The Russian Civil War ends in 1921 -1. The Reds are victorious over the Whites2. Key role played by the Red Army created by Leon Trotsky3. During the war Lenin pursues a policy called “war communism”

War Communism -

1. Government nationalizes transportation, communication, banks, factories, and business

2. It was done during the time of crisis in the Civil War3. The Communist Party basically seizes everything4. Government assumes the right to take agricultural

goods from the peasants5. War communism is a disaster - production collapses

and people turn to the black market6. By 1920 industrial output was at only 20% of what is

was in 1913

The New Economic Policy (the NEP) -

1. March 1921 Lenin ends war communism and established the NEP

2. Russia reverts to a modified version of the old capitalist system

3. Peasants are allowed to sell their products again4. Retail stores and small industries are legalized5. “the Commanding Heights” of the economy

remain under the control of the government6. Russian economy recovers under the NEP

In 1922 Lenin and the Communists create a new state to replace the old Russia - in its place is the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics = USSR = Soviet Union

The death of Lenin in 1924 -

1. One-man rule under Lenin

2. Lenin does not name his successor

3. Struggle for power over the who will be heir

The struggle for power in the Soviet Union following the death of Lenin

The Politburo –The ruling organ of the Communist Party1. Made up of 7 members2. The Left faction = -wanted to end the NEP -Wanted rapid industrialization -Wanted to spread communism abroad3. The Right faction = -rejected the cause of world revolution-Focus on building communism in the Soviet Union- Favored continuing the NEP4. Intense personal rivalry between Trotsky and Stalin

• Joseph Stalin (1879-1953) -• 1. Was a peasant from the region of Russia called Georgia• 2. Joins the party in 1903• 3. After the revolution he takes the dull bureaucratic position of General Secretary of the Party• 4. He was a master of political infighting and a good organizer• 5. His position as General Secretary gave him the power of appointing regional, district, city,

and town party • Secretaries = these people became his allies• 6. Stalin first refuses to join either the Right or the Left factions• 7. Stalin then comes to favor the Right faction = “socialism in one country”• Stalin uses his position as General Secretary to gain control of the Communist Party• • Stalin uses the Right faction to defeat Trotsky and has him expelled from the Party in 1927 and

in 1929 Trotsky is expelled from the Soviet Union • • Later in 1940 Stalin has Trotsky murdered in Mexico where he was living in exile

By 1929 Stalin 1. Controlled the Party2. Defeated Trotsky3. Eliminates from the

Politburo all the “Old Bolsheviks” who had led the revolution

4. Establishes a dictatorship and builds a totalitarian system

THE STALINIST ERA (1929-1939)• Stalin ends the NEP

• Begins a program of “crash industrialization” = throw all resources towards

industrializing the USSR

• The Five Year Plans = Stalin’s economic policy of industrialization 1. Emphasis on heavy industry - steel, machinery. Oil production2. Huge social and political costs involved with industrialization3. Few or no resources were devoted to housing or consumer goods4. Those who didn’t work hard enough or complain were labeled “enemies of the people”

• The first five year plan begins in 1928 - Stalin sets goal to industrial output by 250%

• *transform the Soviet Union from a peasant agricultural economy to industrial state overnight

Collectivization = forced all the peasants to into large collective farms controlled by the government

• 1929 the peasants are forced to give up their land

• The kulaks = better-off peasants/those who employed wage labor• The kulaks became the enemy and Stalin declared that they be “liquidated as a class”• The reality was that any peasant who opposed Stalin and collectivization was labeled a kulak• By 1932 60% of peasants were on collective farms• By 1938 93% were on collective farms• The number of horses, cattle, sheep, and goats fell by at least 50%• The state seized grain to feed the urban workers - millions die in a state directed famine in the Ukraine

forced collectivization was an economic disaster

• Rapid industrialization + the expansion of the party bureaucracy - • 1. Those who resisted were sent into forced labor camps = the Gulag• 2. Stalin’s wife publicly protests then commits suicide• 3. In 1934 Stalin’s second in command in assassinated probably by Stalin - this gives

him an excuse to• Eliminate the “old Bolsheviks” - all possible rivals within the Party• • The Stalinist Purge - a reign of terror• Show Trials - people were tortured and forced to publicly “admit” to treason• Estimated that 8 million Russians were arrested• Millions die in Siberian forced labor camps• • * Stalin was one of the greatest , if not the greatest, mass murderers in human

history

THE GREAT PURGE

WHAT HAPPENED TO NIKOLAI YEZHOV?HEAD OF THE NKVD, STALINIST SECRET POLICE IS PURGED -> AND ERASED FROM HISTORY

DAILY LIFE IN STALINIST RUSSIA In the totalitarian Stalinist state there always had to be either a real or imagined enemy to

battle

Newspapers and films continually told of socialist achievements and capitalist plots

Art and literature became political tools

Russian history was rewritten/religion was persecuted/churches became “museums of atheism”

Stalin’s pictures and images were everywhere

People lived on black bread and vodka

A lucky family was given one room and shared bathroom for housing

STALINISM AND THE WEST/STALINIST SOCIAL POLICIES

•Many in the West fell in love with a romantic fantasy of a true socialist society = ignored or were blind to the horrors and crimes of the Stalinist regime - he was creating “a new civilization” •The Western left wing love affair with Stalin and the Soviet Union ended when Stalin surprises everyone and signs a corrupt cynical treaty with Hitler which allows WW II to begin - selling out Poland •Soviet workers did receive - free education, day care, medical care, and old age pensions - but standards of living were very low and way behind the West •Unemployment and crime were almost nonexistence •Members of the Party received special privileges and lived better than other people •Social legislation and policies in the Soviet Union =

1. In the 1920’s - very progressive and liberated2. In the 1930’s - became very traditional and conservative - abortion, homosexuality

outlawed/women urged to have large families

Death solves all problems – no man, no problem.

Joseph Stalin, 1918

AUTHORITARIANISM IN EASTERN EUROPE

• The new states created in Eastern Europe were all organized as parliamentary and constitutionals governments

• By the time mid-1930’s all except Czechoslovakia had became authoritarian dictatorial regimes

1. No tradition of liberalism or parliamentary government2. No substantial middle class3. States will largely rural and agricultural - dominated by large landowners 4. Fear of land reform, communist agrarian upheaval , ethnic conflict

• Poland - Marshal Joseph Pilsudski = military dictatorship• Yugoslavia - King Alexander = royal dictatorship• Hungary - Admiral Horthy = military dictatorship• Austria - Engelburt Dolfuss = Christian Socialist party authoritarian government

• Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) -1. Popular Front government is formed in 19362. The army led by General Francisco Franco

revolts against the government and starts a bloody civil war

3. Soviet Union backs and assists the Republican government

4. Germany and Italy backs and assists Franco 5. Both sides used the Spanish Civil War to try

out their new weapons6. Franco’s forces win in 1939 • General Franco forms a forms a traditional,

conservative, authoritarian dictatorship that is in power from 1939 to 1975

The ruins of Guernica

Guernica = first aerial bombing of city takes place in this Spanish town /down by German planes assisting Franco

Picasso paints a famous anti-war painting entitled Guernica depicting this event