History of the Russian Revolution

The History of the Russian Revolution by Leon Trotsky is a three-volume book on the Russian Revolution of Trotsky finished. writing it in Russian in
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The History of the Russian Revolution

It led to a big increase in support for the Bolsheviks. By September, they had taken control of the Petrograd Soviet. As divisions grew within the Provisional Government, Lenin realised this was the time to take power in the name of the Soviets.

On 24th October, units of the Red Guards seized strategic positions in the city. Lenin proclaimed the victory of the revolution. The new Soviet government embarked on the construction of a socialist society, but encountered many challenges. Germany agreed to peace in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk , but as soon the First World War ended the Allied powers USA, Britain, France, Japan and others invaded Russia from all directions in support of the White armies, who were united by their opposition to the Bolsheviks and wish to continue the war against Germany.

This work will not rely in any degree upon personal recollections. The circumstance that the author was a participant in the events does not free him from the obligation to base his exposition upon historically verified documents. The author speaks of himself, in so far as that is demanded by the course of events, in the third person. And that is not a mere literary form: However, the fact that the author did participate in the struggle naturally makes easier his understanding, not only of the psychology of the forces in action, both individual and collective, but also of the inner connection of events.

This advantage will give positive results only if one condition is observed: The author believes that in so far as in him lies he has fulfilled this condition. There remains the question of the political position of the author, who stands as a historian upon the same viewpoint upon which he stood as a participant in the events.


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The reader, of course, is not obliged to share the political views of the author, which the latter on his side has no reason to conceal. But the reader does have the right to demand that a historical work should not be the defence of a political position, but an internally well-founded portrayal of the actual process of the revolution. A historical work only then completely fulfils the mission when events unfold upon its pages in their full natural necessity.

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Nobody has yet clearly explained what this impartiality consists of. How can you take as a whole a thing whose essence consists in a split?

In Defence of October

One of the reactionary and therefore fashionable historians in contemporary France, L. It is well that he is concerned only with war camps of the past: The serious and critical reader will not want a treacherous impartiality, which offers him a cup of conciliation with a well-settled poison of reactionary hate at the bottom, but a scientific conscientiousness, which for its sympathies and antipathies — open and undisguised — seeks support in an honest study of the facts, a determination of their real connections, an exposure of the causal laws of their movement.

That is the only possible historic objectivism, and moreover it is amply sufficient, for it is verified and attested not by the good intentions of the historian, for which only he himself can vouch, but the natural laws revealed by him of the historic process itself. The sources of this book are innumerable periodical publications, newspapers and journals, memoirs, reports, and other material, partly in manuscript, but the greater part published by the Institute of the History of the Revolution in Moscow and Leningrad.

History of the Russian Revolution

We have considered its superfluous to make reference in the text to particular publications, since that would only bother the reader. Among the books which have the character of collective historical works we have particularly used the two-volume Essays on the History of the October Revolution Moscow-Leningrad, Written by different authors, the various parts of this book are unequal in value, but they contain at any rate abundant factual material.

The dates in our book are everywhere indicated according to the old style — that is, they are 13 days behind the international and the present Soviet calendar. The author felt obliged to use the calendar which was in use at the time of the revolution. It would have been no labour of course to translate the dates into the new style. But this operation in removing one difficulty would have created others more essential.

The overthrow of the monarchy has gone into history as the February revolution; according to the Western calendar, however, it occurred in March. The Russian Revolution of came about in a way that no one, not even Lenin, had predicted. Its immediate impetus was World War I, which was taking a heavy toll on Russian soldiers at the front and on peasants at home. History Uzbekistan In Uzbekistan: Russian and Soviet rule Europe In history of Europe: The trappings of dictatorship Czechoslovakia In Czechoslovak history: Struggle for independence Estonia In Estonia: Independence Finland In Finland: Return to autonomy France In France: Internal conflict on the left Kiev In Kiev: The revolutionary period Latvia In Latvia: Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students.


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