Russian Revolution and Civil War

In 1904 Russia began a war with Japan.  The war caused many hardships on the country in many areas including economically and politically and mainly the entire society.  Many loses began to hurt the budget of each individual and citizens began to despise of the country’s political makeup and wanted it to change.  All of the turmoil came to a head in January of 1905 when a group of workers approached the palace to submit their problems with the government.  They were met by armed security guards who opened fire on the group which killed many and wounded hundreds.  This action would incite the Russian Revolution of 1905.

As a result, Emperor Nicholas II issued decrees stating certain concessions to the structure of government.  Lenin, however, was not satisfied with this.  He believed that the revolution should be led by the workers or the proletariat class of citizens, that this was the only true way to achieve a socialist revolution.  This belief caused a rift between the Mensheveks and the Bolsheviks which caused much fighting and lead to Lenin separating and creating his own group in 1912.

During World War I Lenin went into exile again but this time it was in Switzerland.  While there he continued his revolutionary ideas and wrote a work entitled, Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism.  This work would end up being the defining work of his life.  It said that war was the natural effect of imperialism.  By 1917, all of Russia opposed the tsar rulers.  The majority party established a Provisional Government where the bourgeois class was in charge.  Lenin instead wanted to have a Soviet Government where the soldiers, workers, and peasants were in charge (Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, 2014).

As a result of this Lenin led the October Revolution which ignited three years of deadly civil war in the country.  Lenin’s group was known as the Red’s and the tsarist group was known as the Whites.  The Whites were desperate to stop Lenin’s Red forces and were helped by Russia’s allies in World War I.  Lenin, however, refused to be defeated and was very ruthless in doing so.  He launched what would be called the Red Terror where all opposition to the Red Regime was exterminated in the civilian population.  Hundreds of thousands of civilians were killed or imprisoned (Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, 2014).