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Alexander III (Part 1)
Alexander III was born in Saint Petesburg in 1845. In 1881 was claimed as tsar, succeeding his father, Alexander II. The system he had was absolute monarchy, and had lots of restrictions to minorities. His government was "orthodox, aristocratic and nationalist. Orthodox christianism was the only official religion, and it was forbidden to use another language which was not Russian; even other slav languages were forbidden as Polish.
His government was also very strict with revolutionaries. -
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Alexander III (Part 2)
He promoved antisemitism and secret police, who persecuted revolutionaries. Some revolutionaries as Lenin's brother were executed.
Also, there were laws which made jewish's lifes harder and they had less rights than the rest of the people.
At that time, peace and some other advances were achieved, as the construction of the Transiberian. Sources: Wikipedia, PDF -
Abolishment of Serfdom
In 1861, the Serfdom in Russia was abolished. Tsar Alexander II and Nicholas I thought slavery in America was inhumane. In Russia slavery was diferent, the owner of lands did not own a serf. Just a serf was bound to the lord just because he was living in lord's lands. Other countries had abolished also slavery, and they did so in Russia in order to progress.
Source: http://www.historytoday.com/michael-lynch/emancipation-russian-serfs-1861-charter-freedom-or-act-betrayal -
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Nicholas II (Part 2)
He got involved in some wars, including WWI, which he lost. Those wars made the country more weaken and that maked easy the revolution of 1917. He was executed that year by Bolchevyks. Sources: http://www.biografiasyvidas.com/biografia/n/nicolas_ii.htm, PDF -
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Nicholas II (Part 1)
Nicholas II was the succesor of Alexander III, his father. He was the last tsar of Russia. He was influenced by Alexandra and Rasputin. At that time Russia suffered a process of industrialization. More factories were built, the Transiberian was built and Russia became the fourth country with most steel production.
Also, he did not know anything about the country's opinion. More and more revolutionary and democratic ideas spread due to peasantry and proletariat conditions. -
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Lenin
Vladímir Ilich Uliánov, known as Lenin, was a politician and communist revolutionary His brother was executed for plotting Alexander III assassination. That made him be a revolutionary. Little by little he was placing his ideas against the tsar. He planned an overthrow to the tsar and they called him "Father of the revolution". -
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Transiberian
The Transiberian Railway is a network of railways which crosses all the territory of Russia. It connects Moscow with Vladivostok, North Korea, China, Mongolia and reaches until the Sea of Japan. It is the longest network of the World, with 9,289 km long, and the whole trip lasts 7 days. Source: Wikipedia -
Russo-Japanese War
The Russo-Japanese War was a conflict which started 5 February 1904 and lasted more than 1 year, finishing in 5 September 1905. The war started because Russia and Japan had many years of disputes for taking control of Manchuria. Russia took Port Arthur and in 1904 Japan attacked them there before declaring war. After that, the war developed in Korea and Sea of Japan. Japan won the war and both countries signed the Treaty of Portsmouth.
Source: https://history.state.gov/ -
Bloody Sunday
In 1905, workers were to the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. They were there to claim for more freedom, democracy and better working conditions. Soldiers had been ordered by tsar's generals to shoot the people. More than 1000 people died or were injured. Due to that situiation, violence and strikes increased among Russia. Nicholas II created the Russian parliament in 1906, the Duma, but abolished it 10 weeks later.
Source: PDF -
Division of Marxists into two groups (Part 1)
Marxism in Russia started in 1898, when the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party was formed. Both were socialists and had similar ideas. But they had different points of view or styles of socialism, so they had also differences. Officially the party was splitted into Volsheviks and Mensheviks in 1912, but they started to be divided some years ago. -
Division of Marxists into two groups (Part 2)
Both factions wanted to destroy capitalism and tsarism, but Menshevisks wanted to do it democratically and without violence, and Bolsheviks wanted to do it without that. Sources: http://alphahistory.com/russianrevolution/bolsheviks-and-mensheviks/
http://www.historytoday.com/richard-cavendish/bolshevik-menshevik-split -
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World War One
Nicholas II decided to enter WWI in 1914 after being defeated in the Russo-Japanese War. Russian army had lots of soldiers, almost 5 million, and 4 were killed or taken as prisoners due to the poorly preparation they had and their little equipment.
Nicholas wife, Alexandra, took control of the government since he moved his headquarters to the East Front. Rasputin was allowed to make some political decissions but was assassinated by a group of nobles. -
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World War One (Part 2)
By the end of the war, Nicholas and Alexandra had many problems which they were not able to solve like inflated prices, less suplies for soldiers, ignored orders and the wish of Russians to have a change. -
Murder of Rasputin
It is said that the assassination of Rasputin was a legend, or invented story. He was a peasant, but friend of the Royal family. He gave pieces of advice to Tsarina to make decissions. They thought he was destroying the monarchy and decided to kill him. He was invited to have dinner at home of Felix Yusupov, a nobleman. Then, there Rasputin was shooted by Felix Yusupov and a second conspirator. -
March Revolution
The March Revolution was not a formal planning, it was more spontaneous. Situation in Russia was very bad, with social and economic problems. People went to street to shout against the monarchy, and soldiers were with them. Cities turned into a chaos and tsar Nicholas II abdicated. The Russian Empire and the Romanov Dynasty ended forever. -
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Provisional Government
The February revolution in 1917 against tsar Nicholas II made him abdicate. After that, the Provisional Government ruled by Alexander Kerensky was formed and the rule of Romanovs ended forever. Conditions in Russia were worse and worse and there were formed Soviets, which were local councils made by socialist soldiers, workers and peasants.
The government lasted 8 months until the Bolsheviks, leaded by Lenin, took control in the October revolution. The Russian Civil War started.
PDF & Wikipedia -
October Revolution
The October Revolution was leaded by Lenin and Bolsheviks. Soviets took more control in the cities and a group of workers went to the Winter Palace with their weapons. They were called the Red Guards, and they captured the Provisional Government leaders. After that, workers took control of factories thanks to the Bolsheviks.
Source: PDF -
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Civil War (Part 1)
The Russian civil war started after the October Revolution. It had two main factions, the Red Army, which were people who liked Bolsheviks way of socialism, and the White Army, who were the conservative, monarchists, capitalists and even some socialists who were against Bolsheviks ideas. Some other countries were involved in the war, but in a very insignificant way, as the USA, who helped the White Army. -
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Civil War (Part 2)
After 3 years of war the situation was even worse. 14 million Russians had died and epidemics and hunger were present in the population. The war finished with the Bolsheviks victory. From now on, Lenin took power and the Soviet Union started. Source: PDF & Wikipedia -
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
The treaty of Brest Livostok was a treaty signed by the Bolshevik Russia (Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic) and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Hungary). It was signed in Brest-Litovsk and it indicated the end of the Russian participation in the WWI. Russia had to give some territories to the Triple Entente: Kars Oblast to Ottoman Empire and Baltic States to Germany.
Source: Wikipedia -
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NEP (Part 2)
This economic policy was abolished and substituted by Stalin in 1928 with the Five-year plans for the national economy of the Soviet Union. Sources: PDF & Wikipedia -
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NEP (Part 1)
The New Economic Policy was an economic system proposed by Lenin for the URSS. He called it "state capitalism". It was a socialist system but accepting some capitalists ideas as private property. The government owned and controlled big bussineses as banks or big industries, but gave freedom for small factories, farms, etc to be private. Also, for example, peasants could sold their crops freely instead of giving them to the government, but they had to pay some taxes. -
USSR
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was the state created after the Russian Civil war and October Revolution. It was founded in 1922 and lasted until 1991. It is a system of many republics, with a central government which controlled totally the economy. It is the most clear and better example of a real socialist state. There was only one party, the Communist Party. Dictatorships ruled the country. The most important were Vladimir Lenin and Iosif Stalin. On 1991 the Soviet Union was disoluted -
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Stalin
Iosif Vissarionovich Stalin was born in 1878. He was the General secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and the leader of the USSR. He was an important Bolshevik revolutionary. In 1922 he was appointed General secretary of the Communist Party, and when in 1924 Lenin died, he increased his power and became dictator in 1928. He abolished the NEP and his regime was much more aggressive and strict. -
Trotsky into exile
When Lenin died in 1924 Stalin came to power. Although Trotsky was another leader of the Bolshevik revolution, he criticized the new Stalin's regime because his fail in developing a better economic system and because of suppressing democracy. He was removed from the Communist Party in 1927, and in 1928 he was expelled to Alma-Ata in Siberia. A year later he was expelled from the USSR. He was in the exile in Turkey, France, Norway and finally Mexico. He died in 1940.
Source: http://www.history.co
