Cruel, oppressive rule of the Czars for almost 100 years Social unrest for decades Ruthless treatment of peasants Small revolts amongst students and

Transcription

1

2 Cruel, oppressive rule of the Czars for almost 100 years Social unrest for decades Ruthless treatment of peasants Small revolts amongst students and soldiers that resulted in secret revolutionary groups Assassination of Czar Alexander II who tried to institute reforms

3 1881 came to the throne after the assassination of his father Alexander II Halted all reforms of his father!! Ruled as an autocratic leader- one in which the government has total power Anyone who spoke against the autocratic rule, the orthodox church, or spoke any language other than Russian was deemed dangerous

4 Too keep control he Used harsh measurescensorship, secret police, students were watched and political prisoners were exiled to Siberia Desired a uniform culture Jews became the target of persecution Pogroms- organized violence against the Jewish people Police and government officials stood by and watched as Russian citizens destroyed and looted Jewish homes and businesses

5 Son of Alexander III, 1894 became czar Kept the tradition of autocratic rule Lagged behind Europe s industrialized nations Accomplishments under Nicholas: Russia became the world s 4 th ranking steel producer Sergey Witte s czar s minister who pushed industry forward through taxes & foreign investments Trans-Siberian Railway was built- the world s largest continuous railway completed in Connected European Russia in the West with Russian ports on the Pacific in the East

6

7 Problems in factories Grueling work conditions Low wages Child Labor Labor Unions Banned

8 Set forth the idea that industrial class of workers would eventually overthrow the Czar They would form a dictatorship of the Proletariat where the workers would rule the state

9 Mensheviks Wanted a broad base of support for the revolution (more people across all of Russia) Bolsheviks Supported a small number of committed revolutionaries willing to sacrifice everything for change Lead by Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov: aka Lenin (fled to western Europe to avoid arrest)

10 A series of events would unfold between 1904 and 1917 that would show the weakness of the Czar and fuel the fire for revolution

11 1. Russo-Japanese War- ( ) Russia and Japan both imperialist powers fighting over control of Korea and Manchuria 2. Bloody Sunday- January 22, ,000 workers and their families approached the Czar s Winter Palace in St. Petersburg Demanded better working conditions and wages The palace soldiers opened fire on the crowd killing between 500-1,000 unarmed citizens

12 1905 Nicholas II reluctantly approves the Duma- Russia s first Parliament It was dissolved after 10 weeks due to the fear of the Czar losing his power World War I 1914 Nicholas II joins the war Russia was no match for Germany In 1 year more than 4 million Russian Soldiers had died

13 World War I While Nicholas was away at the war front, his wife was influenced by Rasputin He was allowed to make many political decisions for Alexandra He opposed reform and spread corruption He was assassinated in 1916

14 strikes flared up around Petrograd over shortages of bread and fuel Russian soldiers joined in Down with the autocracy Down with the war

15 Czar Nicholas II was forced to abdicate the throne He and his family were imprisoned by the Bolsheviks A provisional (or temporary) government was established People were still unhappy and began to form Sovietslocal councils of workers, peasants and soldiers who were competing for power

16 Lenin returns to Russia to lead the Bolsheviks Bolsheviks storm and take over the provisional government at the Winter Palace in Petrograd The Revolution was over in a matter of hours

17 Reforms under Lenin All farmland is distributed amongst the peasants Control of factories was handed over to the workers Treaty of Brest-Litovsk Ended Russia s involvement in World War I Gave up a large chunk of territory to Germany Russians upset and begin objecting to the Bolsheviks and their policies

18 June Bolsheviks murder the former Czar and his family Country split between: The red army- the Bolsheviks The white army- supporters of the Czar Were supported by many Western states including the U.S.A Red army eventually crushed all who opposed the Bolsheviks.

19 The War and Revolution had destroyed the country Lenin shifts his focus to rebuilding the economy of Russia

20 Small-scale form of capitalism Peasants could sell their surplus crops rather than turning them over to the government Individuals could buy/ sell goods for profit

21 Divided the country into several selfgoverning republics renamed the country Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) Bolsheviks became the Communist Party Lenin actually established a dictatorship of the Communist Party; not a dictatorship of the proletariat as promised Lenin s death in 1924 lead to a struggle over power in Russia

22 Lenin s body remains on display in a bullet proof glass case in Russia s famed Red Square

23 Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin were supporters of Lenin and helped create the Soviet State Both became bitter rivals and struggled for control of the Communist Party : Stalin placed his followers in key government positions 1928 Stalin controlled the Communist Party and in 1929 Trotsky was forced into exile.

24

25 Changed his name from Dzhugashivili to Stalin which means man of steel He was cold, hard and impersonal Worked as the general secretary of the Communist Party under Lenin (even Lenin didn t trust him) By 1928 Stalin was in total control of the Communist Party

26 Totalitarianism- a government with TOTAL control over public and private life Other Totalitarian states emerging at the same time included Germany under Hitler, Italy under Mussolini, China under Mao Zedong, and Kim Il Sung in North Korea

27 Lenin had established the NEP which included a mixture of free enterprise and state control Stalin s new plan called for a Command Economy A system in which the government made all economic decisions

28 The Five Year Plan Set impossibly high quotas for the output of steel, coal, oil, and electricity Because of this, production of consumer goods were limited leading to shortages of housing, food, clothing and other necessities Government chose the workers, assigned them jobs, determined working hours and imprisoned or executed those who did not contribute to the economy

29 1928 Government seizes over 25 million privately owned farms and combined them into collective farms Large government owned farms Peasants tried to resist being forced to work on the farms They were herded onto farms and forced to work at the point of a bayonet The Kulaks- a class of wealthy peasants who opposed the collective farms They were executed or sent to work

30 The Secret Police Used armored cars and tanks to stop riots Monitored phone lines, read mail, planted informers everywhere Used children to spy on adults in their homes

31 Stalin s plan to eliminate anyone who opposed his rule or threatened his power Many Bolsheviks were executed for crimes against the Soviet state Even the director of the Moscow Zoo was arrested because his monkeys contracted tuberculosis Stalin was responsible for between 8-13 million deaths in the Great Purge