HISTORY'S CURRENTS
THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION OF FEBRUARY 1917

By late February 1917, (March by the western calendar), Tsarist Russia had been at war with Germany and Austro-Hungry for three and a half years. The armies of Tsar Nicholas II had been defeated by both the German army and ineptness of their own government. In the Russian cities the people were starving due to high prices and inadequate food supplies, and workers in Petrograd (St. Petersburg) and Moscow were striking and rioting for higher food rations. Palace guard units, like the Volinsk Regiment, and other soldiers in the capital refused to suppress the insurgents and in the field military insubordination and mutiny spread.

In response to the riots and military mutinies, Nicholas II ineffectually attempted to put down the workers by force and also tried to dissolve the Duma (the Russian Legislative Assembly). The Duma refused to obey, and the Petrograd insurgents took over the capital. Nicholas was forced to abdicate on March 15, 1917. The Duma appointed a provisional government composed mainly of moderates; it was headed by Prince Lvov and included Alexander Kerensky (a member of the Petrograd Soviet). On March 17th Russia was proclaimed a republic and the Tsar and his family searched for a country that would accept them as exiles.

Most Russians welcomed the end of autocracy, but that was the only point on which they agreed. The provisional government had little popular support, and its authority was limited by the Petrograd Workers' and Soldiers' Soviet, which controlled the troops, communications, and transport. The soviet furthered the military breakdown by establishing soldiers' committees throughout the army, encouraging the units at the front and elsewhere to elect their officers.

Despite its strength and influence, the Petrograd Soviet at first did not openly seize power; the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks who initially dominated the soviet believed that at this stage of the revolution the provisional government should rule. The government's program called for a general amnesty, broad civil liberties, and a constituent assembly to be elected by universal suffrage. However, the provisional government failed to address the burning issue of land reform. (The government announced that the question of land distribution could only be handled by the future constituent assembly.) Above all, the government attempted to continue the war and the losses at the front and shortages in the cities that had provoked the revolution continued.

In March the soviet demanded peace. The foreign minister was forced to resign in May after demonstrations against his insistence on continuing the war. The cabinet was reorganized and several other socialists, in addition to Kerensky, were added. Kerensky took over as minister of war, and Viktor Chernov , a Socialist Revolutionary, became minister of agriculture.

Problems for the government continued. In April, Bolshevik leaders, including V.I. Lenin, returned from exile in Switzerland. Lenin and the other Bolsheviks were sped across Germany to Finland in a German train to spread havoc in Russia. Lenin arrived in Petrograd and quickly began to promise the people "Peace, Land, and Bread."

As pandemonium spread in Russia, word reached the front lines (via Bolshevik propaganda) that the peasants were seizing land back in the countryside. At this point the Russian army did what all armies dream of, they shot their officers and went home.

In July Prince Lvov resigned, and Kerensky formed a new government, but by then Lenin, Trosky, and other Bolsheviks had put forth a plan that demanded: 1) Immediate peace with Germany; 2) transfer of land to the peasants; 3) control of the mines and factories by the workers soviets; and 4) transfer of governmental power to the Petrograd Soviet. The Bolshevik coup of July failed, and several key Bolshevik leaders went into a temporary exile across the border in Finland. By September, several Bolshevik leaders had returned to Petrograd, and Trosky was elected president of the Petrograd Soviet on September 25th.

However the failure of the Kerenski Government to end the war, reduce food shortages, or to enact land reform lost the provisional government the support of the Russian people. Riots and protests were common in the cities and in the country the peasants were seizing land and killing the landlords. By late October (November 7, 1917, on the western calendar) Lenin, Trosky, Stalin and the other Bolshevik leaders had convinced the Petrograd Soviet to support them in a seizure of power. That night members the Bolshevik Red Guard and the Petrograd Soviet, supported by mutinous sailors from Kronstadt Naval Base in the cruiser Aurora, stormed the Winter Palace in Petrograd and ousted the provincial government in Russia. Russia's experiment with democracy had come to an end after only eight months. Communist rule in Russia would continue for most of the 20th Century.

History's currents or current history? You decide!