[Music]
February 1917, World War 1 rages.
Tsar is away at the Eastern front having taken
personal command of the army.
Meanwhile, demonstrations and protest against
food shortages, bread prices, mismanagement
of the war, poor working conditions, and more
boil over in the capital, Petrograd, a.k.a.
St. Petersburg.
The fighting and protesting continued for
a few days before parts of the military
joined in with the crowd and arrest Tsar’s
ministers.
The provisional government made up of moderate
duma ministers takes over, Tsar Nicholas II
abdicates, but rather than past the throne
on to his only son, Alexei, who is ill with
hemophilia, he gives it to his younger brother
Michael.
Michael in turn meets with the provisional
government and says thanks, but no thanks.
He abdicates the next day.
All across the land, the people rejoice at
the end of the Tsar autocracy.
But Russia’s involvement in the Unpopular
War and food shortages continue, bread prices
rise, and the people’s call for land reform
is left unaddressed.
A constituent assembly made up of representatives
around the nation is planned to decide the
permanent government.
April.
Germans, Russia’s war time enemy, helped
Lenin return from exile in an attempt to further
reckon the chaotic country.
Lenin, having missed out on the February revolution,
denounces all sides but his, the Bolshevik
party.
In his famous, April thesis, he called for
the overthrowing of the provisional government
with instead all power to the Soviets.
He tries to rile up the masses once again
to insight another spontaneous coup.
This doesn’t work.
Lenin pushes on.
He demands that Russia leave the war immediately.
This position instantly wins him troop support,
a military connection he will use later.
Throughout the summer, the Bolsheviks continue
to poke and pry to set off the mass demonstrations
and remove the provisional government.
In June, the minister of war, Alexander Kerensky,
orders the new offensive in the war.
Major fail.
Lenin acts fast to try to agitate the masses.
The Bolsheviks along with the soldiers and
sailors of Kronstadt come to coup with the
July Putsch.
They fail.
Kerensky responds by arresting the guilty
Bolsheviks, except for Lenin who manages to
escape and hide out in Finland.
Kerensky is promoted to prime minister replacing
Prince Lvov whose four months as prime minister
turned his hair completely white.
The country is in turmoil.
Discontent and disillusionment abound with
failures on the front, famines at home, chaos
in the factories and in the streets, and increasing
in class polarization.
In August, there is the chaotic Kornilov affair
in which General Kornilov attempt to crush
the Petrograd Soviet and overthrow the provisional
government.
The provisional government turns to the Petrograd
Soviet, including the Bolsheviks, for help
stopping him.
In result, Kornilov fails and support for
the Bolsheviks increases while support for
Kerensky and now obviously weak provisional
government decreases.
End of Summer.
The Bolsheviks are gaining popularity and
win a majority in the Petrograd Soviet which
is a powerful council of workers and soldiers
with whom the provisional government shares
power.
From his hiding spot in Finland, Lenin sees
a golden opportunity for the Bolsheviks revolution
before the constituents assembly November
election.
Lenin’s followers hide out at the Smolny
Institute, a former school for girls.
October 24th.
Lenin, back in the capital, disguises himself
as a drunk with a toothache and heads to the
Smolny Institute.
Bolsheviks troop creep out in the night and
begin occupying strategic points in the capital,
bridges, railway stations, the army headquarters.
No shots are fired.
October 25th.
By morning, Kerensky has fled the Winter Palace,
the only government building not yet occupied.
By this time, the palace is only protected
by junkers who are local military academy
cadets.
The Bolsheviks position the cruiser, Aurora,
outside the palace.
No one wants to fire on the other.
Finally at 2am on October 26th with little
or no violence, the revolutionaries break
into the palace and arrest the remaining ministers.
They are taken to prison cells in the Peter
and Paul Fortress.
Kerensky never returns.
A pretty low key, anticlimactic event.
More of a coup than a revolution.
Afterwards, the second congress of Soviets
makes a decree for land which officially socializes
all land for redistribution to peasant communes.
A new provisional government is established,
the Soviet People's Commissar (SPC).
Lenin is chairman and all the members are
Bolshevik.
They still plan to attend the constituent
assembly November election.
A decree for peace is declared and Lenin gets
to work ending Russia’s involvement in the
war.
In November, the elections for members of
the constituent assembly are held, but when
Bolsheviks receive over twenty three percent
of the vote, they declare one of the opposition
parties, the cadets, illegal and demand the
assembly voluntarily give up its authority.
The assembly refuses but does no challenge
the Bolsheviks.
Once the assembly adjourns, the Bolsheviks
declare it dissolved.
The third congress of Soviets replaces the
assembly.
This group removes the word provisional from
the description of the SPC and thereby makes
Lenin and the Bolsheviks the permanent rulers
of the country and then there were three years
of civil war.
[music]
