Challenges of 1921

• Republic Hangs by a hair

  • 118 uprisings
• soviet economy in ruins

  • transport system collapsing
  • factories had no materials
  • grain production falls disastrously low
  • famine rampant
  • epidemic
• due to all this society wasn’t content with wartime policies
• What was the main threat?

  • Peasantry reisstinggrain requisitioning
  • Tambov uprising inspired others
  • 1920 harvest was poor and little grain left peasants with nothing and high Bolshevik target levels were unrealistically high
  • Leftover green army caused havoc
• the bolsheviks werent peasants and the peasants were Bolsheviks but aspired to become kulaks - capitalism - ideological difference turned them into enemies
• what was the solution to the peasntry?

  • Sent in the red army
  • thousands of hostages and shot
  • around 240,000 died
  • poison ga used
  • introduced NEP
• What was the opposition from the workers

  • severe shortages hit the workers
  • bread ration cut to 1/3
  • Moscow and Petrograd hit
  • chekha broke demonstrations as regular army wouldn’t fire
  • disliked militarised factories - worse than tsarist prison camp
  • unions turned into state intrsumnts for control
  • blamed communism
• how do they tackle worker opposition?

  • introduce martial law
  • inject fear into society
  • chekha mushroomed and relied upon to impose order through violence
• what was the problems with the Kronstadt base?

  • 1917 Trotsky said pride and joy of Russian revolution
  • demanded new elections with secret ballot, freedom of press, liberation of political prisoners, end grain requisitioning and end to terror
  • many were ex peasant who reconnected with peasant plight
• What did the Kronstadt sailors highlight?

  • Flash that lit up reality
  • Their demands would have been accepted by Bolsheviks before power so highlighted how far the party had fallen
• how was the krondsadt base tackled>

  • NEP - reactionary policy
  • 50,000 crack troops enter and over 10,000 sailors killed
  • 2500 shot by chekha execution squads
  • hundreds sent to labour camps
• what were the issues within the party?

  • Alexandra and alex were unhappy were infiltration into unions
  • Felt Bolsheviks became dictatorial
  • Furious arguments emerge that challenged Lenin openlu
• how did Lenin deal with party opposition?

  • 10th party congress openly ridiculed opposition
  • ban on faction Is passed so once central committee agrees on policy it cannot be refuted or you're expelled from party
  • alexandra kicked out
  • chistka emerges and 220,000 members purged from the 3/4 million who recruit during civil war
• Mensheviks and SR outlawed

  1921 - 5000 Mensheviks arrested and 34 SR leaders condemned in show trial with 11 killed
• the workers strieks were defeated through the arrests and executions of leader
• NEP

  • Grai requisition abolished
  • State control of economy heights
  • Small business reopens
  • Ban on private trade removed