1917 - 1924 AOS 2 Russia Revolution

By sharpbe

  • Second All Russia Congress of Soviets meets, Council of People's Commussars (Sovnarkom) elected, with Lenin as head

  • Period: to

    Consolidation of Power

  • Bolsheviks take power in Moscow after 10 days of fighting. Coalition government of Bolsheviks and Left SRs formed. Checka set up

  • Initial decrees on land and peace

    All private land was confiscated and placed into the hands of the peasants, affirming previous land seizures
    Peace was to be sought immediately

  • Sovnarkom established by decree

    Sovnarkom effectively became the executive government with Lenin as chairman
    In theory the Sovnarkom represents the Soviets, but allows Lenin to rule by decree

  • Elections for the Constituent Assembly commence

    Bolsheviks permitted scheduled elections for the Constituent Assembly to proceed, against Lenin's wishes
    The results show a clear majority for the Social Revolutionaries (SRs)

  • Formation of the Cheka

    The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission to Combat Counter-Revolution, Sabotage and Speculation (Cheka) was a secret police given extra-legal powers
    It became an agent of terror

  • Constituent Assembly meets, and is closed

  • Treaty of Brest-Litovsk signed with Germany. Left SRs leave coalition government in protest at Treaty terms

  • Czech Legion begins to fight its way east

  • War Communism implemented

  • Period: to

    War Communism

  • SR set up Komuch government in Samara

  • Period: to

    Civil War

  • Period: to

    Civil War Phase 1 begin (Reds v. mainly Greens)

  • SR rising in Moscow

  • Tsar Nicholas II and his family assassinated at Ekaterinburg

  • Lenin called for 'war on kulaks' and launched the Red Terror

    August-September 1918
    The kulaks were seen as counter-revolutionary conspirators or capitalists, so Lenin ordered their eradication
    These policies highlighted Lenin's willingness to use terror

  • Lenin shot by Fanya Kaplan

  • By this time Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Poland, the Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan all declared independence

  • Whites under Admiral Kolchak crush Komuch Republic

  • Polish army invades the Ukraine

  • Period: to

    Civil War Phase 2 begins (Reds v. mainly Whites)

  • Comintern (Communist International) established

    The (Third) Communist International was aimed at promoting world revolution
    It was ostensibly international but modelled on Soviet government and ideology

  • Yudenich's White Army reaches suburbs of Petrograd

  • Denikin's White Army gets within 200 miles of Moscow

  • Kolchak captured by Reds

  • Yudenich arrested by Reds

  • Denikin's White Army defeated by Reds, Dinikin escapes

  • Tambov region under peasant control

  • Polish invasion of Russia

  • Peasant rebellions and strikes, ending with Kronstadt revolt

    These events represented not only a decline or absence of support for the Bolshevik regime, but direct opposition to it; Bolshevik authority was in danger of a further revolution

  • Kronstadt mutiny crushed

  • Lenin announced New Economic Policy (NEP)

    Petty capitalism and trade of surplus goods was permitted, while Bolsheviks retained control of 'commanding heights'
    This policy is seen by the Left as a betrayal of socialist ideology
  • Period: to

    Civil War Phase 3 (Reds v. Greens, peasant armies and armed bands)

  • Period: to

    New Economic Policy

  • Famine in the Volga region

  • Peace treaty with Poland

  • Tambov rising crushed

  • Civil War peters out

  • Lenin ordered assault on the Church

    This policy was logical continuation of Marxist ideology, dismantling the structures of religion ('the opiate of the masses'); however, this further alienated many sections of the peasantry
  • Death of Lenin

    Death of Lenin

    Lenin had been incapacitated since late 1922, and his death left hte party in limbo; no clear plan for either economic reconstruction or a replacement leader had been established