- What was the name of the Tsar?
- What was the capital city of Tsarist Russia?
- List SEVEN problems in Russia in 1900
- Economy, Peasants, Workers, Aristocracy, Church, Government, Tsar
- Just 700 nobles owned HOW MUCH of the land?
- How long did it take to cross Russia by train
- How was the Tsar’s coronation a catastrophe?
- There was a crowd crush on the Khondynka Field; 1,282 people died.
- Name FIVE groups angry at the government before 1905
- Students, peasants, industrial workers, nationalist groups in Finland and Poland, members of the intelligentsia and bourgeois who wanted a constitution.
- How did the Constitutionalists campaign
in 1904-5?
- Name FOUR of Nicholas II’s reforms
- Max 11½ hours’ work for day workers, abolished villages’ joint responsibility, gave religious freedom throughout the empire, promised more powers for the zemstvo.
- Why did these reforms not stop people’s anger?
- They only came after riots & strikes, did not go as far as people wanted, and were accompanied by repression
- What was the name of the Tsar’s secret police?
- What was the name of the trade unions set up and infiltrated by the secret police?
- Name the FOUR main events of the Russo-Japanese Way of 1904-5
- Feb 1904: the Japanese destroy the Russian Pacific Fleet
5 January 1905: Port Arthur surrenders
May 1905: the Japanese destroy the Russian Baltic Fleet at Tsushima
Sept 1905: the USA mediate the Peace of Portsmouth.
- What were the FOUR Key events of the 1905 Revolution
- 22 January: Bloody Sunday
June: Sailors on the battleship Potemkin mutinied; workers and soldiers set up ‘Soviets’
August Manifesto: the Tsar’s promise of a powerless Duma did not stop the violence
October Manifesto: the Tsar promised a Duma with powers and a universal electorate.
- How did the Tsar overturn his promises in the October Manifesto?
- In May 1905 Nicholas issued the 'Fundamental Laws', giving himself a veto of any decisions, the right to dissolve the Duma, and the right to make laws when it was not in session
- Liat the Dumas and their fate
- 1st (1905): made numerous demand, dismissed by force after 2 months
2nd (1907): demanded nationalisation of land; dismissed after four months and the voting system changed
3rd (1907-12): worked with Stolypin on moderate reforms
4th (1912-1917): was ignored.
- Name the Prime Minister who had tried to reform Russia in the 1900s.
- Name SIX of Stolypin’s reforms.
- Army & navy reforms; Justices of the Peace; better health & accident insurance; universal education; allowed peasants to contract out of the mir (village community); cancelled redemption payments
- Name TWO Russian defeats in the First World War.
- Tannenberg or Masurian Lakes
- What scandal in 1915 severely damaged the government’s reputation?
- How many million men left the fields to join the army?
- What mistake did Nicholas take in September 1915 that severely damaged his personal reputation?
- Who severely damaged the reputation of the Tsarina
- What happened on International Women’s Day?
- 8 March 1917: demonstrations/ bread riots.
- What date did the Tsar abdicate?
- When was the Provisional Government set up?
- Who was the leader of the ‘Provisional Government’?
- Who was the Provisional Government’s first prime minister?
- What post did Kerensky hold at first in the Provisional Government?
- Name FIVE civil rights the Provisional Government introduced.
- Freedom of the press, the vote for all men and women over 21, release of all political prisoners, abolition of the death penalty, the right to strike
- When were elections for a ‘Constituent Assembly’ organised for?
- Which were the two main parties, who disagreed?
- When did Lvov resign and Kerensky take over?
- Why is the Provisional Government sometimes called the ‘Dual Government’?
- It was forced to share power with the Soviets.
- When did the Petrograd Soviet issue Order No.1?
- What did Order No.1 state?
- That soldiers and workers must obey only the Soviet’s orders
- What did Order No.1 mean?
- That the Provisional Government issued orders, but they were only obeyed if the Soviet agreed
- Where did a mutiny occur in May 1917?
- At the Kronstadt naval base
- What did the mutiny declare?
- The Kronstadt Soviet declared independence from the Provisional Government.
- Name FOUR aspects of the disastrous economic situation the Provisional Government inherited from the Tsar’s government.
- Harvest failures, a weak industrial economy, inflation, food shortages in the towns
- What problem was happening in the countryside?
- The peasants were demanding to own their own land.
- Name THREE groups which opposed the Provisional Government.
- Bolsheviks, Mensheviks, Social Revolutionaries
- What was the name of the army’s offensive, in June 1917, which failed disastrously?
- How did the Provisional Government anger the poor in the towns?
- Rationing failed to end the food shortages.
- How did the Provisional Government anger the peasants in the countryside?
- The government gave the land back to the nobles.
- How did the Provisional Government’s granting of civil rights help the opposition?
- It allowed freedom of speech and a free press.
- How did the Provisional Government anger both soldiers and the people?
- It tried to continue the war.
- Name the two groups into which the Social and Democratic Labour Party divided in 1903.
- Bolsheviks and Mensheviks
- Who was smuggled back into Russia in 1917?
- Who smuggled him?
- When did Lenin return to Russia?
- How else did the Germans help the Bolsheviks?
- They funded the Bolsheviks.
- What was the name of the prospectus which Lenin published?
- What did the April Theses promise?
- What was Lenin’s slogan?
- ‘All power to the Soviets’
- The Bolsheviks set up a very efficient party organisation. Name THREE features.
- Two million members by August 1917, a propaganda newspaper (Pravda), a private army
- What was the name of the Bolshevik army?
- Who led the Red Guards?
- When did an attempted Bolshevik Revolution coups fail?
- Who led a right-wing rebellion in August 1917?
- How did Kerensky defeat Kornilov?
- By asking the Red Guards for help
- When did the Bolsheviks gain control of the Petrograd Soviet?
- Who organised and led the actual coup on 6/7 November?
- Why did Lenin not take part in the 6/7 November coup?
- He was forced to stay in hiding in Finland.
- What event on 3 November 1917prompted the coup?
- Kerensky ordered the Petrograd garrison to the front; they refused.
- What happened on the night of 6 November 1917?
- The Red Guards took over key buildings.
- Name TWO key locations the Bolsheviks took over.
- Telephone exchange, bridges
- What was the name of the building which was the provisional Government’s headquarters?
- What signalled the attack on the Winter Palace on 7 November 1917?
- A bombardment from the battleship Aurora
- How did Soviet film-maker Sergei Eisenstein misrepresent the attack on the Winter Palace in his 1927 film Oktyabr?
- He portrayed it as a heroic battle when in reality it was almost bloodless
- How did the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries hand victory to the Bolsheviks?
- They walked out in protest at the Bolshevik takeover, but did not help Kerensky.
- What did Lenin announce on 8 November 1917?
- ‘We shall now proceed to the construction of the socialist order.’
- What characterised Bolshevik rule?
- It was centralised and dictatorial.
- Lenin was the leader – what was the Russian term for ‘leader’?
- What did the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk decide?
- Russia withdrew from the War, but gave big areas of Russia’s best agricultural and industrial land to Germany – Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
- How many seats did the Bolsheviks win in the elections of November 1917?
- What did Lenin do with the Constituent Assembly after one day?
- What date did Lenin dismiss the Constituent Assembly?
- What was the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’
- Lenin said that a dictatorship was needed until Russia was changed into a Communist country.
- How did Lenin rule Russia?
- What set up the government of the USSR in 1923?
- The Constitutional Law set up a ministerial cabinet. What re the English and Russian names for this?
- Sovnarkom : the ‘Council of People’s Commissars’
- What was the Russian name for the Communist Party’s ruling cabinet?
- How did the Constitutional Law organise the government?
- It ensured that the Sovnarkom was controlled by the Politburo.
- Which law gave workers an 8-hour day, unemployment pay and pensions?
- What did the Comintern declare?
- Under Zinoviev, it declared that it would cause communist revolutions all over the world.
- Name the ‘White’ generals in the Civil War.
- General Yudenich and Deniken attacked from the West, Admiral Kolchak from the Eeast.
- When was the last White army in Russia defeated?
- What was the name of the Bolshevik secret police?
- CHEKA (1917-23), then called OGPU (1923-34), then NKVD (1934-46), then KGB.
- Where were opponents of the Bolsheviks sent?
- To the Gulag (the system of labour camps)
- What did the Politburo set up in 1920?
- An Agitprop Department to organise propaganda
- What did an ‘agit-train’ do?
- It took propaganda newsreels round the country.
- Where was there a mutiny against the Bolsheviks in 1921?
- Describe TWO main ideas of the new Economic Policy.
- New Small Businesses/ Experts/ Lenin let the peasants sell their surplus, and pay a tax instead.
- When did Lenin die?
- Give one way the Politburo honoured Lenin in death.
- It organised a massive funeral, it built a granite mausoleum in Red Square, people queued for hours to see Lenin’s embalmed body.
- Who cared for Lenin during his final illness?
- Whom did Stalin fall out with during this time?
- Lenin’s wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya
- What did Lenin’s Testament say?
- It supported Trotsky and warned against giving Stalin power.
- What did Trotsky do as head of the Revolutionary Military Committee?
- Organised the November coup
- What did Trotsky do as Commissar for Foreign Affairs?
- Negotiated the Treaty of Brest–Litovsk
- Give FOUR things that Trotsky did as Commissar for War.
- Formed the Red Army, organised the CHEKA, won the civil war, put down the Kronstadt rebellion
- Of which propaganda organ was Trotsky an editor?
- Name one of Trotsky’s disadvantages in the race to succeed Lenin.
- He was arrogant and unpleasant, he had many enemies, he only joined the Bolsheviks in 1917, so he was resented as a newcomer, he was Jewish; many Bolsheviks were anti-Semitic.
- Who were the two old Bolsheviks who opposed Trotsky because they hoped to be leader themselves?
- How many leading Communists supported Trotsky?
- What did Trotsky and the 46 attack in 1923?
- At which Party Conference were Trotsky and the 46 defeated?
- 13th Party Conference in January 1924
- What were they marked for?
- What disease did Trotsky catch in 1923?
- What did Trotsky mean by ‘world revolution’?
- Encouraging Communists in other countries to rebel
- What had Stalin intended to be as a young man?
- When had Stalin become a Bolshevik?
- Which Bolshevik newspaper had he issued the very first edition of?
- In what way was he a Bolshevik hero?
- He had twice been imprisoned in Siberia.
- What did Stalin do after 1917 as Commissar for Nationalities?
- He destroyed the national identity of the different races.
- What characterised Stalin in his work as Commissar for Nationalities?
- He was particularly ruthless and brutal.
- What key position did Stalin take in 1922?
- No one else wanted to be secretary. What did they mock Stalin as?
- Name one of Stalin’s advantages in the race to succeed Lenin.
- He was a brilliant organiser, e was genial, pleasant and liked a laugh – this made him popular, as General Secretary of the Communist Party, he appointed the top posts in the Party, and he put his supporters into these positions.
- What were the ‘top officials’ called, and how many were there?
- What were the party officials called, and how many were there?
- Why was it an advantage for Stalin that he appointed the nomenklatura?
- Because they appointed the apparatchiki – so all the officials in the Party were Stalin supporters
- What did Stalin mean by ‘Socialism in one country’?
- Establishing Communism in Russia first, and going for world revolution later
- Give one way the Politburo honoured Lenin in death.
- It organised a massive funeral, it built a granite mausoleum in Red Square, people queued for hours to see Lenin’s embalmed body.
- Who organised Lenin’s funeral?
- As General Secretary, Stalin organised Lenin’s funeral.
- How did Stalin turn this to his advantage?
- He told Trotsky the wrong date for Lenin’s funeral, so Trotsky missed it – this made Trotsky look bad.
- What role did Stalin give himself in the funeral and why?
- Chief mourner; it made him look loyal.
- How did Stalin present himself as a follower of Lenin’s ideas?
- He wrote a book summarising Lenin’s ideas.
- What was the ‘Lenin Levy’?
- The enrolment of hundreds of thousands of new members
- How did the ‘Lenin Levy’ help Stalin’s rise to power?
- The new members didn’t know anything of the past, and accepted him as the leader.
- How did Trotsky try to get Stalin discredited in 1924?
- He forced the Politburo to discuss Lenin’s Testament.
- Who saved Stalin at that meeting?
- In 1925, Stalin joined with Kamenev and Zinoviev to form an alliance against Trotsky. What was it called?
- The troika - they forced Trotsky to resign his position as Commissar for War and dismissed the 46.
- After this, Trotsky fell from influence. What happened to him in 1927? In 1929? In 1936? In 1940?
- 1927: Imprisoned
1929: Exiled
1936: Sentenced to death in a show trial.
1940: Murdered in Mexico by a NKVD agent.
- Which two ‘leftists’ did Stalin attack next, and how?
- Kamenev and Zinoviev; Stalin removed their supporters in Moscow and Leningrad and replaced them with his own supporters.
- In 1926, Kamenev and Zinoviev joined with Trotsky to try to stop Stalin. What was this opposition called?
- How did they attack Stalin?
- Who saved Stalin in 1927?
- Bukharin, Rykov and Tomsky (moderate Bolsheviks who supported the NEP)
- What happened to the ‘United Opposition’?
- Kamenev and Zinoviev and 1500 of their supporters were expelled.
- What did Stalin do at the 16th Party Conference in 1929 and why?
- He turned against the NEP to defeat Bukharin, Rykov and Tomsky.
- How did he do defeat Bukharin, Rykov and Tomsky in 1929?
- When Bukharin, Rykov and Tomsky defended the NEP, Stalin denounced them as ‘deviationists’ and they were demoted.
- What happened on Stalin’s 50th birthday, in December 1929?
- Stalin was celebrated as Lenin’s successor, the new vozhd (leader).
- Whose murder started the purges in 1934?
- What was the name of Stalin’s system of workcamps?
- What happened to politicians as soon as they were defeated?
- They ‘disappeared’ from all textbooks and official photographs.
- When did Stalin first announce (voluntary) collectivisation?
- How many million kulaks were ‘eliminated’?
- What was a kolkhoz?
- How many million peasants left the countryside to work in the towns, 1928–37?
- What was a ‘Stakhanovite’?
- A hard worker who tried to emulate the record-breaking shift of Alexey Stakhanov
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