Bolshevik reactions to itOutbreak of the revolution Unrest began in January with demonstrations commemorating the anniversary of

Bloody Sunday in 1905. On 18 February workers at the Putilov armament works went on strike for higher wages. Other workers joined them, as rumours spread of another cut in bread supplies. Despite these signs of unrest, on 22 February the Tsar returned to military headquarters at Mogilev, over 400 miles away.

The February revolution started with a demonstration held in Petrograd on 23 February to mark International Women’s Day, and to protest against the shortage of foodstuffs and hardship caused by the war (Source 1A). Unexpectedly for the leaders of the political groups in the capital, the demonstrations continued on an increasing scale on subsequent days, as more and more workers went on strike. On 24 February street violence broke out among the 200,000 demonstrators. The Cossacks, traditional defenders of the Tsar, and the police, were sympathetic towards the crowds and unwilling to act against them.

On 25 February the city was paralysed by a general strike, yet the Tsarina’s letters to the Tsar still played down the seriousness of the situation (Source 1B). Nicholas ordered General Khabalov, military commander in Petrograd, to end the unrest.

On 26 February solders were ordered to fire on the demonstrators. Some did so and killed forty demonstrators. Others refused to obey orders. Rodzyanko, the Duma President, telegraphed the Tsar, to warn him of the seriousness of the situation and ask him to agree to political change (Source 1C). Nicholas II suspended the Duma, and set off for Petrograd.

On 27 February the last Tsarist government resigned. The Volinsky Regiment killed their officers and joined the crowds. Mutiny spread to other units. The desertion of the troops was the decisive factor for the fate of the tsarist regime.

Dual power In a situation of anarchy, the Duma set up a Provisional Committee to take over the

government. While the Committee met in one part of the Tauride Palace, the Petrograd Soviet of

Soldiers’, Sailors’ and Workers’ Deputies met in another part. This dual power between representatives of the old Duma, workers, soldiers and

sailors lasted until October.

Abdication of the Tsar On 1 March the Tsar’s train was diverted to Pskov, 100 miles from Petrograd, by

mutinous troops. Leading generals advised him to abdicate (Source 1D). He abdicated for himself

and his son, in favour of his brother, Michael, who also abdicated. On 3 March, 304 years of Romanov rule ended. Russia became a republic.


The Provisional Government in power The Duma set up a mainly liberal government with Prince George Lvov as Prime

Minister, to govern until elections were held for a constituent assembly. There were many divisions between the socialists such as Social Revolutionaries

and Mensheviks. The government had to share power with the Petrograd soviet, which issued Order

Number One (Source 1E).

Reforms Political prisoners were granted an amnesty. The secret police was abolished. An independent judiciary and trial by jury were introduced. The death penalty and exile were abolished. Discrimination based on religion, nationality or class was ended. Censorship was ended. Soldiers were granted civilian rights.

Discontent with the Provisional Government Elections for the Constituent Assembly were delayed, partly due to pressing

immediate problems. There was little progress over land reform, which angered the peasants. Many

began to seize the land for themselves. It was unable to improve the supply of food to the cities. Shortages and rising

prices led to riots. It failed to appease the national minorities. It decided to continue the war (Source 1F).

Lenin’s return Lenin was in exile in Switzerland in February 1917. Stalin and Kamenev, the first Bolshevik leaders to return to Petrograd from exile in

Siberia under the political amnesty, supported the Provisional Government. In April the Germans allowed Lenin to travel across Europe in a ‘sealed’ train.

Germany hoped that he would bring down the government and end Russia’s involvement in the war.


April Theses In Pravda, Lenin put forward his policy in his ‘April Theses’ (Source 1G). He won the support of Trotsky, a former Menshevik, who returned from exile, and

joined the Bolsheviks. He had been a leader of the Soviet in 1905. The central committee passed Lenin’s resolutions, on the understanding that the

Soviets should not take over until the Bolsheviks had a majority in them. The Bolsheviks got working class support using slogans ‘All Power to the Soviets’

and ‘Peace, Bread and Land’.

The July Days In May non-Bolshevik members of the Soviet participated with the government in

the formation of a coalition. In June Kerensky, now Minister of War, launched a new Russian attack which

failed. Army morale and discipline collapsed. There were mass desertions. In July Petrograd troops disobeyed a government order sending them to the front. On 3 July factory workers, soldiers and sailors from Kronstadt marched on the

Tauride Palace chanting a Bolshevik slogan, ‘All power to the Soviets’. Lenin was in Finland. The central committee only intervened on 4 July to give

cautious support. The Bolsheviks felt they had to join it as the demonstrators were using their slogans and hoped to further weaken the government.

Three days of rioting were ended using loyal troops from outside the city. Kerensky made a stand against the Bolsheviks and issued warrants for the arrest of

their leaders. Lenin fled to Finland, where he completed his major work, State and Revolution.

Trotsky was imprisoned. The party headquarters and Pravda were seized. A newspaper published damaging material purporting to be evidence of German finance to the Bolsheviks.

The Kornilov revolt Kerensky became prime minister of a second coalition government. Having put down a left wing revolt, he faced a right wing revolt. In August the

new commander-in-chief of the army, General Kornilov, tried to seize power by marching on Petrograd.

Kerensky turned to the Soviet for support. The Bolshevik Red Guard was armed in defence of the city.

Bolshevik appeals to Kornilov’s troops resulted in their refusal to obey him (Source 1H). He was arrested and the revolt collapsed.

The authority of Kerensky and the Provisional Government was further weakened. The Bolsheviks gained more support, and an armed Red Guard.


Primary SourcesSource 1A

On the eve of Woman’s Day…I was sent to…address a women’s meeting. I first spoke on the significance of Women’s Day, on the women’s movement in general, and then went on to discuss the current situation, stressing the need to refrain from isolated outbursts and act solely on the directions of the Party Committee…

One can imagine my astonishment and indignation when on the following day, 23 February…Comrade Nikifor Il’in informed us that several textile factories had gone on strike and that woman delegates had come to declare their support for the metal workers.

I was deeply aggrieved at the behaviour of the strikers; for one thing, it was a blatant disregard for the decisions of the District Committee of the Party, and for another I had urged restraint and discipline on the women workers just the night before, and suddenly they had gone on strike…But what was to be done; one would have to make the best of it. The meeting continued now with the Mensheviks and SRs present. We decided (albeit reluctantly) to support the women on strike, my argument being accepted that since we had decided to make our move, it was incumbent upon us to take the lead in the strike and the demonstrations.(from the memoirs of the Bolshevik V.N. Kayurov, Six Days of the February Revolution, Proletarskaya revolyutsiya, No. 1, 1923)

Source 1B…a hooligan movement, young people run and shout that there is no bread, simply to create excitement, along with workers who prevent others from working. If the weather were very cold they would probably all stay at home.(Alexandra to Nicholas, 25 February, 1917)

Source 1CThe situation is serious. The capital is in a state of anarchy. The government is paralysed; the transportation system has broken down; the supply systems for food and fuel are completely disorganised. General discontent is on the increase. There is disorderly shooting in the streets; some of the troops are firing at each other. It is necessary that some person enjoying the confidence of the country be entrusted immediately with the formation of a new government. There can be no delay. Any procrastination is fatal. (Telegraph to Nicholas II from Rodzianko, 26 February 1917)


Source 1D

I implore you to immediately make the decision which the Almighty will dictate to you; a delay threatens Russia with disaster. For the time being we manage to save the army from the disease that has infected Petrograd and Moscow…but further maintenance of military discipline cannot be guaranteed. Your Imperial Majesty loves Russia dearly, and for the sake of her integrity, of her independence, and for the sake of victory You should deign to make a decision which may give a peaceful and favourable issue to a situation which (has become) more than difficult.

(General M.V. Alekseev, Chief of Staff to Nicholas II, 2 March 1917)

Source 1ETo the garrison of the Petrograd District. To all soldiers of the Guard, army, artillery and fleet for immediate and precise execution, and to the workers of Petrograd for information.

The Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies has decided:

1.In all companies, battalions, regiments…and separate branches of military service of every kind and on warships immediately choose committees from the elected representatives of the soldiers and sailors

3.In all its political demonstrations a military unit is subordinated to the Soviets

4.The orders of the military commission of the State Duma are to be fulfilled only in those cases which do not contradict the orders…of the Soviet…

5.Arms of all kinds…must be at the disposition and under the control of the company and battalion committees and are not in any case to be given out to officers, even upon their demand.

(From Order No. 1 of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, 1 March 1917)

Source 1F

In the sphere of foreign policy, the cabinet…, faithful to the promises given by Russia, will strictly observe the international obligations entered into by the fallen regime…Faithful to the treaty that links her by indissoluble ties to her glorious Allies…the Government…, will devote all its energy to the achievement of victory.(From the Note of P.N. Miliukov, Minister of Foreign Affairs, to the Allied Governments, 4 March 1917)


Source 1G1. In our attitude toward the War, which on Russia’s side, also under the new

Govermnet of Lvov and Co. remains a predatory imperialistic war as a result of the capitalist character of this Government, ……we must … prove that without the overthrow of capital it is impossible to end the War with a truly democratic and not an annexationist peace.

2. The peculiarity of the present period in Russia is the transition from the first stage of the Revolution, which gave power to the bourgeoisie as a result of the insufficient class-consciousness and organisation of the proletariat, to its second stage, which must give power into the hands of the proletariat and the poorest classes of the peasantry.

3. No support to the Provisional Government, explanation of the complete falsity of all its promises…

4. Explanation to the masses that the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies is the only possible form of revolutionary government…

5. Not a parliamentary republic-to return to a parliamentary republic from the Soviets of Workers’ Deputies would be a retrograde step-but a republic of the Soviets of Workers’, Agricultural Labourers’ and Peasants’ Deputies throughout the country, from top to bottom. Abolition of the police, the army and the bureaucracy.The salaries of all officials, all of whom are to be elected and subject to recall at any time, not to exceed the average wage of a competent worker.

6. .…Confiscation of all land belonging to landlords.Nationalisation of all Land in the country, management of the land by local Soviets of Farmhands’ and Peasants’ Deputies…

(From V.I. Lenin’s April Theses, 4 April 1917)

Source 1H

General Kornilov has instigated a revolt against the revolution and the Provisional Government. He wants to restore the old regime and deprive the people of land and freedom. He is ready to open the front lines and betray the fatherland for the sake of his criminal goal.

Comrade Soldiers and Comrade officersThe revolution and the fatherland call upon you to perform your duty. Let everyone stand up, as one man, in defence of land and freedom. Not a single order of General Kornilov must be obeyed. Submit only to the orders of the Provisional Government, which is acting in full agreement with the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets of Workers’, Soldiers’, and Peasants’ Deputies; rally around them in a united family.(From an appeal by the All-Russian Soviet, 29 August 1917)


Historians’ views on the February RevolutionIssue: Was Nicholas overthown by anti-tsarist forces or did his own weaknesses as an individual and the weaknesses of his system of government force him to abdicate?

Source 1AA: The role of workers and soldiersThe February events were complex. The workers had rebelled, and the soldiers had refused to suppress them. But the strikes, demonstrations and mutiny could still have been quashed if coercive agencies had kept faith with Nicholas II. There was no popular certitude that the last knell of Romanov power had been tolled. What made the difference, finally, was that the middle-ranking enforcers of order on the streets had lost their will to use violence to maintain the status quo. In the meantime the revolutionary party activists shrugged off the worries they had felt since the ‘Okhrana’ had smashed their little groups in December 1916; and behind the scenes the elites of the Duma and big business were gleeful. The Allies quietly approved. But it was the workers and soldiers and not the politicians, administrators, generals, businessmen and ambassadors who acted. And a revolution requires action, audacious action. Action came in the form of strikes, demonstrations and mutiny in central Petrograd.

On 2 March, the bewildered Nicholas II agreed to abdicate. The ultimate pressure had been applied by a group of Duma politicians, who proceeded to form a Provisional Government.(Robert Service, The Russian Revolution 1900-1927, 1999, pp. 33-35)

Source 1BB: The importance of the war/weakness of the regimeThe two chief causes of the February revolution were the unsuccessful progress of the war and the weakness of the regime. Ostensibly, the Russian state collapsed suddenly, but its foundations had been eroded long before…As for the war, despite strategic failures, Russia’s position was not hopeless. The front had been stabilized far from the Russian capital and other vital centres…

Russia had not yet exhausted her material and human resources…

But the regime proved incapable of governing in a critical situation. Nicholas II’s decision on 6 August 1915 to assume the post of Supreme Commander did not help. Almost the entire cabinet of ministers had protested that the tsar’s decision could threaten both him and the monarchy. Nicholas was adamant, however, and departed for Staff Headquarters, leaving the capital to the hostile and venal groupings that had formed in his own entourage. In a country accustomed to one-man rule, the ‘domestic peace’ proclaimed by the Duma when war broke out soon evaporated.(Dmitri Volkogonov, Lenin Life and Legacy, 1991, p. 105)


Source 1CC: The conflict between society and stateThe February Revolution was the explosion of the two fundamental contradictions in Russia-the revolt of the masses against established order and the irreconcilable conflict between ‘society’ and ‘state’. The process…had steadily progressed after 1905 under the impact of the successful modernisation undertaken by Russia. The outbreak of the First World War at first appeared to halt this process - the liberals pledged to support the government in its effort to win the war and the ‘sacred union’ seemed to close the gap between state and society. The workers’ strike movement that had appeared to be approaching a clash with the regime was silenced at the outbreak of the war. But internal peace did not last more than a year. Once the crack appeared in the monolith after the first humiliating defeat of the Russian army, the war that had initially cemented all segments of society together began to rip them apart with ferocious force.(Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, The February Revolution: Petrograd, 1917, 1981, p. 569) Source 1DD: The role of the army and dumaFebruary was not a ‘workers’ revolution’: industrial labour played in it the role of a chorus that reacted to and amplified the actions of the true protagonist, the army. The mutiny of the Petrograd garrison stimulated disorders among the civilian population unhappy over inflation and shortages. The mutiny could have been contained had Nicholas chosen to quell it with the same brutality Lenin and Trotsky employed four years later. When the generals and Duma politicians persuaded him that he had to go to save the army and avert a humiliating capitulation, he acquiesced. The record leaves no doubt that the myth of the tsar being forced from the throne by the rebellious workers and peasants is just that. The tsar yielded not to a rebellious populace but to generals and politicians…from a sense of patriotic duty.(Richard Pipes, Russia under the Bolshevik regime, 1995, p. 497)

Source 1EE: The victory of the Bolshevik-led proletariatLeon Trotsky, a brilliant chronicler of the revolution, posed the question, ‘Who led the revolution?’ He concluded that a handful of Bolsheviks had given it the necessary guiding spirit. In his version of the story, the nameless workers who had taken to the streets were acting in the name of the Bolsheviks. Even a cursory examination shows this view to be untenable, for it is absurd to assume that the workers needed the Bolsheviks to tell them that they were hungry and tired of the war. There is no evidence whatever to demonstrate that class-conscious revolutionaries played an important role during those chaotic days. But even if we conceded this point to Trotsky, it would make little difference. The important event in February was not the workers’ demonstration; it was the soldiers’ refusal to obey. Once the chain of command and the bonds of authority were broken, the imperial order collapsed…(P. Kenez, A History of the Soviet Union from the Beginning to the End, 1999, p. 16)


The nature and immediate consequences of the October RevolutionGrowing support for the Bolsheviks On 23 September Trotsky was elected chairman of the Petrograd Soviet. By September the Bolsheviks were in control of both the Petrograd and Moscow

Soviets, though they were still in a minority in the country as a whole. Kerensky set up a new government and arranged for elections to be held in

November for a Constituent Assembly. Lenin wanted to act before the elections, and before the opening of the Second

Congress of Soviets (Source 1I). On 10 October he persuaded a reluctant Central Committee that the time was right to seize power.

Objections by Zinoview and Kamenev (Source 1J) were published in a newspaper, alerting the public and government to Bolshevik plans for a rising.

Preparations Trotsky, persuaded the Soviet to set up a Military Revolutionary Committee under

his leadership to plan the revolution. Bolshevik headquarters were set up at the Smolny Institute. Trotsky won over some army units in Petrograd, and got others to stay neutral. Workers were armed with weapons from the fortress of St Peter and Paul. Kerensky tried to close down Bolshevik newspaper offices and to get the cruiser

Aurora near the Winter Palace to put to sea. His counter-measures failed. In parliament he had lost the support of the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries.

The revolution in Petrograd During the night of 24 to 25 October (6 to 7 November new style), Red Guards

occupied all key points in Petrograd. On 25 October Kerensky escaped to raise troops from the front, while the

Provisional Government held out in the Winter Palace. Trotsky announced that the Provisional Government had been overthrown (Source

1K). During the night the Bolsheviks occupied the Winter Palace. They were

disorganised but most of the defenders, a womens battalion and officer cadets, gave up without a fight. The ministers were arrested.

On 26 October Lenin announced in the All-Russian Congress of Soviets the setting up of a new government, and his decrees on peace and land.

The rest of Russia After a week of fighting in Moscow, the Soviet gained control. By the end of November other cities were under Bolshevik control. There was further resistance in the country. It was another four years before the

Bolsheviks were in complete control of Russia.


Immediate consequencesIt was expected that all power would be transferred to the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets. However the second Congress of Soviets set up an all-Bolshevik government, the Council of People’s Commissars (Sovnarkom). Lenin was Chairman, Trotsky Commissar for Foreign Affairs, and Stalin Commissar for Nationalities. In theory it was responsible to the people through the All-Russian Congress of Soviets. A number of decrees were issued to gain support: Russia would make peace with the Central Powers immediately peasants were to be given land taken from the Tsar and other landowners an eight-hour day was introduced for all workers unemployment insurance was promised to all workers factories were put under the control of workers’ committees banks were put under government control women were given equal rights with men all ranks and titles were abolished.

There were also a number of decrees attacking opponents: newspapers which did not support the Bolsheviks were banned (Source 1L) in November the Constitutional Democrats, the main Liberal party was banned in December the ‘All-Russian Extraordinary Commission to fight

Counter-Revolution and Sabotage’ or Cheka, was set up under Felix Dzerzhinsky the Orthodox Church lost its privileged status and wealth.

Dissolution of the constituent assembly Lenin knew he would have to allow elections, having strongly criticised Kerensky

for postponing them. It was very unlikely that the Bolsheviks would achieve a majority as they did not

have the support of the peasants. Democratic elections were held in Russia in November 1917. The Bolsheviks won 25 per cent of the popular vote, compared to 40 per cent for the Socialist Revolutionaries. Bolshevik support was mainly from the cities and armed forces.

After some anti-Bolshevik speeches at its first meeting in January 1918, the Assembly was dispersed by Bolshevik Red Guards and never met again. The Bolsheviks defended their actions (Source 1M). Socialist Revolutionaries held an unarmed protest march in Petrograd, and were dispersed by the Red Guard. A third All-Russian congress of Soviets formally approved of Lenin’s action.


Primary SourcesSource 1IThe Bolsheviks, having obtained a majority in the Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies of both capitals, can and must take state power into their own hands…For the Bolsheviks, by immediately proposing a democratic peace, by immediately giving the land to the peasants and by re-establishing the democratic institutions and liberties which have been distorted and shattered by Kerensky, will form a government which nobody will be able to overthrow.(V. I. Lenin, A Letter to the Central Committee, September, 1917)

Source 1JWe are most profoundly convinced that to declare at once an armed uprising would mean to stake not only the fate of our party, but also the fate of the Russian and the international revolution…It is said that: (1) the majority of the people in Russia are already for us and (2) the majority of the international proletariat are for us. Alas! Neither the one nor the other is true, and this is the crux of the matter.

A majority of the workers and a significant part of the army in Russia are for us. But all the rest are in question. We are all convinced, for example, that if it now comes to the elections to the Constituent Assembly, then the majority of peasants will vote for the SRs.(Statement of G. E. Zinoviev and L. B. Kamenev to Bolshevik Party Committees, 11 October 1917 )

Source 1KTo the Citizens of Russia: The Provisional Government has been overthrown. The power of state has passed into the hands of the organ of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies, the Military Revolutionary Committee, which stands at the head of the Petrograd proletariat and garrison.

The cause for which the people have fought-the immediate proposal of a democratic peace, the abolition of landed proprietorship, workers’ control of production and the creation of a Soviet Government-is assured. Long live the revolution of the workers, soldiers and peasants!(From an announcement by the Military Revolutionary Committee, 25 October 1917)


Source 1LEveryone knows the bourgeois press is one of the mighty weapons of the bourgeoisie. In a critical time like this, when the new Workers’ and Peasants’ Government is just getting started, it is not possible to leave in the hands of the enemy a weapon no less dangerous than bombs and machine-guns. This is why temporary and special measures were taken to stop the flow of filth and lies from the green and yellow press which would have drowned the recent victory of the people…

The Council of the People’s Commissars decrees that:1. Only those organs of the press will be closed which call for open opposition to

the Workers’ and Peasants’ Government…2. The present ordinance is of a temporary nature and will be repealed by a

special decree as soon as normal conditions of social life set in.(From Lenin’s Decree on the Press, 9 November 1917))

Source 1MThe Constituent Assembly, elected according to lists which were made up before the October Revolution, reflected the old relation of political forces, when the compromisers and the Cadets were in power.

At that time the people, voting for the candidates of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, could not choose between the Right Socialist Revolutionaries, the supporters of the bourgeoisie, and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries, upholders of socialism. So the … Assembly, which had to be the crown of a bourgeois-parliamentary republic, could not but become an obstacle on the road of the October-Revolution and Soviet regime.

The October Revolution, which gave power to the Soviets and through them to the working and exploited classes, evoked the desperate resistance of the exploiters and in suppressing this resistance fully revealed itself as the start of a socialist revolution.

The working classes had to convince themselves by experience that the old bourgeois parliamentary democracy had outlived itself, that it was completely inconsistent with the problems of realising socialism, that not general national, but only class, institutions (such as the Soviets) are able to conquer the resistance of the propertied classes and to lay the foundation of a socialist party.

Any renunciation of the full power of the Soviets, of the Soviet Republic which has been conquered by the people, in favour of bourgeois parliamentary democracy and the Constituent Assembly would now be a step backward and a breakdown of the whole October workers’ and peasants’ revolution…(Central Executive Committee of the Soviets, Decree on the Dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, 19 January 1918)


Historians’ views on the October Revolution

Issue: Was the Bolshevik seizure of power a coup d’etat or a popular revolution of workers and soldiers?

Source 1FF: Growing support for the BolsheviksAs it was, a major source of the Bolsheviks’ growing strength and authority in 1917 was the magnetic attraction of the party’s platform as embodied in the slogans ‘Peace, Land and Bread’ and ‘All Power to the Soviets’. The Bolsheviks conducted an extraordinarily energetic and resourceful campaign for the support of the Petrograd factory workers and soldiers and Kronstadt sailors. Among these groups, the slogan ‘All Power to the Soviets’ signified the creation of a democratic, exclusively socialist government, representing all parties and groups in the Soviet and committed to a program of immediate peace, meaningful internal reform, and the early convocation of a Constituent Assembly. In the late spring and summer of 1917, a number of factors served to increase support for the professed goals of the Bolsheviks, especially the transfer of power to the soviets. Economic conditions steadily worsened. Garrison soldiers became directly threatened by shipment to the front. Popular expectations of early peace and reform under the Provisional Government dwindled. Concomitantly, all other major political groups lost credibility because of their association with the government and their insistence on patience and sacrifice in the interests of the war effort. In the wake of the Kornilov affair, among the lower strata of the Petrograd population the desire for an end to coalition government with the Kadets became very nearly universal.(Alexander Rabinowitch, Prelude to Revolution: The Petrograd Bolsheviks and the July 1917 Uprising, 1968, p. 311)

Source 1GG: Coup d’etatLenin and Trotsky concealed their bid for one-party dictatorship with slogans calling for the transfer of power to the soviets and the Constituent Assembly, and they formalized it by a fraudulently convened Congress of Soviets. No one but a handful of the leading figures in the Bolshevik Party knew the truth behind these promises and slogans: few, therefore, realized what had happened in Petrograd on the night of October 25, 1917. The so-called ‘October Revolution’ was a classic coup d’etat. The preparations for it were so clandestine that when Kamenev discolosed in a newspaper interview a week before the event was to take place, that the party intended to seize power, Lenin declared him a traitor and demanded his expulsion. Genuine revolutions, of course, are not scheduled and cannot be betrayed.(Richard Pipes, Russia under the Bolshevik regime, 1995, p. 498)


Source 1HH: The myth of October 1917Few historical events have been more profoundly distorted by myth than those of 25 October 1917. The popular image of the Bolshevik insurrection, as a bloody struggle by the tens of thousands with several thousand fallen heroes, owes more to ‘October’ – Eisenstein’s brilliant but largely fictional propaganda film to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the event – than to historical fact. The Great October Socialist Revolution, as it came to be called in Soviet mythology, was in reality such a small-scale event, being in effect no more than a military coup, that it passed unnoticed by the vast majority of the inhabitants of Petrograd. The whole insurrection could have been completed in six hours, had it not been for the ludicrous incompetence of the insurgents themselves, which made it take an extra fifteen. The legendary ‘storming of the Winter Palace’…was more like a routine house arrest, since most of the forces defending the palace had already left for home, hungry and dejected, before the assault began.(Orlando Figes, The People’s Tragedy, 1996, p. 484)

Source 1II: A situation of anarchyBy this time the provisional government had lost all power and authority: every politically aware person in Petrograd knew that the Bolsheviks were about to act, but the government could not defend itself. Under the circumstances one could hardly speak of a coup d’etat, much less a conspiracy. The Bolsheviks seized power because the country was in the throes of anarchy.(P. Kenez, A History of the Soviet Union from the Beginning to the End, 1999, p. 28)

Source 1JJ: The role of the Soviet…there was uncertainty about the strength of active support for the Bolsheviks in Petrograd. Even any leftists in the party reported on workers’ lack of enthusiasm for violent measures. But adequate forces were forthcoming. The Petrograd Soviet, through its Military-Revolutionary Committee, controlled the garrison; and workers in the Red Guard had the necessary arms and commitment. These overwhelmed the government’s guard at the Winter Palace. Popular uprisings have never been organised by a people as a whole. Only a minority directly participates. And, by mid-October, Lenin could also argue that soviets in city after city throughout Russia were following the example of Petrograd and Moscow in acquiring Bolshevik majorities.(Robert Service, The Russian Revolution 1900-1927, 1999, p. 50-51)


Student tasks on section 1Note-takingUse the overview provided and your own reading to make detailed structured notes on the main issues of the section.

Essays/issues for discussion

1. To what extent did the First World War cause the February Revolution?

2. How accurate is the description of the February Revolution as ‘spontaneous’?

3. What were the reactions of the Bolsheviks to the February Revolution?

4. Account for the Provisional Government’s swift loss of popularity between March and October 1917.

5. Evaluate the roles of Lenin and Trotsky in the making of the October Revolution, 1917.

6. Were the similarities between the February and October Revolutions of 1917 greater than the differences?


Source-based questions1. Explain why the views of events in Petrograd in Sources 1B and 1C differ so

significantly.

2. How useful are Sources 1A and 1EE in an analysis of the part played by the Bolsheviks in the February Revolution?

3.Study Source 1D. How important were the views of his generals in the Tsar’s decision to abdicate?

4.To what extent do Sources 1E and 1H explain the problems of dual power?

5.How adequately does Source 1F explain the reasons for the decision of the Provisional Government to continue the war?

6.Analyse Source G and discuss Lenin’s motives for the announcement of his April Theses at the time.

7.Compare the views on the February Revolution put forward in sources 1AA to 1EE.

8. Analyse Sources 1I and 1J and explain the differences between them.

9.Comment on the accuracy of Source 1K at the time when the announcement was made.

10.How convincing is Lenin’s explanation in Source L of the reasons for the introduction of press censorship in 1917?

11.Does Source M give an adequate explanation of Bolshevik reasons for dissolving the Constituent Assembly?

12.To what extent can the Bolshevik claim of a popular revolution of workers and peasants be justified, from an analysis of Sources 1FF to 1JJ and your reading.


SECTION 2: LENIN AND THE CONSOLIDATION OF POWER

The material in this part deals with the second content area in the syllabus:

Lenin and the consolidation of power, including: the withdrawal from the First World War the Civil War and the reasons for Bolshevik victory changing economic policy from War Communism to New Economic Policy policies towards national minorities and foreign states.

Suggested reading (selected sample from full SCCC bibliography)

The selection given in Section 1 is also useful to Section 2.

Figes, Orlando, A People’s Tragedy. The Russian Revolution 1891-1924, London: Jonathan Cape, 1996.

Mawdsley, Evan, The Russian Civil War, London: Allen and Unwin, 1987.

Pipes, Richard, Russia under the Bolshevik Regime 1919-24, London: Fontana Press, 1995.

Issues for investigation/research The withdrawal from the First World War: reasons for the withdrawal; nature of

the peace treaty; results. The Civil War: causes; strengths and weaknesses of the two sides; reasons for

Bolshevik victory; importance of popular support; economic factors; military factors; foreign intervention; reasons why it lasted three years.

Changing economic policy: political and economic reasons for introduction of War Communism and New Economic Policy; nature of the policies; effects.

Policies towards national minorities: importance of the problem; reasons for Bolshevik policies; effects.

Policies towards foreign states: objectives; nature of relationships with western powers; role of the Comintern; importance of foreign policy.

Soviet Government 1917-24: nature of Soviet Government; role of Lenin. The wider context: continuity and discontinuity 1880s to 1920s; Leninism to

Stalinism.


Timeline

Date Event1918 Civil War

January: Constituent Assembly is forcibly dissolvedFebruary: Red Army established by decree3 March: Treaty of Brest-Litovsk signedMarch: Trotsky becomes Commissar for War.March: Moscow becomes Soviet capitalMarch: Bolshevik Party renamed Communist PartyApril: foreign intervention in civil war startsJuly: Constitution of Russian Soviet Federated Socialist RepublicJuly: start of War Communism; forced grain requisitions from

peasantsJuly: Tsar and family executed at EkaterinburgAugust: Assassination attempt on Lenin failsSeptember: Red Terror beginsNovember: First World War ends; revolution in Germany

1919 March: Communist International (Comintern) foundedApril: Kolchak’s advance on Moscow is haltedOctober: Denikin is defeatedNovember: Yudenich is defeated

1920 March: Wrangel replaces Denikin April: Poles invade UkraineJuly: Anglo-Soviet trade treatyOctober: Armistice with PolandNovember: Civil War and Allied intervention end

1921 March: Peace of Riga with PolandMarch: Kronstadt uprising crushedMarch: New Economic Policy introduced; factions in party banned

Famine1922 February: Cheka renamed GPU

April: Stalin becomes General Secretary of the Communist PartyApril: Treaty of Rapallo with GermanyMay: Lenin suffers first strokeJune: show trial of Socialist Revolutionaries in MoscowAugust: intellectuals exiled abroadDecember: Union of Soviet Socialist Republics formedDecember: Lenin completes his ‘political testament’

1923 Revised Fundamental Law publishedOctober: Forty-six leaders criticise ruling group in ‘Scissors crisis’

1924 January: Lenin dies


The withdrawal from the First World WarReasons for withdrawal Lenin had to keep his promise of peace given before and immediately after he

came to power (Source 2A). The Russian army could no longer offer serious resistance to the Germans. Lenin wanted to concentrate on defeating internal enemies.

NegotiationsRussia and the Central Powers agreed on an armistice in December 1917. Long negotiations followed at Brest-Litovsk. The harsh German terms divided the Bolshevik leadership. Bukharin wanted to reject the terms and restart the war. Trotsky argued for a delaying tactic of ‘neither war or peace’. Lenin insisted on acceptance (Source 2B). He believed the losses were worth a

breathing space to recover and hoped to get the land back when revolution broke out in Germany.

Treaty Terms The treaty of Brest-Litovsk, signed in March 1918, was severe. Russia lost Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, the Ukraine, Georgia and

Finland. This included a third of its farming land, a third of its population, two-thirds of its

coal mines and half its heavy industry. Three billion roubles had to be paid in reparations.

Results Lenin moved the government from Petrograd to Moscow because of the presence

of the German army close to Petrograd. Political discontent against Bolshevik rule grew (Source 2C). The Left Social

Revolutionaries resigned from Sovnarkom in protest. In June 1918 the Right Social Revolutionaries set up the Committee of Members of the Constituent Assembly in the Urals to try to overthrow the treaty and Bolshevik rule.

The strongly nationalist middle and upper classes were outraged. The officer class increased its efforts to organise anti-Bolshevik forces. Russian’s wartime allies supported anti-Bolshevik groups.


Primary sourcesSource 2AThe Workers’ and Peasants’ government, created by the revolution of October 24-25 and basing itself on the Soviets of Workers’, Soldiers’ and Peasants’ Deputies, calls upon all the belligerent peoples and their governments to start immediate negotiations for a just, democratic peace…by such a peace the government means an immediate peace without annexations (ie without the seizures of foreign lands, without the forcible incorporation of foreign nations) and without indemnities.…The Government abolishes secret diplomacy, and, for its part, announces its firm intention to conduct all negotiations quite openly in full view of the whole people. It will proceed immediately with the publication of the secret treaties…(The Decree of Peace, 26 October 1917)

Source 2BLenin spoke in defence of signing the German proposals. He began by saying that Soviet power must face up to the truth, that it must acknowledge the total impossibility of resistance to the Germans…the view that we could organise an army in the near future was wholly without grounds; the army did not want to fight and no-one could compel it to do so…Further, Lenin said that our Russian proletariat was not at all to blame if the German revolution was delayed. It would come but it was not there yet, and for us the best way was to gain time…(From V.I. Lenin’s speech at the Joint Meeting of the Bolshevik and Left Socialist-Revolutionary Groups of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets, 23 February 1918).

Source 2CBy this peace, Russia becomes a tool of German-Austrian imperialism…By ratifying this robber treaty we admit that we are traitors to those parts of Russia that are being handed over to the Germans in order to save other parts.

‘We must have a breathing spell’, says Lenin. We have heard this hundreds of times. It is nothing but words, words, words. What does he really mean by it? Who is going to benefit by it? We or the Germans? By the time we get our breath, the revolutionary proletariat will be dead, and Russia, cut off from her economic resources and loaded down with indemnity, will have no chance to recuperate and offer any resistance in the future.(From criticism by the Left Socialist Revolutionary leader, Boris Kamkov, of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, March 1918)


The Civil War and the reasons for Bolshevik victoryOrigins Armed opposition to the Bolsheviks broke out in many areas after October 1917. The ‘Whites’ included Social Revolutionaries, ex-tsarist officers, and other

anti-Bolshevik groups. Their aims differed. Some wanted to restore the tsar, others to set up a democracy.

Course In October 1917 armed units loyal to Kerensky under General Krasnov advanced

on Petrograd and were defeated by the Bolsheviks. In November 1917 a Volunteer Army was formed in the Don Cossack region. In Siberia Admiral Kolchak, former Black Sea Fleet commander, set up a White

government. A Czechoslovak Legion of about 40,000 men controlled the Trans-Siberian Railway in the Omsk region.

Early in 1919 Kolchack advanced with three armies towards Moscow. Trotsky, now Commissar for War, had created a new Red Army (Sources2D and 2E). A Bolshevik counter-attack in May to July 1919 forced Kolchak back. He was later executed by the Bolsheviks. The Czech legion was defeated.

Denikin, commander of the Armed Forces of Southern Russia, advanced in the summer of 1919. By October he was within 250 miles of Moscow, but was forced to retreat. His army disintegrated. His successor, Wrangel, was defeated in November 1920.

In 1919 General Yudenich advanced from Estonia and in October reached the outskirts of Petrograd. He was defeated by a larger force led by Trotsky.

The ‘Green’ armies of peasant forces, some linked with the Socialist Revolutionaries were defeated by the Bolsheviks in Siberia.

Foreign intervention The Allied excuse for helping the Whites was that they wanted a government

which would continue the war against Germany. When intervention continued after the defeat of Germany, it became clear that the

aim was to destroy the Bolshevik government which sought world revolution. The USA, Japan, France and Britain sent troops to Archangel, Murmansk and

Vladivostock. Intervention was half-hearted after the end of the First World War.

The War with Poland In 1920 Polish troops invaded the Ukraine. Pilsudski, the Polish leader, did not

accept the border between Poland and Russia fixed after the First World War. The Red Army advanced on Warsaw, but was forced to retreat. After a cease-fire in October 1920, under the Treaty of Riga, March 1921 the

Bolsheviks handed over part of the Ukraine and White Russia.


Primary sourcesSource 2DA real army cannot be run by elected committees and elected officers who may be dismissed at any moment by their subordinates. The tsarist regiments that survived the Kerensky regime broke up after November and then vanished entirely. We were not going to introduce the same system of committees and elective officers. The Red Army was an institution built from the top on the principle of the dictatorship of the working class, with officers selected and controlled by the Soviet government and the Communist Party. We could not build up a centralised army…without making use of the old officers; they were to come in, however, not as representatives of the old ruling class but as appointees of the new revolutionary class. The institution of (military) commissars played a most important part in the formation of the commanding staff. The commander occupied himself with pure military matters and the commissar with political-educational work.(From Lev Trotsky, How the Revolution Was Armed, Volume 1)

Source 2ENo quarter will be given to the enemies of the people, the agents of foreign imperialism, the mercenaries of the Bourgeoisie. In the train of the People’s Commissar for War, where this order is being written, a military Revolutionary Tribunal is in session…which has unlimited powers within the zone of this railway line. A state of siege is proclaimed over this zone. Comrade Kamenshchikov, whom I have charged with the defence of the Moscow-Kazan line, has ordered concentration camps to be set up at Mormon, Arzamas and Svyazhsk…I am warning responsible Soviet officials in all regions of military operation that we shall be doubly exacting towards them. The Soviet Republic will punish its sluggish and criminal servants no less severely than its enemies…The Republic is in peril! Woe to those who directly or indirectly aggravate the peril.(Order of the Day to Red Soldiers by Lev Trotsky, August 1918)


Historians’ views on the outcome of the Civil WarSource 2AASince the Red Army emerged victorious from the Civil War, it is tempting to ascribe its victory to better leadership and superior motivation. While subjective factors undeniably played a role in the outcome, scrutiny of the military balance indicates that the decisive factors were of an objective nature. The situation was not unlike that in the American Civil War, in which the North enjoyed such overwhelming preponderance in population, industrial resources, and transport that it was certain of victory as long as it had the will to fight. From the strategic point of view, nearly all the advantages lay on the side of the Red Army. The ability of the whites to carry on against such overwhelming odds and at one point even to seem near victory suggests that, contrary to conventional wisdom, it is they who had the superior generalship and morale. In the final analysis, they appear to have lost not because they represented a less popular cause or committed fatal political and military errors, but because they faced insuperable handicaps.(Richard Pipes, Russia under the Bolshevik Regime, 1995, pp. 9-10)

Source 2BB Here the Reds had one crucial advantage that enabled them to get more soldiers on the battlefield when it really mattered: they could claim to be defending ‘the revolution’ – a conveniently polyvalent symbol on to which the people could project their own ideals. Being able to fight under the Red Flag gave the Bolsheviks a decisive advantage. Its symbolic power largely accounts for the fact that the peasants, including hundreds of thousands of deserters, rallied to the Red Army during the Whites’ advance towards Moscow in the autumn of 1919. The peasants believed that a White victory would reverse their own revolution on the land… This same ‘defence of the revolution’ also helps to explain the fact that many workers, despite their complaints against the Bolsheviks, rallied behind the Soviet regime during Yudenich’s advance towards Petrograd.

At the root of the Whites’ defeat was a failure of politics. They proved unable and unwilling to frame policies capable of getting the mass of the population on their side… their only idea was to put the clock back to the ‘happy days’ before 1917; and they failed to see the need to adapt themselves to the realities of the revolution. The Whites’ failure to recognize the peasant revolution on the land and the national independence movements doomed them to defeat…

This was partly a problem of image. Although Kolchak and Denikin both denied being monarchists, there were too many supporters of a tsarist restoration within their ranks which created the popular image – and gave ammunition to the propaganda of their enemies – that they were associated with the old regime…

(Orlando Figes, A People’s Tragedy, 1996, p. 681)


Changing economic policy from War Communism to New Economic Policy‘War Communism’The policies retrospectively termed ‘War Communism’ were introduced for two main reasons: practical, in response to a situation of economic disruption in the country ideological because they seemed to be based on socialist principles.

Practical reasons In towns food was in short supply and rationed. The army had to be supplied. Money had lost its value through inflation, so peasants were unwilling to sell

foodstuffs to the state. Industrial production had declined dramatically, so that there was a shortage of

industrial goods for the peasants to buy. Workers were returning to the countryside to escape the hunger of the towns.

Ideological reasons The system of rationing, inherited from the Provisional Government, seemed an

egalitarian and therefore socialist way of distributing goods. The drop in the value of money through inflation was seen as a step towards a

moneyless, socialist economy. The centralised control of the economy and the absence of market relations were

thought to be how a socialist economy ought to work.

Features All private manufacture was banned; nearly all industry was nationalised and

subordinated to the Supreme Council of the National Economy (VSNKh); resources were allocated centrally.

Private trade was banned. The agricultural produce of the peasants was seized (Source 2F). Money was eliminated from much of the economy. There was a system of rationing for goods which were available. Workers were strictly disciplined and party control imposed on trade unions.

Effects Peasants had no incentive to produce surplus foodstuffs and reduced their

cultivated area. There were severe food shortages both in towns and countryside, made worse by

droughts in 1920-21. Millions died in the famine of 1921. Industrial production declined even further. Many town workers went on strike and there were clashes with troops.


The Red Terror The Bolsheviks passed decrees to control the press in November 1917 and set up o

the Cheka in December 1917. In June 1918 Social Revolutionaries and Mensheviks were expelled from the

Central Executive Committee. In July the Bolsheviks put down a demonstration against the peace treaty. In August Uritsky, chief of the Petrograd Cheka, was killed in Petrograd and Lenin

was seriously wounded in Moscow. The Central Executive Committee of the Soviets announced a policy of terror.

Official figures show 6,300 executions by the Cheka in 1918. The ‘Red Terror’ continued throughout the Civil War.

The Kronstadt rising In March 1921 a serious naval mutiny took place at Kronstadt among sailors of the

Baltic fleet who had been loyal supporters of the Bolsheviks. They were angry at the way Trotsky crushed a strike by workers in Petrograd . They did not support war communism, and called for a ‘third revolution’. They put together a manifesto of their demands at a mass meeting on 1 March

(Source 2G). Trotsky acted quickly to suppress the mutiny by force. General Tukhachevsky led

45,000 troops across the ice on the Gulf of Finland. After a week of bitter fighting, the sailors were defeated. Several thousand were killed, wounded or missing.

Lenin claimed that the rebellion was a White plot, but knew this to be untrue. The mutiny convinced him that War Communism had to end (Source 2H).

The New Economic Policy (Source 2I) Key industries were kept under state control, but smaller industries returned to

private ownership. Old managers and capitalist incentives were brought back. Requisitioning was replaced by a tax in kind on goods and crops. Private trade was legalised. Peasants could sell surplus grain to Nepmen. Foreign investment was encouraged. Lenin saw the NEP as a temporary measure, a return to a certain amount of private

enterprise until the country’s economy recovered. His long-term aim was full state control of industry, and of agriculture through collective farms.

Results Gradually the economy began to recover, though food shortages remained. Some peasants became wealthy kulaks and nepmen rich traders. Communists criticised the return to a semi-capitalist system and were divided over

how long the NEP should last. In 1923 different growth rates of agriculture and industry resulted in the ‘scissors

crisis’ (Source 2J).

The One-Party State There was no relaxation in politics at the time of the NEP. Control was tightened. Members of other political parties were tried, imprisoned, exiled, or executed. Sovnarkom lost power to the Politburo of the Communist Party. Power within the Communist Party moved away from the Central Committee to

the Politburo. The Secretariat controlled appointments.


In 1921 the formation of factions within the party was banned, strengthening the power of the leadership.

There was a major purge on members of the party. Soviets and trade unions were firmly controlled. In 1922 a new constitution created the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Each

of the six republics, Russia, the Ukraine, Belorussia, Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan, had the theoretical right only to withdraw from the union.

xxxxxxPrimary sourcesSource 2FThe food armies sent from the centre are not representative of the best workers but consist of men whose ambition is to plunder the village. They get very little grain but bring about a united front of the kulaks and the hired hands and an open war between city and country. The peasants are beginning to look upon the soviets as nothing better than robber gangs…Of all your stupid and criminal measures the food armies and the committees of the village poor are the worst. You know nothing about the village or how to deal with the kulaks. Comrade Lenin is trying to frighten us by saying that nothing will be left of the party that leaves the Soviet. As it stands today, the Soviet is nothing but the dictatorship of Mirbach. We are not going to leave the Soviet, and Lenin, cannot put us out.(From a Speech by the Left Socialist-Revolutionary Boris Kamkov at the Fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets, July 1918)

Source 2GHaving heard the report of the representatives of the Crews, despatched from the ships to Petrograd in order to learn the state of affairs in Petrograd we decided:1. In view of the fact that the present Soviets do not represent the will of the

workers and peasants, immediately to re-elect the Soviets by secret voting, with free preliminary agitation among all workers and peasants before the elections.

2. Freedom of speech and press for workers, peasants, Anarchists and Left Socialist parties.

3. Freedom of meetings, trade-unions and peasant associations.5. To liberate all political prisoners of Socialist Parties, and also all workers,

peasants, soldiers and sailors…6. To elect a commission to review the cases of those who are imprisoned in jails

and concentration camps.7. To abolish all Political Departments because no single party may enjoy

privileges in the propaganda of its ideas and receive funds from the state for this8. All ‘cordon detachments’ (requisitioning detachments) are to be abolished …9. To equalise rations for all workers…10. To abolish all Communist fighting detatchments in all military units and also

various Communist guards at factories…11. To grant the peasant full right to do what he sees fit with his land…(The Demands of the Kronstadt sailors, 1 March 1921)


Source 2HIn 1921, after we had passed through the most important stage of the Civil War…we felt the impact of a grave-I think it was the gravest-internal political crisis in Soviet Russia. This internal crisis brought to light discontent not only among a considerable section of the peasantry but also among the workers. This was the first time and, I hope, the last time in the history of Soviet Russia that feeling ran against us among large masses of peasants, not consciously but instinctively. What gave rise to this peculiar, and for us, of course, very unpleasant situation? The reason for it was that in our economic offensive we had run too far ahead.(From V.I.Lenin’s Speech to the 4th Comintern Congress, 13 November 1922)

Source 2INaturally, the tax in kind means freedom for the peasant to dispose of his after-tax surplus at his own discretion. Since the state cannot provide the peasant with goods from socialist factories in exchange for all his surplus, freedom to trade with this surplus necessarily means freedom for the development of capitalism.

Within the limits indicated, however, this is not at all dangerous for socialism as long as transport and large-scale industry remain in the hands of the proletariat. On the contrary, the development of capitalism, controlled and regulated by the proletarian state…is advantageous and necessary in an extremely devastated and backward small-peasant country (within certain limits, of course), inasmuch as it is capable of hastening the immediate revival of peasant farming.(From Theses presented by V.I. Lenin at the Third Congress of the Communist International, June-July 1921)

Source 2JThe extreme seriousness of the position compels us (in the interests of our Party, in the interests of the working class) to state openly that a continuation of the policy of the majority of the Politburo threatens grievous disasters for the whole Party. The economic and financial crisis beginning at the end of July of the present year…has inexorably revealed the inadequacy of the leadership of the Party, both in the economic domain, and especially in the domain of internal Party relations.

(The Platform of the 46 (the Left Opposition), October 1923)


Historians’ views on the origins of War CommunismSource 2CCWas war communism a response to the war emergency and to collapse, or did it represent an all-out attempt to leap into socialism? I have already suggested that it could be both these things at once. Perhaps it should also be said that it meant different things to different Bolsheviks, and this is an important element in our understanding their view of the about-turn of 1921. Some felt that the days of 1918-20 were not only heroic and glorious days of struggle, leading to victory against heavy odds, but were also stages towards socialism or even the gateway to full communism. Some of these men were deeply shocked by the retreat, which seemed to them a betrayal of the revolution. Others saw the necessity of the retreat, but were above all concerned with limiting its consequences and resuming the advance at the earliest date. Still others – some of the future right were among them – looked forward to a prolonged pause, and saw in war communism at best an unavoidable series of excesses. For them a large private sector in small-scale industry and trade, linked with an overwhelmingly private agriculture, was the condition of political security and economic reconstruction, and this would go on for a long time. These attitudes were by no means clear-cut. Lenin himself admitted that he had been over-sanguine about the war-communism period.(Alec Nove, An Economic History of the USSR, 1992, p. 73)

Source 2DDThe question lying behind the debate is how quickly the Bolsheviks thought they could move towards communism; and the answer depends on whether we are talking about 1918 or 1920. The Bolsheviks’ first steps were cautious, and so were their pronouncements about the future. However, from the outbreak of the Civil War in mid 1918 the Bolsheviks’ earlier caution began to disappear. To cope with a desperate situation, they turned to more radical policies and, in the process, tried to extend the sphere of centralized governmnnet control much further and faster than they had originally intended. In 1920, as the Bolsheviks headed towards victory in the Civil War and disaster in the economy, a mood of euphoria and desperation took hold. With the old world disappearing in the flames of Revolution and Civil War, it seemed to many Bolsheviks that a new world was about to arise…This hope, perhaps, owed more to anarchist ideology than to Marxism, but it was nevertheless expressed in Marxist terms: with the triumph of proletarian revolution, the transition to communism was imminent, possibly only weeks or months away.(Sheila Fitzpatrick, The Russian Revolution, 1982, p. 71)


Policies towards national minorities Half of the Russian Empire in 1900 was non-Russian. It included Ukranians,

Belorussians, Poles, Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Finns, Jews, Armenians, Georgians, Muslin Turkish groups, and many smaller ethnic minorities. Successive Tsars followed policies of discrimination and ‘Russification’. National minorities supported the liberal movement as a means of achieving independence.

The Provisional Government was divided over the wishes of national minorities, and reluctant to allow more than limited autonomy. Most set up local governments for themselves. The Ukranians set up an elected parliament, the Rada.

Bolsheviks policies Before the October revolution, Lenin promised non-Russian peoples the right to

self-determination, even if this resulted in outright separation. Immediately after the October Revolution in 1917, Lenin, announced his

‘Declaration of the Rights of the Peoples of Russia’, (Source 2K). He promised non-Russian minorities rights of self-determination, including the right to separate from Russia if they wished, in order to keep their support. Stalin, as Commissar for Nationalities, also promised a form of self-determination (Source 2L).

In Constituent Assembly elections, national minority groups gained 99 seats. By mid-1918 there were independent states in Armenia, Aazerbaijan, Belorussia,

Finland, Georgia and the Ukraine. A pan-Islamic movement swept through the Muslim peoples of Central Asia.

Lenin changed tactics in favour of a form of federalism. His constitution of July 1918 created the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic or RSFSR.

Bolshevik armies fought against the Ukrainian separatist regime of Simon Petluria in 1918-20, the Baltic (Estonian, Latvian Lithuanian) separatists in 1918-19 and the Transcaucasian (Armenian, Georgian, and Azerbaijani) separatists in 1920-21. In 1922 the Ukraine, Belorussia and Tanscaucasia joined a union with Russia.

Lenin had to recognise the independence of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

The creation of the USSR In 1922 a new constitution created the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Its six

republics were Russia, the Ukraine, Belorussia, Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan. While in theory each republic had the right to leave the union, in practice the

government was not prepared to lose the population and resources of the areas. Supreme Soviets were elected in each republic, with power over matters not

controlled by the Congress of Soviets. The constitution created a highly centralised state. The distribution of power left

the republics with little economic, political or military authority. They had some control over language, education, health and justice, and had more freedom than under tsarist rule, as long as they accepted control of Moscow.

Lenin and Stalin disagreed over the structure of the new state.


Primary sourcesSource 2K…The Council of People’s Commissars has resolved to base its activity in the matter of the Nationalities on the following principles:1. The equality and sovereignty of the peoples of Russia2. The right of the peoples of Russia to free self-determination, even to the point

of separation and the formation of an independent state.3. The abolition of any and all national and national-religious privileges and

disabilities.4. The free development of national minorities and ethnographic groups

inhabiting the territory of Russia.(From Declaration of the Rights of the Peoples of Russia, November 1917)

Source 2LThe nationality question…is among those which greatly agitate Russia at the present time. Its seriousness is aggravated by the fact that Great Russians do not form a majority of the total population and are surrounded by a chain of non-sovereign nationalities…It was only the Soviet Government that came out openly for self-determination of peoples even to the point of separation from Russia…

Nevertheless certain conflicts developed between the Soviet Government and the borderlands…political in their character…The principle of self-determination should be limited in such a way as to make it applicable only to the toilers and not to the bourgeoisie. Self-determination must be a means of attaining socialism.(From a speech by J. Stalin to the 3rd Congress of Soviets, 28 January 1918)

Historian’s view on policies towards national minoritiesSource 2EE: Implementation of the principle of self-determinationThe party also continued to try and obtain the sympathy of the non-Russians. But the principle of national self- determination was implemented much more restrictedly than had been promised by Lenin before the October revolution. The Red Army was charged with the task of reconquering; it was not asked to hold plebiscites about state frontiers. Territory densely inhabited by non-Russians was nevertheless given favourable dispensation. Ukraine, Belorussia, Estonia and Latvia acquired their own Soviet republics that, at least formally, had equal status to the Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic (RSFSR). Inside the RSFSR, the Politburo ordered that autonomous national republics should be established. Scope was given for schooling and for newspapers in the local language....(Robert Service, The Russian Revolution 1900-1927, 1999, p. 65)


Policies towards foreign statesBolshevik policy towards foreign states was of two kinds. The policy conducted through the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, headed by

Georgii Chicherin, aimed to normalise relations with foreign countries. The policy conducted through the Communist International, or Comintern, headed

by Grigorii Zinoviev, sought to spread revolution throughout the rest of the world.

Chicherin and Zinoviev were, therefore, attempting to pursue contradictory policies and often found themselves at odds with each other.

The Comintern and World Revolution The Bolsheviks assumed that their revolution would spread to other parts of the

world and that a federation of Soviet republics would be created. They were very hopeful of a revolution in Germany at the time of the Brest-

Litovsk negotiations (Source 2M). In the situation created by Germany’s defeat in the First World War and the revolution in November 1918 which swept away the Kaiser’s government, the prospects seemed favourable.

Lenin encouraged the formation of new communist parties and sent Karl Radek to Berlin to help organise the German Communist Party (KDP).

Lenin helped finance Communist Parties in other countries. In March 1919 the Communist International or Comintern was formed in Moscow

to coordinate and control the activites of Communist parties worldwide. The Second Congress of the Comintern took place in July 1920, while the Red Army was advancing into Poland, and the spread of the revolution into Western Europe seemed imminent. (Sources 2N and 2O)

Foreign relations The Bolsheviks had antagonised foreign governments by withdrawing from the

war, cancelling Russia’s foreign debts and nationalising foreign firms. The Bolsheviks were regarded as German agents. The Soviet government was not

recognised and treated as an outcast. Britain, France, the USA and Japan intervened in the Russian Civil War on the side

of the Whites in order to destroy the Bolsheviks. The Russians were not invited to the Versailles peace conference.

By the middle of 1920, in changing circumstances, relations improved: Most of the interventionist countries had withdrawn their troops, though the

Japanese did not leave until 1922. Communist revolutions in Germany and Hungary had failed. The Bolsheviks now accepted that world revolution was not imminent. Diplomatic relations had been established with the new Baltic states and Poland. Chicherin’s policy of improving relations with the West bore fruit. Diplomatic

relations had been re-opened with most countries by 1924, but not with the USA.


Relations with Britain.An Anglo-Soviet trade treaty was signed in March 1921: After the failure of intervention in the Russian Civil War, Lloyd George, British

Prime Minister from 1916-1922, wanted reconciliation. Lenin wanted improved relations with the west to acquire foreign trade and capital. Trade was to be channeled through an All-Russian Co-operative Society in Britain. Britain was the first power to accept the Bolshevik government. It led to similar agreements with other countries and to full political recognition.

Relations fluctuated after 1921: At the Genoa Conference, 1922, Lloyd George suggested that the Bolsheviks pay

tsarist war debts. In 1924 Ramsay MacDonald, the new Labour Prime Minister, reopened full

diplomatic relations. Another trade treaty was signed, and a British loan proposed. This was unpopular with Conservatives and Liberals who then brought down the government. Labour lost the following election partly because of the affair of the ‘Zinoviev Letter’. It was taken to show that Labour sympathy towards Russia was encouraging British communists.

Under the Conservative government 1924-9, relations with the USSR deteriorated.

Relations with FranceRussia and France were not on good terms: with the Bolshevik revolution in 1917, France lost an important ally against

Germany. Russia was calling for revolution in all capitalist countries France sent troops to help the Whites in the civil war the Bolsheviks were not invited to the Versailles talks on French insistance France intervened in the war between Russia and Poland in 1920 and helped repel

a Russian advance on Warsaw France signed an alliance with Poland in 1921 relations improved in 1924 when the moderate Herriot government resumed

diplomatic relations. Suspicion remained of Russian control over the French Communist Party.

Relations with GermanyRelations were more consistent and friendly than with Britain and France: Germany, Europe’s other outcast, saw advantages in friendship with the USSR the Bolsheviks wanted stable relations with at least one capitalist power a secret trade treaty was signed in 1921 the Rapallo Treaty was signed in 1922 after both Germany and Russia withdrew

from the Geneva Conference. Full diplomatic relations were resumed. Mutual claims for reparations were cancelled. They co-operated to keep Poland weak, which was in both their interests. Russia had Germany as a buffer against any future attack from the west. The Germans built munitions factories in Russia.


Primary sourcesSource 2MThat there will be a Socialist revolution in Europe there is no doubt. All our hopes in the final triumph of socialism are based on this certainty, which is in the nature of a scientific prediction. Our propaganda work in general and our fraternization in particular should be strengthened and developed in order to help bring about the Socialist revolution. It would be a mistake for the Socialist Government in Russia to formulate its policy on the supposition that within the next six months (or thereabouts) there will be a European, to be more specific, a German Socialist revolution. (From an article by Lenin in Pravda, 24 February 1918)

Source 2NAt the present moment in history, however, it is the Russian model (of a socialist revolution) that reveals to all countries something-and something highly significant-of their near and inevitable future.

The experience of the victorious dictatorship of the proletariat in Russia has clearly shown even to those who are incapable of thinking, or have had no occasion to give thought to the matter, that absolute centralisation and rigorous discipline in the proletariat are an essential condition of victory over the bourgeoisie.(From ‘Left-Wing’ Communism - An Infantile Disorder by Lenin, May 1920)

Source 2OPolitical parties throughout the world which wish to join the Communist International and to become official communist parties must agree to do the following:4. Persistent and systematic propaganda and agitation must be conducted in the

armed forces…5. Regular and systematic agitation is indispensable in the countryside…9. It is the duty of any party wishing to join the Communist International to

conduct systematic and unflagging communist work in the trade unions, co-operative societies and other mass workers’ organisations.

12. The Party’s periodical and non-periodical press, and all published enterprises, must likewise be fully subordinate to the Party Central Committee.

13. Parties belonging to the Communist International must be organised on the principle of democratic centralism.

14. Communist parties in countries where Communists can conduct their work legally must carry out periodic membership purges

(From Terms of Admission into the Communist International by Lenin, July 1920)



Essays/issues for debate

1. ‘The Bolsheviks’ method of seizing and consolidating power led naturally to the Civil War.’ Discuss.

2. Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the two sides in the Civil War.

3. What factors explain the emergence of a one-party dictatorship in Soviet Russia between 1918 and 1921?

4. Why were the Bolsheviks unable to continue with War Communism by 1921?

5. How successful was the New Economic Policy?

6. Discuss why few of the national minorities of the Russian Empire were able to secure their independence after 1917, using one or more as an example.


Sources1. How realistic was the Decree of Peace in Source 2A at the time?

2. How adequately does Source 2B explain Lenin’s reasons for making peace?

3. Evaluate Kamkov’s criticism of the signing of the peace treaty in Source 2C in light of later events.

4. What light do Sources 2D and 2E throw on Trotsky’s contribution to the Red victory in the Civil War.

5. Compare and contrast the explanations given in Sources 2AA and 2BB for the defeat of the Whites in the Civil War.

6. How justified was the author of Source F in his criticism of war communism?

7. How useful is Source G in explaining reasons for discontent in Russia in 1921?

8. What justification does Lenin give for the introduction of the NEP in 1921 in Source 2I?

9. What sets of circumstances led to the views expressed in Sources 2H and 2J?

10. Analyse Sources 2CC and 2DD in light of your own reading. Which viewpoint on the origins of War Communism do you find most convincing?

11. Compare and contrast the policies on nationalities and national self-determination put forward in Sources 2K, 2L and 2EE.

12. Explain the changes in Lenin’s attitude towards socialist movements in other countries in Sources 2N and 2O, compared to his views in Source M.


SECTION 3: THE MAKING OF THE STALINIST SYSTEM

The material in this part deals with the third content area in the syllabus:

The making of the Stalinist system, including: Stalin’s struggle for power with his rivals the policies of industrialisation and collectivisation the purges.

Suggested reading(selected sample from full SCCC bibliography)

Laver, J., Joseph Stalin. From Revolutionary to Despot, London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1995. ‘Personalities and Powers’ series.

Lynch, Michael, Stalin and Khrushchev: The USSR 1924-64, Hodder and Stoughton ‘Access to History’ series.

McCauley, Martin, Stalin and Stalinism, London: Longman, 1995. ‘Seminar Studies in History’ series.

Mawdsley, Evan, The Stalin Years. The Soviet Union, 1929-53, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998.

Ward, Chris, Stalin’s Russia, 2nd edn., London: Edward Arnold, 1999.

Issues for Investigation/Research Stalin’s struggle for power with his rivals: nature of the struggle; issues at stake;

lack of effective opposition from Trotsky and the Left; Stalin’s political skill; role of his supporters; role of Russian history and society; Lenin’s inheritance; development of the ‘cult of personality’; extent of Stalin’s power in the 1920s.

The policies of industrialisation and collectivisation: reasons for abandonment of the NEP and introduction of rapid industrialisation and collectivisation; support in the Communist Party and country at large for these policies; success of the policies; effects on society; comparison with economic policies in the 1920s.

The purges: totalitarian nature of Stalin’s regime; reasons for and nature of the purges/terror; effects.

The wider context: political, economic and social structures of the Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin; continuity or discontinuity; why Stalinism happened.


Timeline

Date Event1924 January: constitution of USSR becomes law

May: Stalin re-elected to Politburo and elected Secretary General

1925 January: Trotsky removed as commissar of warDecember: Fourteenth Party Congress: industrialisation plan

announced1926 Zinoviev, Trotsky and Kamenev expelled from Politburo1927 November: Trotsky and Zinoviev expelled from the Communist party

December: Fifteenth party congress approves first five-year plan 1928 January: Stalin starts forcible grain collection in Siberia

January: Trotsky exiled to Alma AtaApril: First Five-Year Plan startsJuly: Shakhty trials heldStalin’s ‘cultural revolution’ begins

1929 January: Trotsky deported from the USSSRNovember: Bukharin expelled from PolitburoDecember: Stalin proclaims end of NEP and start of collectivisation

1930 March: collectivisation suspendedDecember: Trials of groups in agricultural sectorLiquidation of kulaks

1931 Trial of Mensheviks1932 Stalin’s second wife, Nadezhda, commits suicide1932-37 Second Five-Year Plan 1934 January: Seventeenth Party Congress, the ‘Congress of Victors’

September: USSR joins the League of NationsDecember: Kirov assassinated; purges start

1935 February: model collective farm statute1936 Stakhanovist Year

August: show trials; Zinoviev, Kamenev and fourteen others executed

December: Stalin Constitution: Fundamental Law revision1937 January: second show trial, thirteen executed

May to June: purge of Red Army; Tukhachevsky executed1938-42 Third Five-Year Plan starts

March: third show trial; Bukharin, Rykov and sixteen others executed

December: Beria becomes head of NKVD1940 August: Trotsky assassinated in Mexico1946-50 Fourth Five-Year Plan1946 Zhdanov cultural campaign1949 ‘Leningrad Affair’ executions1951-55 Fifth Five-Year Plan1953 ‘Doctors’ plot’; death of Stalin


Stalin’s struggle for power with his rivalsWhen Lenin died in 1924, a complex power struggle developed from which Stalin had emerged successful by the end of 1929.

Lenin’s TestamentIn December 1922 Lenin dictated a series of instructions to the party as to what to do when he was dead and added a postscript in January 1923 (Source 3A).

Rivals for powerWhen Lenin died in 1924, Stalin was Secretary-General of the Communist Party and a member of the Politburo, the committee of seven which decided government policy. Circumstances arose in which Stalin was able to eliminate his rivals: Stalin promoted the cult of Lenin and himself as Lenin’s apostle leading party members were jealous and resentful of Trotsky, the orator,

intellectual, organiser of the Red Armies and hero of the civil war. It was feared that he might become a second Napoleon. He refused to compete with Stalin

they underestimated Stalin, seeing him as a mediocre but competent administrator they ignored Lenin’s advice to get rid of Stalin Stalin used his powers of appointment and promotion to place his own supporters

in key positions.

Conflict between right and left Stalin took advantage of disagreements in the Politburo over policy. Marx had not

described in detail how the new communist society should be organised and Lenin was vague about it. Lenin had departed from socialist principles with the New Economic Policy, though it was to be a temporary measure until the crisis passed.

The right, led by Bucharin, wanted to keep the NEP, though the number of kulaks was growing. It wanted to consolidate power inside the USSR, based on a prosperous peasantry, and gradual industrialisation – ‘socialism in one country’.

The left wanted to abandon the NEP and concentrate on rapid industrialisation at the expense of the peasants. It favoured international communism.

The ambitious Stalin, with no strong views either way, supported the right to isolate Trotsky. In January 1925 Trotsky resigned as Commissar for War.

There was a split between Bucharin and Politburo members Zinoviev and Kamenev, over the NEP. Stalin supported Bucharin, Rykov and Tomsky against the others. They were voted off the Politburo by Stalin’s yes-men, and expelled from the party. In 1928 Stalin decided to abandon the NEP. When Bucharin protested, he too was expelled in 1929 and Stalin was in complete control.


Primary sourcesSource 3AComrade Stalin, having become General Secretary, has concentrated an enormous power in his hands; and I am not sure that he always knows how to use that power with sufficient caution. On the other hand, Comrade Trotsky…is distinguished not only by his exceptional abilities – personally he is, to be sure, the most able man in the present Central Committee – but also by his too far-reaching self-confidence and a disposition to be too much attracted by the purely administrative side of affairs.

These two qualities of the two most able leaders of the present Central Committee might, quite innocently, lead to a split; if our party does not take measures to prevent it, a split might arise unexpectedly.

I will not characterise the other members of the Central Committee as to their personal qualities. I will only remind you that the October episode of Zinoviev and Kamenev was not, of course, accidental but that it ought as little to be used against them personally as the non-Bolshevism of Trotsky…

Bucharin is not only the most valuable and biggest theoretician of the party, but may legitimately be considered the favourite of the whole party; but his theoretical views can only with the very greatest doubt be regarded as fully Marxist…

Of course, both these remarks are made by me merely with a view to the present time, or supposing that these two able and loyal workers may not find an occasion to supplement their knowledge and correct their onesidedness.

Postscript:

Stalin is too rude and this defect, although quite tolerable in our midst and in dealings among us Communists, becomes intolerable in a Secretary-General. That is why I suggest that the comrades think about a way of removing Stalin from that post and appointing another man in his stead who in all respects differs from Stalin only in superiority – namely more patient, more loyal, more polite and more attentive to comrades, less capricious…This circumstance may appear to be a negligible detail. But I think that from the standpoint of safeguards against a split and from the standpoint of what I wrote above about the relationship between Stalin and Trotsky it is not a detail, or it is a detail which can assume decisive importance.(V.I. Lenin, Letter to the Party Congress, 4 January 1923)


The policies of industrialisation and collectivisation‘Socialism in one country’ Although Russian industry was recovering from the effects of the war, production

from heavy industry was still very low compared to western powers. Stalin believed that a rapid expansion of heavy industry was essential so that

Russia would be able to survive the attack which he was convinced would come sooner or later from anti-communist western capitalist powers.

Industrialisation would increase support for the government. More food had to be produced for the growing industrial population and to provide

a surplus for export. Backward farming methods could not meet such needs. A serious obstacle was the lack of capital to finance expansion, as foreigners were

unwilling to invest. NEP was abandoned in 1929. Industry and agriculture were taken under government control. Stalin introduced a series of Five Year Plans to overcome the problems as quickly

as possible. In a 1931 speech he explained his reasons (Source 3B).

The Five Year Plans; the expansion of industry The first Five-Year plan, 1928-32, concentrated on heavy industry. Coal, iron,

steel, oil and machinery were to triple output (Source 3C). The second, 1933-37, provided for some increases in consumer goods as well as in

heavy industry. The third, 1938-42, cut consumer production in order to concentrate on armaments

and defence due to the fear of war. The fourth, from 1946-50 aimed to rebuild the country’s industries and exceed

pre-war levels of production by 1950. The main emphasis was on heavy industry.

Effects In spite of mistakes, the plans were a great success. The growth in industrial

production would be very important to the outcome of the Second World War. Hundreds of factories were built, many in new towns east of the Ural Mountains

where they would be safe from invasion. Some examples are the iron and steel works at Magnitogorsk and tractor works at Kharkov and Gorki.

A hydro-electric dam was built at Dnepropetrovsk, and oil refineries in the Caucasus.

Money was provided almost entirely by Russians, with no foreign investment. It came from grain exports, peasant payments for use of government equipment, and use of all profits and surplus.

Foreign technicians were brought in. Education was expanded in technical colleges, universities and in factory schools

to provide a whole new generation of skilled workers.


Working and living conditions In factories, old capitalist methods of piecework and pay differentials between

skilled and unskilled workers were used to encourage production. Medals were given to workers who achieved record output. These were known as

Stakhanovites after Alexei Stakhanov, a miner who in 1935 cut 102 tons of coal in a single shift.

Ordinary workers were ruthlessly disciplined. There were severe punishments for bad workmanship, accusations of being a ‘saboteur’ when targets were not met and time spent in a forced labour camp.

Primitive housing conditions and a severe shortage of consumer made life hard for most workers.

By the mid 1930s there were some improvements with introduction of benefits such as improved education, medical care and holidays with pay.

Collectivisation of agricultureThe problems of agriculture were tackled by the process of collectivisation of small farms and holdings into large collective farms jointly owned by the peasants. Stalin decided to collectivise for two reasons: the existing system of small farms was inefficient. Large farms, under state

direction and using tractors and combine harvesters, would greatly increase grain production (Source 3D)

he wanted to eliminate the class of prosperous kulaks or nepmen as, he claimed, they were standing in the way of progress. The real reason was probably political. He saw the kulak as the enemy of communism.

The policy was started in 1929 and had to be carried through by brute force due to determined resistance in the countryside. Peasants who owned property, whether kulaks or not, were hostile and had to be

forced to join by armies or party members. Peasants often reacted by slaughtering cattle and burning crops, rather than allow

the state to take them. Kulaks were not allowed to join collective farms and were deported to Siberia. Peasants on the new collective farms tried to sabotage the system by producing

only enough for their own needs. Local officials insisted on seizing the required quotas, resulting in large-scale

famine 1932-3, especially in the Ukraine. Over 90 per cent of all farmland had been collectivised by 1937. Stalin claimed

that the policy was a success. It allowed greater mechanisation which gradually increased grain output. However livestock production took a long time to recover.

The cost in human life and suffering was enormous. In 1946 a decree on the ‘liquidation of the abuses of the statute artel and collective

farm’ led to impoverishment, famine, and exodus from country to town. Newly obtained lands were collectivised.


Primary sourcesSource 3BIt is sometimes asked whether it is not possible to slow down the tempo a bit, to put a check on the movement. No, comrades, it is not possible!…To slacken the pace would mean to lag behind; and those who lag behind are beaten. We do not want to be beaten…We are fifty or a hundred years behind the advanced countries. We must make good this lag in ten years. Either we do it or they crush us…(extract from a speech by Stalin in 1931 to a Conference of Workers in Moscow)

Source 3CWhat was the fundamental task of the five-year plan?The fundamental task…was to transfer our country with its backward technology, on the lines of modern technology…to convert the USSR from an agrarian and weak country, dependent on the caprices of the capitalist countries, into an industrial and powerful country……the party undertook the fulfilment of this task not in five years, but in four years.What are the results of the five-year plan in four years…?We did not have an iron and steel industry. Now we have one.We did not have a tractor industry. Now we have oneWe did not have a machine tool industry. Now we have one.We did not have a…big industry for the production of modern agricultural machinery. Now we have one.In output of electric power we were last on the list. Now we rank among the first…It is true we are 6 per cent short of fulfilling the total programme……that output of goods for mass consumption was less than the amount required…(Stalin, in January 1933, describes the achievements of the first Five-Year Plan)

Source 3DAgriculture is developing slowly, comrades. It should be developing with gigantic strides, grain should become cheaper and harvests bigger, fertilisers should be applied to the utmost and mechanized production of grain should be developed at high speed. But that is not the case comrades, and will not come about quickly. Why?

Because our agriculture is a small-peasant economy, which does not lend itself readily to substantial improvement…we have about twenty-five million individual peasant farms…It is the most insecure,…primitive,…undeveloped form of economy…

Can we adopt the policy of encouraging privately owned, large capitalist farms in the countryside? Obviously we cannot. It follows then we must do our utmost to develop in the countryside large farms of the type of the collective farms and State farms and to convert them into grain factories for the country organised on a scientific basis…(Stalin, in April 1928, proposes the modernisation of agriculture)


The purges Russians apply the word ‘purge’ (chistka – cleansing out) to attempts to purge

party membership and the government bureaucracy. Such purges began soon after the 1917 revolution and continued throughout the 1920s and 30s. Many lost their jobs and were expelled from the party, but were not arrested or executed.

The ‘Great Purge’ refers to the Stalinist terror of 1936-38 when mass arrests and executions of Party and non-Party members took place. This period is also known as the Ezhovshchina, the ‘time of Ezhov’, commander of the secret police.

Reasons for the purgesSee section on historians’ views.

Development of the purges / terror From 1928, OGPU agents arrested and shot or sent to labour camps, many kulaks

and peasants. Between 1933 and 1936 unworthy Party members were expelled. Party membership records were reorganised and new Party cards issued. In 1934 Sergei Kirov, one of Stalin’s supporters in the Politburo, was assassinated.

Stalin may have been responsible for the murder and blamed it on his critics to give an excuse for his future actions.

The NKVD began mass arrests began in 1936. Thousands of party officials were tortured and made to confess to all sorts of crimes of which they were largely innocent. Some confessed to plotting with the exiled Trotsky or with capitalist governments to overthrow the USSR.

Some appeared in a series of ‘show trials’, were found guilty and sentenced to death or labour camp. Those executed from 1936-39 included the ‘Old Bolsheviks’ such as Zinoviev and Kamenev, Bukhain and Radek.

About 30,000 officers including Marshal Tukhavhevsky, commander of the Red Army, half the generals in the Red Army, and every admiral were arrested and expelled from the military, imprisoned or shot.

Non-Russian minorities suffered heavily. Millions were deported to labour camps. Ezhov was dismissed in 1938. The pace of the terror slowed down. Trotsky was hunted down and murdered in exile in Mexico City in 1940. During the Second World War over a million people were deported.

Results The number of those arrested, imprisoned and killed is still under debate. Possible leadership rivals were removed and the masses terrorised into obedience. The loss of many of the best brains in the government, army and industry resulted

in the disruption of administration and chaos in planning and production. The armed forces were greatly weakened at the start of the Second World War.


Purges / terror after the Second World War Stalin reorganised the High Command and as Minister of Defence conducted a

‘purge of the victors’. Many officers were arrested or demoted. By 1949 a quarter of the inhabitants of the Baltic states were ‘resettled’ to the

RSFSR and replaced by ethnic Russians. The labour camp population swelled by millions after the war with displaced and

repatriated persons, and ‘enemy elements’. In August 1946 Zhdanov, secretary of the central committee, organised a campaign

to purify Soviet intellectual life of Western influences, the Zhdanovshchina. When Zhadanov died Malenkov and Beria purged his power base. In the

‘Leningrad affair’, 200,000 communists were expelled from the party and state jobs and 200 executed. A purge of 1951 exterminated many or Beria’s supporters.

In the ‘doctor’s plot’ in January 1953, nine doctors, seven of whom were Jewish, were arrested for conspiring to assassinate the top soviet leadership. Stalin may have instigated it as an excuse for the elimination of Beria and another purge.

The Stalin Constitution of 1936 In 1936 a new and apparently more democratic constitution was introduced: everyone was allowed to vote by secret ballot for members of the Supreme Soviet

which met for about two weeks in the year the Soviet elected a smaller body, the Praesidium, to act on its behalf it also chose the Union Soviet of Commissars, a small group of ministers of which

Stalin was the Secretary, and which held the real power democracy was an illusion. The constitution strengthened the power of Stalin and

the party. Though there was mention of freedom of speech, critics were purged.

Social and cultural change Between 1928 and 1933 a ‘Cultural Revolution’ resulted in great social change.

Stalin wanted to promote his leadership style and to harness mass party support. New workers were encouraged to join the Party. Workers were encouraged to

criticise non-Party managers in industry. Younger workers were encouraged into higher education in industry. Non-Party managers were blamed for industrial failures and accidents and were

persecuted, for example in the Shakhty Trial, 1928. Writers, artists and musicians were expected to produce works of realism,

glorifying soviet achievements. Those who did not conform were persecuted. Education, like everything else, was closely watched by the secret police. It was

compulsory and free, and used for indoctrination. Literacy improved. There were improvements in social services. An attack on the Orthodox Church failed. Churches were closed and clergy

persecuted but in 1940 probably half the population were still believers. During the war the persecution was relaxed to help maintain morale.


Primary sourcesSource 3EThey started on me again. I was put on the ‘conveyor belt’. The interrogators worked in shifts; I didn’t. Seven days without sleep or food. Without even returning to my cell.

The object of the ‘conveyor is to wear out nerves, weaken the body, break resistance and force the prisoner to sign whatever is required. The first day or two I still noticed the individual characteristics of the interrogators – Livanov, calm and bureaucratic as before, urging me to sign some monstrous piece of rubbish as though it were no more than a perfectly normal, routine detail; Tsarevsky and Vevers always shouting and threatening…Major Elshin was invariably courteous and ‘humane’. He liked talking about my children. He heard I was a good mother, yet it didn’t look as if I cared about what happened to them…

‘Is it really worth torturing yourself like that rather than sign a purely formal, unimportant record? Come on now, get it over and go to sleep…’

The ‘unimportant record’ stated that, on Elvov’s instructions, I had organised a Tartar writers’ branch of a terrorist group of which I was a member…(Evgenia Ginzburg, Into the Whirlwind, 1968, pp. 69-70)

Source 3FStalin invented the concept of ‘enemies of the people’. This term made it automatically unnecessary for the ideological errors of a man or men engaged in a controversy to be proved: this then made possible the use of the most cruel oppression, violating all norms of revolutionary legality, against anyone who in any way disagreed with Stalin, against those who were only suspected of hostile intent, against those who had bad reputations. The concept ‘enemy of the people’ actually eliminated the possibility of any kind of ideological struggle or the making of one’s views known on this or that issue, even issues of a practical nature.

This led to glaring violations of revolutionary legality and to the fact that many entirely innocent persons, who had in the past defended the party line, became victims. The formula ‘enemy of the people’ was specifically invented to annihilate physically such individuals. Arbitrary behaviour by one person encouraged and permitted arbitrariness by others. Mass arrests, the deportation of many thousands of persons, executions without trial and without normal investigation created a climate of insecurity, fear and even desperation.(Khrushchev in his ‘secret speech’ explains the events of 1934-38)


Historians’ interpretations of StalinismThe following outline is a broad generalisation.

The traditional/totalitarian/intentionalist approaches Historians stress the importance of the state and Stalin in determining policy. They view Soviet society as the victim of a strong ‘totalitarian’ state, suffering

systematic and widespread repression which was centrally organised by the Communist Party.

They have been accused of adopting a distorted view of the USSR, writing at the time of the anti-soviet bias of the Cold War period, and basing their interpretation on traditional and often biased sources.

They argue that some of the latest data from Russia since 1985 supports their views, for example the discovery of mass graves and documents reveal Stalin’s active role in the policy of Terror.

The pluralist/revisionist/structuralist/decisionist approaches Since the mid 1980s historians have challenged traditional viewpoints. They claim that the only reliable interpretations are those based on detailed archive

sources, many of which are only recently available. They stress that powerful leaders are not the sole explanation for why events occur.

Some see Stalin as weak and opportunist. They stress the importance of institutional, economic, social and other pressures,

which made government domination of the USSR difficult, and resulted in chaotic and confused government.

They point to evidence of widespread support for Stalin and many of his policies as an explanation for his success in dominating Soviet society.

Structuralists or social historians, view the Stalin era as a division into two parts between the ‘revolution from above’ presented in the views of the totalitarians, and the ‘revolution from below’, presented in the views of the revisionists, the social historians. They focus on the relationships between the different social strata and classes rather than on the actions of the state.


Historians’ views on the terrorIssue: the origins of the Great Purge.

Source 3AA: Theory of historical traditionMore than anyone else he represented those ‘responsible communist administrators’ whose ‘culture’ was still inferior to that of Russia’s old rulers, and whose overwhelming inclination it was therefore to imitate, often unknowingly, the old rulers’ customs and habits. This, historically inevitable, process was reflected in the changing expressions of Stalin’s own political physiognomy: the features of not one but of several great Tsars seemed to revive in the Georgian Bolshevik who now ruled from their Kremlin…. Now, in the period of great purges, as he suppressed his opponents, he more than resembled Ivan the Terrible raging against the ‘boyars’. His political police, in charge of industrial enterprises as well as of prisons, were not unlike the ‘oprichnina’, that landed praetorian guard, through which Ivan had secured his ascendancy…In this revenge of history, it was not so much the recent past as the remote one that seemed to chase and overtake the forward-moving nation…(Isaac Deutscher, Stalin, Hammersworth, Penguin, 1972, pp. 357-358)

Source 3BB: Leninism to StalinismThe war against the Russian people was the Bolsheviks’ greatest sin. It may be objected that terror was only used against those found guilty of crimes against the regime. Not so…

Those who like to think that such measures were prompted by circumstances and that they applied only to particular cases, are simply wrong. The scale was massive, and the measures are typical of the way Lenin operated during the civil war…

The idea of the concentration camp system – the State Camp Administration, or Gulag - and the appalling purges of the 1930s are commonly associated with the name of Stalin, but the true father of the Bolshevik concentration camps, the executions, the mass terror and the ‘organs’ which stood above the state, was Lenin. Against the background of Lenin’s terror, it becomes easier to understand the methods of Stalin’s inquisition, which was capable of executing someone solely on the grounds of suspicion. Lenin did not merely inspire revolutionary terror, he was also the first to make it into a state institution…(Dmitri Volkogonov, Stalin, 1991, pp. 235-236)


Source 3CC: Leninism to StalinismThe Great Terror of 1936 to 1938 did not come out of the blue. Like any other historical phenomenon, it had its roots in the past. It would no doubt be misleading to argue that it followed inevitably from the nature of Soviet society and of the Communist Party. It was itself a means of enforcing violent change upon that society and that party. But all the same, it could not have been launched except against the extraordinarily idiosyncratic background of Bolshevik rule; and its special characteristics, some of them hardly credible to foreign minds, derive from a specific tradition. The dominating ideas of the Stalin period, the evolution of the oppositionists, the very confessions in the great show trials, can hardly be followed without considering not so much the whole Soviet past as the development of the Party, the consolidation of the dictatorship, the movements of faction, the rise of individuals, and the emergence of extreme economic policies.(Robert Conquest, The Great Terror, 1990, p. 3)

Source 3DD: Stalin’s lust for powerHis main motive…was lust for power, boundless ambition. This all-consuming lust appeared in Stalin much earlier than 1936. Even though he had great power, it was not enough – he wanted absolute power and unlimited submission to his will. He understood at the same time that the generation of party and government leaders formed in the years of underground work, revolution, and civil war would never become totally submissive. They too had taken part in the creation of the party and the state and demanded their share of the leadership. But Stalin did not want to share power.(Roy Medvedev, Let History Judge. The Origins and Consequences of Stalinism, 1989, pp. 585-586)

Source 3EE: Stalin’s paranoiaStalin was not only rude, ill-tempered, self-centred, and cruel; he was a morbidly suspicious man… Many criminals, afraid of exposure, begin to fear those around them, and the result may be more and more crimes. Something of this sort must have happened to Stalin. Having wiped out most of the Leninist old guard and almost all his erstwhile friends and comrades, having cast aside all laws of the party and state, of friendship, of simple humanity, Stalin had good reason to be afraid of people … Stalin’s fear of exposure and retribution drove him to commit more and more crimes. But we should not attribute the tidal wave of repression in the thirties to maniacal suspiciousness. Every despot is suspicious, but suspicion does not explain despotism.(Roy Medvedev, Let History Judge. The Origins and Consequences of Stalinism, 1989, p. 551)


Source 3FF: Scapegoats for failures of the Five Year Plans…, the trials provided scapegoats. Shortages of consumers’ goods, breakdowns in supply, errors in planning, could be attributed to malevolent plotting by enemies of the people, in the pay of Hitler, the Mikado, and ‘Judas-Trotsky’. The published reports of the trials abound in economic self-accusation. Thus the shortages of eggs was supposedly due to the efforts of wreckers, who smashed eggs in transit just to deprive the Soviet people of the fruits of their labour and to create politically exploitable discontent. Or so the readers of Pravda were supposed to believe. Bucharin’s – and other oppositionists’ – doctrines would be publicly associated with treason, and thereby placed outside the area of legitimate discussion or comment.(Alec Nove, An Economic History of the USSR, 1969, pp. 237)

Source 3GG: Influence of HitlerOn the night of 30 June 1934 in Germany came the first overt large-scale indication of the ruthless violence permeating the Nazi system. Hundreds of people were murdered by Hitler’s SS gunmen…The principal victims were Brownshirt leaders whom Hitler had come to find an encumbrance now that he was solidly in power. Then, when the death lists were being drawn up, other possible enemies of the Party were added, as were private individuals against whom one or other of the Nazi satraps had nourished a grievance.

…Only far to the east, in the Kremlin, was the purge regarded with undisguised admiration. An awed Stalin announced to his hastily convened Politburo that ‘The events in Germany do not at all indicate the collapse of the Nazi regime. On the contrary, they are bound to lead to the consolidation of that regime and the strengthening of Hitler himself.’

The Fuhrer had exhibited qualities he was well capable of estimating. Henceforth Stalin was to regard him with an entirely new fear and respect. He was particularly impressed, it seems, by the punity with which Hitler had been able to massacre large numbers of suspected adversaries in broad daylight. Within a few weeks Stalin began preparations for his own first bloody purge: that following the mysterious murder of his rival Kirov.(Nicolai Tolstoy, Stalin’s Secret War, 1981, pp. 83-84)


Source 3HH: Threat of war / link between domestic and foreign policyThe first of the great trials, that of Zinoviev and Kamenev, took place a few months after Hitler’s army had marched into the Rhineland; the last, that of Bucharin and Rykov, ended to the accompaniment of the trumpets that announced the Nazi occupation of Austria. German imperialism was rearming and testing its strength…(Stalin) had no illusions that war could be altogether avoided; and he pondered the alternative courses – agreement with Hitler or war against him – that were open to him…

In the supreme crisis of war, the leaders of the opposition, if they had been alive, might indeed have been driven to action by a conviction, right or wrong, that Stalin’s conduct of the war was incompetent and ruinous. At an earlier stage they might have been opposed to his deal with Hitler…It is possible that they would have then attempted to overthrow Stalin. Stalin was determined not to allow things to come to this.(Isaac Deutscher, Stalin, 1972, pp. 372-4)

Source 3II: Army plotThe real conspiracy was said to have been begun by the leaders of the army, Tukhachevsky and his associates. It is not known whether the semi-liberal civilian leaders like Rudzutak and Mezhlauk joined ands with the military. The exact circumstances of Tukhachevsky’s plot and of its collapse are not known. Some deny the existence of any plot, and maintain that Hitler’s Secret Services forged evidence of a plot and planted it on President Benes of Czechoslovakia, who transmitted it to Stalin. It is suggested that the real source of the forgery was in the G.P.U. in Moscow and that the forger calculated the whole plant, probably with Stalin’s connivance. But quite a few non-Stalinist sources maintain that the generals did indeed plan a coup d’etat and did this from their own motives, and on their own initiative, not in compact with any foreign power…(Isaac Deutscher, Stalin, 1972 pp. 375-6)


Source 3JJ: Centre-perifery conflictJ. Arch Getty considers the implications of an incompetent and chaotic administration at a central and local level, and the splits and conflicts between party factions, on the causes of the terror.

The evidence suggests that the Ezhovshchina – which is what most people really mean by the ‘Great Purges’ – should be redefined. It was not the result of a petrified bureaucracy’s stamping out dissent and annihilating old radical revolutionaries. In fact, it may have been just the opposite. It is not inconsistent with the evidence to argue that the Ezhovshchina was rather a radical, even hysterical ‘reaction’ to bureaucracy. The entrenched office holders were destroyed from above and below in a chaotic wave of voluntarism and revolutionary puritanism.(J. Arch Getty, Origins of the Great Purges, 1985, p. 206)

Source 3KK: The purges get out of controlThis book argues that Stalin was not guilty of mass first-degree murder from 1934-1941 and did not plan or carry out a systematic campaign to crush the nation. This view is not one of absolution, however; his policies did help to engender real plots, lies and threats to his position. Then this fear-ridden man reacted and over-acted to events. All the while the he could not control the flow of people within the country, job turnover, or illegal acts by managers and many others. He was sitting at the peak of a pyramid of lies and incomplete information and he must have known it. His power was constrained in fundamental ways, which contributed to his anxiety and tendency to govern by hit and run methods. His attitude and deeds must be situated in a context of vast, popular suspicion generated in part by World War One and the Civil War.(Robert Thurston, Life and Terror in Stalin’s Russia, 1934-1941, 1996, p. 227)




1. What aspects of Russian history and society facilitated Stalin’s rise to power?

2. What were the issues at stake in the intra-party debates of the 1920s?

3. To what extent was the collectivisation of agriculture a break with earlier Communist policy and doctrine?

4. Evaluate the success of the Soviet industrialisation drive of the late 1920s and 1930s.

5. Can any rational explanation be offered for the Great Terror in the 1930s?

6. In what ways did the 1930s alter the political, economic and social structures of the Soviet Union?


Sources1. What circumstances led Lenin to dictate his testament in Source 3A?

2. To what extent does Source 3A provide an accurate account of the suitability of the contenders for the leadership of the party after Lenin?

3. Why did Stalin put forward the explanation given in Source B for the pace of industrialisation at the time?

4. To what extent do you agree with Stalin’s assessment of the first Five-Year Plan in Source 3C?

5. How adequately does Source 3D explain the reasons for collectivisation?

6. How useful is Source 3E as evidence of treatment of victims of the terror?

7. Why did Khrushchev put forward the views expressed in Source 3F at the time?

8. How justified is Khrushchev’s assessment of Stalin in Source 3F?

9. Compare and contrast the views on the origins of the terror expressed in Sources 3AA to 3KK in light of your own reading.

10. Why do some of the views expressed in sources 3F and 3AA to 3KK differ so significantly?


SECTION 4: THE SPREAD OF STALINIST AUTHORITY

The material in this part deals with the fourth content area in the syllabus.

The spread of Stalinist authority, including: Stalin’s policies in the Second World War Stalinism and post-war Eastern Europe.

Suggested reading(Selected sample from full SCCC bibliography)

The sample list in Section 3 is also useful to Section 4.

Kennedy-Pipe, Caroline, Russia and the World, 1917-1991, London: Arnold, 1998.

Overy, Richard, Russia’s War, London: Penguin, 1998.

Barber, J.D. and Harrison, M., The Soviet Home Front 1941-45, Longman: London, 1991.

McCauley, Martin, The Origins of the Cold War 1941-49, 2nd edn., London: Longman, 1995. ‘Seminar Studies in History’ series.

McCauley, Martin, Russia, America and the Cold War 1940-1991, London: Longman, 1998. ‘Seminar Studies in History’ series.

Kennedy-Pipe, Caroline, Stalin’s Cold War: Soviet strategies in Europe, 1943-1956, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995.

Issues for Investigation/Research Stalin’s policies in the Second World War: foreign policy objectives in the 1920s

and 1930s; fluctuations of policy with regard to Germany; reasons for adoption and abandonment of ‘collective security’; Nazi-Soviet Pact; strengths and weaknesses of the USSR during the Second World War; reasons for initial failures 1941-42 and ultimate victory; Stalin’s leadership; effects of the war on the USSR.

Stalinism and post-war Eastern Europe: reasons for and nature of the expansion of Soviet power; origins of the Cold War; extent to which the USSR was responsible; effects on the USSR.

Wider context: the emergence of the USSR as a great power by 1953; continuity and discontinuity in foreign policy in pre-Soviet and Soviet history.


Timeline: the Second World War

Date Event1939 April: talks with Britain and France over military alliance

against HitlerMay: Molotov replaces Litvinov as Commissar for Foreign

AffairsAugust: talks with Britain and France collapse23 August: Non-Aggression pact signed with Germany1 September: Germany invades Poland; World War II begins17 September: Red Army invades eastern PolandNovember: USSR annexes western Ukraine and Western BelorussiaNovember: Winter War with Finland

1940 March: peace treaty with FinlandApril: Polish officers murdered at Katyn forestJune: USSR annexes Bessarabia and Northern BukovinaAugust: USSR annexes Baltic republics

1941 April: Treaty of Friendship with YugoslaviaApril: Neutrality Pact with JapanMay: Stalin becomes Chairman of Council of People’s

Commissars22 June: Germany invades USSRAugust: Stalin becomes Commander-in-Chief of armed forcesAugust: siege of Leningrad startsNovember: USA begins Lend-Lease for USSRNovember: Germans reach Moscow suburbsDecember: Japan attacks Pearl HarbourDecember: Battle of Moscow won by Red Army

1942 August: Germans reach CaucasusNovember: Soviet counter-attack at StalingradSiege of Moscow ends

1943 January: Stalin becomes MarshalFebruary: German troops surrender at StalingradMay: Stalin dissolves the CominternJuly-August: Battle of Kursk won by Red Army

1944 January: siege of Leningrad ends August: Red Army enters Romania and BulgariaAutumn: Red Army moves into Hungary, Yugoslavia and Poland

1945 April: Red Army enters ViennaMay: Red Army takes BerlinMay: Germany surrenders; war ends in EuropeAugust 6: Atomic bomb destroys HiroshimaAugust 8: USSR declares war on JapanSeptember 2: Japan surrenders; World War II ends


Timeline: the Cold War

Date Event1941 USSR accepts Atlantic Charter1943 November to December: Teheran Conference held1945 February: Yalta Conference held

April: United Nations founded at San Francisco conferenceJuly-August: Potsdam Conference held

1946 March: Churchill makes ‘iron curtain’ speech at Fulton, MissouriUnited Nations proposals for atomic energy control

1947 March: Truman Doctrine announcedJune: Marshall Plan for economic rebuilding of EuropeSeptember: Cominform founded in Poland; Zhdanov proclaims the

doctrine of the two campsPeace treaties signed with Finland, Italy, Bulgaria, Rumania, Hungary

1948 February: communist coup in CzechoslovakiaJune: 11-month Berlin blockade and airlift startsJune: Yugoslavia expelled from CominformJune: Czechoslovak People’s Republic proclaimed

1949 January: Council for Mutual Economic Assistance set upApril: North Atlantic Treaty Organisation formedSeptember: USSR tests A-bomb October: People’s Republic of China founded

1949-55 Political relations with Yugoslavia interrupted1950 February: treaty of friendship with Japan

June: Korean War starts1952 November: US tests first hydrogen bomb1953 March 5: Stalin dies; Malenkov succeeds

August: USSR explodes H-bombSeptember: Khrushchev elected First Secretary

1955 Warsaw Pact signed1956 Twentieth party congress: Khruschev’s ‘secret speech’ denounces Stalin1961 Twenty-Second Party Congress: Khrushchev steps up de-stalinisation.

Stalin’s body removed from Mausoleum.


Stalin’s policies in the Second World WarForeign policy in 1920s and 1930sForeign policy from 1917 to 1924 is covered in Section 2.

Under both Lenin and Stalin, foreign and domestic policy were closely related. Stalin often referred to external threats and dangers when promoting his changes to

agriculture and industry. He developed the idea of socialism in one country as a practical response to the

country’s domestic and foreign problems. He knew that the USSR was not strong enough to win a war against the west. He needed time to build up the armed forces through the Five-Year Plans.

Litvinov, Commissar for Foreign Affairs, made alliances in Eastern Europe to strengthen the USSR. In 1932 non-aggression pacts with Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland In 1935 Mutual Assistance Treaties with France and Czechoslovakia.

Diplomacy was used to avoid confrontation and maintain security. The Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931 was seen as a threat to the Soviet

border. Some army generals wanted military action but Stalin backed off. In 1933 the USA recognised the USSR. In 1934 the USSR joined the League of Nations. Relations with Germany deteriorated under Hitler. Mein Kampf clearly set out his

aim to conquer living space in the east at the expense of the USSR. In the Spanish Civil War, 1936-39, Stalin gave limited help to the Republic in the

form of tanks, aircraft, food and military advisors. Italy and Germany supported help the Nationalists. Stalin did not want to oppose Hitler openly, and wanted to prolong the war to divert attention from his purges at home. He withdrew his support in 1938. Britain and France followed a ‘Non-Intervention’ policy.

The Anti-Comintern Pact between Germany and Japan convinced Stalin of the need for an alliance with Britain and France. Litvinov stepped up attempts to make collective security a reality, despite doubts about the sincerity of western powers.

In 1938 Czechoslovakia mobilised in defiance of Hitler’s threat to invade. Stalin saw this as a final test of the western powers’ commitment to collective security. He was bound by treaty to aid the Czechs, provided France did so first. The USSR was excluded from the Munich conference at which France and Britain abandoned Czechoslovakia. Stalin felt he could not rely on western help against Germany.

The 1939 border clashes between Soviet and Japanese troops in Manchuria, led to a victorious short war for the USSR. Stalin feared the threat of a two front war.

In March 1939 Hitler took the rest of Czechoslovakia. Britain and France gave a guarantee of support to Poland, already under pressure from Hitler. A joint anglo-french mission was sent to Moscow in a halfhearted attempt to get Soviet support.


Nazi-Soviet Pact In May Litvinov was replaced by Molotov. He began secret talks with the

Germans while negotiations with Britain and France dragged on. On 23 August the German foreign minister Ribbentrop, signed a ten-year

non-aggression pact in Moscow. Fascist Germany was seen as the enemy so a change in Soviet propaganda was needed. Britain and France had lost a possible ally.

A secret protocol divided Eastern Europe into communist and nazi spheres of influence. Stalin would take control of Finland, the Baltic states, and part of Rumania. Poland would be partitioned between Germany and the USSR.

They also signed a trade agreement. Russia sent oil, raw materials and grain in exchange for German machinery and weapons. Soviet supplies strengthened the German war machine for the campaign in the west.

Stalin justified the Pact on the grounds that it gave him more time to prepare for war. Hitler was also offering him an opportunity to rebuild the Russian Empire.

Soviet gains in the west, 1939-40 On 1 September Germany invaded Poland. On 17 September the USSR invaded

eastern Poland. By the end of the month Poland was occupied. One and a half million Poles were deported to Siberia in cattle trucks. In 1943 the corpses of 4,254 Polish officers were discovered by the Germans in the Katyn forests of western Russia. They were executed by Soviet security forces in 1940.

The USSR invaded Finland in November 1939. It won the ‘Winter War’ with difficulty. Under the Treaty of Moscow in March 1940, Finland handed over land and a site for a Baltic naval base.

In June 1940 the USSR annexed the Baltic republics, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and took Bessarabia from Rumania. Stalin now had a frontier from Finland to the Black Sea which included a border with Germany.

The approach of war In June 1940 the Germans took France. The speed alarmed Stalin who was

hurriedly modernising his demoralised army after the ‘Winter War’. Relations between the USSR and Germany deteriorated in the winter of 1940.

Molotov went to Berlin and assured Stalin of Hitler’s peaceful intentions and respect for Stalin. Stalin ignored intelligence reports that Hitler was about to invade though Hitler massed several million troops along the Soviet border.

The German invasion of Russia Hitler’s help to Italy in its invasion of Greece and Yugoslavia delayed his attack,

originally planned for 15 May, by five weeks. If it had taken place in May, Germany might have taken Moscow before the winter.

On 22 June 1941, Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, a three-pronged attack; in the north towards Leningrad; in the centre towards Moscow; in the south through the Ukraine to Kiev.


Early Soviet defeats The German blitzkrieg of men, tanks and aircraft, was on an enormous scale. It

pushed back the Red Army, and forced civilians to flee eastwards. On 3 July Stalin made his first wartime radio speech of the ‘Great Patriotic War’

(Source 4A). Stalin introduced the scorched earth policy. Everything that might help the

invaders was moved eastwards or destroyed, resulting in great suffering. In the Baltic states and the Ukraine the soviet government was so unpopular that

the people might have supported the Germans. The German attitude towards them as sub-humans, to be enslaved or exterminated, backfired. Many joined partisan groups which waged a guerilla war behind German lines (Source 4B).

The Germans captured important cities such as Riga, Smolensk and Kiev. The Red Army put up tough resistance in front of Kiev. Hitler delayed an attack on Moscow and sent his panzers south into the Ukraine. The Soviets suffered major defeats in the battles of Uman and Kiev. One third of the Red Army was lost. Further north the Russians were defeated at the Battles of Smolensk and Bryansk.

The turn of the tide Heavy autumn rains turned the roads into mud, hampering the advance. The Germans had inadequate winter clothing as Hitler had expected the campaigns

to be over before the severe winter frosts. By September they had reached the outskirts of Moscow. They met fierce

resistance by General Zhukov. He tempted crack German divisions into combat and tried to inflict as many casualties as possible, the retreat and repeat. At the end of November the Germans called off their advance on Moscow.

Counter-offensives 1941-42 Zhukov’s counter-attacks with new armies forced the Germans to retreat. In early 1942, with no progress in the north and centre, the Germans drove

south-east towards the oil-fields of the Caucasus. They took the Crimea and Sevastopol.

At the end of August the Germans reached Stalingrad on the Volga. If it fell, the supply route for the USSR’s oil from the Caucasus would be cut off. Though the Germans almost destroyed the city, they were halted then destroyed by a combination of weather, poor equipment and Russian bravery.

In November a Russian counter-attack trapped the Germans whose supply lines were dangerously extended, and cut off their retreat.

Hitler’s refused to allow a withdrawal. On 2 February 1943 the German commander, von Paulus, surrendered with about 100,000 men.

The Germans had to abandon their plan to advance up the River Don to attack Moscow from the south-east.

Defeat lowered German and raised Russian morale.


The advance of the Red Army ‘Lend-lease’ aid from the USA, Britain and Canada, in the form of food supplies,

raw materials and weapons, was by now arriving in the USSR in large quantities. In May 1943 the Red Army retook captured cities as the Germans retreated. It counter-attacked in the Ukraine. Hitler attacked at Kursk. In July 1943 Russian

artillery bombarded the Germans who were defeated and forced to withdraw. In January 1944 the Germans were forced to abandon the siege of Leningrad,

which began in August 1941. A million people had died, many from starvation (Source 4C).

The Germans retreated from their position west of Moscow. Heavily outnumbered and short of tanks and guns, they were pushed out of Soviet territory.

The Red Army then drove them from Eastern Europe, advancing through Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Rumania and Bulgaria.

The end of the war Early in 1945 Germany was being invaded on both fronts. The British wanted to

push ahead and take Berlin before the USSR. Supreme commander Eisenhower would not be hurried.

In April Zhukov and Konev encircled Berlin, which surrendered on 8 May. Anglo-American troops evacuated their positions inside the Soviet zone on 1 July. In a Victory Parade in Berlin on 7 September, the Red Army showed off its latest

Josef Stalin IIIs, the most powerful tank in the world. On 6 August the USA used its first atomic bomb against Hiroshima. Two days

later Stalin declared war on Japan. The Red Army began a blitzkrieg in the Far East, and pushed as far as Mukden and Port Arthur in Korea. On 23 August, 1945, Stalin announced the final Soviet victory in the Far East.

A conservative estimate of Soviet military losses is seven million.

The Home Front In a situation of total war, the people suffered from severe shortage of clothes,

footwear and food. Prices rocketed but wages did not rise. The black market flourished.

From 1941-44 the NKVD deported eight nations from Western Russia to remote regions of the USSR, partly to stop collaboration with the Germans, and to take advantage of the war to eliminate divisive elements in the population. Possibly half-a-million died as a result.

At least 20 million Soviet citizens died during the war. Millions were permanently disabled.

The cities, towns and countryside of the European part of the Soviet Union had been devastated. 25 million were homeless.


Primary sourcesSource 4AComrades, citizens, brothers and sisters, men of our Army and Navy! It is to you I am speaking dear friends!

The treacherous military attack by Hitlerite Germany on our Motherland on 22 June, is continuing. In spite of the heroic resistance of the Red Army, and although the enemy’s finest divisions and air force units have already been smashed…, the enemy continues to push forward, hurling fresh troops to the front. Hitler’s troops have succeeded in capturing Lithuania, a considerable part of Latvia, the western part of Byelorussia and part of Western Ukraine. Fascist aircraft are extending the range of their operations…Grave danger overhangs our country.

It may be asked: how could the Soviet Government have consented to conclude a non-aggression pact with such treacherous monsters as Hitler and Ribbentrop? Was this not a mistake on the part of the Soviet Government? Of course not!…

What did we gain by concluding…the non-aggression pact? We secured for our country peace for a year and a half and the opportunity of preparing our forces to repulse fascist Germany should it risk an attack on our country despite the pact.

The Red Army, Red Navy and all citizens of the Soviet Union must defend every inch of Soviet soil, must fight to the last drop of blood for our towns and villages, must display the daring, initiative and mental alertness characteristic of our people…

We must strengthen the Red Army’s rear, subordinating all our work to this end; all our industries must be got to work with greater intensity to produce more rifles…

We must wage a ruthless fight against all disorganizers of the rear, deserters, panic-mongers and rumour mongers; we must exterminate spies…We must bear in mind that the enemy is treacherous, cunning, experienced in deception…

In case of a forced retreat of Red Army units, all rolling stock must be evacuated, the enemy must not be left a single engine…railway truck…pound of grain or gallon of fuel…Collective farmers must drive off all their cattle…

In areas occupied by the enemy, partisan units…must be formed; sabotage groups must be organized to combat enemy units, to ferment partisan warfare everywhere, blow up bridges and roads…They must be hounded and annihilated at every step…(Stalin’s radio broadcast speech on 3 July 1941)


Source 4B Because of its dense woods, and because the Germans set up permanent housekeeping there first, White Russia was one of the main partisan areas. Whole sections of it behind the German lines…never submitted to Nazi rule…

The Germans were maddened by this; they organised punitive expeditions… deported whole village populations. They tortured, froze, beat, hanged, gouged out eyes, drove men and women-and young girls-naked through the snow…

‘We were not sure at first that we had the right to destroy Soviet property,’ Saveli was saying. ‘Then came Stalin’s speech saying it was the duty of every man to do all he could behind the lines. That reassured us.’

Guerillas were divided into detachments. Saveli’s detachment started with ninety-five men…The main jobs were to blow up trains, dynamite bridges, harass supply lines, attack German individuals in their headquarters…. Saveli explained how they got their weapons. ‘Some we picked up after battle’, he said. ‘Others we could buy. They had a regular price. A rifle would be so many dozen eggs or three hens; a tommy gun could be had for a kilo of butter. The Germans were very venal”…

‘Our main help, though, came from the villagers,’ Saveli said. ‘They gave us food, information, scouts, advance notice of Nazi movements, showed us where arms were hidden. They knew where the enemy had sowed mines. We could count on our villagers, their loyalty and support. Every peasant was a guerilla assistant.’(E. Winter, I Saw the Russian People, 1945, pp. 144-146)

Source 4C‘…We were all very hungry. To walk up to the third floor was agony. You’d stop a dozen times…But people didn’t complain. They never looted bakeries. Many thousands died quietly each week.

There was a terrible fuel shortage…In the Port of Leningrad…the coal ships from Cardiff used to be unloaded…(some of it) drops into the water. Well, large holes were cut in the ice, and divers went down and worked for many days in the icy waters; and they brought to the surface 4,000 or 5,00 tons of coal!…

One of the greatest examples of how Leningrad fought for its life was when in the spring 300,000 or 400,000 people came out into the street with shovels-people who were scarcely standing on their feet, so weak and hungry were they and proceeded to clean up the town. All winter the drains and sewers had been out of action; there was great danger of epidemics…it was a joy to see the city streets…all clean and tidy. It had a great moral effect.’(A. Werth, Leningrad, 1944, pp. 127-129)


Historians’ Views on the Second World WarIssue: the reasons for early Soviet failures and eventual victory

Source 4AA Since the mid 1940s historians have furnished answers to these questions by reference to established analytical categories: military, political and economic. Each contains two interpretative view-points, ‘negative’ and ‘positive’. The first emphasizes Soviet incompetence (particularly in 1941) and Germany’s military and political failures. The second highlights the USSR’s tenacity and responsiveness in the context of total war.(Chris Ward, Stalin’s Russia, 1999, p. 208)

Source 4BBThe actions around Smolensk showed both the strengths and the weaknesses of Soviet forces. Soldiers fought with an extraordinary ferocity and bravery. They inflicted casualties at a high rate and in the early battles often refused to take prisoners…When they ran out of bullets and shells - as was all too often the case in the early stages of the war - they fought with knives or bayonets. Horsemen charged with sabres drawn…

Soviet forces lacked basic military equipment. The standard rifle dated from Tsarist days and was not generally replaced by automatic weapons until 1944. Radio communications were rudimentary and radios in short supply. Radar was not generally available. Tanks, even the most modern T-34 and KV-1 tanks, were short of supplies and fuel and were attacked repeatedly by German aircraft which had local air superiority. Though brave, Red Army officers were tactically inept…

In 1941 the two opposing sides made war in very different ways. Both the Soviet and the German armed forces were committed from strategic tradition to the offensive. But in the summer of 1941 it was German forces who were on the offensive, forcing the Red Army to wage an unaccustomed war of defence, for which there had been almost no systematic preparation…

The Soviet dispositions to meet the German attack could not have been worse. The defensive belts were not finished; the reserve army was only just being formed; above all the concentration of forces in the southern zone allowed the weight of the German attack in the north to punch a giant gap in the Soviet front, then swing forces south to eliminate the threat to their flank from Soviet armies that could not be fully deployed. The defensive weaknesses were compounded with the poor state of organization and preparation in Soviet armoured and air formations…(Richard Overy, Russia’s War, 1988, pp. 86-89)


Source 4CCIn short, Stalin was in several respects a poor commander, with a weakness for abstract schematizing, for underestimating the enemy and overestimating his own forces. He was shortsighted and cruel, careless of losses, little interested in the fate of soldiers or the common people. He had much more to do with the reverses at the beginning of the war than with the victories at the end.(Roy Medvedev, Let History Judge, 1989, pp. 748 and 770)

Source 4DD‘Negative’ and ‘positive’ interpretations based primarily on economic, military and political factors will only take researchers so far. They need to be supplemented by social interpretations...the Great Patriotic War should be characterized as a people’s war. While the Stalinist regime responded to the ferocious demands imposed on the country – the ‘politics of permanent emergence’ and the command-administrative system were, in crucial respects, produced respectively by war and the fear of war – Stavka’s battle plans and GoKO’s orders would have been unavailing without widespread popular determination to destroy fascism.

Much of this had to do with policies emanating from Berlin and Moscow. There is no doubt that Hitler’s blunders helped Germany to defeat; the potential of the vast reservoir of Red Army defectors, prisoners and subject nationalities was never fully exploited and Nazi ideology drove millions of waverers into choosing Stalinism as the lesser evil. Equally, the re-invigoration of nationalism and Orthodoxy ‘from above’ by the Soviet regime simultaneously released and stimulated mass support for the struggle against the invader. But the people were not just acted upon by two governments, fascist and communist: the ‘positive’ factor of spontaneous Soviet patriotism cannot be overestimated.(Chris Ward, Stalin’s Russia, 1999, p. 221)

Source 4EESoviet success owed something to all these factors: popular patriotism and native endurance; the role of Stalin; the political environment of planning and mobilization; and the temporary flowering of a spirit of initiative and endeavour just powerful enough to transcend the grim climate of fatalistic conformism with which post-purge society had been afflicted. The war effort was not sustained just by the efforts of the people in defiance of the system they inhabited; but neither was it just the product of the Soviet State, its leader and the Party. The two elements operated in an uneasy symbiosis, neither entirely trusting the other, yet bound together by mutual necessity imposed by German aggression. (Richard Overy, Russia’s War, 1998, p. 330)


Sources1. Why did Stalin not make his first broadcast speech of the war in Source 4A

until 3 July?

2. Analyse his motives in making the speech in Source A.

3. What light does Source B shed on the activities of the partisans?

4. How useful is Source C as evidence of life in Leningrad during the siege?

5. To what extent do you agree with the explanation given in Source 4AA for early Soviet defeats in World War Two?

6. How valid are the criticisms of Stalin’s war leadership in Source 4BB?

7. Compare and contrast the views put forward in Sources 4CC and 4DD on reasons for Soviet success in the Second World War.


Stalinism and post-war Eastern EuropeCauses of the Cold War Differences between communist and capitalist countries existed since 1917. A

common need to defeat Hitler brought them together. Divisions in the alliance at the 1943 Teheran Conference over Eastern Europe widened (Source 4D).

Truman, who replaced Roosevelt as US President in April 1945, and Churchill, both mistrusted Stalin.

Stalin’s seemingly aggressive foreign policy in 1945 increased the tension. He took advantage of the military situation to take control of most of Eastern Europe.

The USSR feared the atomic power developed by Britain and the USA but not shared with their wartime ally. The west feared the power of the Red Army.

Agreements at wartime conferences created problems in a divided Europe.

The Yalta Conference, February 1945Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill met in the Crimea. Stalin was in a powerful position as the Red Army was within forty miles of Berlin. It was decided that: the United Nations Organisation would be set up Germany would be divided into Russian, American and British zones. A French

zone was included later. Berlin in the Russian zone, would also be so split free elections would be allowed in the states of eastern Europe the USSR would keep the part of eastern Poland seized in 1939. Poland’s eastern

frontier should return to the 1920 Curzon Line. Poland would be compensated with land from Germany. Non-communist members of the London-based Polish government-in exile should be allowed to join the Lubin government, set up by the USSR after the Red Army ‘liberated’ Poland in 1944

Stalin would attack Japan in return for Sakhalin Island and part of Manchuria.

The Potsdam Conference, July to August 1945 The main representatives were Stalin, Truman and Churchill, who was replaced by Clement Attlee after Labour’s election victory. Relations were cool. The war with Germany was over but no agreement was reached about its future. Stalin did not allow free elections in ‘liberated’ countries, including Poland. Western leaders unwillingly accepted the occupation of Germany east of the

Oder-Neisse Line by Soviet troops and expulsion of six million Germans. Truman told Churchill but not Stalin about the nature of the atomic bomb. After the conference, two atomic bombs were dropped on Japan. The war ended

on 10 August without the need for Russian aid, though the USSR declared war on Japan on 8 August and invaded Manchuria. The USSR annexed south Sakhalin as agreed at Yalta, but was not allowed to occupy any of Japan.


Churchill’s ‘Iron Curtain’ speechIt was made in March 1946 in Missouri USA in response to the spread of communism in Eastern Europe (Source 4E). Pro-communist coalition governments had been set up under Soviet influence in

Poland, Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria and Albania. In some cases their opponents were imprisoned or murdered.

Churchill denounced Stalin’s unwillingness to allow access to or from the west. He expressed Europe’s need for US help to safeguard Western Europe and

suggested a joint military response to Stalin by the USA and Britain. His speech widened the rift between east and west.

Stalin’s policies in Eastern Europe By the end of 1947 only Czechoslovakia did not have a communist government.

Elections were rigged. Non-communist members of coalition governments were expelled. Many were arrested and executed.

Stalin treated the Russian zone of Germany as if it belonged to the USSR, allowing only the Communist party and draining it of vital resources.

The west was angry at his disregard of his promise of free elections made at Yalta. The Soviets argued that friendly governments in neighbouring states were essential for self-defence; that these states had never been democratic anyway; that communism would bring much-needed progress to backward countries.

The ‘Truman Doctrine’ A communist attempt to overthrow the monarchy in Greece alarmed Truman. He announced in March 1947 that the USA would ‘support peoples who are

resisting subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures’. Amercian financial and military aid were given to Greece and Turkey. The Doctrine made it clear that the US had no intention of returning to isolation. It was committed to a policy of containing the spread of communism by preventing

further expansion of Soviet influence.

The Marshall Plan It was an economic extension of the Truman Doctrine. In June 1947, American Secretary of State George Marshall in his ‘European

Recovery Programme’ offered economic and financial help where it was needed. This would ensure markets for American exports and prevent communism from

gaining control in a prosperous Western Europe. Sixteen nations became members. Western Europe received millions of dollars of American Aid.


The Communist Information Bureau Stalin was suspicious of the motives behind Marshall Aid. Molotov denounced the

plan as ‘dollar imperialism’, a blatant American device for gaining control of western Europe and for interfering in eastern Europe. Although aid was in theory available to eastern Europe, the USSR and satellite states rejected the offer of help.

Stalin set up the Cominform in September 1947 at a conference in Warsaw. It was seen by the west as a revival of the old Comintern which he had abolished in 1943.

Zhdanov in a speech put forward his ‘two camp’ thesis. He stressed the leading part the USSR had played in the defeat of Germany and his country’s readiness for another struggle against the expansionist policy of the USA.

The organisation drew together European communist parties. All the satellite states were members and the French and Italian parties were represented.

Stalin aimed to tighten his grip on the satellites through Russian-style communism. Eastern Europe was to be industrialised, collectivised and centralised. States were

expected to trade with Cominform members and have little contact with non-communist countries. Only Yugoslavia objected and was expelled in 1948.

In 1949 the Molotov Plan offered Russian aid to satellite states. The Council of Mutual Economic Assistance, Comecon would co-ordinate economic policies.

Czechoslovakia In the freely elected coalition government in 1946, the communists had won 38%

of the votes and held a third of cabinet posts under a communist Prime Minister. It was likely that the communists would lose support in the elections due in May

1948. They seized power in February in an armed coup. This was a blow to the west as it was the only democratic state left in Eastern

Europe. Western powers protested but could not prove Stalin’s involvement. The ‘iron curtain’ was complete.

Crisis in Germany There was disagreement over the treatment of Germany which was divided into

four Allied zones. The three western powers began to organise the economic and political recovery of their zones. Stalin wanted the Germans pay for the damage to the USSR. He treated his zone as a satellite, draining its resources to the USSR.

In 1948 the three western zones merged into a single economic unit. Its prosperity, due to Marshall Aid, was a contrast to the poverty of the Soviet zone. The west also began to prepare a constitution for a self-governing West Germany. Stalin was alarmed at the prospect of a strong independent West Germany.

In June 1948 the west introduced a new currency and ended price controls and rationing in their zone and in West Berlin. Stalin, already unhappy at a capitalist area in the communist zone, did not want two currencies in the city or the embarrassment of a prosperous West Berlin.


The Berlin blockade and airlift Stalin closed all access routes between West Berlin and West Germany. His aim

was to force the west to withdraw from West Berlin by starving it. The western powers were determined not to retreat as this might lead to a Russian

attack on West Germany. They flew in supplies, rightly judging that the Russians would not risk shooting down the transport planes. Over the next ten months, two million tons of supplies were airlifted to the blockaded city to keep the 2.5 million West Berliners fed and warmed through the winter.

In May 1949 Stalin lifted the blockade. The outcome was a psychological boost for western powers. Relations with the USSR were at an all time low.

In August 1949 the western powers set up the German Federal Republic or West Germany. In October Stalin set up the German Democratic Republic or East Germany.

North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Western powers co-ordinated their defences by forming NATO, in April 1949. The blockade had demonstrated the west’s military unreadiness and frightened

them into making definite preparations. All signatories, Britain, the USA, and ten other countries initially, agreed to regard

an attack on any one of them as an attack on all. They placed their defence forces under a joint NATO Command Organisation,

which would co-ordinate the defence of the west. The USA became committed to the defence of western Europe. Stalin took it as a challenge. Tension remained high, especially when it became

known in September 1949 that the USSR had developed its own atomic bomb. The focus of the Cold War was the Korean War, 1950-53.

The ‘thaw’ in the Cold War When the Korean War ended tensions relaxed and there was talk of a ‘thaw’ in the

Cold War. A starting point was the death of Stalin in March 1953. New leaders, Malenkov, Bulganin and Khrushchev, wanted to improve relations

with the USA, partly due to the danger of nuclear war. Nikita Khrushchev explained the new policy in a speech in February 1956. He

criticised Stalin and said that ‘peaceful co-existence’ with the west was not only possible but also essential.


Primary SourcesSource 4DAs I look at the map of Europe, certain things seem clear to me. As the Nazis go down to defeat they will inevitable leave behind them in Germany and the satellite states of south-eastern Europe a legacy of confusion. It is essential that we and our Allies establish the controls necessary to bring order out of this chaos as rapidly as possible and do everything possible to prevent its spread to the German-occupied countries of eastern and western Europe while they are in the throes of re-establishing government and repairing the most brutal ravages of the war. If confusion should spread throughout Europe it s is difficult to over-emphasize the seriousness of the disaster that may follow. Therefore, for us, for the world, and for the countries concerned, a stable Europe should be an immediate objective of allied policy.(Cordell Hull’s Radio Address, April 9, 1944: Leland M. Goodrich and Marie J. Carroll (eds), Documents on American Foreign Relations, July 1943-June 1944, Vol VI, Boston, 1945, pp. 25-35)

Source 4E

A shadow has fallen upon the scenes so lately light by the Allied victory. Nobody knows what Soviet Russia and its Communist international organisation intends to do in the immediate future, or what are the limits, if any, to their expansive and proselytising tendencies. I have a strong admiration and regard for the valiant Russian people and for my war-time comrade, Marshal Stalin…We understand the Russians need to be secure on her western frontiers from all renewal of German aggression. We welcome her to her rightful place among the leading nations of the world. Above all we welcome constant, frequent and growing contacts between the Russian people and our own people on both sides of the Atlantic…

From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia, all these famous cities and populations around them lie in the Soviet sphere and all are subject in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and increasing measure of control from Moscow…

(Churchill’s Speech at Fulton, Missouri, March 5 1946: Vital Speeches of the Day, XII, March 15, 1946, pp.329-332)


Historians’ views on the Cold WarIssue: To what extent was Stalin to blame for the Cold War? A traditionalist view is that Stalin was the aggressor, continuing Lenin and

Trotsky’s policy of world revolution, now that ‘socialism in one country’ had been established. An American military presence in Europe was an obstacle to such expansion. Some view Stalin as an opportunist who took advantage of circumstances at the end of World War Two to spread communism.

A revisionist view from the 1960s is that American aggression towards the USSR was mainly to blame. Stalin’s policies were a defensive reaction to the threat to Soviet interests of America’s military, atomic and economic power in Europe.

A neo-revisionist view from the 1970s focuses on the hesitant nature of American foreign policy and sees the Cold War as a result of a series of mistakes and misunderstandings.

A post-neo revisionist view supports the traditionalist view.

Source 4FFIt is clear that the main reason for the conflict must be sought in the character of the state systems that dominated the world.

It is sometimes argued that the change in American foreign policy after Roosevelt was bound to maximise Soviet suspicions. But, with the war concluded, it was impossible for large sections of western public opinions to remain unconcerned at what was happening in Soviet-dominated Europe and this could not but effect the policies of the American and British governments. Then in turn, it was impossible for the Soviets to abandon their suspicions about the intentions of the western powers. Not the most extensive credits, or even the turning over to the Russians of sample atomic bombs could have appeased them or basically affected their policies. Suspicion was built into the Soviet system; it was inherent in the character of its ruler…

…while Stalin’s policy could not have been essentially different after 1945, the problem remains as to the reasons for its abrupt shift in line and method…Why, in their satellites did the Soviets ruthlessly and speedily crush all effective opposition… If, as is often argued, the Soviets were fearful of America’s aggressive intentions and nuclear weapons, why maximise the danger by brutal and uncompromising policies rather than disarming suspicions through a more subtle and conciliatory diplomacy?

The basic explanation must be sought in the same consideration that dictated the course of events leading to the Nazi-Soviet Pact. Then it was Stalin’s conviction that any war on Soviet soil, however victorious, in the end would spell disaster to the regime and to his own personal power. Now the same internal policy dictated isolation from and hostility towards the west…(A. Ulam, Expansion and Coexistence: Soviet Foreign Policy 1917-1973, 1974, pp.399-401)


Source 4GGThe war years were spent in a desperate battle for survival. After 1943, and with the launching of the second front, Stalin started to outline his requirements for the peace. First, he demanded space on the Soviet periphery, through the annexation or control of territory. Second, he demanded complete subjugation of German power. For the former aim he used Soviet troops to achieve a pattern of occupation, and, for the latter, he called upon the aid of the United States.

Through a combination of diplomacy and troop movements, Stalin operated a strategy of denial to British and American influence in Eastern Europe and hence to ensure ‘de facto’ control. He also attempted, through the use of diplomatic measures, to assert special rights in the east. While excluding American influence in one part of Europe, Stalin sought its long-term presence and aid in another, Germany. It was Stalin who suggested the American occupation of a zone in both Germany and Austria, it was Roosevelt who hesitated.(Caroline Kennedy-Pipe, Stalin’s Cold War, 1995, pp.193-194)

Source 4HHProfoundly debilitated by four years of struggle against the most vicious imperialist regime ever to emerge from Europe, Russia was quite unable to risk further conflict…

…there is no reason to suspect the existence of a Soviet plot to swallow up Europe or Asia. In fact the evidence points in the opposite direction. Russia’s victory over Germany was, to a large extent, Pyrrhic. The USSR’s economy was in turmoil and Stalin quickly demobilized the bulk of the country’s massive army. Moreover, after 1945 a virulently anti-communist Pax Americana ruled the world, not a Pax Sovietica, and any withdrawal from the occupied territories would have been taken as a clear sign of weakness, an invitation to increase the pressure on the socialist camp. If Churchill was more than willing to launch a military offensive against his country’s erstwhile ally, American actions, while less alarming in the short term, were just as threatening in the long term – Marshall Aid and the Truman doctrine were hardly likely to assuage Moscow’s fears…

The development of the Cold War must be seen in the context of the broad sweep of Soviet history – and perhaps of pre-Soviet history too. Allied policy towards Germany and Eastern Europe undoubtedly fuelled Stalin’s long standing suspicions of the West, and with good cause – neither before nor after 1945 did Britain or America evince much sympathy for socialist Russia, or even any clear understanding of traditional Russian concerns for the security of the country’s borders. The Nazi-Soviet War was the greatest test ever faced by Russia, and to a large extent it faced it alone. The lesson for her rulers after that war seemed obvious and overwhelming; allies of convenience soon reverted to being enemies. (Chris Ward, Stalin’s Russia, 1999, pp. 223-224)


Source 4IIWhat is there new to say about the old question of responsibility for the Cold War? …Here I think the ‘new’ history is bringing us back to an old answer; that as long as Stalin was running the Soviet Union a cold war was inevitable.

History is always the product of determined and contingent events: it is up to historians to find the proper balance between them. The Cold War could hardly have happened if there had not been a United States and a Soviet Union, if both had not emerged victorious from World War II, if they had not had conflicting visions of how to organise the post-war world. But these long term trends did not in themselves ensure such a contest because there is always room for the unexpected to undo what might appear to be the inevitable…

Individuals…more often personify contingency in history…

…For the more we learn, the less sense it makes to distinguish Stalin’s foreign policies from his domestic practices or even his personal behaviour…he functioned in much the same manner whether operating within the international system, within his alliances, within his country, within his party, within his personal entourage, or even within his family. The Soviet leader waged war on all these fronts. The Cold War we came to know was only one of many from his point of view.

This argument by no means absolves the United States and its allies of a considerable responsibility for how the Cold War was fought…

…For all of their importance, one could have removed Roosevelt, Churchill, Truman, Bevin, Marshall or Acheson, and a cold war would still have probably followed …If one could have eliminated Stalin, alternative paths become quite conceivable…Who then was responsible? The answer, I think, is authoritarianism in general, and Stalin in particular.(J. L. Gaddis, We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War History, 1997, pp. 292-294)




1. What were the objectives of Soviet foreign policy in the period between 1922 and 1939, and to what extent were they realised?

2. Did the Soviet Union gain anything from the Nazi-Soviet Pact of 1939?

3. Why did the USSR eventually triumph over Germany in World War Two?

4. In what ways did the Second World War facilitate the expansion of Soviet power in Europe?

5. To what extent can the USSR be held responsible for the beginning of the Cold War?

6. In what ways and to what extent had the Soviet Union become a super power by 1953?


Sources1. Why did Stalin not make his first broadcast speech of the war in Source 4A

until 3 July?

2. Analyse his motives in making the speech in Source A.

3. What light does Source B shed on the activities of the partisans?

4. How useful is Source C as evidence of life in Leningrad during the siege?

5. To what extent do you agree with the explanation given in Source 4AA for early Soviet defeats in World War Two?

6. How valid are the criticisms of Stalin’s war leadership in Source 4BB?

7. Compare and contrast the views put forward in Sources 4CC and 4DD on reasons for Soviet success in the Second World War.

8. How adequately does Sources 4D explain the attitude of the USA towards Eastern Europe at the time?

9. What circumstances led Churchill to put forward the views in Source 4E?

10. What light do Sources 4FF to 4II shed on the reasons for the development of the Cold War?


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