The ten years 1917–1927, saw a radical transformation of the Russian Empire into a socialist state, the Soviet Union: initially called Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1922 and then the Soviet Union from 1922 onward. This period spanned the 1917 Russian revolutions to Joseph Stalin's rise to power in 1927.
Following the February Revolution in 1917 that deposed Tsar Nicholas, a short-lived provisional government had given way to Bolsheviks in the October Revolution. After winning the Russian Civil War (1917–1923), the Bolsheviks solidified their political control. They were dedicated to a version of Marxism developed by Vladimir Lenin, promising the workers would rise, destroy capitalism, and create a socialist society under the leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The awkward problem, regarding Marxist revolutionary theory, was the small proletariat, in an overwhelmingly peasant society with limited industry and a very small middle class.
The Bolshevik Party was renamed the Russian Communist Party (RCP). All politics and attitudes that were not strictly RCP were suppressed, under the premise that the RCP represented the proletariat and all activities contrary to the party's beliefs were "counterrevolutionary" or "anti-socialist." Most rich families fled to exile. During 1917 to 1923, the Bolshevik government capitulated to Germany in World War I, then fought an intense civil war against multiple enemies especially the White Army. They won the Russian heartland but lost most non-Russian areas that had been part of Imperial Russia. One by one defeating each opponent, the RCP established itself through the Russian heartland and some non-Russian areas such as Ukraine and the Caucasus. It became the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) upon the creation of the Soviet Union (USSR) in 1922. Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin, General Secretary of the CPSU, became the leader of the USSR, being general secretary from the early 1920s to his death in 1953.
Russian Revolution of 1917
During World War I, Tsarist Russia experienced military humiliation, famine and economic collapse. The demoralized Imperial Russian Army suffered severe military setbacks, and many captured soldiers deserted the front lines. Dissatisfaction with the monarchy and its policy of continuing the war grew among the Russian people. Tsar Nicholas II abdicated the throne following the February Revolution of 1917 (March 1917 N.S. See: Soviet calendar.), causing widespread rioting in Petrograd and other major Russian cities.
The Russian Provisional Government was installed immediately following the fall of the Tsar by the Provisional Committee of the State Duma in early March 1917 and received conditional support of the Mensheviks. Led first by Prince Georgy Lvov, then Alexander Kerensky the Provisional Government consisted mainly of the parliamentarians most recently elected to the State Duma of the Russian Empire, which had been overthrown alongside the Tsar. The new Provisional Government maintained its commitment to the war, remaining in the Triple Entente with Britain and France. The Provisional Government postponed the land reforms demanded by the Bolsheviks.
Lenin, and his assistant Joseph Stalin embodying the Bolshevik ideology, viewed alliance with the countries of Western Europe and the United States as slavery of the proletariat, who was forced to fight the imperialists' war. As seen by Lenin, Russia was reverting to the rule of the Tsar, and it was the job of Marxist revolutionaries, who truly represented socialism and the proletariat, to oppose such counter-socialistic ideas and support socialist revolutions in other countries.
Within the military, mutiny and desertion were pervasive among conscripts. The intelligentsia was dissatisfied over the slow pace of social reforms; poverty was worsening, income disparities and inequality were becoming out of control while the Provisional Government grew increasingly autocratic and inefficient. The government appeared to be on the verge of succumbing to a military junta. Deserting soldiers returned to the cities and gave their weapons to angry, and extremely hostile, socialist factory workers. The deplorable and inhumane poverty and starvation of major Russian centers produced optimum conditions for revolutionaries.
During the months between February and October 1917, the power of the Provisional Government was consistently questioned by nearly all political parties. A system of "dual power" emerged, in which the Provisional Government held nominal power, though increasingly opposed by the Petrograd Soviet, their chief adversary, controlled by the Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries (both democratic socialist parties politically to the right of the Bolsheviks). The Soviet chose not to force further changes in government due to the belief that the February Revolution was Russia's "crowing" overthrow of the bourgeois. The Soviet also believed that the new Provisional Government would be tasked with implementing democratic reforms and pave the way for a proletarian revolution. The creation of a government not based on the dictatorship of the proletariat in any form was viewed as a "retrograde step" in Vladmir Lenin's April Theses. However, the Provisional Government still remained an overwhelmingly powerful governing body.
Failed military offensives in summer 1917 and large scale protesting and riots in major Russian cities (as advocated by Lenin in his Theses, known as the July Days) led to the deployment of troops in late August to restore order. The July Days were suppressed and blamed on the Bolsheviks, forcing Lenin into hiding. Still, rather than use force, many of the deployed soldiers and military personnel joined the rioters, disgracing the government and military at-large. It was during this time that support for the Bolsheviks grew and another of its leading figures, Leon Trotsky, was elected chair of the Petrograd Soviet, which had complete control over the defenses of the city, mainly, the city's military force. Membership of the Bolshevik party had risen from 24,000 members in February 1917 to 200,000 members by September 1917.
In the early days of the October Revolution, the Provisional Government moved against the Bolsheviks, arresting activists and destroying pro-Communist propaganda. The Bolsheviks were able to portray this as an attack against the People's Soviet and garnered support for the Red Guard of Petrograd to take over the Provisional Government. The administrative offices and government buildings were taken with little opposition or bloodshed. The generally accepted end of this transitional revolutionary period, which will lead to the creation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) lies with the assault and capture of the poorly defended Winter Palace (the traditional home and symbol of power of the Tsar) on the evening of 26 October 1917.
Bolshevik figures such as Anatoly Lunacharsky, Moisei Uritsky and Dmitry Manuilsky agreed that Lenin's influence on the Bolshevik party was decisive but the October insurrection was carried out according to Trotsky's, not to Lenin's plan.
The Mensheviks and the right wing of the Socialist Revolutionaries, outraged by the abusive and coercive acts carried out by the Red Guard and Bolsheviks, fled Petrograd, leaving control in the hands of the Bolsheviks and remaining Left Socialist Revolutionaries. Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies held on 7–9 November 1917 formed the Council of People's Commissars as the new government headed by Lenin and issued Decree on Peace and Decree on Land. Then the Left Socialist Revolutionaries entered the Council of People's Commissars, which became a coalition government of Bolsheviks and Left Socialist Revolutionaries
The period from November 1917 to February 1918 was distinguished by the relative speed and ease of establishing the power of the Bolsheviks and eliminating the armed resistance of their opponents. The victory of the uprising in Petrograd marked the beginning of the transfer of power into the hands of the Soviets in all major cities of Russia. A series of radical legislative acts was issued, fulfilling revolutionary promises to the working class, and completely dismantling the old Tsarist social and economic order.
Russian Constituent Assembly met for 13 hours, from 4 p.m. to 5 a.m., 18–19 January [O.S. 5–6 January] 1918, whereupon it was dissolved by the Bolshevik-led All-Russian Central Executive Committee. Third All-Russian Congress of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants Deputies' Soviets which took place on 23-31 January 1918 [O.S. 10-18 January 1918] renamed the unrecognised state, calling it Russian Soviet Republic.
Russian Civil War
Prior to the revolution, the Bolshevik doctrine of democratic centralism argued that only a tightly knit and secretive organization could successfully overthrow the government; after the revolution, they argued that only such an organization could prevail against foreign and domestic enemies. Fighting the civil war would actually force the party to put these principles into practice.
Arguing that the revolution needed not a mere parliamentary organization but a party of action which would function as a scientific body of direction, a vanguard of activists, and a central control organ, the Tenth Party Congress banned factions within the party, initially intending it only to be a temporary measure after the shock of the Kronstadt rebellion. It was also argued that the party should be an elite body of professional revolutionaries dedicating their lives to the cause and carrying out their decisions with iron discipline, thus moving toward putting loyal party activists in charge of new and old political institutions, army units, factories, hospitals, universities, and food suppliers. Against this backdrop, the nomenklatura system (a class of people who were granted key positions only with approval of the party) would evolve and become standard practice.
In theory, this system was to be democratic since all leading party organs would be elected from below, but also centralized since lower bodies would be accountable to higher organizations. In practice, "democratic centralism" was centralist, with decisions of higher organs binding on lower ones, and the composition of lower bodies largely determined by the members of higher ones. Over time, party cadres would grow increasingly careerist and professional. Party membership required exams, special courses, special camps, schools, and nominations by three existing members.
On 14 June 1918, representatives of the Right Socialist-Revolutionaries and the Mensheviks were expelled from the All-Russian Central Executive Committee by a Bolshevik decree. Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, who resigned its position in government after the signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918, ultimately assassinated German ambassador Wilhelm von Mirbach oт 6 July 1918 in an attempt to cause Russia to re-enter World War I and launched an ill-fated uprising against the Bolsheviks shortly after. The resulting expulsion of the Left SRs from the All-Russian Central Executive Committee meant that the few sessions of the body that followed the Fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets had a ceremonial character, all opposition to the Bolsheviks having been excluded from them. For many historians, July 1918 is considered the milestone of the final formation of a one-party Bolshevik dictatorship in the country, since after July 1918 the representation of other parties in the Soviets became insignificant.
In December 1917, the Cheka was founded as the Bolshevik's first internal security force following the failed assassination attempt on Lenin's life. Later it changed names to GPU, OGPU, MVD, NKVD and finally KGB. The Red Terror became the instrument to eliminate groups defined as "enemies" of the new society. Summary executions were widespread, including in service of dekulakization (redistribution of wealth from prosperous peasants). Leon Trotsky led the Red Army, despising "bourgeois democracy" and committed to the forced removal of the prosperous and political opponents, often through summary executions. He initiated concentration camps, labor camps, military control over labor, and state control of trade unions.
At the same time, the White Terror, mostly uncontrolled and perpetrated by such warlords as the Cossack atamans Grigory Semenov or Boris Annenkov, targeted suspected Bolshevik sympathizers.
During the Russian civil war the Jewish communities of Ukraine, and to a lesser extent Belarus, suffered the worst pogroms ever to take place in these regions. They were performed by various armed units: by the White Army of Anton Denikin, by troops of the Ukrainian People's Republic headed by Symon Petliura, by gangs of warlord atamans and "Green" insurgent peasants, and even by some Red Army units.
The Soviet government was able gradually to consolidate its hold on central Russia first and then to fight its enemies successfully. The Allied intervention and the Polish invasion allowed the Bolsheviks to play the nationalist card. Worsening economic conditions, however, created mass social turmoil. This came to a head after the final defeat of organised White military forces in the autumn of 1920 with mass peasant insurgencies, such as the Tambov Rebellion. They were brutally suppressed.