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Collectivization was almost completed, kulaks had been eliminated and the peasants were afraid of Communist powers. Stalin turned the Soviet Union into a personal dictatorship where the communist ideal was still alive but filtered by his powerful personality. He ruled over the USSR using three tools.
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Stalin began collectivising all farms (kolkhos). Another
type of collectivisation were the state farms (sovkhos): owned completely by the state, peasants worked as labourers, so they received wages even if the farm did badly. -
Under Stalin the state planned industry and agriculture with a commission called Gosplan. A Five-Year Plan set targets for all basic industrial factories and workers. They started in 1928. In 10 years the USSR had almost doubled its industrial output but the price was misery and low living standards for Soviet workers.
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Stalin controlled the party. Trotsky was isolated and thrown out of the Communist Party. Trotsky was finally murdered in Mexico by
Ramón Mercader, a fanatic spanish stalinst. -
In 1924 a new constitution established the USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics). Each republic had a government but they all had to be communist, and the system was run centrally by the Politburo.
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In 1921 Lenin introduced a New Economic Policy to restore order and increase prosperity after the chaos of Revolution, Civil War, and War Communism.
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The Bolsheviks finally won the Civil War in 1921. The Bolsheviks expected communist revolutions to break out all over Europe but, except for a small one in Germany, they did not. However, communist parties did exist in other countries. As allies of the Soviet government, they worked for an international revolution from the
Third International. -
In 1918 Russia was divided into two factions:
-White Russians:. The counterrevolutionary elements,
-The Red Army. At the beginning of the civil war Len
in asked Leon Trotsky, a young Bolshevik leader, to create a new army from the Red Guards, an army of workers. -
Russia suffered as a result of the impacts of the First World War. More than 1.5 million soldiers had died by the end of 1917. Inflation greatly increased prices and there were hunger and food
shortages. -
In February 1917 riots broke out in Petrograd. The Tsar lost support and control: his soldiers refused to fire on the mobs or deserted to join the rioting workers
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Disputes inside the government and the army led to a coup by general Kornilov. These problems caused a new wave of strikes and demonstrations in July 1917, which were harshly repressed by Kerensky’s government. The new government was repressing workers much like the previous government had done.
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The Russian Empire joined World War I. Neither the economy nor the army were ready to face the German army
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In 1905 Russia ́s defeat in a war with Japan provoked rebellion. Rebellion broke out, after troops fired on striking workers in the capital, St.
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The Tsar himself took control of the army. This was his biggest mistake.
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Lenis lied
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Second World War was started
