Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as simply Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary leader and founder of the Soviet Union and the Marxism–Leninism political ideology. He was born on April 22, 1870 in Ulyanovsk, a very small town in a western-central district in the Russian Empire. He was the third of six children of a Russu-German couple, some of which ended up initiating controversial political stir-ups against the Tsar at the time.
Growing up, he and his family, like most Russians, were not very favourable of the Tsar Nicholas II. The Tsar’s rule was nothing to them but a hipocratic dictatorship regime which focussed more on opression and battling democracy than on developing the Russian Empire as a whole. Russians, who only recently were freed from feudalism, were struct by their version of the Industrial
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The Balshaviks win the war and founded the Soviet Union. Russia was devistated after the war since not only did over 8 million people died during the war, the nation was plagued with famine and inflation. Lenin proposes the New Economic Policy, allowing farmers to sell their crops, and dies shortly afterwards in January 21, 1924.
Lenin was, even decades after his death, the icon of the Soviet Union. Infact, when he died, over 300,000 Russians lined up to see his mummified body in what was one of the world’s largest and longest funerals, lasting over five days. The Soviet people loved Lenin as after hundreds of years of oppression from the Tsars, he was the one who freed them and created the modern Communist views of Leninism. Over the course of Soviet history, statues of Lenin were built in every city in Russia, pictures of him were painted in every school and the Soviets went as far as to deploy a picture of Lenin as a child into
The Russian’s loss in the Russo-Japanese war was the another way that they got the public to turn against the provisional government and strengthen the communist revolt. The revolt got stronger and stronger until the Bolsheviks finally revolted and took down the Russian Provisional Government. Because of this, civil war erupted all over the country. At the end of this war, in 1920, the Bolsheviks set up the USSR, or Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, under control of Vladimir Lenin. When Lenin died, Stalin aggressively worked his way up until he was the leader of the USSR. In his control, Stalin set up a “5 year plan” to advance the Russian economy from just farming to also having industry. In this plan, he would also advance the military and “cleanse the country of villains” or those he saw as villains. To “cleanse the country”, Stalin would have unfair trials that would have many on trial at once. These were called his “Show Trials”. The majority, if not all, of these people were found guilty and sent for execution. They were executed all at once, and the executions were called the Purges. To advance the Russian economy, Stalin would work the farmers to death… literally. When the farmers revolted, Stalin stopped sending them food and even more died from starvation. On the last of the purges, 16 men were put on trial and accused of acts of terrorism towards Stalin and the Soviet government. Two of them were Stalin’s allies after Lenin’s death, Zinovyev and
“Freedom in capitalist society always remains about the same as it was in ancient Greek republics: Freedom for slave owners” (Lenin). Lenin was founder of the Russian Communist Party, leader of the Bolshevik Revolution, and architect and first head of the Soviet state. He was also the inspiration for ‘Leninism” which was conjoined with Marx's work to create Marxism-Leninism. He has been regarded as one of the greatest revolutionary leaders and thinkers since Marx. Vladimir Lenin was an important Russian leader that helped shape Russian society to what it is now.
In 1917, Russia was crumbling into pieces. The World War I was draining all of Russia’s resources. There was shortage of food throughout the country, which left people starving. At the battlefront, millions of Russian soldiers were dying, they did not possess many of the powerful weapons that their opponents had. The government under Czar Nicholas II was disintegrating, and a provisional government had been set up. In November of 1917, Lenin and his communist followers known as the Bolsheviks overthrew the provisional government and set a communist government in Russia. However, in 1924, Lenin died and Josef Stalin assumed leadership of the Soviet Union, which was the name for the communist Russia. Stalin was a ruthless leader who brought
In 1922, Vladimir Lenin founded the Soviet Union, and during these years, Stalin became one of his most loyal followers. As he continued to gain popularity and began to move up the party ladder, Stalin became Secretary General of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. This role enabled him to appoint his allies to government jobs and have a base of political support (History.com Staff, 2009). When Lenin passed away in 1924, Stalin began creating a "cult of personality" around himself and got artists to paint pictures glorifying him (Trueman, 2015). He also built himself to be a great genius and a leader who was guided by Lenin and described himself as "Lenin's right hand man" (Kenny 2015). In the late 1920's, Stalin gained complete control over the Soviet Union and became its dictator.
According to the History.com Staff, “The October Revolution began on November 6 and 7, 1917 (or October 24 and 25 on the Julian calendar).” (Russian Revolution”). The October Revolution has also been called the Bolshevik Revolution since the Bolshevik Party played a crucial role in the revolution. The leader of the Bolshevik Party, Vladimir Lenin was a big supporter of Karl Marx. Another Marxist who leads this revolution was Leon Trotsky. In an article by the History.com Staff, “Lenin had created an, almost, bloodless coup d’état against the provisional government.” (“Russian Revolution”). The Bolshevik revolution started when, Alexander Kerensky, rather than follow an order. On October 24th, Kerensky ordered troops that were loyal, to act against the Bolshevik. Encyclopædia Britannica tells us that, “Kerensky was a socialist revolutionary who served as head of the Russian Provisional Government.” (“Aleksandr Kerensky”).
Leon Trotsky, originally known as Lev Davidovich Bronstein, was born November 7th in the year 1879. Born to a Jewish-Russian family of wealthy but illiterate farmers, he was sent to school in Odessa by age nine. Although he was enrolled in a German school, during his studies there the school was “Russified” during the Imperial Government’s policy of Russification. The environment of the town of Odessa contributed greatly to the development of Trotsky’s revolutionary ideas and his international outlook. Later on in his life, by 1896, he quickly became involved in revolutionary activities after moving to the harbor town of Nkdayev. As a narodnik, also known as a revolutionary populist, he was first introduced to Marxism, but disliked the core
Lenin grew up in a middle class family but was never fond of the political party and the class system. Having a Marxist political belief system, Lenin wanted the government to own and control everything. After taking control of the Soviet Union, Lenin wanted supreme power for himself and the government, with hopes to make all of the citizens’ equal. Throughout his reign, the Soviet Union was crowded with war, disease, and destruction. His idea of a perfect communist society was anything but
Lenin became one of the most powerful and influential tsars in Russian history. He led Russia into a one-party communist country. Lenin fell when Joseph Stalin had him assassinated. This caused a serious uproar and led to a new form of communism. Finally, when Stalin came to power, he
This humiliating defeat exemplified how far Russia was behind the industrialized world. Russia at the middle of the nineteenth century was still primarily an agricultural society, with little industry. Russia was deemed to be behind the times as they still had serfdom and there is incompetence in Russia’s style of government, military and social structure. To progress Russia economically and become a more modernize country, they have to break free from their traditional system that is impeding their progress. All these prompted Alexander II to consider reforms in education, the government, the judiciary, and the military. The first reform was the emancipation of serf as the serfs kept rising against their masters and there was numerous act of rebellion that is causing unrest in the country. Furthermore, as most of the Russian army was made up of serfs and they were often malnourished, it shows evidence of the dangers of serfdom. In order for Russia to become a strong military power, serfdom has to be abolished and other reforms have to be
DICTATORS of hermetically sealed nations do terrible things to their people to retain power. Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong and Pol Pot are perhaps the most infamous examples in recent history of despots who controlled every waking moment of their subjects' lives from inside the impenetrable boundaries of their countries.
Vladimir Lenin was the founder of Russian Communism, better known as The Communist Party of the Soviet Union. It was founded in 1912 and was diminished in 1991. They were organized around the idea of democratic centralism. Vladimir Lenin conceived democratic centralism, and the main idea was that their
Lenin died. Lenin had a pragmatic and realistic approach to problems. He was able to ‘seize the moment’ which was vital in the Bolsheviks gaining power. His organisation and leadership of the Bolshevik party transformed it. When Lenin died in January 1924 he had nominated Leon Trotsky as his chosen successor.
Stalin influenced the world of politics since the start of his reign in 1924. Stalin’s economic policy is believed to be one of the best models for poorer countries and many think that he single-handedly destroyed socialism. Most importantly, it is thought that Stalin “molded the features that characterized the Soviet regime” (Gale Staff, 5). His strict policy inspired many of the modern-day rulers in their grapple for power. However, his political impact is only a speck of dust compared to his other prominent actions. Stalin is most famous for the Great Purge, the execution of thousands of citizens due to his paranoia, and his military operations were one of the main causes for the rise of the Cold War. Like Hitler, many articles were written and numerous studies published about Stalin’s life and intentions. Today, his name is met with a mixed reaction. While some admire the way Stalin helped Russia regain its title, most often he is criticized for the harsher laws he placed on the people (Gale.org, 3). His visual reputation has also been quite influential. When he was alive, Stalin blurred out all of the scars from his childhood sickness in photos. He also walked with a limp that usually heavily concealed. For this reason, when people met Stalin they were often disappointed and left with a lesser opinion. Learning from his mistakes, modern executives often hide their flaws to ensure utmost
After hearing about the recent coup, throwing out the czar, Lenin came back to Russia from his exiled in Switzerland. Using his charisma and status, he helped kick start another revolution which knocked out the makeshift democracy. This made a place for the Bolsheviks (communists) to place themselves in a position of power in the government. (Rashid, Aatif). Lenin came to be an influential person in the Bolshevik party and used Karl Marx’s ideas to make Communism in Russia blossom. Two major things he did were make private industry and agriculture public and redistributed the land of wealthy proprietors to peasants. This went well for a few years, until the Russian Civil War ended in 1920. While they came out victorious, Russia was left in disaster. The economic productivity was insufficient and the people were starving and unhappy. Because of this, Lenin was desperate for a new change to benefit the people, so he announced the New Economic Policy. The state took control of large industries again, but people were encouraged to have private and individual businesses. Soon after this was out in place, another major change was about to occur in the Russian government. This occurred after Lenin died in 1924. Joseph Stalin took over his place and became the leader of the Communist Party. He began intimidating and doubting his rivals while also claiming to see spies everywhere. He cleared the party and general population of Russia or these so called “spies.” By executing or exiling rebels to Siberia, he struck fear into those who remained after his purging. Everyone lived in fear of Stalin’s secret police and he ruled over Russia with an iron fist from that point on until his death (Dagger,
War Communism was in favour of Lenin being able to consolidate power as the Bolsheviks used terror effectively. There was a six week period known as the Red Terror that saw any remaining aristocracy (most begun to flee the country after February revolution). Monarchists and riches middle class, were arrested, executed, exiled or stripped of their power, estates and privilege. Additionally, in March, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk signed with the Germans, was the Bolsheviks ending the war. Russia lost the Ukraine, its Polish and Baltic territories, and Finland. The treaty was hugely unpopular in Russia but necessary if the Bolsheviks were to establish control of Russia. Lenin believed that the revolution would soon spread to Germany and this would reduce the effect of the Treaty.