“The October Revolution cannot be considered only a revolution within the national framework. It is, first of all, a revolution of the international, world order”.
I. Stalin
Why did the Bolsheviks win? Because they gave Russian civilization and the people a new development project. They created a new reality, which was in the interests of the majority of the workers 'and peasants' population in Russia. “Old Russia”, represented by the nobles, the liberal intelligentsia, the bourgeoisie and the capitalists, committed suicide, thinking that it was destroying the Russian autocracy.
The Bolsheviks were not going to revive the old project: both the state and society. On the contrary, they offered people a new reality, a completely different world (civilization), which was fundamentally different from the old world, which perished before their eyes. The Bolsheviks made excellent use of the short moment in history when "old Russia" died (was killed by the Western Februaryists), and the Februaryist temporary workers could not offer the people anything except the power of the capitalists, the bourgeois property owners and the increased dependence on the West. At the same time, without the sacred royal power, which for a long time hid the flaws of the old world. A conceptual, ideological emptiness has formed. Russia had to perish, torn apart by western and eastern "predators" into spheres of influence, semi-colonies and "independent" bantustans, or make a leap into the future.
Moreover, the Bolsheviks themselves did not expect that there would be a revolution in Russia, and even in a country, in their opinion, not ready for a socialist revolution. Lenin wrote: “They (traditional Marxists. - Auth.) Have an endless template that they learned by heart during the development of Western European Social Democracy and which consists in the fact that we have not grown to socialism, that we do not have, how expressed different learned gentlemen of them, the objective economic prerequisites for socialism. And it never occurs to anyone to ask themselves: could the people, who faced a revolutionary situation as it developed in the first imperialist war, under the influence of the hopelessness of his situation, rush into such a struggle that at least any chances opened up to him to conquer for oneself in not quite normal conditions for the further growth of civilization?
That is, the Bolsheviks used the historical chance to try to create a new, better world on the ruins of the old. At the same time, the old world collapsed both under the weight of objective reasons that had sharpened the Romanov empire for centuries, and under the subversive activities of the heterogeneous “fifth column”, where Western liberals, the bourgeoisie and capitalists, led by the Freemasons, played the main role (the support of the West also played a role). It is clear that the Bolsheviks also sought to destroy the old world, but until February they were such a weak, small and marginal force that they themselves noted that there would be no revolution in Russia. Their leaders and activists were hiding abroad, or imprisoned, were in exile. Their structures were defeated, or went deep underground, having practically no influence on society, compared to such powerful parties as the Cadets or Socialist-Revolutionaries. Only February opened a "window of opportunity" for the Bolsheviks. The Westernizing Februaryists, in an effort to seize the desired power, themselves killed "old Russia", destroyed all the foundations of statehood, began a great Russian turmoil and paved a loophole for the Bolsheviks.
And the Bolsheviks found everything that the Russian civilization and the Russian super-ethnos needed to create a new project and reality where the majority would “live well”, and not just a small stratum of the “elite”. The Bolsheviks had a bright image of a possible and desirable world. They had an idea, an iron will, energy and faith in their victory. Therefore, the people supported them and they won
The main milestones of the Great October Socialist Revolution
It is worth noting that Lenin's ideas about the need to take power, expressed by him in the "April Theses", caused misunderstanding in the ranks of the Bolsheviks. His demands to deepen the revolution, to go towards the dictatorship of the proletariat were then incomprehensible to his comrades-in-arms, and frightened them. Lenin was in the minority. However, he turned out to be the most far-sighted. Within a few months, the situation in the country changed in the most dramatic way, the Februaryists undermined all the foundations of power, the state, launched turmoil into the country. Now the majority was in favor of the uprising. The VI Congress of the RSDLP (late July - early August 1917) headed for an armed uprising.
On October 23, a meeting of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b) (Bolshevik Party) was held in Petrograd in a secret atmosphere. Party leader Vladimir Lenin achieved the adoption of a resolution on the need for an early armed uprising in order to seize power in the country with 10 votes in favor and 2 against (Lev Kamenev and Grigory Zinoviev). Kamenev and Zinoviev hoped that under the given conditions the Bolsheviks could gain power through a mine route, from the Constituent Assembly. On October 25, on the initiative of the chairman of the Petrograd Soviet, Lev Trotsky, the Military Revolutionary Committee (VRK) was created, which became one of the centers of preparation for the uprising. The committee was controlled by the Bolsheviks and Left SRs. It was established quite legally, under the pretext of protecting Petrograd from the advancing Germans and Kornilov rebels. With an appeal to join him, the Council appealed to the soldiers of the capital's garrison, the Red Guards and the Kronstadt sailors.
Meanwhile the country continued to fall apart and decay. So, on October 23 in Grozny, the so-called "Chechen Committee for the Conquests of the Revolution" was formed. He proclaimed himself the main power in the Grozny and Vedeno districts, formed his own Chechen bank, food committees, and introduced a compulsory Sharia law. The criminal situation in Russia, where the liberal-bourgeois "democracy" won, was extremely difficult. On October 28, the newspaper Russkiye Vedomosti (# 236) reported on the atrocities committed by the soldiers on the railways, and the complaints about them from the railroad workers. In Kremenchug, Voronezh and Lipetsk, soldiers robbed freight trains and passengers' luggage, and attacked the passengers themselves. In Voronezh and Bologo, they also smashed the carriages themselves, breaking glass and breaking roofs. “It's impossible to work,” complained the railroad workers. In Belgorod, the pogrom spread to the city, where deserters and local residents who joined them destroyed grocery stores and wealthy houses.
The deserters fleeing from the front with arms in hand not only went home, but also replenished and created bandit formations (sometimes entire "armies"), which became one of the threats to the existence of Russia. In the end, only the Bolsheviks can suppress this "green" danger and anarchy in general. They will have to solve the problem of suppressing the criminal revolution, which began in Russia with the "light" hand of the Februaryist revolutionaries.
On October 31, a garrison meeting (of representatives of the regiments stationed in the city) was held in Petrograd, the majority of the participants in which expressed support for an armed uprising against the Provisional Government, if it occurs under the leadership of the Petrograd Soviet. On November 3, representatives of the regiments recognized the Petrograd Soviet as the only legal authority. At the same time, the Military Revolutionary Committee began to appoint its commissars to the military units, replacing them with commissars of the Provisional Government. On the night of November 4, representatives of the Military Revolutionary Committee announced to the Commander of the Petrograd Military District Georgy Polkovnikov about the appointment of their commissars to the district headquarters. Polkovnikov initially refused to cooperate with them, and only on November 5 agreed to a compromise - the creation of an advisory body at the headquarters to coordinate actions with the Military Revolutionary Committee, which never worked in practice.
On November 5, the Military Revolutionary Committee issued an order giving it to the commissars the right to veto the orders of the commanders of military units. Also on this day, the garrison of the Peter and Paul Fortress went over to the side of the Bolsheviks, which was personally "propagated" by one of the leaders of the Bolsheviks and the actual head of the Revolutionary Committee, Lev Trotsky (formally, the Revolutionary Revolutionary Committee was headed by the Left SR Pavel Lazimir). The fortress garrison immediately captured the nearby Kronverksky arsenal and began distributing weapons to the Red Guards.
On the night of November 5, the head of the Provisional Government, Alexander Kerensky, ordered the Chief of Staff of the Petrograd Military District, General Yakov Bagratuni, to send an ultimatum to the Petrograd Soviet: either the Soviet recalls its commissars, or the military authorities will use force. On the same day Bagratuni ordered the cadets of the military schools in Petrograd, the students of the ensigns' schools and other units to arrive at the Palace Square.
On November 6 (October 24), an open armed struggle began between the Military Revolutionary Committee and the Provisional Government. The Provisional Government issued an order to arrest the circulation of the Bolshevik newspaper Rabochy Put (previously closed Pravda), which was printed in the Trud printing house. Policemen and cadets went there and began to seize the circulation. Upon learning of this, the leaders of the Military Revolutionary Committee contacted the Red Guard detachments and the committees of the military units. “The Petrograd Soviet is in direct danger,” the VRK said in an address, “at night the counter-revolutionary conspirators tried to summon the cadets and shock battalions from the vicinity to Petrograd. The newspapers Soldat and Rabochy Put are closed. It is hereby ordered to bring the regiment to combat readiness. Wait for further instructions. Any delay and confusion will be viewed as treason to the revolution. By order of the Revolutionary Committee, a company of soldiers under his control arrived at the Trud printing house and drove out the cadets. The press of Rabochiy Put was resumed.
The provisional government decided to strengthen its own security, but for the protection of the Winter Palace during the day it was possible to attract only about 100 disabled war veterans from among the knights of St. It should be noted that The Provisional Government, Kerensky themselves did everything to prevent the Bolsheviks from meeting serious armed resistance. They feared the "rightists" like fire - the Cadets, Kornilovites, generals, Cossacks - the forces that could overthrow them and establish a military dictatorship. Therefore, by October, they suppressed all the forces that could provide real resistance to the Bolsheviks. Kerensky was afraid to create officer units and bring Cossack regiments into the capital. And the generals, army officers and the Cossacks hated Kerensky, who destroyed the army and led to the failure of Kornilov's speech. On the other hand, Kerensky's indecisive attempts to get rid of the most unreliable units of the Petrograd garrison led only to the fact that they drifted "to the left" and went over to the side of the Bolsheviks. At the same time, the temporary workers were carried away by the formation of national formations - Czechoslovak, Polish, Ukrainian, which later would play an important role in unleashing the Civil War.
Head of the Provisional Government Alexander Fedorovich Kerensky
By this time, a meeting of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b) had already taken place, at which a decision was made to start an armed uprising. Kerensky went for support to the meeting of the Provisional Council of the Russian Republic (Pre-Parliament, an advisory body under the Provisional Government), which was held on the same day, asking him for support. But the Pre-Parliament refused to grant Kerensky extraordinary powers to suppress the incipient uprising, adopting a resolution criticizing the actions of the Provisional Government.
The Revolutionary Committee then issued an appeal "To the population of Petrograd," which stated that the Petrograd Soviet had taken upon itself "to protect the revolutionary order from attempts by counter-revolutionary pogromists." An open confrontation began. The Provisional Government ordered the building of bridges across the Neva to cut off the Red Guards in the northern half of the city from the Winter Palace. But the junkers sent to carry out the order managed to lift only the Nikolaevsky bridge (to Vasilyevsky island) and for some time hold the Palace (next to the Winter Palace). Already at Liteiny Bridge they were met and disarmed by the Red Guards. Also, late in the evening, Red Guard detachments began to take control of the stations. The last one, Varshavsky, was busy by 8 am on November 7.
Around midnight, the leader of the Bolsheviks, Vladimir Lenin, left the safe house and arrived in Smolny. He did not yet know that the enemy was not ready for resistance at all, so he changed his appearance, shaving off his mustache and beard so that he would not be recognized. On November 7 (October 25) at 2 am a detachment of armed soldiers and sailors on behalf of the Military Revolutionary Committee occupied the Telegraph and the Petrograd Telegraph Agency. There and then telegrams were sent to Kronstadt and Helsingfors (Helsinki) demanding to bring up warships with detachments of sailors to Petrograd. Detachments of the Red Guards, meanwhile, occupied all the new main points of the city and by morning controlled the printing house of the Birzhevye Vedomosti newspaper, the Astoria hotel, a power station and a telephone exchange. The cadets guarding them were disarmed. At 9 o'clock 30 min. a detachment of sailors occupied the State Bank. Soon the police department received a message that the Winter Palace was isolated and its telephone network was disconnected. An attempt by a small detachment of cadets led by the commissar of the Provisional Government Vladimir Stankevich to recapture the telephone exchange ended in failure, and the cadets of the ensigns school (about 2000 bayonets) summoned by Kerensky to Petrograd could not get from the outskirts of the capital, since the Baltic Station was already occupied by the rebels. The cruiser "Aurora" approached the Nikolaevsky bridge, the bridge itself was recaptured from the cadets and again brought down. Already early in the morning, sailors from Kronstadt began to arrive by transports in the city, who landed on Vasilievsky Island. They were covered by the cruiser Aurora, the battleship Zarya Svoboda and two destroyers.
Armored cruiser "Aurora"
Kerensky on the night of November 7 moved between the headquarters of the Petrograd military district, trying to pull up new units from there, and the Winter Palace, where the meeting of the Provisional Government was taking place. The commander of the military district Georgy Polkovnikov read out a report to Kerensky, in which he assessed the situation as "critical" and informed that "there are no troops at the disposal of the government." Then Kerensky removed Polkovnikov from his post for indecision and personally appealed to the 1st, 4th and 14th Cossack regiments to take part in the defense of "revolutionary democracy." But most of the Cossacks showed "irresponsibility" and did not leave the barracks, and only about 200 Cossacks arrived at the Winter Palace.
By 11 o'clock in the morning on November 7, Kerensky, in the car of the American embassy and under the American flag, accompanied by several officers, left Petrograd for Pskov, where the headquarters of the Northern Front was located. Later, a legend would appear that Kerensky fled from the Winter Palace, disguised as a woman's dress, which was a complete fiction. Kerensky left the minister of trade and industry, Alexander Konovalov, to act as head of government.
Day 7 November left the rebels to disperse the Pre-Parliament, which was sitting in the Mariinsky Palace not far from the already occupied Astoria. By noon, the building was cordoned off by revolutionary soldiers. From 12 o'clock 30 min. the soldiers began to go inside, demanding that the delegates disperse. A prominent politician, Minister of Foreign Affairs in the first composition of the Provisional Government, Pavel Milyukov, later described the inglorious end of this institution: “No attempt was made to stop a group of members in order to react to events. This is reflected in the general consciousness of the impotence of this ephemeral institution and the impossibility for it, after the resolution adopted the day before, to take any joint action."
The capture of the Winter Palace proper began at about 9 pm with a blank shot from the Peter and Paul Fortress and a subsequent blank shot from the cruiser Aurora. Detachments of revolutionary sailors and Red Guards actually simply entered the Winter Palace from the side of the Hermitage. By two o'clock in the morning, the Provisional Government was arrested, the cadets who defended the palace, the women and the disabled partly fled even before the assault, partly laid down their arms. Already in the USSR, art workers created a beautiful myth about the storming of the Winter Palace. But there was no need to storm the Winter Palace, the temporary workers from the Provisional Government were so tired of everyone that practically no one protected them.
Creation of the Soviet government
The uprising coincided in time with the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets, which opened on November 7 at 22.40. in the building of the Smolny Institute. Deputies from among the Right Socialist-Revolutionaries, Mensheviks and Bundists, having learned about the beginning of the coup, left the congress in protest. But by their departure, they could not break the quorum, and the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, part of the Mensheviks and anarchists and delegates from national groups supported the actions of the Bolsheviks. As a result, Martov's position on the need to create a government with representatives of all socialist parties and democratic groups was not supported. The words of the leader of the Bolsheviks Vladimir Lenin - "The revolution, the need for which the Bolsheviks have been talking about for so long, has come true!" - caused a standing ovation at the congress. Relying on the victorious uprising, the Congress proclaimed "To workers, soldiers and peasants!" proclaimed the transfer of power to the Soviets.
The victorious Bolsheviks immediately began lawmaking. The first laws were the so-called "Decree on Peace" - an appeal to all belligerent countries and peoples to immediately begin negotiations on concluding a general peace without annexations and indemnities, to abolish secret diplomacy, to publish secret treaties of the tsarist and Provisional governments; and the "Decree on Land" - the landowners' land was subject to confiscation and transfer to the peasants for cultivation, but at the same time all lands, forests, waters and mineral resources were nationalized. Private land ownership was abolished free of charge. These decrees were approved by the Congress of Soviets on November 8 (October 26).
The Congress of Soviets formed the first so-called "workers 'and peasants' government" - the Council of People's Commissars headed by Vladimir Lenin. The government included the Bolsheviks and Left Socialist-Revolutionaries. Leonid Trotsky became the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, A. I. Rykov became the Commissar of Internal Affairs, Lunacharsky became the Commissar of Education, Skvortsov-Stepanov became the Commissar of Education, Stalin became the Commissar for Nationalities, and so on. Antonov-Ovseenko, Krylenko and Dybenko. The supreme body of Soviet power was the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (VTsIK), headed by Chairman Lev Kamenev (in two weeks he will be replaced by Yakov Sverdlov).
Already on November 8, by a resolution of the All-Union Revolutionary Committee, the first "counter-revolutionary and bourgeois" newspapers - Birzhevye Vedomosti, Kadet Rech, Menshevik Den and some others - were also closed. The "Decree on the Press", published on November 9, said that only press organs that "call for open resistance or disobedience to the Workers 'and Peasants' government" and "sow confusion by clearly slanderous perversion of facts" are subject to closure. They pointed to the temporary nature of the closure of newspapers pending the normalization of the situation. On November 10, a new, so-called "workers" militia was formed. On November 11, the Council of People's Commissars adopted a decree on an 8-hour working day and a regulation "On workers 'control", which was introduced at all enterprises that had hired workers (the owners of enterprises were obliged to fulfill the requirements of the "workers' control bodies").
V. I. Lenin, the first chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Russian Soviet Republic
