Ms. Mallard 7th Grade

Causes for the Russian Revolution Russia is not industrialized World War I Losses and Russian defeat in the Russo-Japanese war leads to unrest Fuel shortages, poor working conditions Factory workers: overworked, almost homeless The elected assembly (Duma) were blocked by tsar (king) and leads to widespread suffering Absolute ruler Tsar Nicholas II displays weak leadership

What is the February Revolution? Also called the March Revolution Huge protest on National Women’s day “Bread, Bread!” Petrograd (St. Petersburg) is paralyzed Tsar Nicholas II abdicates (leaves the throne)

Results? Duma sets up a temporary government They prepare a constitution Soviets (councils) of workers worked with provisional government The Bolshevikstook control of soviets Bolshevik leader Vladimir Llyich Ulyanov (Lenin)

The Lithuanian Castle

What’s a Bolshevik? The term means “majority” in Russian An elite group would lead the revolution and set up a “dictatorship of the proletariat” (lower classes) This elite revolutionary party represented only a small percentage of the population Menshevik means “minority”

Lenin Lenin was a Marxist and believed in communism. He was exiled to Siberia and later went to Switzerland. Germany helped Lenin return to Russia. Lenin promised “Peace, Land and Bread.”

October Revolution (1917) AKA November Revolution The provisional government did not make adequate reforms. Red guards (factory workers and sailors) attacked the provisional government in St. Petersburg and overtook it. Moscow became the Bolshevik headquarters/capital. Changes: Ended private ownership. Entwined hammer and sickle symbolize union between workers and peasants.

World War I Ends Only for Russia Bolsheviks believe it is a capitalist war. Russia negotiates an independent peace treaty with Germany Leon Trotsky negotiated treaty of Brest-Litovsk March 1918 Russia gave up a huge western portion of its population

Russian Civil War Reds: Communists Whites: Counterrevolutionaries. Tsarist imperial officers, Mensheviks, Democrats, and others who wanted to defeat the Bolsheviks. Also Britain, France and the United States Brutal war. Communists killed former tsar and tsarina and their five children in July 1918 Rumors that Anastasia survived Trotsky created a disciplined army Reds won in 1921

What did this new state look like? 1922 Lenin’s Communist government united much of the old Russian empire into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) or Soviet Union The communists produced a constitution that was democratic and socialist an elected legislature and universal suffrage They did not believe in private property (tetris example) Used the army and secret police

Lenin’s New Economic Policy (1921) “War communism” over. Party had controlled everything and output down In NEP, Capitalist ventures were allowed for small business The state controls banks, foreign trade, and large industries Peasants were allowed to freely sell their surplus crops 1928, food and industrial production climbed to prewar levels and standard of living rose

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes Tsarist rule (monarchy) ended in Russia. Lenin died in 1924 at 54 years of age. Trotsky and Stalin battled for power. Trotsky: brilliant Marxist thinker, a skilled speaker, an architect of the Bolshevik Revolution Stalin not a scholar or orator but a skilled organizer and political operator Stalin stripped Trotsky of party membership and fled the country in 1929 In 1940, a Stalinist agent murdered Trotsky in Mexico. Stalin became the new leader of the USSR

When did the Russian Revolution end? Good question.