Bronze-level articleOctober Revolution

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The October Revolution of 1917 was a major turning point in Russian, and indeed world history, when in 1917 the Bolshevik Party of Russia overthrew the Russian Provisional Government over one night and established the first Marxist-Socialist state in the world.

The October Revolution is less frequently called the November Revolution, as it was dated 25th October on the Julian Calendar and 7th November on the Gregorian Calendar.

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[edit] Background Information

Since March of the same year, Russia had been governed by a dual power system, which saw the Soviets and the Provisional government exercising and sharing power between each other, which was created after Tsar Nicholas II abdication at the beginning of March - a development caused by the February Revolution. While the Provisional Government was liberal, it was steadfastly behind the war effort despite the fact that the Germans were getting closer to St. Petersburg with every passing day.

[edit] The Revolution

The Revolution was largely orchestrated by Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin and leader of the Red Guard, Leon Trotsky. Lenin had been exiled since July of that year,[1] returning only a few weeks before the revolution. Trotsky was largely responsible for the revolution, as it was he that organised the Red Guard in a largely bloodless takeover.[2] On the night of October 25th, the Soviet Red Guard marched through Petrograd and took power from the Provisional Government at the Winter Palace.

[edit] Glorification in the Soviet Union

While the events of October were largely a bloodless revolution, latter-day education and propaganda in the Soviet Union was exacerbated to make the events of October seem more violent, heroic and generally revolutionary than they actually were.[3] Movies later made romanticized the Revolution, such as The Storming of the Winter Palace in 1920 [4] and October in 1928.[5]

During the ensuing Civil War the western powers (and Japan) wanted to make sure that the reds didn't get their hands on weapons and supplies that they hoped would go to the "white" (non-Communist) forces. As a result several nations, including the United States, deployed troops to Russia in an attempt to intervene, and some saw military action. While this expedition largely became a footnote in American military history, during the Cold War the Soviets liked to use it to try and make the Americans look like bad imperialists (forgetting the far more recent Soviet ventures into Budapest or Prague).[6] The amount of troops sent were actually negligible, most only keeping open the supply lines to the Whites rather than actually fighting alongside them-something the Whites repeatedly complained of.

[edit] Outcome

The Revolution was the beginning of the first Socialist state in the world. Lenin was head of the Party until his death in 1924, two years after the Soviet Union was officially created. After a power struggle, Stalin became leader from 1924 to his death in 1953. After WWII, the agriculturally-based backwards Russia had become a superpower capable of militarily competing with the USA. Ultimately, however, she was incapable of rivaling the domestic economic growth of the United States and the rest of the western world throughout the Cold War.

[edit] See Also

[edit] Footnotes

  1. http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history.do?action=Article&id=434
  2. http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/leon_trotsky.htm
  3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_Revolution#Events
  4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Storming_of_the_Winter_Palace
  5. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0018217/
  6. Polar Bear Expedition Digital Collections
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