In January 1905, there was a revolutionary tide in Russia. This was mainly caused by the defeat of the Russo-Japanese War in September and the Bloody Sunday Incident in January. In the country, workers, peasants and merchants were holding demonstrations in order to express their discontent to the Tsarist government. Although Nicholas II issued the October Manifesto to pacify the discontent of people temporarily, he still had to face some problems after the 1905 Revolution. To regain the support from people, he needed to carry out the reforms in the October Manifesto.
The main reason that Stalin was able to rise to power was his ingenious defeats of both the left and right wings of the Party. The key figure Stalin had to take down from the left wing was Leon Trotsky. Trotsky was important because in effect, it was his leadership of the Red Army during the Civil War that had won the war for the Reds. If it hadn’t been for Trotsky, the Bolsheviks may not have been in the position they were by 1924. The first step Stalin took towards removing the threat of Trotsky was to lie to him about the date of Lenin’s funeral.
At the time, the formation of political parties was illegal but despite this, they still existed. Every sector of society was represented through one of these illegal parties to act as opposition to the Tsarist autocracy. A number of parties set up used violence and terrorist activities to express their views. The Social Revolutionaries and the Social Democrats were set up to create a new society which gave power to the workers and peasants. The Social Revolutionaries were responsible for over 2000 assassinations from 1901-1905 including the Tsars uncle, Grand Duke Sergei in February 1905.
There were signs of an early revolution in the making when the people had had enough off being ruled by an autocratic government. On January 9, 1905 in St. Petersburg, the civilians of Russia peacefully marched to the palace of the tsar with just a simple compromise in which the Russian government was not very fond of due to the fact that they thought an autocratic government was the only government that could rule Russia. They ordered to soldiers to open fire on the demonstrators killing nearly 1,000 people. Russian’s were furious with this and throughout the year, they went on strikes in which one strike paralyzed the country, which then compelled Nicholas the second to grant civil and political freedoms to the people. The document was known as The October Manifesto.
How far was Lenin responsible for the Bolsheviks’ growing hold on power in the years 1917-1924? To a fairly large extent, Lenin was responsible for the Bolsheviks’ growing hold on power from 1917-24. Lenin had, of course, led the Bolsheviks in the October Revolution, the reason the Bolsheviks had any power in the first place, and it was Lenin who dissolved the Constituent Assembly. He also managed to hold on to power by introducing War Communism during the Civil War. On the other hand, it can be argued that Trotsky’s leadership of the Red Army during the Civil War was just as, or even more important in the Bolsheviks’ seizure of power, as was the image of the Bolsheviks as being patriotic heroes fighting against Tsarist leaders and foreign invaders.
Lenin also suppressed democracy, closing down the constituent assembly in January 1918 after ‘one day of democracy’. Both the Tsars and the communist rulers also showed no hesitation in the use of secret police and mass terror. Each regime had its own secret police - the Third Section under Alexander II, the Okhrana under Alexander III and Nicholas II, the Cheka, the NKVD and the KGB under the communists. The suppression of opponents was also a common practice throughout the period. Under the term of Pyotr Stolypin as Prime Minister (1906-11), hundreds of opponents were hanged - earning the hangman’s noose the nickname - ‘the Stolypin necktie’.
How far do you agree that Trotsky’s leadership of the red army was responsible for the survival of the Bolshevik government? In October 1917 the Bolshevik’s took control of Russia after staging a revolution. However they faced many dangers/threats while in power from the years 1917-1924 such as a civil war and the economic crisis it caused. The leadership of the red army by Trotsky is a very important reason that the Bolsheviks got into power as his red army implanted the revolution but also to the survival of the Bolsheviks as the red army overcame the Bolsheviks biggest threat of the civil war. However there are other reason which just as or more important than Trotsky’s leadership such as the ideas and sacrifices made by Lenin during the year’s 1917-1924 such as signing the harsh treaty of Brest-Litovsk and enforcing the New Economic Policy or NEP, to create economic sacrifices rather than political ones which allowed the Bolsheviks to remain in power.
The increasing pressures of World War 1 combined with years of injustice, lead to the fall of Russian Romanov Tsar Nicholas 2 in March 1917. Forced to step down from power, Nicholas was replaced by a Provisional government committed to continuing the war. However there was increasing losses and fear of German advance on Moscow showed what little support remained for the war and, undermined the provisional government’s authority. Hoping to aggravate the uproar, the Germans were said to have secretly transported, an exile Vladimir Lenin from Switzerland to Russia. In November Lenin led a group of Bolsheviks from the Russia's Social Democrat Party, in a successful attempt to gain power in St. Petersburg.
However, his dismissal led to Bloody Sunday. 150,000 unarmed workers and families congregated in St. Petersburg outside the Narva gates and troops fired into them. 200 were killed and 800 were wounded which led to an outbreak of rebellion through the military, the peasantry, national minorities and urban workers whereas before, only the military and national minorities were dissatisfied. Nicholas II had continued refusal to negotiate with them, however, 'bloody Sunday' showed the threat to his position. Sergei Witte was aware of this and drew up the October Manifesto, forcing Nicholas II to sign it.
In this way, many people were intimidated into voting for the Nazi Party. Once again, Hitler targeted the Communists more than other groups. He used the emergency decree issued by Hindenburg and banned all Communist Party meetings and