On the Brink of Red October

 

One hundred years ago this week, plus three, it was still October in Russia, because they were still using the old-style Julian calendar. Today there will be one entry for the whole eventful week that led up to Red October.

The Week beginning October 31 – October 18, 1917: “Vigorous Preparations.” With intensified Bolshevik agitation, led by Trotsky, in the background, forces aligned with that party vigorously gathered the political and physical resources that would be necessary for a successful insurrection, the date of which had not and could not yet be fixed. When Trotsky refused to answer a question in the Petrograd Soviet (where rumors were flying) about the date, Kamenev’s comment made it seem like the Bolsheviks thought an insurrection might not even be necessary. But this of course was not the case; it was Kamenev’s opinion. Kamenev well knew how the votes in the Bolshevik Central Committee had gone. Read about it here and here.

November 2 – October 20, 1917: Kamenev Resigns. Hearing of this, Lenin denounced it as a ”trick.” Accordingly Kamenev offered to resign from the Bolshevik Central Committee. The offer was accepted, and Kamenev was further admonished to remain silent on the issue. Under the pressure of events, cracks were appearing in the wall of party solidarity! Read about it here.

November 3 – October 21, 1917: Resolution of the Garrison Conference. The Garrison Conference accepted three proposals made by Trotsky: that the garrison would support the Military Revolutionary Committee, that the garrison would take part in the review of forces planned for the following day, and that the Congress of Soviets should “take the power in its hands.” Even the Cossack regiments agreed. These proposals were of course consistent with and essential to the overall plan of insurrection. Read about it here. 

November 4 – October 22, 1917: The Day of the Petrograd Soviet. As the delegates to the Congress of Soviets began to assemble, the Petrograd Soviet held a review of its revolutionary forces, now to include those of garrison who had agreed to take part the day before. There were meetings in the public halls and squares. One audience would assemble, listen to the speeches, then depart. Then another audience would file in. Read about it here.

November 5 – October 23, 1917: The Peter and Paul Comes Over. The Garrison Conference having definitely broken the chain of command that led back to the Coalition Government, the Bolsheviks began to appoint commissars who sought to fill the power vacuum thus created. When the commissar sent to the Peter and Paul fortress and prison in the middle of the Neva River was resisted by the officer in command, Trotsky went over to talk to the soldiers themselves. In the result, the fortress, its artillery, and 100,000 rifles for the Red Guards came over to the insurrection. Read about it here.

You can read the whole chapter on the Day of the Petrograd Soviet here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

 

Democratic Conference of the Soviets

One hundred years ago yesterday, plus three, the right-socialists who had associated themselves with Prime Minister Kerensky’s directory convened a national “Democratic Conference” of the soviets. They hoped to recover what they were losing in the local Petrograd Soviet, which earlier that week had voted to confirm the Bolshevik resolution calling for a government of the soviets, that is, not of Kerensky, the bourgeois-liberal Cadets, and the right-socialist compromisers.

 Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the Democratic Conference here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

 

Congress of Soviets

One hundred years ago today, plus three, the All-Russia Congress of Soviets, first of its kind in the aftermath of the February Revolution, convened in Petrograd. People should understand that a soviet was not based on a geographic unit or a subdivision of the state, but rather, in good socialist form, on an economic unit such as a factory, industry, or agricultural region. And that the members were chosen democratically.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the June Demonstration here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

Divided Government

One hundred years ago today, plus three, as the demonstrations of the April Days continued and counter-demonstrations grew up, the Executive Committee of the Soviet met with the ministers of the Provisional Government to try to figure out what to do. Turns out, divided government was no more effective then than it is now.

Read about it here. Or read the whole chapter on the April Theses here. Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

Congress of Soviets Meet-up

One hundred years ago today, plus two, the Congress of Soviets convened in Petrograd. Not sure what a “soviet” is? It’s something like participatory democracy. Read about it here, and follow the Newer Post links at the bottom of the page to get the rest of the story. 

Or read the whole story from the beginning by following this link.

February Revolution

February 27 – February 14, 1917: Last State Duma. The State Duma had first been convened in May 1906 as part of a program of civil and political reforms addressing the issues raised by the failed 1905 revolution. This would be the last one.

Tsar Nicholas II granted this elective body certain legislative and oversight functions. However, he retained all executive powers, including the power to appoint state ministers and to dismiss the Duma itself. The Russian state remained effectively an autocracy.

The workers were already aroused. Some 90,000 were on strike in Petrograd, and others had closed plants in Moscow.

March 1 – February 16, 1917: Bread Rationing. Authorities issue cards for rationing bread in Petrograd. Food shortages were widespread in Russia during World War I. Not only had many agricultural workers been conscripted into the armies, but the armies themselves still had to be fed.

March 4 – February 19, 1917: Bread. Within a few days after rationing starts, people – mostly women – mass around Petrograd shops demanding bread.

March 5 – February 20, 1917: Bakeries. The next day, people ransack bakeries in several parts of Petrograd.

March 8 – February 23, 1917: International Women’s Day. A strike by female textile workers celebrating International Women’s Day begins the February Revolution. The Women’s Day observance had been created in 1909 by the Socialist Party of America to commemorate a strike by the Ladies Garment Workers the previous year.

The want of bread continued to be an issue. Though the Bolsheviks had not called for strikes, the women asked the metal workers of the Vyborg district to support theirs. Soon, with the Bolshevik, Menshevik, and Social Revolutionary party machineries behind them, 90,000 workers were in the streets. The demonstrations began on the mainly industrial Vyborg side of the frozen Neva River. Later they poured over to the Petersburg side, which held the imperial palace and the seats of government.

Meanwhile, the tsar Nicholas II is at the front with his marshals. He is not sent word of the strikes until the third day.

At this time, Lenin was an émigré in Berne, Switzerland, Trotsky in New York. Stalin, having flunked the physical for induction into the Russian army, was held a political prisoner in Krasnoyarsk on the Trans-Siberian Railway.

March 9 – February 24, 1917: The Strike Spreads. Two hundred thousand workers, about half the industrial labor force, are on strike in Petrograd. Among others, students joined them. The slogans cried for bread, but also against tsarist autocracy and the war.

On the first day of strikes, only police were sent to control the crowds. But on the second day, the authorities took the second step in a long-planned escalation: they sent Cossacks to drive the workers back with horses and whips. But the plan of the tsar’s Council of Ministers failed. The Cossacks, instead of driving away the workers, in some cases simply filed through them, or let them pass under their horses. Nor did they fire on the workers, but some of them broke up police formations that were. Trotsky says, “…one of them gave the workers a good wink.”

March 10 – February 25, 1917: General Strike. The strike in Petrograd becomes general. By now, 240,000 workers have joined it. Even small factories, and commerce generally, are affected.

The authorities responded with another of their planned escalations, in which the city’s military garrison forms line of battle and opens fire. The result was not at all according to plan. The workers did not confront the soldiers. Rather, one of them, cap in hand, asked the Cossacks to help against the police. Reportedly, some Cossacks attacked the mounted police instead, and one of the police was sabered.

Confrontation was reserved for the police. To the soldiers, the women said, according to Trotsky, “Put down your bayonets – join us.” With the result to be seen in the sequel.

Meanwhile the tsar’s Minister of War telegraphs him about the strikes. Naturally the tsar would like the disorders to be put down. The commander of the Petrograd garrison threatened to send all workers who had registered for the draft to the front – in three days. But the situation would be very different by then.

March 11 – February 26, 1917: Countermeasures Fail. Overnight police arrest revolutionist leadership, including Molotov, Schliapnikov, and Zalutsky of the Bolshevik Committee. The revolution goes on without them.

Workers have gained physical control over parts of the city; all government apparatus in those neighborhoods, including police stations, had been abandoned. The bridges over the Neva being blocked, workers crossed into Petersburg on the ice. Police were firing from concealed positions.

An alarmed tsarina Alexandra, German by birth, telegraphs her husband from the imperial palace in Petersburg. The Minister of War considered asking for troops from the front, but decided to use firehoses instead. That tactic was unsuccessful.

The President of the Duma, Rodzianko, asks the head of the Council of Ministers, Prince Golytsin, to resign. The latter responds by revealing the tsar’s undated edict dissolving the Duma.

Some of the soldiers, or their officers, fired on the demonstrators. Chagrined that trainees from their regiment had done so, a company of the Imperial Guards garrison refuses orders. This was mutiny. Meanwhile the leaders of the Vyborg workers were discussing whether to end the strike.

March 12 – February 27, 1917: The Garrison Mutinies. The morning starts quietly. The tsarina, relieved, telegraphed her husband to that effect. But the workers were meeting at the factories and deciding to continue the insurrection. They issued a declaration to the soldiers …

… but some of them had already refused orders to march into the streets. Instead the regiment leading the mutiny sent messages to the other regiments calling on them to join it. By evening there was scarcely a battalion of loyal troops left to the commander of the garrison, who nevertheless felt it his duty to declare martial law. Meanwhile soldiers had helped the Vyborg workers destroy the police barracks. The Moscow regiment armed some of the workers. They spread throughout the city in armored cars, sacked the arsenal, freed the political prisoners, and arrested the commander of the garrison.

Telegrams to the tsar communicated alarm. Rodzianko thought “the last hour has come,” but the tsar said it’s nonsense. Troops from the front were dispatched to the capital. Golytsin resigned but the tsar refused to appoint a replacement. When part of the Duma assembled in the Tauride Palace (the Progressive Bloc held back), the tsar’s edict of dissolution was revealed. Fearing to remain in session, the deputies could only resolve not to leave town quite yet. Miliukov addressed them, then Kerensky warned that a crowd was approaching.

It was, led by soldiers. As the assembly evaporates, Rodzianko’s motion to form a Provisional Committee of the State Duma cannot be voted on, but this does not stop him from forming it. In another part of the palace, by now occupied by soldiers and workers, the revolution, with the help of leadership just released from the prisons, formed the Soviet of Workers Deputies. The soldiers’ deputies were added the following day. A Menshevik, Cheidze, was named president of the Soviet and its Executive Committee.

The Soviet met that evening amid chaos and ratified the membership of its self-appointed Executive Committee. They assumed control of the distribution of food. In the hours and days that followed, the Soviet occupied the State Bank, Mint, Treasury, and Printing Office; it took control of Petrograd’s postal and telegraph services, the wireless, rail stations, and printing plants. It also arrested those of the tsar’s ministers it could lay its hands on.

The same things happened in Moscow. There were strikes and demonstrations. Soldiers came forward asking how they could become part of the revolution. Political prisoners were freed.

March 13 – February 28, 1917: The Provisional Committee and the Soviet. Neither the leadership of the Progressive Bloc, including the socialist and communist parties in the Duma, much less that of the Bolsheviks, attempts to lead the establishment of the revolutionary state. That was left to the bourgeois liberal parties under Rodzianko, Miliukov, and Kerensky.

The tsar was by then trying to make his way back into Petrograd, from where the thoroughly alarmed tsarina was trying to telegraph him. Neither the telegraphs nor the railways were working for the imperial family by then; they were in the hands of the workers and the Soviet. The tsarina’s telegrams were never sent; the tsar was held up at a suburban station and eventually had to return to the front. The Soviet had also closed down the monarchist press and began to print its own newspaper Izvestia – “The News of the Soviet.”

Troops sent earlier from the front turned back of their own accord. The situation in the capital was too completely lost for them to restore it.

Even the Peter and Paul fortress in the middle of the Neva River, hitherto undisturbed by the insurrection, offered to surrender. Schlusselberg prison was also taken.

March 14 – March 1, 1917: The Provisional Committee and the Tsar. Rodzianko wants to telegraph the tsar. Fearing arrest by the workers, he asked for an escort to the telegraph office by deputies of the Soviet.

The Provisional Committee, on the one hand, accepted the power to form the state that the revolution had won, but on the other, continued to negotiate with the tsar. Though the tsar’s ministers had been placed under arrest and brought before the Duma, he nevertheless proposed a deal that would allow him to continue to fight the war, while the Provisional Committee would administer all other government functions. But it was too late for the tsar. Abdication was broached in an exchange of telegrams that also made the situation in the capital clear to the tsar. He may have offered to appoint new ministers; he definitely agreed to submit the question of abdication to his marshals at the front.

For their part, Miliukov and other bourgeoisie now being named or naming themselves ministers of the Provisional Committee did not want to part with the monarchy entirely, preferring to keep it in name as a shield against the revolution. But the demand of the Soviet’s Executive Committee when it met with the Provisional Committee was modest: only to be allowed to continue agitation among the workers, soldiers, and peasants. The rest of the revolutionary program – land reform, an end to the war, the eight-hour day, etc. – was not put on the table. Even the Bolsheviks on the committee went along with this.

Meanwhile the revolution is complete in Moscow, where the Moscow Soviet holds its first session. It was also spreading to the provincial cities. At Novgorod, the mayor made a speech in its favor; political prisoners are freed. The workers of Samara and Saratov organized Soviets. The chief of police in Kharkov cried, “Long Live the revolution!”

Back in Petrograd, Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries of the Executive Committee issued Order No. 1 for the benefit of the soldiers who had joined the revolution. It called for each regiment to elect members to the soviets and to form regimental committees of enlisted men. It also regulated control of weapons and social interactions with officers, who in every case came from a different social stratum than the peasant soldiery.

March 15 – March 2, 1917: The Tsar Abdicates. The tsar makes one final offer to appoint a new cabinet of ministers. Rodzianko informed him that, no, the question is now “the dynasty itself.” Having received the same advice from his marshals, the tsar agreed. But the Provisional Committee did not insist on getting rid of the whole dynasty. The deputies sent to meet with the tsar returned with an abdication in favor of his brother the Grand Duke Michael, as regent for his son Alexei. One of them said, “Long live the Emperor Michael!” and was promptly arrested.

The Provisional Committee completed its work for becoming a Provisional Government. Prince Lvov was made head of state; Miliukov became Foreign Minister; Kerensky became Minister of Justice. Kerensky was the only minister with any socialist credentials whatsoever. Many ministers – of agriculture, of labor, for example – came from among the big landowners and bourgeoisie. In other words, it resembled Mr. Trump’s cabinet. So much so that the big bourgeois organ, the Council of Trade and Industry, put its resources at the service of the Provisional Government.

Meanwhile the Bolshevik Central Committee resolved that the Provisional Government was counter-revolutionary, but also not to oppose it.

March 16 – March 3 1917: Right and Left Bolsheviks. The Provisional Government next asks Grand Duke Michael to abdicate. He complies. The revolution was announced to the world by radio.

The Bolshevik leadership on the scene, Molotov and self-educated workers Schliapnikov and Zalutsky formulated the party’s response to the measures of the bourgeois liberal Provisional Government. There were still left and right Bolsheviks, with “defensists,” who wanted to continue the war, on the right.

Among the left Bolsheviks were the workers of the Vyborg district. They wanted to depose the Provisional Government in favor of the Soviet. But this precariously balanced “dual government,” as Trotsky calls it, was held together by mutual suspicions in the weeks and months that followed.

Meanwhile “compromisers” on the Executive Committee of the Soviet issued Order No. 2, intended to annul Order No. 1 by limiting it to the Petrograd garrison. Order No. 2 was ineffective, being ignored by the revolutionary soldiery.

Dual Power

March 17 – March 4, 1917: Dual Government. The Bolshevik Central Committee states its opinion of the dual government shared by the Soviet and the Provisional Government: the latter is counter-revolutionary. But on the same day, the Petrograd committee of the Bolshevik party resolved not to oppose the Provisional Government, contrary to the wishes of the Bolshevik left, including the Vyborg workers.

In the spread of the revolution through the armed forces, officers of the Baltic Fleet were arrested or drowned.

March 18 –  March 5, 1917: Pravda. First issue of Pravda, central organ of the Bolshevik Party. By order of the Executive Committee of the Soviet, the workers printed only those publications approved by the Soviet. That meant no more “right press” for the time being; the decision was reversed some days later under pressure from the bourgeoisie.

Among Pravda’s first editors was the left-Bolshevik Molotov.

Meanwhile, the workers returned to work under conditions, including eight-hour days, proposed by the Soviet. Word of the revolution began filtering through to the soldiers at the front, where the Bolshevik peace policy was not widely accepted.

March 19 – March 6, 1917: A Declaration. The Provisional Government issues a declaration promising to summon a Constituent Assembly and to carry the war through to victory. Trotsky observes that neither promise meant want it seemed to mean, nor indeed anything at all. The Provisional Government hadn’t summoned the Constituent Assembly months later when the October Revolution overtook it. The promise about the war was addressed more to Britain and France than to the people of Russia; the Provisional Government wanted business as usual with its allies of the Entente.

The Soviet voted to appoint commissars to each regiment of the army. The soldiers were gravitating towards the view that they would fight to defend the revolution, but refuse to take the offensive. The defensist position was also that of a majority of the Soviet, but not necessarily of the Bolsheviks.

From Switzerland, Lenin cabled the Petrograd Bolsheviks advice on tactics. His “Letters from Afar,” opposing accommodation with the Provisional Government, began to appear in Pravda during this time.

March 20 – March 7, 1917: A Separate Peace? The war continues to be a problem for the Provisional Government. Making a separate peace is discussed. But just two weeks later, Miliukov, the Foreign Minister, hatched a plot to seize the Dardanelles by betraying Serbia.

March 21 – March 8, 1917: The Tsar Arrested. Kerensky declares the tsar is “in my hands”; he wants to escort him to England. What really happened is that the railroad workers would not let the tsar pass. A Menshevik delegated by the Soviet placed the tsar under arrest at Moghilev, near the front.

Meanwhile, the Provisional Government declared amnesty for political prisoners, most of whom had already been freed anyway.

March 22 – March 9, 1917: Under House Arrest. At the insistence of the Soviet, and against the recommendation of Kerensky for exile to England, the tsar and his family are detained in the Winter Palace. The soldiers would have preferred that he be held in the Peter and Paul fortress.

The Council of the United Nobility put its resources at the disposal of the Provisional Government. This, coming immediately after the arrest of the tsar, completed the realignment of big bourgeoisie and landowning elements from the autocracy to the liberal-bourgeois government.

March 23 – March 10, 1917: Eight-Hour Days. The Manufacturers Association agrees to recognize the union shops and to limit the working day to eight hours. They had little choice, as the Petrograd workers were simply leaving the factories after eight hours of work. The same conditions prevailed in Moscow; the Moscow Soviet there made them official some ten days later.

March 25 – March 12, 1917 Stalin arrives. Bolsheviks released from detention in Siberia arrive in Petrograd by train. Stalin, Kamenev, and Muranov were greeted by the local, mostly younger, leadership of the party. Stalin deposed the local trio Molotov, Schliapnikov, and Zalutsky as senior member of the 1912 Central Committee then named by Lenin.

Meanwhile, the Provisional Government outlawed the death penalty, though it was later restored in the army.

March 27 – March 14, 1917: A Manifesto. The Soviet issues a manifesto “to the people of the whole world” declaring for peace without annexations or indemnities. But until that should happen the war against Germany and her allies was to continue. The manifesto had carried the Soviet unanimously.

Meanwhile Trotsky left New York for Russia on a Norwegian vessel. At Halifax, Nova Scotia, he was detained by officials of the British navy and held with the Germans in a prisoner of war camp. His speeches there won the support of many of the enlisted men, but drew the ire of the German officers, not to mention the British commandant.

The soviets pressured the Provisional Government to secure Trotsky’s release, with the result to be seen in the sequel.

March 28 – March 15, 1917: Pravda Turns Right. Stalin and Kamenev take over as co-editors of Pravda. They adopted, among other views, the defensist position taken by the Manifesto of the Soviet the day before.

This was contrary to Lenin’s views. Lenin considered the defeat of Russia the lesser of two evils, the greater one being participation in an imperialist war, by and for the capitalist classes of the belligerents.

March 29 – March 16, 1917: The Soviet and the Dual Government. Delegates from the fleets to the Soviet announce that they will recognize the Provisional Government as a partner in the dual government. But only if it carries out the program of the Soviet.

In general, soviets in all the principal towns and industrial centers were taking the same position during this time. They also acknowledged the leadership of the Petrograd Soviet in this role.

March 30 – March 17, 1917: Lenin Writes. Lenin writes Pravda criticizing the defensist views published there. He blamed Kamenev, not Stalin.

March 31 – March 18, 1917: “The army is sick.” So it is said at a conference of the high officers in command. Desertions reached 8,000 weekly by mid-April.

April 1 – March 19, 1917: Tseretilli Arrives. The Menshevik émigré Tseretilli, like Stalin a native of Georgia, arrives in Petrograd. He, along with Martov and Dan, took over the leadership of the party in the Soviet, and helped steer the Soviet to the right. He favored sharing the government with the bourgeois-liberal parties the Provisional Government was then made up of, and the defensist position on the war.

April 2 – March 20, 1917: War News. A German offensive obtains a certain degree of success before petering out in the mud of the spring thaw. Trotsky says the bourgeois press of Petrograd made it seem like a threat of military disaster.

Meanwhile Miliukov, the Foreign Minister, hatched his (unsuccessful) plot to seize the Dardanelles by betraying Serbia.

April 3 – March 21, 1917: Eight-hour Day. The Moscow Soviet promulgates the eight-hour day in the factories of the city.

April 7 – March 25, 1917: The United States Enters the War. The United States House and Senate cast votes declaring war on Germany and its allies.

In Petrograd, a funeral march honoring the victims of the February Revolution was held. Some 800,000 filed past the graves.

April 9 – March 27, 1917: Lenin Entrains. Lenin boards a train in Berne, Switzerland, en route for Russia. He and his wife Krupskaya are part of a group of 30 Bolsheviks travelling via Stuttgart, Stockholm, and, partly in horse-drawn sleighs, Finland.

Because he was travelling through Germany, the itinerary appeared vaguely treasonous. The train itself was said to have been sealed, but really Lenin had demanded that it not be subject to the routine intrusions travelers normally suffer. Lenin and other revolutionary emigres had tried without success to obtain passage with the help of the French and British, who had their own reasons to keep them from reaching Petrograd.

April 10 – March 29, 1917: All Russia Conference of Soviets. A conference of all the soviets of revolutionary Russia convenes in Petrograd. Attending Bolsheviks voted along with the rest of the conference in favor of sharing power with the Provisional Government.

The Bolsheviks also discussed reunification with the Mensheviks, something that was already taking place in the provinces. Some favored reunification without conditions. Molotov objected, as the Mensheviks had taken the defensist position for keeping Russia in the war. Stalin favored negotiating the terms of reconciliation with the Mensheviks. The negotiations continued until Lenin’s arrival the following week.

April Theses, April Days

About April 14 – April 1, 1917: Somewhere in Finland. A group of Bolsheviks travels to Finland to greet Lenin as he approaches Petrograd. Lenin chided one of them, the right-leaning Kamenev, for positions he had taken in Pravda on cooperation with the Provisional Government and in favor of the defensist war policy.

April 16 – April 3, 1917: At the Finland Station. Lenin arrives in Petrograd at the Finland Station and is given a bouquet that Trotsky says must have made him feel very awkward. He was greeted by Cheidze, the Menshevik president of the Petrograd Soviet.

Cheidze felt he had to caution Lenin about cooperation with the Provisional Government and its defensist policies. Ignoring this, Lenin concluded his brief set of remarks saying, “Long live the world socialist revolution!”

Lenin and his entourage, including Zinoviev the agitator, drove to Bolshevik headquarters in armored cars. They stopped from time to time so Lenin could deliver essentially the same brief speech to crowds along the way.

At headquarters, the expropriated mansion of a court ballerina, Lenin impatiently endured numerous speeches of welcome. At length he addressed the party. For two hours he spoke against the defensist, collaborationist, and right opportunist policies the Petrograd Bolsheviks had let themselves be drawn into. He must also have explained what he thought was the correct line, for as we’ll see he read out the “April Theses” the next day.

Nobody seems to have taken notes. The speech left its hearers dumbfounded, wondering whether he really meant what he’d said.

The All Russia Conference of Soviets was just ending that day.

April 17 – April 4, 1917: The April Theses. Twice, once at a meeting of the Bolsheviks and again at a meeting to which the Mensheviks were also invited, Lenin reads his ten “April Theses.” He said later that week, prefacing the version published in Pravda:

I did not arrive in Petrograd until the night of April 3, and therefore at the meeting on April 4, I could, of course, deliver the report on the tasks of the revolutionary proletariat only on my own behalf, and with reservations as to insufficient preparation.

The only thing I could do to make things easier for myself—and for honest opponents—was to prepare the theses in writing. I read them out, and gave the text to Comrade Tseretelli. I read them twice very slowly: first at a meeting of Bolsheviks and then at a meeting of both Bolsheviks and Mensheviks.

The first thesis addresses the policy of the revolution to the war, “…[N]ot the slightest concession to ‘revolutionary defensism’ is permissible.” This includes the “error” of fighting only to defend the homeland, with no thought of annexations or indemnities, as the bourgeois Provisional Government would have it publicly – in spite of their private alignments with capitalist interests at home and abroad.

The next four theses address the phenomenon of dual government – power being shared between the soviets and Provisional Government with the soviets as the junior partner – under the heading Fraternization. Lenin sees the dual government as a transitional phase between the bourgeois February Revolution and the proletarian revolution that was yet to come. But the party, a small minority even in the soviets, should not therefore with join the Mensheviks and social democrats in support of the Provisional Government. The party’s goal should be to transfer “the entire state power to the Soviets of Workers’ Deputies,” not ”to return to a parliamentary republic.”

The sixth and seventh theses call for nationalization of all lands under the soviets and consolidation of all banks in a single state bank under the Soviet. Yet in the eighth thesis, Lenin does not advocate immediate transfer of ownership of the means of production to the workers, but rather only the strengthening of the workers’ soviets.

The ninth and tenth theses set forth the political tasks of the Bolshevik party, to include the convocation of a new revolutionary International, one that would specifically exclude social democrats of the stripe who favored collaboration with the Provisional Government.

Visit this page to find the entire text of the Pravda article and all ten theses.

April 20 – April 7, 1917: Pravda publishes “April Theses.” See the link in the entry for April 17 – April 4, 1917.

April 21 – April 8, 1917: Pravda’s Critique. The editors split with Lenin on the “immediate transformation of [the Russian] revolution in to a socialist revolution." In fact, right Bolsheviks continued to struggle against Lenin’s program of action down to the beginning of the October Revolution.

April 29 – April 16, 1917: Trotsky Released. Trotsky is released from British detention in Canada at the request of the Foreign Minister of the Provisional Government, Miliukov, who was himself being pressured by the Petrograd Soviet. Trotsky took ship for Russia.

April 30 – April 17, 1917: War Invalids Demonstrate. The Cadets, the bourgeois party of Foreign Minister Miliukov, organize a pro-war demonstration of veterans invalided by the war.

Meantime, in provincial elections, democratically elected dumas are chosen. As the soviets retained local control, Trotsky notes, these bodies were nullities.

May 1 – April 18, 1917: International Socialist May Day. Russian socialists celebrate International Socialist May Day according to the new style calendar, that is, when other socialists around the world are celebrating it – though it happens to be April 18 on the old style calendar. It became a national holiday; not only factories but also government offices shut down.

The holiday atmosphere spread to the front at staff headquarters in Moghilev, where even the tsarist generals marched. Elsewhere Russian troops celebrated with Austro-German POWs, singing the same revolutionary songs in different languages.

This was also the day Foreign Minister Miliukov chose to send a note reaffirming Russia’s loyalty to her allies and her pledge not to make a separate peace. This part was generally agreeable to the defensists in the Soviet. But the subtext endorsed the annexations and indemnities his British and French counterparts expected as part of the peace agreement. Naturally one of the annexations Miliukov was contemplating was that of the Dardanelles, at the expense of Germany’s ally Turkey. This raid had been planned for, but the soldiers eventually refused to carry the plan out.

May 2 – April 19, 1917: The Executive Committee Meets. Miliukov’s note is the topic at a meeting of the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet. The meeting ran late without producing any consensus or plan of action.

May 3 – April 20, 1917: The April Days. The text of Miluvov’s note hits the Petrograd papers, sparking three days of demonstrations: the “April Days.”

The Finland Regiment marched to the seat of the Provisional Government at the head of over 30,000 armed soldiers. Workers left their factories and joined them. The banners read, “Down with Miliukov!” “Down with Guchov,” Minister of War in the Provisional Government, too.

The demonstrators lacked a specific program; nor was the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet, hastily reconvened, able to supply one. In reaction, General Kornilov, not for the last time, offers troops for suppressing the demonstrations; bourgeois agitators denounce Lenin as a German agent.

May 4 – April 21, 1917: The Dual Government Meets. As the workers and soldiers regather in the streets, ministers of the Provisional Government meet with the Executive Committee of the Soviet. Neither side of the dual government knew what to do about the demonstrations. Prince Lvov, President of the Council of Ministers, thought maybe the Provisional Government should withdraw. Chernov, Minister of Agriculture, said it might be sufficient for Miliukov to exchange the Foreign Ministry for the portfolio of the Minister of Public Education. Miliukov refused both that suggestion and the suggestion that he write a new note. Some members of the Soviet would apparently have been satisfied with a better explanation of the first one.

Meanwhile the demonstrations, which had been announced by Bolshevik workers from Vyborg, continued. The demonstrators ignored the plea of the President of the Petrograd Soviet, Cheidze, to disperse. Counterdemonstrators, organized by the Cadet Party, clashed with the workers. General Kornilov made good his threat to mobilize cavalry and artillery against the workers. Some officers tried to seize one of their banners. Gunfire was exchanged.

But the Soviet ordered the revolutionary regiments to stay in their barracks, and Kornilov’s to return there. The soldiers obeyed the Soviet’s orders; thereafter none of the troops would march unless the orders were counter-signed by the Soviet.

For its part, the Executive Committee would be satisfied with a verbal explanation of Miliukov’s note; he was not compelled to resign. Having come so close to civil war in the capital (and the situation was much the same in Moscow), the Soviet ordered demonstrations to stop for two days. The Bolshevik Central Committee subsequently agreed to the halt.

May 5 – April 22, 1917: Izvestia’s Interpretation. Izvestia, the official organ of the Petrograd Soviet, thinks it necessary to declare that the Soviet had not interfered with the “legally constituted” authority of the Provisional Government by its actions during the April Days. Since the demonstrators were calling for more rather than less interference, the Soviet thus remained less revolutionary-minded than the people themselves.

Nor could a Bolshevik motion for a vote of no confidence in the government come within hundreds of votes of passage. The Petrograd Soviet also politely ignored a resolution of the Helsinki Soviet, backed by revolutionary sailors, offering to help remove the Provisional Government.

May 7 – April 24, 1917: Bolshevik Party Conference. The All-Russia Bolshevik Party Conference called for in the April Theses begins. Neither Stalin nor Kamenev were named to the five-member praesidium.

Lenin spoke against misdirected violence, violence that is not being used as a tactic to further some specific revolutionary strategy. He also presented a resolution “On the Attitude Towards the Provisional Government” that had been adopted by the Petrograd conference of the party. The resolution recognized the government as an organ of the bourgeoisie and landowners, enumerating the programs such as land reform and the eight-hour workday it had failed to act upon or actively resisted. The resolution was published in Pravda on May 10 – April 27.

Kornilov’s Defeat

September 10 – August 28, 1917: Kornilov Advances. Petrograd receives news about the movement in its direction of General Kornilov’s forces. Reportedly: at 12:30 p.m., General Krymov reached Luga, 87 miles from the capital; at 2:30 p.m., trains loaded with Kornilov’s troops were passing through Oredezh station; at 3:00 p.m., Luga’s garrison surrendered; at 6:00 p.m., troops were advancing past Narva and approaching Gatchina, 28 miles from the capital.

The stock markets actually went up!

Little did the bourgeoisie know, this is what was really happening: Railroad workers were tearing up the tracks on the insurrection’s line of march. They isolated Moghiliev, Kornilov’s headquarters, from the rest of the railroad net. They put the railroad bridges under guard. Rail dispatchers and engineers were sending parts of Kornilov’s units one way, other parts another way, so that troops got separated from commanders and staff, from their own weapons and supplies, and from each other. Telegraph operators were not only holding up messages, but retransmitting them to the Committee of Defense. Other workers dug trenches – in hours instead of days.

And in Petrograd itself, workers eager to join the Red Guard were arming themselves with 40,000 stand of rifles. The workers of the Putilov factory turned out 100 cannon for defense of the city. The chauffeurs union provided transportation and delivered messages for the Soviet’s Committee of Defense. Clerks of the metal workers union prepared and distributed the necessary paperwork. The printers union decided, favorably to the interests of the Soviet, what would go into print. Counter-revolutionary elements were put under arrest.

Governor-general Savinkov had little or nothing to do with the organization of the defense.

Significantly, the Menshevik Dan, on behalf of the Petrograd Soviet, decreed that units of the Petrograd garrison should not carry out any movements unless orders were countersigned by the Committee of Defense. This was the same tactic the Soviet had employed during the April Days. It effectively deprived Kerensky of command over the city’s troops. Not only did he not control resistance to Kornilov on behalf of the Provisional Government, he did not have forces to support his own ambitions as against both Kornilov and the Provisional Government.

I might observe, without revealing too much too soon, that this was all good practice for the October Revolution.

September 10 – August 28, 1917: Kerensky Negotiates. Kerensky summons Commissar Savinkov to the Winter Palace. When he arrived at about 4:00 a.m., General Alexiev and Foreign Minister Tereshchenko were already there. They began talking as if there had been some kind of misunderstanding between Kerensky and Kornilov, thinking to deceive the public with this explanation. Kerensky asked the press not to print anything about his rift with Kornilov, but it was already too late.

The cruiser Aurora sailed to the Winter Palace from Kronstadt that day at about noon. The revolutionary sailors were thus on guard, whether over or for Kerensky was still to be determined.

Towards evening, Miliukov arrived at the palace and offered to mediate between Kerensky and Kornilov. Kerensky seems to have welcomed this, accepting Miliukov’s argument that the balance of power then lay with Kornilov. Miliukov did not disclose that he and his friends on the bourgeois right had Alexiev in mind to succeed Kerensky.

Later still, word came to the palace that Russia’s allies in the Entente were willing, “in the interests of humanity,” to bridge the difficulties between Kornilov and Kerensky. British Ambassador Buchanan had given Foreign Minister Tereshchenko a note to this effect.

Kerensky called the “retired” Cadet ministers to the palace. But before they could reach any decisions, alarming (but false) news that the enemy was nearing the capital was received. So they began to talk again about forming a directory with Alexiev in it. Miliukov’s plan was about to bear fruit.

Then there came a knock at the door. It was Tseretilli, returned from the Soviet to announce its demands. There would be no negotiations with Kornilov; instead the Committee of Defense would continue the struggle. 

Kerensky and his cohorts had no answer for this, no means of compelling the Soviet to abandon its decision. The meeting broke up, the Cadet ministers having resigned the cabinet for good this time. After everyone took his leave, Kerensky spent the night in nearly “complete solitude,” no longer, presumably, singing opera.

Meanwhile Krymov was actually withdrawing from Luga on the evening of the 28^th (September 10, new style). The Committee of Defense took control of the Southwestern Front through the soldiers committees. The Rumanian, Western, and Caucasian Fronts telegraphed the Winter Palace in support of the revolution and against Kornilov. The Northern Front, which Kornilov had suborned, got a new commander who later volunteered for the Red Army.

Kaledin, the Cossack general and political leader, was in the Don steppes, riding around the countryside and testing the mood of the people. Effectively neutral, he was emphatically not forming another front against the Provisional Government. Likewise, the fifth column in Petrograd promised by the League of Officers never showed itself. The provocateurs who were supposed to have drawn the Bolsheviks into the streets left for Finland, taking their allotment of money – what they hadn’t already spent on parties – with them.

Overnight, September 10-11 – August 28-29, 1917: The Savage Division Stalls. The Savage Division enters the battle unprepared. Some of its arms were still well down the railroad line, supposedly expected at Pskov. Overnight, the division came to a halt.

Two days later, the tracks leading to Pskov had been cut. In the result, the division never engaged troops supporting the Provisional Government at all.

September 11 – August, 29, 1917: Kornilov’s Insurrection Stalls. From headquarters in Moghiliev, General Kornilov orders General Krymov, in command of the advance on Petrograd, to concentrate his troops. But this was impossible; Krymov didn’t know where his troops were. The railroad workers had sent them hither and yon on eight different rail lines. Meanwhile, Kerensky telegraphed Krymov telling him Petrograd was quiet, his troops were not needed.

The capital received reports of a battle at Antropshio Station. Maybe this was in fact a reconnaissance in force that Krymov had actually ordered; it retired without engaging revolutionary troops.

The revolutionary Kronstadt sailors docked at Petrograd that morning, adding their numbers to those of the garrison and the armed workers. The sailors had replaced Kornilovist officers with men of their own choosing. Their representatives visited Trotsky in prison, but did not free him. Even though Kerensky had been refusing continuous requests of the Central Executive Committee to free the political prisoners taken after the July Days, Trotsky advised the sailors not to arrest the members of the Provisional Government – yet.

In Vyborg (the city near the Finnish frontier, not the workers’ district near Petrograd), the commanding officer had withheld news of the insurrection from his troops. When they found out, they shot him. Bolshevik-leaning units from the Vyborg garrison were also on the march to Petrograd. In the Baltic Fleet, they shot a number of officers who refused to take oaths of allegiance to the revolution. At Helsinki, the Soviet and fleet brought over the Cossacks of the garrison to the defense of the revolution.

When the railroad workers refused to move the trains at Luga, the garrison there, loyal to the revolution (and not having surrendered, as reported in Petrograd the day before), began to fraternize with Kornilov’s troops stranded there. Here too, even the Cossacks came under the influence of the Bolshevik agitators among the revolutionary soldiery.

Neither was the Savage Division immune. Their officers wanted to arrest the delegation of Moslems the Bolsheviks sent to negotiate, but the soldiers refused this order as lacking hospitality to their co-religionists. In the result, the soldiers set up a red banner bearing the words “Land and Freedom” over a staff car.

Kornilov’s troop concentration near Pskov had also evaporated.

September 12 – August 30, 1917: The Insurrection Collapses. The Central Executive Committee of the Soviets announces the “complete demoralization” of the forces in Kornilov’s insurrection. General Krymov presented himself to Kerensky at the Winter Palace and was treated to a theatrical speech. He shot himself dead on the way back to the War Ministery.

General Krasnov, the commander of Kornilov’s cavalry advance, saw the same thing other Kornilovist officers had been seeing: animated agitators among his troops. These particular troops began to arrest their officers and put themselves under soldiers committees they themselves had elected. Going further, they formed a soviet and sent a delegation to the Provisional Government.

The Kronstadt sailors were also making their views felt. They sent a delegation to the Central Executive demanding representation there, but had to be satisfied with four non-voting seats.

The Bolsheviks in Finland went even further, assuming governmental functions that, Trotsky says, anticipated the October Revolution itself.

Meanwhile Kerensky dismissed Governor-general Savinkov and replaced him with another individual, who himself was dismissed three days later.

September 13 – August 31, 1917: Change in Command, etc. Prime Minister Kerensky appoints himself commander-in-chief in preference to General Kornilov. General Alexiev was made chief of staff. Kornilov asked for terms; meanwhile, said Kerensky, his orders as against the Germans should be obeyed.

Alexiev was sent to headquarters at Moghiliev. The Compromisers in the Soviet wanted Kornilov’s head; the Moscow Church Council was against it as not Christian. Kerensky placed Kornilov and a few other headquarters conspirators under house arrest instead.

Meanwhile Alexiev was trying to persuade the big bourgeoisie to supply stipends for the conspirators, under the explicit threat that Kornilov was in a position to reveal their conspiratorial roles. For essentially the same reason, Miliukov dropped out of sight; his party, the Cadets, officially explained that he had “gone to the Crimea for a rest.”

On the same day, Kerensky assembled the Directory he had been planning. He kept Tereshchenko as Foreign Minister, and added a general (who had to be promoted from colonel), an admiral, and a Menshevik.

Lenin’s Insurrection

October 5 – September 22, 1917: Bolsheviks Will Attend. Riazanov, a Marxist of long standing, announces that the Bolsheviks will attend the Pre-Parliament in order to “expose all attempts at a new coalition with the bourgeoisie.”

Meanwhile, delegates of the disbanded Democratic Convention brought the question of convening the Congress of Soviets before the Central Executive Committee. The Bolsheviks demanded that it convene within two weeks, otherwise they would call their own congress of delegates from the Moscow and Petrograd soviets, where they had majorities. The Central Executive agreed to call the All Russian Congress on October 20 (November 2, new style).

October 6 – September 23, 1917: Bolsheviks Will Not Attend. In a letter, Lenin argues forcefully in favor of a Bolshevik boycott of the Pre-Parliament. Not only would participation send a mixed message to the party’s adherents about the goals of the party, it would mean working in the wrong direction. The party should be working where it has strength, in the soviets, factory committees, trade unions, soldiers committees; not in a forum got up by the Compromisers and bourgeoisie to cover up their weakness.

This view of the matter gained acceptance within the party as the meeting of the Pre-Parliament approached.

October 7 – September 24, 1917: Railroad Strike. The frustration of railroad workers over a long-awaited raise boils over into a strike. Nothing had been done about the raise since the February Revolution. With numerous railroad lines paralyzed, the government offered concessions a few days later.

The strike was symptomatic of increasing difficulty with industrial production and in the food supply. The overall effect was to shift the railroad workers to the left. 

Meanwhile the Bolshevik Central Committee appointed Sverdlov to monitor the Central Executive Committee’s attitude towards the Congress of Soviets and to administer the party’s campaign for the selection of delegates.

October 8 – September 25, 1917: The Last Coalition and the New Soviet. Kerensky announces a new coalition government, destined to be the last one and consisting in large measure of substantial capitalists. The Cadet Konovalov was made Kerensky’s second in command, and given the portfolio for Commerce and Industry. Kerensky also recruited the president of the Moscow stock exchange and the president of the Moscow Military Industrial Committee to the cabinet. Tereshchenko, who drew his wealth from the sugar trade, remained as Foreign Minister. Several Mensheviks held portfolios, but none of them had been of any importance in the Petrograd Soviet. A Social Revolutionary was made Minister of Agriculture.

Kerensky also mended fences with the Entente, keeping their preferred ambassador to London and naming a new one, a Cadet, to Paris.

On the same day, the Petrograd Soviet elected Trotsky as its President. Then it named a new Executive Committee consisting of thirteen Bolsheviks, six Social Revolutionaries, and three Mensheviks. Trotsky introduced and passed a resolution calling on the coalition to resign: the soon to be convened All-Russian Congress of Soviets would “create a genuinely revolutionary government.”

Thus the Bolsheviks continued to be quite open about their claims on the state power. The step missing from Trotsky’s resolution, of course, is armed insurrection.

Trotsky also adduces evidence about the deterioration of Kerensky’s mental condition during this time. Miliukov, for example, called it “psychic neurasthenia.” He later wrote that Kerensky’s friends had observed him pass from “extreme failure of energy” to “extreme excitement under the influence of drugs” during the course of a day. Kerensky was under the treatment of his own Minister of Public Welfare, Kishkin, professionally a psychiatrist, politically a Cadet.

October 9 – September 26, 1917: Second Thoughts. The Central Executive Committee of the Soviets discovers it would be impolitic to hold the Congress of Soviets as early as two weeks thence. The compromisist parties saw they could not campaign effectively for the Constituent Assembly if they had to be campaigning for the Congress of Soviets as well.

The Menshevik Dan moved for a delay. Trotsky responded for the Bolsheviks that if the Central Executive would not call the Congress under its constitution, the Bosheviks would call it on behalf of the revolution. The motion carried, for a delay until October 20 (November 2, new style); the result will be seen in the sequel.

October 9-10 – September 26-27, 1917: September Theses. Lenin publishes “Tasks of the Revolution,“ a kind of September version of the April Theses, in Rabochy Put. There are seven tasks; though some of them address issues already addressed in the April Theses, they all take account of developments in the interim.

The first two tasks lead to forming the new revolutionary state: all power must pass to the workers, soldiers and peasants through their representatives in the soviets; no compromise with the bourgeoisie or their political apparatus is possible.

The third reiterates the party’s war policy against indemnities, annexation, and defensism. Lenin lays out specific actions against contingencies during the lead up to, and after, the insurrection.

The agrarian policy of the Bolsheviks does not change, but acquires new force in light of the inaction of the Compromisers and the peasant revolt.

The fifth task recognizes that the progress of the revolution and the soviets has given the workers more ability to control the means of production. Therefore this, not as in April just the development of the soviets, becomes the task.

The last two tasks offer measures for combating the counter-revolution, something that had already been done successfully once with the defeat of Kornilov.

On the 10^th (September 27, new style), Lenin, still anxious about putting off the insurrection until the Congress of Soviets could be convened some two weeks thence, wrote to Smilga, the President of the Finnish Regional Committee and a member of the Central Committee. Lenin let Smilga know that the revolutionary troops in Finland and the Baltic Fleet might be called upon to advance on Petrograd. He asked Smilga do to a number of other things, both in the political open and underground. One, interestingly, was to prepare identification papers for him in the name of Konstantin Petrovich Ivanov. That’s how he signed the letter.

October 10 – September 27, 1917: Resolution in Reval. The soviets of Reval (now Tallinn), the capital of Estonia and the next line of defense if the Germans should decide to march on Petrograd, demand that the Pre-Parliament disband and that a congress of soviets be called to form the government. This was one of a number of similar resolutions in a battle of resolutions between the Bolsheviks and the Compromisers on the Central Executive Committee.

On another front, the resolution also demanded that the soviets must agree to troop transfers. This policy would prevent, for example, the government from transferring troops loyal to the revolution out of the Petrograd garrison. It was to become an issue as the Bolsheviks prepared for insurrection. In theory, Trotsky observes, the maintenance and deployment of armed forces is a fundamental right of the state. But the policy the resolution advocates had been a feature of the dual government since the February Revolution. Now it would become a feature of preparation for insurrection.

After October 10 – September 27, 1917: Northern Regional Conference of Soviets. In another “well calculated blow” (according to Trotsky) in the battle over the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, the Bolsheviks arrange for a conference of soviets of the northern region. This was a region of Bolshevik strength; the soviets of Petrograd, its suburbs, Moscow, Kronstadt, Helsinki, and Reval would send delegates, to arrive on October 13 (October 26, new style), a week before the declared date for the Congress of Soviets.

October 12-October 20 – September 29-October 7, 1917: Operation Albion. Germany launches an amphibious operation to secure the West Estonian Archipelago. These islands lay at the entrance to the Gulf of Riga; they were a stepping stone from Riga (taken on August 21, old style) to Petrograd. Russian resistance ended shortly after the naval Battle of Moon Sound.

Wikipedia has details on the operation, including a map.

October 14 – October 1, 1917: Lenin on the State Power. Lenin’s pamphlet “Can the Bolsheviks Retain State Power?” is published. This detailed argument starts by quoting statements in the bourgeois and compromisist press to the effect that the Bolsheviks could not hold the power, even that the best way to get rid of them would be to let them try and see them fail. Lenin disputes the claims made to support these conclusions.

For example, to the claim the proletariat "will not be able technically to lay hold of the state apparatus," Lenin replies, first, why bother? The existing state apparatus, that of the Provisional Government, is broken and useless and deserves rather to be smashed up altogether. And second, what do you suppose the soviets are for? They are the new state apparatus, closer to the people and more democratic. They were already at work, and, I might add, the only difference between the existing power of the soviets and “All Power to the Soviets!” was one of degree.

Knowing that after an insurrection the Bolsheviks would be faced by the question of state power, Lenin took some of the time of his enforced exile to continue his work on The State and Revolution, an analysis of Marxist texts on the evolution of the state through and after a revolution. When he wrote the pamphlet, he said the book would hopefully be available soon, but it was not published until after the October Revolution. 

October 16 – October 3, 1917: A Moscow Resolution. The Bolshevik Central Committee learns of a resolution of the Moscow Regional Bureau condemning them for irresolution on the question of insurrection. Trotsky says that “beyond a doubt” Lenin was behind the resolution and its “bitter” tone.

The committee left the matter on the table for a time; the result will be seen in the sequel.

October 17 – October 4, 1917: Battle of Moon Sound. When they observe German minesweepers attempting to clear the minefields protecting the passage into the Gulf of Riga, the Baltic Fleet attacks, hoping to forestall the German amphibious assault on Moon Island. German battleships exchanged fire with the Russian battleship Slava, which was so badly damaged it had to be scuttled. Though seven German minesweepers were sunk, the German fleet gained control of the sound. This led to the final success of Operation Albion, and put another scare into Petrograd.

Wikipedia has details on the battle, including the timetable of engagements and a list of ships damaged or sunk.

The American journalist Reed says this was also the day the first number of Rabochy i Soldat (Worker and Soldier) was published.

October 18 – October 5, 1917: Change of Plans. The Bolshevik Central Committee votes, with only Kamenev dissenting, to reverse the decision of October 3 (September 20, old style) in favor of sending its delegates to the Pre-Parliament.

Beginning October 19 – October 6, 1917: Evacuate Petrograd? After the success of the German amphibious operation against the archipelago at the entrance to the Gulf of Riga, the government floats the idea of evacuating itself to Moscow. Naturally the forces responsible for the defense of Petrograd objected. On October 19^th (October 6, old style), the soldiers section of the Petrograd Soviet adopted Trotsky’s resolution calling on the government, if it could not defend the capital, either to make peace or step aside.

Neither did the government’s proposal gain any traction with the Compromisers on the Central Executive Committee, who were told that in the event of a move they would have to fend for themselves. For their part, the workers considered Petrograd their fortress.

Within a week’s time, and after a subsequent demand by the delegates of the Pre-Parliament, the government decided to stay in the Winter Palace and convene the Constituent Assembly in the Tauride Palace.

October 20 – October 7, 1917: Pre-Parliament Meets. As the delegates to the Council of the Republic, or Pre-Parliament, prepare to assemble, its President, the Social Revolutionary Avksentiev, visits with Trotsky to ask what is going to happen. (Rumors had been circulating about the Bolsheviks withdrawing.) Trotsky says he answered, “A mere nothing, a little shot from a pistol.”

Problems for the Pre-Parliament had appeared on the horizon. Kerensky said long before that the Provisional Government would determine its organization and staff in its own discretion. The new Coalition Government was now a fait accompli. So much for the resolution of the Democratic Conference reserving to its permanent body the sanction of those choices. Moreover, if they had their way, the Cadets would not give the Pre-Parliament legislative powers either. But they feared the powers of a constituent assembly even more, such was their standing among the mass of voters. Note that, at this point, both the Bolsheviks and the Cadets still supported, at least verbally, holding elections for a constituent assembly, an organization that would normally have powers to form a constitution.

The delegates expected at the Mariinsky Palace were aligned by party as follows:

·         120 Social Revolutionaries

·         60 Mensheviks

·         66 Bolsheviks

·         156 from the bourgeois parties, half of them Cadets.

Some of them may have noticed that the Bolshevik seat on the five-member praesidium went unoccupied.

Kerensky gave the opening speech. Though the government, he said, possessed “the fulness of power,” he was nevertheless willing to listen to “any genuinely valuable suggestion.” This was, of course, more polite than it was democratic.

Under rules of order adopted from the now-defunct State Duma, the Bolsheviks were accorded ten minutes to address the council. Trotsky began by questioning the purpose and composition of the Pre-Parliament. He accused the bourgeoisie of plotting to “quash the Constituent Assembly.”

Pleased with the response to this, Trotsky continued with his prepared text. He denounced the policies of the Provisional Government as effectively “compelling the masses to insurrection,” and the government’s proposal to abandon Petrograd to the Germans as a step in a “counter-revolutionary conspiracy.”

This got an even bigger reaction. Finally Trotsky announced the withdrawal of the Bolsheviks from the Pre-Parliament. In his peroration he warned, “Petrograd is in danger! The revolution is in danger! The people are in danger! …We address ourselves to the people. All power to the soviets!” And he and the other Bolsheviks left the hall, leaving behind only a few as observers.

Foreign Minister Tereshchenko telegraphed the embassies of the Entente that the withdrawal of the Bolsheviks was “a mere scandal.” In his history of the revolution, the Cadet Miliukov more insightfully writes that the Bolsheviks spoke and acted “like people feeling a power behind them.”

There followed in the Pre-Parliament three days of discussion on the war. The American journalist Reed says he heard Martov speak in favor of at least raising the “question of peace,” but the debate ended lamely with a request that the Pre-Parliament be included in the delegation to the coming Paris Conference of the Entente. They planned to send the Menshevik Skobelev with instructions: no indemnities, no annexations, no secret diplomacy; neutralization of canals and straights, including those of Panama and Suez; gradual disarmament. Believing Skobelev would be ignored, the Cadets made no objection to these instructions.

This was also the day that General Cheremissov, the commander of the Northern Front, summoned representatives of the Petrograd Soviet to a meeting at Pskov. At lot was to happen before the meeting could take place. Meanwhile Cheremissov was in nominal command of the Petrograd garrison.

October 20 – October 7, 1917: “The Crisis is Ripe” Lenin publishes “The Crisis Is Ripe” in Rabochy Put on this day. Lenin’s articles had been anticipating the vote of the Central Committee on insurrection for some weeks. This particular article, among other things, draws a connection between the call for insurrection and both the agrarian and nationalities questions.

The Bolshevik policy on the agrarian question dated back to Lenin’s April Theses. As against the failure of either the Provisional Government or the Compromisers to act, he argued, it remains the correct policy for joining the workers’ insurrection to the on-going peasant revolt.

The importance of the nationalities question to the timing of the insurrection, Lenin also argued, is illustrated by the vote of their delegates in the Democratic Conference. The nationalities were second only to the labor unions in voting against coalition at the conference.

But these questions were secondary in Lenin’s mind to the question of the “world working-class revolution.” Trotsky says this had always been Lenin’s point of departure. Even though capitalism in Russia lagged behind Europe and America, the crisis had come in Russia first. The ripeness of the crisis meant precisely that the Russian insurrection should not be held back, lest the opportunity pass forever and for workers everywhere.

In Lenin’s opinion this meant not waiting for the Congress of Soviets, still two weeks off. He thought the forces in Finland, where the soviets and the Baltic Fleet were already in a state equivalent to insurrection, would be a sufficient reinforcement for those already in Petrograd and Moscow. Moreover, his doubts about parliamentary struggle and the ability of such institutions to bring about world proletarian revolution applied not only to the Pre-Parliament, but to the Congress of Soviets as well.

And then, to emphasize his point (in a portion of the letter not intended for publication), Lenin resigned from the Central Committee. Trotsky believes he can explain this action. Bolshevik party discipline called for members to accept and support the democratically decided line of the party. As a member of the Central Committee, Lenin was already approaching the limit set by this rule. If he resigned, perhaps, he would be freer to advocate what he thought was the correct line on insurrection. It was another instance of the masses being to the left of the party.

But the resignation was not accepted and nothing more came of it. Meanwhile Lenin’s wife, Krupskaya, travelled to the party’s district meetings and read this and his other letters to the rank and file.

October 21 – October 8, 1917: Lenin Agitates. In an address to the Bolshevik delegates of the Northern Regional Conference of Soviets, Lenin argues for the line he took in “The Crisis Is Ripe.” He did not want to put off the insurrection until the Congress of Soviets, still almost two weeks away. He wanted the revolutionary soldiers and sailors based in Finland to make “an immediate move on Petrograd.”

Once again, Trotsky says, as in April with his theses, Lenin had placed himself in isolation, ahead and to the left of the party and its leading organ, the Central Committee.

October 22 – October 9, 1917: Military Revolutionary Committee. Reacting to the German occupation of the Western Estonian Archipelago, the Compromisers in the Petrograd Soviet move for the creation of a Committee of Revolutionary Defense in the capital. The initial responsibility of the committee would be to decide questions about transfers from the Petrograd garrison to the front, now nearer to the capital than at any previous time in the war.

This solved a political problem for the Bolsheviks. How could the Soviet, which they controlled, refuse reinforcements from the garrison without appearing to have betrayed the soldiers at the front? The motion by the Compromisers put the onus of the decision on them.

The Compromisers were nevertheless a little surprised when the Bolsheviks supported the motion. A bit more parliamentary work would be required before the committee became a reality. In the end, it became a formidable tool, Trotsky says the “chief lever,” of the October Revolution.

At the same meeting Trotsky gave his report on the withdrawal of the Bolsheviks from the Pre-Parliament. He concluded, pretty unambiguously, “Long live the direct and open struggle for revolutionary power!”

October 23 – October 10, 1917: Northern Regional Conference. The Northern Regional Conference of Soviets opens in Petrograd under the presidency of Ensign Krylenko. Antonov had organized the meeting for the Bolshevik Central Committee – not coincidentally, as he was also working on the Military Revolutionary Committee.

Trotsky read the political report. The main issue had become the government’s renewed efforts to transfer revolutionary troops from the Petrograd garrison. But this question was connected to the question of power. By their votes, “the people are trusting us and authorizing us to seize the power.” The question of power had therefore become something for the whole body of soviets to decide. The conference adopted a resolution to this effect unanimously, with only three abstentions.

The military resources available to the Bolsheviks made themselves heard. A representative of the Latvian sharpshooters promised 40,000 rifles for the defense of the Congress of Soviets. The powerful radios of battleships in the Baltic Fleet broadcast appeals to “overcome all obstacles” to the convocation of the Congress. Smolny was openly the center of efforts to procure weapons wherever possible.

October 23 – October 10, 1917: The Vote for Insurrection. At the apartment of the Menshevik Sukhanov, his wife, a Bolshevik, receives a quorum of her party’s Central Committee. Twelve of the twenty-one members attended, including Lenin, disguised with a wig and spectacles, and shorn of his characteristic beard. The meeting lasted ten hours; Sukhanov’s wife served her guests bread, sausage, and tea “for reinforcement,” Trotsky says.

Sukhanov’s wife had encouraged him not to tire himself by the trip home from Smolny that evening. But one wonders if he missed the sausages or the household funds required to procure them.

Sverdlov opened the meeting in the usual way with a report on organization. He focused, apparently by previous arrangement with Lenin, on suspicious activities at the front, including an effort to surround the revolutionary garrison at Minsk with Cossack cavalry, and communication between the headquarters of the Minsk garrison and the general staff.

With that Lenin began to marshal his arguments. He spoke earnestly and extemporaneously; it was time to put an end to the waverings on the committee. The question came to a vote sooner than Lenin might have expected: ten to two in favor of insurrection. For the balance of the ten-hour meeting, one after another, the members favoring insurrection tried unsuccessfully to persuade the dissenters, Kamenev and Zinoviev, to change their minds. 

The resolution itself summarizes, somewhat elliptically, the arguments Lenin used and the committee accepted. Lenin wrote it out, Trotsky says, with the “gnawed end of a pencil” on a child’s notebook paper. The reasons given for immediate action begin, in Lenin’s preferred order of precedence, with the international situation:

·         Perceived progress in the “world-wide socialist revolution” combined with imperialist threats to its leading edge, the Russian Revolution

·         Kerensky’s machinations to abandon the military stronghold of the revolution, Petrograd, to the Germans

·         The scale and intensity of the peasant revolt

·         Bolshevik majorities in elections to the soviets, etc.

·         Counter-revolutionary preparations, including renewed efforts to break up the Petrograd garrison

Lenin might have added another argument he’d used before, that the people might lose confidence in the Bolsheviks just as they had in the Social Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, and sink back into indifference and despair. At any rate, the resolution says, “…all this places the armed insurrection on the order of the day.” Note that the resolution did not set a specific date for the insurrection. Trotsky recalled that Lenin wanted Kerensky to be deposed before the Congress of Soviets was to assemble, and so October 15^th (October 28, new style) was discussed and tentatively set.

The resolution concludes by putting the onus of action on the party, specifically for organizing the Northern Regional Conference of Soviets and for resisting the break-up of the Petrograd garrison.

Reed recounts a different story about how the vote was taken, one that has verisimilitude but not verity. He says the vote was taken twice, at first going against insurrection. Then a “rough workman” arose and warned the committee not to allow the destruction of the soviets. If they did, “we’re through with you!” Then another vote favorable to insurrection supposedly took place. Of course the public were not invited to this secret session of the Central Committee. But the rumor Reed picked up epitomizes the ripeness of the crisis, and the risk that the people were growing, again in the words of the committee, “tired of words and resolutions.”

The seven-member political bureau selected by the committee at this meeting, because it included Zinoviev and Kamenev and because they immediately tried to stir up opposition to the resolution, was still-born – it never met.

The Bolsheviks also took a decision to publish a paper, Beydnoth, addressed to the peasantry. Though the Social Revolutionaries were the strongest vote getters in rural areas, Lenin saw an opportunity to bring the peasants over to the party once the workers’ insurrection caught up with the peasant revolt.

Besides this, Trotsky gave a speech to a conference of Petrograd factory committees that day, calling for the workers to “break through [the] wall” between them and the peasants. On Trotsky’s motion, the conference created the “Worker to Peasant” program, under which workers would fabricate farm implements from the waste and scrap metal of the factories and distribute them in the provinces. But this was not the real solution to the peasants’ problem; the effort was primarily a form of agitation. The problem could only be addressed directly when the workers controlled the means of production.

Meanwhile, now that the harvest was passing, the peasant revolt was growing.

October 24 – October 11, 1917: Zinoviev and Kamenev State Their Views. Evidence that the party was not unanimously behind the resolution of the Bolshevik Central Committee for insurrection is not long to appear. Naturally Zinoviev and Kamenev spoke up first. Other members of the Central Committee who were not at the meeting of the 10^th (October 23, new style) joined in their reservations. Volodarsky also did.

On this day. Zinoviev and Kamenev circulated a lengthy pamphlet calling insurrection an unjustified gamble; the Bolsheviks, relying on their strength in the soviets, ought to work as an opposition party in the Constituent Assembly instead. They argued that the “mood” of the masses did not match that of the July Days, and that Bolshevik strength in the electorate would continue to grow.

But Lenin was not trying to win an election; he was trying to win a revolution. He and the members of the committee who had voted for insurrection did not want to re-establish the dual government in a new parliamentary body, and there carry on the debate until the people lost interest and gave up. On the contrary he thought “[t]he success of the Russian and world revolution depends upon a two or three days’ struggle.” This was his understanding of the mood of the people and the corresponding consequences of delay. And, as to the Russian Revolution at least, Lenin was right.

Meanwhile, the commander of the Northern Front, General Cheremissov, demanded a reinforcement of troops from the Petrograd garrison. In response, the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet named the Military Revolutionary Committee and charged it with deciding questions of this kind. A left Social Revolutionary, Lazimir, headed the committee. His instructions were such that the regulations he was to draft would serve armed insurrection and the defense of the capital equally well.