Bolsheviks and Left Socialist Revolutionaries. The emergence of the AKP in the political arena
page 37. Test yourself
Explain the names of the parties: “Socialist Revolutionaries”, “Socialist-Revolutionary Maximalists”, “Bolsheviks”, “Meneviks”, “Cadets”, “Octobrists”, “Black Hundreds”.
The Social Revolutionaries and Bolsheviks were revolutionary parties that advocated the overthrow of the autocracy in Russia.
The Mensheviks and Cadets are social democratic parties with a “softer” position on the revolution, but also advocated a change in the state regime.
The Octobrists were a liberal party that stood for personal freedom and the rights of citizens.
The Black Hundreds are anarchists who advocated the overthrow of any regime in the country.
Union of Socialist-Revolutionary Maximalists (SSRM). The most characteristic feature of the maximalist theory was their belief in the possibility of Russia's immediate transition to socialism. Therefore, they refused to put forward immediate, or so-called “minimal” tasks, and recognized the need to implement a maximum socialist program already during the first revolution. Hence the name of their organization. A direct continuation of the theory of the maximalists was their tactics, marked by an adventuristic desire to cause the rise of a mass revolutionary movement through active terrorist activities.
Page 37 Questions and tasks
1. What is the difference between the Socialist Revolutionary “new populism” and the populism of the 19th century?
The populists of the 19th century had a negative attitude towards the political struggle and did not connect the struggle for the constitution and democratic freedoms with the interests of the people. They underestimated the power of autocracy, did not see the connections of the state with the interests of classes, and concluded that social revolution in Russia was an extremely easy matter. The populists resolved the main socio-political question about the nature of the post-reform development of Russia from the position of utopian socialism, seeing in the Russian peasant a socialist by nature, and in the rural community - the “embryo” of socialism. The populists denied the progressiveness of the capitalist development of the country, considering it a decline, regression, an accidental, superficial phenomenon imposed from above by the government, and contrasted it with “originality,” a feature of the Russian economy - popular production. The populists did not understand the role of the proletariat; they considered it part of the peasantry.
The Socialist-Revolutionaries sought, by revolutionary means, to sharply turn the development of agricultural Russia towards the development of a labor rather than a bourgeois economy, public rather than private property.
2. Think about whether there is any significant difference between political and criminal terrorism. Can purity of thoughts and the greatness of the tasks being solved justify the use of terror in the political struggle?
I believe that terrorism (no matter what: political or criminal) is expressed in physical violence up to destruction and is intended to intimidate. Thus, a characteristic feature of terrorism is the reliance on force to achieve its goals - to intimidate the population and sow panic. The use of terror in political struggle cannot be justified under any circumstances.
3. How did the views of the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks differ?
In 1903, the RSDLP split into 2 factions: Bolsheviks and Mensheviks (Yu. Martov, G. Plekhanov). Differences between them existed in the following issues:
1) The agrarian question.
The Mensheviks developed a program for the municipalization of the land. Its essence was that confiscated landowners', appanage, monastery and church lands were placed at the disposal of local governments (municipalities), which then distributed it among the peasants. It was envisaged that peasants would retain their ownership of their allotment land. It was also allowed to transfer part of the land into the hands of the state to create a resettlement fund. The Menshevik program was aimed against the overbearing intervention of the state in agrarian relations.
The Bolsheviks proposed the confiscation of landowners' lands and their nationalization with subsequent rental to the peasants.
2) The second part of the RSDLP program (“maximum program”) provided for the socialist reconstruction of society after the victory proletarian revolution. However, the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks imagined the implementation of this program differently.
The Bolsheviks focused on the immediate construction of socialism after the victory of the proletarian revolution, even envisaging the possibility of a direct “development of the bourgeois-democratic revolution into a socialist one,” without any transition period.
The Mensheviks considered the imposition of socialism in an economically and culturally backward country a utopia. They believed that after the bourgeois-democratic revolution, a certain period of bourgeois development should pass, which would transform Russia from a backward to a developed capitalist country with bourgeois-democratic freedoms and institutions.
The Cadets and Octobrists represented two options (radical and moderate) of the reformist path to transforming the social and state system of Russia. At the same time, both recognized that the main method of modernizing Russia was only its reform “from above.”
5. What social forces spoke out in defense of the autocracy?
The armed uprising of the Bolsheviks was not a surprise for the Socialist Revolutionary elite, but it did not have the forces that could resist the uprising. Moreover, the majority of the capital's Socialist Revolutionary organization ended up with the Bolsheviks. In the appeal of the Central Committee “To all revolutionary democracy of Russia,” issued on October 25, the Bolsheviks’ attempt to seize state power by armed force the day before the opening of the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies and a month before the Constituent Assembly was called “insane.” It was said that only the government organized by the Democratic Conference could be legitimate, and therefore the Socialist Revolutionaries would not enter the Soviet government that would be created by the Bolsheviks. Revolutionary democracy was called upon to refrain from isolated actions until the creation of a political center that would unite it to fight the Bolsheviks and possible attempts at counter-revolutionary actions from the right. In order to weaken the influence of Bolshevik slogans and decrees, on the next day of the revolution a platform was published, which the Socialist Revolutionary Party promised to defend in the Constituent Assembly.
The Moscow Socialist Revolutionaries were more active in opposing the Bolsheviks. They created a Public Safety Committee under the city government. This committee tried to become an all-Russian center for the fight against the Bolsheviks. By telegraph, he addressed all city dumas and zemstvos with a proposal to immediately elect delegations that were to gather in Moscow at the first call to organize support for the Constituent Assembly and the formation of a new Provisional Government.
The Social Revolutionaries believed that the Bolsheviks would not last long in power, that the impracticability of their promises would soon become apparent and they would fail. To speed it up, the Socialist Revolutionary leadership sought to isolate the Bolsheviks from the masses, organize armed attacks against them, and create a socialist government without the Bolsheviks, which would unite and lead the forces of democracy and bring the country to the Constituent Assembly.
Following these tactics, the Socialist Revolutionary faction left the Second Congress of Soviets, declaring that the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks was a crime against the homeland and the revolution, marked the beginning of the civil war, the breakdown of the Constituent Assembly and threatened the death of the revolution, and that the decisions of the congress were incompetent due to insufficient representation of the front and many advice. It was also decided to recall parties from the political organizations on which the Bolshevik government relied: the Military Revolutionary Committee, the Central Executive Committee, as well as the Petrograd and other Bolshevik Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies. To coordinate the actions of anti-Bolshevik democratic forces in Petrograd, the Committee for the Salvation of the Motherland and the Revolution was created, headed by A.R. Gotsem.
At the end of October - beginning of November, attempts at armed uprisings were made in Petrograd, Moscow and the fronts. A.F. Kerensky, who fled Petrograd, organized a campaign against it by the Cossack corps of General P.N. Krasnov, and the Committee for the Salvation of the Motherland and the Revolution is a revolt of the cadets in Petrograd itself. The Moscow Socialist Revolutionaries also began an armed struggle. Around the same time, they tried to raise the troops of the Western Front V.M. Chernov, and South-West - N.D. Avksentiev. However, all these attempts were unsuccessful.
Plans to create a socialist government without the Bolsheviks or with a minority of them also failed. The last option, proposed by the executive committee of the All-Russian Railway Union (Vikzhel), found support among a significant part of the Bolshevik leadership, but was decisively rejected by V.I. Lenin and L.D. Trotsky. Let us note that among the Socialist Revolutionary elite, the idea of a homogeneous socialist government had strong opposition led by Avksentiev and Gotz. The latter continued to insist on a policy of coalition with the bourgeoisie, now further arguing for the need to unite forces to fight the Bolshevik dictatorship.
One of the reasons that caused the defeat of the Socialist Revolutionaries in the October Revolution was their ideological and organizational split. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries supported the Bolsheviks not only in Petrograd, but also in a number of other places. In an effort to rectify the situation, the Socialist Revolutionary leadership, more widely than ever before, used repressive measures against those party members who collaborated with the Bolsheviks. The Petrograd organization was dissolved, and those members who participated in or contributed to the armed uprising and worked in the Bolshevik government were expelled from the party.
After the October Revolution, the Socialist Revolutionary Party found itself in a difficult situation. Its political status has changed. From the ruling party it turned into an opposition one. In addition, the Socialist Revolutionaries now had to confront not an anti-people autocratic regime, but the regime of a socialist party related to them in purpose, which not only borrowed a number of their popular program positions, but also tried to implement them in its own way. The Social Revolutionaries were especially disarmed by the fact that the Bolsheviks, trying to win over the peasantry, declared the socialization of the land. As a result, the influence of the Social Revolutionaries was significantly undermined. This was evidenced by the results of the elections to the Constituent Assembly, and then the majority of the All-Russian Congresses of Soviets of Peasant Deputies, which took place in Petrograd in November-December 1917, turned out not to be on their side, but on the side of the left Socialist Revolutionaries and Bolsheviks. The number of the party began to decrease. Its mass work was losing effectiveness not only because of the obstacles that the Bolsheviks put in its way, but also because the peasants, workers and soldiers, experiencing euphoria from the Bolshevik decrees and tired to a large extent from the good, but left without practical consequences, speeches of the Socialist Revolutionaries, were already did not listen to them with the former enthusiasm and trust. The fate of the party was under threat. The only hope remained was that the masses would soon be convinced of the impracticability of the Bolshevik decrees, and that there would be a Constituent Assembly. The IV Congress of the AKP was devoted to the problems of the crisis in which the party found itself, and to the search for ways out of it.
The IV Congress of the Socialist Revolutionary Party was held in Petrograd from November 26 to December 5, 1917. The agenda included such important issues as the work plan of the party faction in the Constituent Assembly and the adoption of the organizational charter. However, the main attention of the delegates was focused on discussing the current moment and the issue of party unity. The congress sharply criticized the activities of the Central Committee, emphasizing that it did not adequately control party members who held responsible positions in government and leading public organizations, which made the party responsible for policies not sanctioned by it, for actions that did not correspond to the party program, nor its collective will. Some believed that the Central Committee in its directives gravitated towards Bolshevism, others - that it followed the lead of the Mensheviks.
The congress confirmed the resolutions of the Central Committee on the expulsion from the party of the left Socialist Revolutionary Internationalists, as well as those party members who became part of the Bolshevik authorities and participated in separate peace negotiations with Germany and Austria-Hungary. In relation to persons who did not leave the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies or who took part in military-revolutionary committees, it was proposed to be dealt with individually, finding out how much their participation contributed to the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks.
The Socialist Revolutionary Party's rejection of the October Revolution and its loss of its left wing did not mean that it became more right-wing. The congress condemned the coalition policy pursued by the Central Committee and approved the Central Committee's decision to expel the extreme right Socialist Revolutionary Defenseists from the party. Supporters of coalition politics were not elected to the Central Committee. In this regard, it should be emphasized that the name “party of the right Socialist Revolutionaries”, which has been fixed in Soviet literature in relation to the part of the AKP that remained after the departure of the left Socialist Revolutionaries, is unlawful.
The Socialist Revolutionaries pinned great hopes on the Constituent Assembly. The party began preparing for it virtually immediately after the February Revolution. Particular attention was paid to the qualitative composition of the party faction in the Constituent Assembly. Measures were taken to ensure that among the candidates for the Constituent Assembly were the leaders of the AKP, its talented speakers and specialists in state law, land, labor, national economic and other issues.
The Third Party Congress spoke in favor of the party standing in the elections to the Constituent Assembly independently, without concluding any agreements with other socialist parties. But in the overwhelming majority of constituencies it participated in the elections in a bloc with local councils of peasant deputies. In the joint list, half of the seats were allocated to the party organization and half to the peasant councils, with the indispensable condition that the candidates of the latter would be members of the Socialist Revolutionary Party.
The ideological and organizational confusion that reigned in the AKP was reflected in election campaign. In some electoral districts parallel Socialist Revolutionary lists were put up. The Right Socialist Revolutionaries came out with their list in Petrograd and the provinces of Kazan, Perm, Simbirsk and Kharkov, and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries - in the Voronezh, Yenisei provinces and the Baltic Fleet district. In a number of places (Moscow, Tver, Kursk province, etc.) the compilation of lists took place in intense struggle between the right and left Social Revolutionaries.
Elections to the Constituent Assembly took place in November 1917. Their results for the Socialist Revolutionaries cannot be assessed unambiguously. Across the country as a whole, they received a majority (39.5%) of the votes. However, this majority was secured at the expense of the provinces, especially the agricultural regions. The Social Revolutionaries collected the most votes in the Central Black Earth, Northern and Middle Volga regions. This is explained not only by the popularity of the Socialist Revolutionary land program here, but also by the fact that political life in the province lagged significantly behind political life in capitals, major cities and on the fronts. And here the results of the elections to the Constituent Assembly for the Socialist Revolutionaries were not encouraging. Thus, in Petrograd, only about 17% of the votes were cast for the Socialist Revolutionaries, and for their political opponents - the Bolsheviks and Cadets - 45 and 26%, respectively. In Moscow, the Socialist Revolutionaries received only 8% of the votes, while the Bolsheviks received 48% and the Cadets 34%. In seven military districts, the majority of voters voted for the Social Revolutionaries only on the Romanian and Caucasian fronts remote from the center. Only 23% of the votes were cast for the Socialist Revolutionaries in the rear garrisons, and in the especially important garrisons of the Petrograd region and the Moscow region, 71 and 74% of voters, respectively, voted for the opponents of the Socialist Revolutionaries - the Bolsheviks.
The results of the elections to the Constituent Assembly not only clarify the social character of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, but are also of significant interest for understanding the main reason for its defeat in the October Revolution (the lack of a preponderance of forces in the places where the fate of the revolution was decided), as well as for explaining its tactics in the post-October period.
As is known, the Bolsheviks decisively stopped the attempt of the Socialist-Revolutionaries to arbitrarily open the Constituent Assembly on November 28, 1917. After this failure, the Socialist-Revolutionaries decided not to force events and not to provoke the Bolsheviks with their extremist antics, but to wait for a favorable moment, which, according to their calculations, should have arisen in connection with inevitable failures of Bolshevik domestic and foreign policy. The center of gravity of party work was shifted to intensified agitation and propaganda in favor of the Constituent Assembly. The task was set to organize “all the living forces of the country, armed and unarmed,” for its defense. Local party organizations were ordered to create fighting squads and form a “peasant militia.” The Social Revolutionaries played an active role in the “Union for the Defense of the Constituent Assembly,” headed by military worker V.N. Filippovsky. However, as always, at decisive moments there was no unity among them. The majority of the deputies of the Constituent Assembly and members of the Central Committee believed in the holiness and magical power of the Constituent Assembly and believed that the people themselves should take it under their protection and that the Bolsheviks would “save” it and would not dare to encroach on it. Others, especially deputies from the front, were more determined. They declared that in the fight against the Bolsheviks all means were permissible, including terror. First of all, at their insistence, the Central Military Commission was reorganized and given some autonomy from the Central Committee.
This commission was mainly concerned with work in the Petrograd garrison and combat activities, but it did not achieve much success. The plans for the combat activities of the terrorist group created by F.M. were also met with opposition in the Central Committee. Onipko, deputy of the Constituent Assembly and former deputy of the First State Duma. These plans provided for the removal of “the entire Bolshevik head,” primarily V.I. Lenin and L.D. Trotsky.
Thus, the situation in Petrograd before the opening of the Constituent Assembly was not in favor of the Socialist Revolutionaries. Taking this into account, the party leadership agreed with the date for convening the Constituent Assembly on January 5, 1918, appointed by the Bolsheviks. At a meeting of the Central Committee held on January 3, the armed uprising on the opening day of the Constituent Assembly, proposed by the military commission, was rejected “as an untimely and unreliable act.” At the same time, references were repeated to the fact that Bolshevism is a popular phenomenon, that it is necessary to provide the masses themselves with the opportunity to get rid of illusions regarding Bolshevism without a fratricidal war. It was decided to limit ourselves to a peaceful demonstration.
767 deputies were elected to the Constituent Assembly, including 347 Socialist Revolutionaries. Not all of them were present at the opening of the Constituent Assembly. The most numerous was the Socialist Revolutionary faction - about 240 deputies. There were 110-120 Bolsheviks, and 30-35 Left Socialist-Revolutionaries.
The Socialist Revolutionary faction began its meetings at the end of November 1917. The chairman of its presidium was V.V. Rudnev, former Moscow mayor. About 15 different commissions were created - land, socio-economic, state-legal, legislative proposals, agitation and propaganda, etc. Particular attention was paid to the “commission of the first day”, which was involved in developing the procedure for the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly. At the general meeting of the faction, held the day before the opening of the Constituent Assembly, the candidacy of V.M. Chernov was approved for the post of chairman of this meeting. The Constituent Assembly was to be opened by the oldest deputy, a member of the Socialist Revolutionary faction S.P. Shvetsov. However, the Bolsheviks thwarted the scenario planned by the Socialist Revolutionaries. The noise raised by them and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries brought S.P. Shvetsov was at a loss, which Ya.M. was quick to take advantage of. Sverdlov, Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, stating that the All-Russian Central Executive Committee instructed him to open the Constituent Assembly. Having read out the “Declaration of the Rights of Workers and Exploited People,” which contained the most important decrees of the Soviet government, and calling for its approval, he proposed electing the Chairman of the Constituent Assembly. V.M. was elected chairman. Chernov, not M.A. Spiridonov, candidate of the Bolsheviks and Left Socialist Revolutionaries. The Socialist Revolutionary majority also rejected the discussion of the “Declaration of the Rights of the Working and Exploited People” and approved the following agenda: the question of measures to end the war as soon as possible, the draft fundamental law on land, laws on the state structure of Russia and regulation of industry, measures to combat unemployment and food poverty , the question of the protection of the Constituent Assembly and the inviolability of its members, an appeal to the people and current affairs. Having accused the Socialist Revolutionary majority of being “bourgeois and counter-revolutionary” and declaring their unwillingness to “cover up the crimes of the enemies of the people for a minute,” the Bolsheviks left the Constituent Assembly in order to transfer to the Soviet government the final decision on the issue of attitude “towards the counter-revolutionary part of the Constituent Assembly.” Following the Bolsheviks, the Left SRs also left, dissatisfied with the fact that their proposal to approve the peace clause contained in the declaration of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee was rejected.
After the departure of the Bolsheviks and Left Socialist Revolutionaries, the Constituent Assembly continued its work according to the adopted agenda. Member of the Central Committee E.M. presented the position of the Socialist Revolutionary Party on the issue of ending the war. Timofeev. The Social Revolutionaries proposed, firstly, to address the allied powers with a note in order to work out with them the conditions for a democratic peace and jointly present them to their opponents; secondly, while continuing the truce, continue negotiations with the warring powers, respecting the interests of Russia and achieving universal democratic peace; thirdly, to provide every possible assistance in convening an international socialist conference on the same issues; fourthly, to elect a plenipotentiary delegation from the Constituent Assembly to conduct negotiations with representatives of the Allied powers.
On the second item on the agenda, V.M. Chernov managed to read out only ten points of the Socialist Revolutionary “Draft of the Basic Law on Land” when sailor A.G. Zheleznyakov, the head of security at the Tauride Palace, demanded that those present leave the meeting room, “because the guard was tired.” Without debate, the announced points of the land law were adopted and a commission was elected, which was supposed to consider the remaining points of this law within seven days. The Socialist Revolutionary proposals on the issue of peace and a resolution proclaiming Russia a “democratic federal republic” were also adopted. Having scheduled the next meeting for 5 p.m., V.M. Chernov closed the first and only meeting of the All-Russian Constituent Assembly at 4:40 a.m. on January 6, 1918. The Bolsheviks' dispersal of the Constituent Assembly was a triumph of force over the nascent Russian democracy. This act became one of the main prerequisites for the civil war.
After the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly, the leadership of the Social Revolutionaries called on party members not to fall into despair and not to succumb to emotions, not to go underground and not to resort to conspiratorial tactics of struggle against the “workers’ and peasants’ government,” as this would play into the hands of the Bolsheviks, who sought to deprive the party of its legal arena of struggle, presenting her as an enemy of the people. Once again it was emphasized that Bolshevism, unlike tsarism, has support among the broad masses and, in connection with this, the fight against it should be primarily of a peaceful ideological and political nature. Although the councils were still not recognized by state authorities or local governments, the attitude towards them was changing. Not only did their boycott end, but it was also recommended to protect them as class-political organizations of the masses and strongholds in the fight against counter-revolution from the right, and to strive to gain dominance in them by campaigning for re-elections and recall of Bolshevik deputies. It was decided to take part in the work of the III All-Russian Congress of Soviets, in the congresses of land committees and women workers, to return to the All-Russian Council of Peasant Deputies, to factory committees and trade unions, to abandon the boycott of the “socialist army”, to end the strike of employees government agencies. The meaning of all agitation, propaganda and organizational work was seen in preparing the masses so that, at the first call of the Constituent Assembly, they could stand up in its defense. The struggle for the immediate resumption of the work of the full-power Constituent Assembly was declared the party's top priority.
The left wing in the Socialist Revolutionary Party began to stand out before the First World War. During the February Revolution, part of the Social Revolutionaries of Petrograd, led by V. Aleksandrovich, opposed the compromise with the liberal leaders of the Duma, in favor of transferring power to the government of the socialists who dominated the councils. Subsequently, the left wing was headed by the Socialist Revolutionary terrorist M. A. Spiridonova, one of the oldest populists M. A. Nathanson, B. D. Kamkov, V. A. Karelin and others, supporting the strategic goals of the Social Revolutionaries and advocating deepening the revolution in the interests of the peasantry and other “working classes”, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries considered the freezing of social transformations by the Provisional Government, which included the Socialist Revolutionary Party, unacceptable. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries shared the populist ideas of peasant socialism. They believed that for the victory of the revolution it was necessary to act more decisively, and this brought them closer to the Bolsheviks, they sought to reconcile the Bolsheviks and moderate socialist parties, and achieve the creation of a multi-party socialist government “without the bourgeoisie.” But radicalism involved the Left Socialist Revolutionary party masses in the October Revolution.
The leaders of the radical wing of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, who advocated joint action with the Bolsheviks to establish the power of the soviets, were expelled from the party on October 27, 1917 for participating in the overthrow of the Provisional Government and created the PLSR. With the help of the Left Social Revolutionaries, the Bolsheviks managed to gain the support of part of the peasant councils. At the Second Congress of Peasant Deputies in November 1917, the leader of the Social Revolutionaries V. M. Chernov convinced the peasant representatives that the Bolsheviks’ agreement to give in to the populist demand for the transfer of land to the peasants was temporary, and the Bolsheviks would seek nationalization. Despite this, about half of the peasant councils supported the Left Socialist Revolutionaries. On November 15, an agreement was reached between the Bolsheviks and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries, according to which the united All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Councils (VTsIK) was composed on a parity basis by workers and Left Socialist Revolutionary peasant deputies (a significant part of each group were soldiers), after which representatives from the army and trade unions were additionally elected. The additional deputies gave the Bolsheviks an advantage. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries became the Bolsheviks' junior partners in the coalition. In November 1917, they entered the government; in December, the Council of People's Commissars included seven left Socialist Revolutionaries, including A. L. Kolegaev - People's Commissar of Agriculture, Karelin - People's Commissar of State Property, P. P. Proshyan - People's Commissar of Posts and Telegraphs.
The alliance of the Bolsheviks and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries became an important stage in the formation of the Bolshevik regime, and the breaking of this alliance was an important step towards the creation of a one-party dictatorship.
On November 19, the Party of Left Socialist Revolutionaries (Internationalists) was founded. Nathanson and later Kamkov were elected chairman of the presidium of the party's Central Committee. The newspaper “Znamya Truda” became the organ of the party. At a joint congress of councils controlled by the Bolsheviks and Left Socialist Revolutionaries, on December 10, a united workers' and peasants' All-Russian Central Executive Committee (VTsIK) was created. The coalition of the Bolsheviks and one of the socialist parties took place, giving the dictatorship the form of a union of the proletariat and the peasantry.
The Left Socialist Revolutionaries took seriously the slogans of Soviet power, workers' control, and an equal union of workers and peasants. At the same time, they were characterized by a fascination with radical methods of struggle and forceful solutions. Violence was seen as a temporary remedy; it was believed that the dictatorship would die out by itself, turning into the rule of the majority. Until then, the Bolshevik dictator had to restrain their desire to subordinate everything to the government - the Council of People's Commissars, and not the supreme body of the councils - the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. Initially, the Left Social Revolutionaries tried to actually give the dictatorship a democratic character. On December 18, security officers arrested several leaders of socialist parties. However, the Minister of Justice, one of the leaders of the Socialist Revolutionaries, I. Sternberg, intervened in this matter and released those arrested, which marked the beginning of a long struggle between the two government parties over the issue of the competence of the Cheka. Since the Left Socialist Revolutionaries actively worked in the Cheka, it was difficult to unleash government terror at that time. However, work in the punitive agencies influenced the psychology of the Socialist-Revolutionary Chekists, who became increasingly tolerant of repression.
In the elections to the Constituent Assembly in January 1918, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries, who passed on the lists of the Socialist Revolutionary Party (despite the fact that the Socialist Revolutionaries received a majority), received only about 40 mandates (about 5%). In the same districts where the Left Socialist Revolutionaries decided to go on their own, they were defeated in most cases - PLSR supporters could not compare with the AKP electorate. After consultations with the Left Social Revolutionaries, the Bolshevik leadership decided to disperse the Constituent Assembly.
Since the dispersal of the meeting actually disrupted the adoption of the law on land, which was contrary to the interests of the peasants, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries proposed their own project, which was adopted by the All-Russian Central Executive Committee on January 27 as a law on the socialization of the land. This law assigned land to the peasantry at the legislative level. However, it was adopted without lengthy discussion and contained many flaws, ambiguities and contradictions. This suited the Bolsheviks, as it fueled conflicts in the village. In particular, it was unclear how to divide the land - by food or by labor.
The contradictions between the Bolsheviks and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries grew inexorably. The PLSR believed that it was defending the interests of the peasantry and advocated socialism based on self-government. The Bolsheviks were supporters of the dictatorship of the proletariat, an industrial economy with a single centralized management and planning. The PLSR opposed grain requisitions and arbitrary arrests. The contradictions between the allies became especially acute in connection with the conclusion of the Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty in March 1918. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries came out categorically against capitulation to German imperialism.
At the IV Congress of Soviets, Kamkov, on behalf of the majority of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, declared that peace does not provide a respite for the revolution, but a respite for imperialism. Lenin called the proposals of the left a trap.
From the point of view of the left Socialist Revolutionaries and their supporters, the Bolsheviks “betrayed” the idea of world revolution, the “brotherly people of Ukraine” were given over to the Germans for plunder, Ukrainian grain was used to save the German Empire. An additional burden fell on the grain-producing regions of Russia, primarily Siberia and the Don. The dictatorship became anti-peasant, which led to a further aggravation of relations between the Bolsheviks and the Left Social Revolutionaries.
Despite the fact that the Central Committee of the PLSR, immediately after ratification, by a majority of one vote, decided to remain in the government, on March 15, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries still announced their withdrawal from the government. This decision was made under strong pressure from local organizations.
Having left the government, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries remained a Soviet party, recognizing the legitimacy of Soviet power and, therefore, the power of the Bolsheviks. They had no other choice - the AKP was more popular among the peasant masses, and only the Sovietized peasantry could constitute the force of the left. Opposing the Soviet regime would mean the meaninglessness of the split of the Socialist Revolutionary Party in October 1917. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries continued to fight against the Bolsheviks, but not against the Soviet regime. The extremist attitude of the left Socialist Revolutionaries inclined them to armed methods of struggle, but the danger of the collapse of the Soviet system as such held back the PLSR within Russia.
The fundamental disagreement of the PLSR on the issue of the already concluded Brest-Litovsk Peace Treaty led to the Left SR rebellion. Having suppressed it, the Bolsheviks shot without trial several participants in the uprising, showing the Germans that they had punished the murderers of the German ambassador Mirbach. But other more popular leaders of the PLSR, including Spiridonova, were released the following year. However, by this time the PLSR had ceased to be a serious force. The Bolsheviks consolidated their monopoly on power. After this, the party split. Some of the Left Socialist Revolutionaries created pro-Bolshevik parties and later joined the RCP(b). A group of left Socialist Revolutionaries led by D. Cherepanov participated in the organization by anarchists of the explosion of the Moscow City Committee of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) in Leontyevsky Lane in 1919. The majority of left Socialist Revolutionaries, led by Spiridonova, continued to campaign against the communist regime. PLSR continued to operate in Russia and Ukraine, but its influence was declining. By 1923, the legal activities of the PLSR were banned, and the remaining party activists were repressed.
The Great Russian Revolution, 1905-1922 Lyskov Dmitry Yurievich
9. Convening the Assembly and dispersing it. Why did the Social Revolutionaries decide to accept the Bolshevik decrees and why did the Bolsheviks disagree?
The question of how representative the Constituent Assembly was is still open. The elections, which took place in conditions of revolutionary chaos, can hardly be called free and democratic. In some areas they did not take place at all, in others they were delayed, taking place over several days and even weeks. Overall, about half of all voters took part in the elections.
The voting results gave the following picture: 23.9 percent of the votes were received by the Bolsheviks, 40 percent of voters voted for the Socialist Revolutionaries. The Mensheviks received 2.3 percent of the votes, 4.7 percent went to the Cadets, the remaining votes were cast for other small parties and groups.
Thus, the Socialist Revolutionaries became the largest faction of the Constituent Assembly. They were joined by their allies, the Mensheviks. History likes to joke like this: elections once again put forward socialist parties to the leading roles in the state, while the same Soviet majority of the March 1917 type was formed in the US, which transferred power in Russia into the hands of the “liberal” Provisional Government.
However, the October Revolution made its own adjustments. Now the Socialist Revolutionary Party, which accused the Bolsheviks of usurping power and stealing their program, was ready to independently and seriously fight for power. In fact, the course of the work of the Constituent Assembly was predetermined at the political headquarters of the two parties - the right Socialist Revolutionaries and the Bolsheviks.
Political preparation for the convening of the Constituent Assembly on the part of the Socialist Revolutionaries was carried out at meetings of the faction bureau. A number of commissions were formed to prepare and conduct the Assembly, and a scenario for the opening of the Assembly was developed, which excluded its dissolution.
On the first day of work, the right-wing Socialist-Revolutionaries were supposed to “surprise” the country by adopting a package of “propaganda” acts from the Socialist-Revolutionary program - the Decree on Land, On Workers’ Control and others. The need to adopt a “good Decree on Peace” and an “appeal to the allies” was also considered. All this should, if not incite people to unequivocally support the US, then at least attract serious attention to its work.
The defects of this tactic lay in its secondary nature - all the resonant points of the Socialist Revolutionary program had already been implemented by the Bolsheviks and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries. In addition, the right-wing Social Revolutionaries incorrectly assessed both their own political weight and public sentiment towards the Constituent Assembly. A typical example is the editorial article of the newspaper “Piter”, the organ of the “all-Russian man in the street”, dated December 17, 1917: “Are you expecting salvation from the Constituent Assembly? In vain. They have chosen talkers like Kerensky, who are capable of destroying saints... What can the Constituent Assembly do? Spew out a sea of good words? Enough! We heard. The collection of donkeys will not become smarter by being called Constituent... Even Smolny will not have to disperse them. This trifle will be accomplished by four teenagers from behind the Nevskaya Zastava on their own “anarchist initiative.”.
The Bolsheviks, in preparation for the convening of the Constituent Assembly, faced another crisis within their party. On December 2, 1917, the leadership of the Bolshevik faction of deputies of the Constituent Assembly was elected. It ended up in the hands of pro-establishment figures - L. B. Kamenev, D. B. Ryazanov, M. A. Larin, A. I. Rykov. The convening of the Constituent Assembly was interpreted by them as the final stage of the Russian Revolution. Accordingly, the internal party oppositionists were categorically against any interference of the Council of People's Commissars in the process of convening the Assembly, in the course of its work, and even against the general leadership of the Bolshevik faction being exercised by the Central Committee of the RSDLP(b).
In essence, the Kamenevites were still in captivity of “democratic” illusions. Despite all the events that followed the October Revolution, the opposition viewed the Constituent Assembly as a new chance to save the unity of “all democratic forces.” They advocated cooperation and joint work in the Assembly with socialist parties, that is, they again raised the old issue of creating a coalition government of socialists.
Lenin joined the fight against this “heresy” voiced not for the first time. A thesis recording of his speech at a meeting of the Central Committee of the RSDLP(b) dated December 11 (24), 1917 has been preserved: “Comrade Lenin proposes: 1) to remove the bureau of the faction of the Constituent Assembly; 2) present to the faction our attitude towards the Constituent Assembly in the form of theses; 3) draw up an appeal to the faction, in which they remind the party charter about the subordination of all representative institutions to the Central Committee; 4) appoint a member of the Central Committee to lead the faction; 5) develop a charter for the faction".
From December 11 to 12, re-elections of the bureau of the Bolshevik faction took place. At the same meeting, after a heated discussion, Lenin’s position prevailed and the “Theses on the Constituent Assembly” were approved. Their key provisions, which formed the basis of the Bolshevik Party’s attitude towards the Constituent Assembly, are expressed in the first two paragraphs:
"1. The demand for the convening of a Constituent Assembly was quite legitimately included in the program of revolutionary social democracy, since in a bourgeois republic the Constituent Assembly is the highest form of democracy...
2. In demanding the convocation of the Constituent Assembly, revolutionary social democracy, from the very beginning of the revolution of 1917, has repeatedly emphasized that the republic of Soviets is a higher form of democracy than an ordinary bourgeois republic with a Constituent Assembly.”
Accordingly, the Constituent Assembly, according to Lenin’s logic, had only to recognize the power of the Soviets. This idea was unambiguously stated in the “Declaration of the Rights of the Working and Exploited People,” submitted for consideration and adopted by the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the Soviets on January 3, 1918.
The Constituent Assembly opened on January 5, 1918 at 16:00 in the White Hall of the Tauride Palace. Of the 715 elected deputies, about 410 were present, according to other sources - about 460.
Deputies of the Socialist Revolutionary faction, according to Trotsky, “We carefully developed the ritual of the first meeting.” “They brought candles with them in case the Bolsheviks turned out the electricity, and large number sandwiches in case they are deprived of food".
In the very first minutes, a fight broke out between the Bolsheviks and the Right Socialist Revolutionaries for the right to open the first meeting. According to the scenario of the Bolsheviks and the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, this should have been done by the head of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee Ya. M. Sverdlov, but he was late for the start of the meeting. Taking advantage of the confusion, the Socialist Revolutionary faction seized the initiative and proposed to open the CS to the oldest Socialist Revolutionary deputy S.P. Shvetsov. When he stood up to the podium, he was “clapped” by the Bolshevik and Left Socialist Revolutionary factions.
Despite the noise, Shvetsov declared the meeting open. At this time, Sverdlov appeared, who, taking the chairman’s bell from Shvetsov, reopened the work of the Constituent Assembly. Here the Right Socialist Revolutionary faction showed itself with noise and clapping.
In his speech, the head of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee raised the issue of choosing the chairman of the Constituent Assembly and proposed the “Declaration of the Rights of the Working and Exploited People” for discussion by the deputies. The question of the chairman was put to a vote first. Socialist-Revolutionary V. M. Chernov was elected by 244 votes against 151.
In his speech, Chernov spoke, as was subsequently repeatedly (and completely unfairly) pointed out, from a conciliatory position. The Chairman of the US Council stated the desirability of working with the Bolsheviks, but on the condition that they would not try to “push the Soviets against the Constituent Assembly.” The Soviets, he said, as class organizations, “should not pretend to replace the Constituent Assembly,” which is the exponent of true “democracy.”
In reality, there were no new conciliatory notes in Chernov’s speech. Words about readiness to cooperate with the Bolsheviks within the framework of a “coalition government” were heard earlier, the main thing is that Chernov’s assessment of the Soviets and the US once again clearly indicated the role that the Soviets were assigned in this “cooperation.”
Chernov announced the agenda of the Constituent Assembly developed by the Social Revolutionaries: the question of peace; O state system Russia; about the earth; about unemployment; on preparation for demobilization.
This is an important point to pay attention to. There is an opinion that if the dispersal of the US had not happened, Russia would have taken a different path of development. As we see, the path proposed by the Socialist Revolutionaries differed from the Bolshevik only in terms of timing - they were several months late in implementing their provisions.
The Bolshevik faction again came up with a proposal to consider the “Declaration of the Rights of the Working and Exploited People.” The proposal was put to a vote and rejected by a vote of 237 to 136.
At the request of the Bolsheviks and Left Socialist Revolutionaries, a break was announced at the meeting for meetings in the factions. The position of the Bolsheviks was discussed with the participation of the Central Committee of the RSDLP(b). As a result of the debate, it was decided to leave the hall of the Constituent Assembly. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries joined the Bolsheviks.
Next, the Constituent Assembly, already without the Bolshevik and Left Socialist Revolutionary factions, began work in accordance with the plans of the Right Socialist Revolutionaries. Without discussion, the Land Law was adopted, according to which the right of private ownership of land was abolished “from now on and forever.” Following this, a declaration in favor of universal peace and a number of other “propaganda” laws were approved.
The meeting lasted all evening and all night. The first and last meeting of the Constituent Assembly was put to an end early in the morning of January 6 by the legendary sailor Zheleznyak with the phrase “the guard is tired.” On the same day, the Council of People's Commissars decided to dissolve the Constituent Assembly. On the night of January 7, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee approved this decree. On January 10, the Third Congress of the Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies opened at the Tauride Palace, which finally approved this decree as the highest authority of the Soviet state.
The decree, in particular, said: “Any rejection of the full power of the Soviets, of the Soviet Republic won by the people in favor of bourgeois parliamentarism and the Constituent Assembly would now be a step back and the collapse of the entire October Workers' and Peasants' Revolution. The Constituent Assembly, opened on January 5, gave, due to circumstances known to everyone, a majority of the Right Socialist Revolutionary Party... Naturally, this party refused to accept for discussion... the proposal of the supreme body Soviet power, the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets, recognize the program of Soviet power, recognize the “Declaration of the Rights of the Working and Exploited People”, recognize October Revolution and Soviet power. Thus, the Constituent Assembly severed all connections between itself and the Soviet Republic of Russia. The departure from such a Constituent Assembly of the Bolshevik and Left Socialist-Revolutionary factions, which now constitute obviously a huge majority in the Soviets and enjoy the confidence of the workers and the majority of peasants, was inevitable.
And outside the walls of the Constituent Assembly, the majority parties of the Constituent Assembly, the right Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, are waging an open struggle against Soviet power, calling in their bodies for its overthrow, thereby objectively supporting the resistance of the exploiters to the transfer of land and factories into the hands of the working people.
It is clear that the remainder of the Constituent Assembly can therefore only play the role of covering the struggle of the bourgeois counter-revolution to overthrow the power of the Soviets.
Therefore, the Central Executive Committee decides: The Constituent Assembly is dissolved.".
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While “Memory of Azov” is engaged in practical artillery and mine firing, let us turn to the political situation in the country. By mid-1906, the situation in Russia had clearly stabilized. The provinces calmed down one after another. The revolutionary community was completely confused and despondent. That is why it was decided to make a last desperate attempt to turn everything back and once again fan the sparks of the dying revolutionary fire. And this time the firewood for this fire was supposed to be yesterday's workers and peasants - the sailors of the Baltic Fleet.
The image of a young worker in Tsarist Russia was invariably present in Soviet revolutionary fiction. This worker was acutely aware of injustice. On this basis, he eventually met a professional Social Democrat (Bolshevik). The charming Bolshevik at first sympathized with the worker’s experiences, and then gave him Marx’s “Capital” to read: they say, read it and you will understand everything yourself. Now the worker had a goal. On long evenings after a hard day at work, while burning a candle, he eagerly read volume after volume of “Capital” in the attic, and hitherto unknown horizons opened up before him. When he turned the last page of the great book, everything was already completely clear to the worker. From now on, he knew that the source of all his troubles was surplus value, and also that from now on he was a convinced Marxist-Bolshevik. An example of this topic, apparently, can be considered the novel by M. Gorky “Mother”. I remember reading such books in my youth and imagining an illiterate worker (with two or three years of parish school) and I was surprised at the kind of natural intelligence, patience and obsession one must have in order to overcome such a huge and obscure work as Capital.
It is possible that in the history of Russia there really were several dozen such workers who, even falling asleep, put Marx’s work under their heads. But I seriously doubt that the other hundreds of thousands of workers were vying with each other to read Marx avidly. Imagine a modern worker with a complete secondary, or even a secondary technical education, who would voraciously read theoretical works on political economy at night. If there are any somewhere, then they are rather the rarest exception from the total number of people who like to go to the dacha with their family in their free time or enjoy a beer with friends. What can we say about the poorly educated proletarian of the early twentieth century!
Let me make a small digression from the main topic. My fate was such that I first studied at the Naval Political School, and then graduated from the Military-Political Academy. V.I. Lenin, and its most elite is the scientific and pedagogical faculty. As for the school, there we, of course, studied all the main works of the classics of Marxism-Leninism, but, having only 10 years of school behind us, we did not understand much, and they did not demand much from us. We got the general idea, and okay! Another thing is the academy. Our faculty trained future teachers of all social disciplines for the departments of social sciences of military universities (scientific communism, party history, political economy, psychology and pedagogy, sociology and philosophy), i.e. those who were supposed to put the knowledge of Marxism into the heads of future Soviet officers -Leninism, and therefore taught us fundamentally. If at the other (general) faculties candidates of science gave lectures, and even adjuncts conducted seminars, then we had the right to give lectures and conduct seminars exclusively by doctors of science, and the best ones at that. Every lesson with teachers of this level was a real revelation. I chose the path of a historian for myself, and therefore, during all three years of study, I studied volume after volume of materials from congresses and conferences, dealing with all sorts of oppositions and political movements. I remember a huge volume of protocols of the Second Congress of the RSDLP, which we meticulously studied for two months, delving into every dialogue and every remark. This did not add to our love for conventions, but we knew the material perfectly. If historians reference books were the protocols of the congresses, then the philosophers had the famous 18th volume of Lenin’s complete works - “Materialism and Empirio-Criticism,” one of Ilyich’s most confused and dreary works. Graduates of military schools and academies of the Soviet era will understand me, because not one of them escaped the fate of taking notes on this endless and obscure creation. As for the group of political economists, they, of course, had their own bible - Marx's Capital. They taught him, poor fellows, all three years of his stay at the academy. I remember their groans and curses against the father of Marxism, their envy towards us. The poor political economists actually copied all the volumes of Marx into their notes by hand and dismantled them down to the last comma.
Let me make a reservation that the composition of our faculty’s students was very strong. By the end of our studies, we had already passed the candidate minimums and outlined topics for future dissertations. Today, most of my fellow students are candidates and doctors of science, heads of departments at prestigious universities and well-known historians in their circles.
Why am I saying all this? And to the fact that even for well-theoretically prepared students with very strong motivation (obtaining a prestigious teaching specialty that will provide you with a career and all the accompanying benefits), in the presence of the best teachers, mastering Karl Marx’s “Capital” was a very difficult task. And they tried to tell us about crowds of self-educated workers who, voraciously reading Capital after work and having understood for themselves the essence of Marxist theory, went into revolution!
Of course, the Social Democratic agitators told the workers something about Marx, but only in the most primitive form understandable to illiterate people. In addition, they talked a lot about social injustice and the fact that only they can destroy tsarism and the bourgeoisie - the proletarians, who have nothing to lose except their own chains, but then they will live happily ever after. Of course, such agitation sometimes bore fruit, and the workers became carried away by the idea of expropriating the expropriators. But for the most part, both sailors (yesterday’s workers) and workers (yesterday’s peasants) did not follow the Social Democrats. Their ideas were too abstruse, the prospect of a bright communist paradise, which they could hardly imagine, was too distant.
The social revolutionaries were a completely different matter. Unlike the abstruse Social Democrats, the Socialist Revolutionaries were men of action. Without any hesitation, they threw bombs at the windows of police stations, fired revolvers at governors and gendarmes, robbed banks and did not read any morals. They attracted people by their courage, audacity, and by the ease with which they shed blood and how the authorities feared them. This caused not only fear, but also admiration, especially among young people. For many, this is why it was the Social Revolutionary terrorists who were the real heroes! In addition, the Socialist-Revolutionaries placed above all not the proletarian, but the free peasant cultivator with the land given to him forever. This was well understood by the sailors (mostly yesterday's peasants) and they liked it much more than the incomprehensible proletarian communism. Needless to say, the ranks of Socialist Revolutionary supporters were growing much more cheerfully than their competitors.
The successes of the Socialist-Revolutionaries could not help but cause irritation and even hatred among the Social Democrats. That is why Lenin’s group decided to adopt much from the arsenal of the Socialist Revolutionaries in order to also become popular. This caused indignation among orthodox Marxists, after which the once united party of Social Democrats broke up into two warring wings - left-wing radical Bolsheviks and centrist Mensheviks. At the same time, the reader should not be confused by the names of the factions. In reality, it was the other way around: there were much more Mensheviks than Bolsheviks.
However, the Socialist Revolutionaries also had their problems. Some of them were so carried away by terrorism and robbery that they no longer wanted to hear about anything else. Blood and easy money quickly became intoxicating. Others still consoled themselves with the ideas of a future peasant republic. On this basis, the Socialist Revolutionaries also gradually split into left and right, but not yet as clearly as their main competitors, the Social Democrats.
By 1906, when it became extremely clear to everyone that the revolution was in decline, competition between the revolutionary parties intensified even more. There was no longer any talk of any kind of alliance that had existed a year ago. Everyone strived for individual success so that only he could get the laurels of starting the social fire. And in the Baltic, in this struggle for the sailor masses, the Socialist-Revolutionaries were far ahead of their competitors.
In Soviet times, the Socialist Revolutionaries were labeled with all sorts of negative labels. They allegedly deliberately provoked premature uprisings in order to doom the sailors and soldiers to defeat; they handed over everyone and everything to the police. They, finally, were almost paid agents of the same police. All this, of course, is not true. The Socialist-Revolutionaries were no worse, but not better than their competitors, the Social Democrats. The fact that it was they who started almost all the rebellions in 1905–1907 speaks only of their authority and strength, which their competitors lacked. The fact that at times the Socialist Revolutionaries pushed the sailors into premature action was caused by the same competition and the desire to get ahead of the Social Democrats in order to be the first to succeed, lead the revolution and seize power in the country. If history had decreed that not the Bolsheviks, but the Socialist Revolutionaries, would come to power in Russia, then in history textbooks we would read about the people’s favorite social revolutionaries and about the provocateurs and agents of the secret police, the Bolsheviks.
By the summer of 1906, it was absolutely clear to both of them that they had one last chance to push Russia into the chaos of revolution - to mutiny the Baltic Fleet, which until that time had been relatively calm, except for the drunken mutiny in Kronstadt in 1905, which stopped by itself as soon as it began. The competitors were feverishly preparing their own uprising, but the Socialist Revolutionaries, as always, were a corps ahead.
It seems that here, as always, there was some global involvement behind the scenes. Of course, it was no coincidence that everything had to happen in the Baltic. At the same time, taking into account the experience of the Black Sea Fleet, the mutiny should have broken out simultaneously in several naval bases at the same time. Kronstadt and Sveaborg were chosen for this. The first was located in close proximity to the capital, and the second was in Finland, which was loyal to revolutionaries of all stripes. In addition, warships were also supposed to rebel. At the same time, the armored cruiser “In Memory of Azov” was supposed to lead the mutiny of the ships. The calculation was that a mutiny on such a famous ship would stir up not only the fleet, but also society, which would come to the conclusion that if the most honored and “close” ships rebel against the government, then this government has no right to exist. In addition, the mutiny at the “Memory of Azov” was a personal challenge to the emperor himself, who was literally forced by this brilliant move to become disillusioned with the sailors and, as a result, lose interest in the fleet, and therefore in the revival of the naval power of the empire. Needless to say, such far-reaching goals justified the costs. And the costs were considerable. In the Baltic in 1906, the revolutionaries concentrated their best forces. A number of riot specialists were transferred from the south of Russia. The experience of 1905 was taken into account as much as possible. At the same time, just like a year ago in Sevastopol and Odessa, in the Baltic there was an intense, continuous competitive struggle between the Social Democrats and the Socialist Revolutionaries for influence on the sailor masses and the right to appoint the leaders of the mutinies. Everyone understood that the mutiny of the Baltic Fleet was the last chance not only to spark a revolution, but also to become its leader. And no one wanted to miss this chance.
From the chronicle of the 1905 revolution: “It was much easier to carry out revolutionary work on the territory of Finland than in Russia; there was no Russian police here. During the October strike of 1905, the workers of Helsingfors created Red Guard detachments. These groups existed quite legally. By the summer of 1906, the Red Guard numbered up to 20–30 thousand people, although only a portion of them were armed. True, the leadership of the Finnish Social Democracy took an opportunist position.” Amazingly, in the empire there was quite officially an entire army, ready at any moment to enter into battle with the authorities. And after this the tsar is accused of reactionaryness and despotism! Give at least some other example of this in history! Ask yourself which most democratic and liberal government would tolerate such a state of affairs!
It is officially accepted that the revolts in the Baltic in 1906 broke out spontaneously. They were supposedly planned, but for a later time. In the premature action of the masses, as always, the Socialist-Revolutionaries played the most vile role. According to the version of the greatest Soviet specialist in the field of the revolutionary movement in the Russian fleet, S. Naida, the famous Socialist Revolutionary provocateur Azef distinguished himself here, who, fulfilling the task of the secret police - to disrupt the uprising being prepared by the Bolsheviks, organized a premature performance.
In fact, everything was not like that. The rebellion in Sveaborg (the rebellion began with him) was prepared ahead of time, and was prepared precisely for the time when it happened. This is confirmed by the almost simultaneous beginning of the uprisings in “Memory of Azov” and in Kronstadt with the Sveaborg riots. The charges against the Socialist-Revolutionaries were “hung” after all these rebellions were suppressed. The Bolsheviks simply blamed their competitors for the failure. By the way, the Socialist Revolutionaries, in turn, blamed the same Bolsheviks for the failure of the uprisings in Sveaborg and Kronstadt.
As noted in one of the Bolshevik leaflets: “Our tactics were: to prepare, organize and wait for the general movement, the tactics of the Socialist Revolutionaries was to start, and the rest, they say, would not retreat behind us... They conducted all their work as conspirators, counting on the fact that The most important thing in this matter is the mystery, the surprise of the attack. We believed that if we are going to start an uprising, then we need to give it a mass character, we need to prepare the mood at rallies and extras and at the decisive moment call a crowd of thousands of workers onto the street.”
The historian S. Naida wrote about the preparation of the rebellion in the Baltic by the Bolsheviks in 1906: “V.I. Lenin paid exceptional attention to preparing and then leading uprisings of sailors and soldiers in the Baltic. The Central Committee of the RSDLP at that time was dominated by the Mensheviks; this Central Committee did not lead the uprisings, could not and did not want to do this. He gave opportunistic slogans, which the masses did not follow. At the time of the uprisings, Lenin was in St. Petersburg. Under his leadership, the St. Petersburg Committee of the RSDLP led the struggle of the masses through the head of the Menshevik Central Committee. On July 16, the St. Petersburg Committee received information from Sveaborg about the impending revolutionary action of soldiers and sailors. Having received this news, the Bolsheviks convened a meeting, which was chaired by Lenin. The meeting discussed the issue of leading the uprising and adopted a resolution written by Lenin. Bolsheviks - members of the PC and the Central Committee were immediately sent to all districts of the city, quickly contacted workers' organizations and began to prepare a workers' strike. They were sent to Kronstadt to lead the uprising on July 19th. Manuilsky, member of the Central Committee Innokenty (Dubrovinsky), Gusarev and other workers. These comrades, according to Manuilsky, did everything possible to give the uprising the character of an organized struggle, and they led the uprising until the end of events. On July 21, at the call of the Bolsheviks, about 100 thousand workers went on strike for several hours. Finnish railway workers, who had previously dismantled railway tracks in a number of places, joined the strike. The Mensheviks treacherously disrupted the organization of the strike, but the Bolsheviks, destroying the obstacles erected by the traitors, led the St. Petersburg workers to fight. To discuss the issue of organizing a general strike at the Udelnaya station, a meeting of the St. Petersburg Committee of the RSDLP was convened. Apparently, a provocateur was present at the meeting, since before the participants of the planned meeting had time to gather, all 19 people were arrested.”
So, on July 2, 1906, a meeting of representatives of the Finnish military party organization of the RSDLP was held in Helsingfors, at which a general plan for the uprising was developed. In accordance with this plan, Sveaborg, with a conditional telegram “father is healthy,” was supposed to give the fleet and Kronstadt a signal for a general uprising. The rebel fleet, in turn, had to respond to Kronstadt and Sveaborg with a conditional telegram - “father is sick,” which meant: “I have rebelled, I am going to Kronstadt.” According to the plan of the uprising, sailors and soldiers were first to capture the Sveaborg and Kronstadt fortresses and ships. Then the fleet had to go partly to St. Petersburg to support the workers, and partly to the Baltic ports to support the uprisings there.
At the same time, the Socialist Revolutionaries were developing approximately the same plan, with the only difference being that they, not the Bolsheviks, were at the head of the rebellious fleet. The authorities soon became aware of plans for an uprising in the Baltic Fleet. Counterintelligence worked quite well. After the events of 1906, the Bolsheviks will blame the Socialist Revolutionaries for leaking information, and they, in turn, will blame the Bolsheviks. How the security department actually became aware of the plan for the uprising, we will never know. Be that as it may, the naval command immediately responded to the information received: the ships were dispersed throughout the Gulf of Finland and Riga, many unreliable sailors were decommissioned from the ships, the crews and guards were reinforced with proven and reliable sailors, as well as officers and midshipmen. In addition, the ship's crews were cleared of unreliable elements. It should be noted that the information received by the naval authorities about a possible mutiny was of a very general nature. Nothing was known about the initiators of the uprising or its timing. This made it difficult to identify the instigators.
However, the authorities suddenly got lucky. Help came from where it was least expected. On the eve of the mutiny in the Baltic Fleet, relations between the Social Democrats and the Socialist Revolutionaries deteriorated to the limit.
Historian S. Naida writes about this inter-clan fight as follows: “The Social Revolutionaries provoked an immediate uprising. In Kronstadt and other places they began to create their organizations under the guise of contact and non-party organizations, committees, centers, etc., inviting Social Democrats to join these organizations, ostensibly to unite actions to prepare an uprising, but in reality in order to to subordinate the Social Democrats to their influence, to weaken the Bolshevik military-party and military organizations. They acted as conspirators, counting on the fact that the most important thing in preparing an uprising was secrecy and surprise of the attack. The Bolsheviks believed that if they were to go for an uprising, they had to give it a mass character and at the decisive moment call many thousands of workers onto the streets. The Social Revolutionaries believed that they could do without it. They were preparing an explosion and did not consider it necessary to notify the Social Democrats about their plans. The Bolsheviks mercilessly criticized the Socialist Revolutionaries and exposed their adventurism to the masses. Having rejected the Social Revolutionaries' offer to join a non-party organization, the Bolsheviks, with the permission of higher party centers, did not refuse to establish contact with them on certain issues of preparing and carrying out uprisings. With these tactics, the Bolsheviks pursued the goal of not scattering the forces of the revolutionary-minded masses and maintaining influence over them in order to keep them from the Socialist Revolutionary adventure at the right moment. At the same time, the Bolsheviks worked hard among the masses, explaining to them the harm and unacceptability of unorganized riots and protests. Ten days before the uprising, the Bolsheviks wrote in No. 5 of the Kazarma newspaper that what was needed was not military riots, but the transfer of troops at the decisive moment to the side of the insurgent masses. Three days before the uprising, the Bolsheviks of Kronstadt issued a special leaflet in which they warned the masses that they needed to save their strength for the great cause of a general uprising.”
On July 8, 1906, Nicholas II dissolved the overly politicized First State Duma. Some of the radical deputies of the disbanded Duma went to Finland, where on July 10 they adopted the “Vyborg Appeal,” in which the Russian population was called upon to passively resist – refusing to pay taxes and give recruits to the government.
Let us note that the Socialist Revolutionaries tried to act as a united front with the Bolsheviks. Their leaders Yevno Azef and Chernov arrived in Finland. In both Helsingfors and Kronstadt, the Socialist Revolutionaries invited their competitors to enter into an agreement for joint action. But the Social Democrats rejected this proposal, saying that they did not have the consent of higher party bodies. The Social Revolutionaries did not retreat, and in the end, a kind of joint information commission was created, which in reality was of no use. But even after this the Socialist Revolutionaries did not calm down. A few days before the uprising in Sveaborg, the Socialist Revolutionary military organization convened an emergency meeting in Helsingfors, inviting the Social Democrats to it. A representative of the Social Revolutionaries from Kronstadt stated at the meeting that the Kronstadters, the fleet, especially the ships “Tsesarevich”, “Bogatyr” and “Slava”, were ready for an uprising and would start it immediately and that only support was required from the Sveaborzhites. But the representative of the Bolsheviks opposed it, saying that it was impossible to start an uprising without the sanction of the Central Committee of his party. After much debate, the Social Democrats obtained assurances from the Socialist Revolutionaries that they would not raise an uprising in Kronstadt before this happened in Sveaborg, and representatives of both parties never agreed to join forces. They decided to prepare the uprising independently of each other.
The general leadership of the mutiny from the Socialist Revolutionary Party in the Baltic Fleet was carried out by S.F. Mikhalevich nicknamed Jan. F.M. was sent to help him. Onipko, nicknamed Trudovik. Both of them were popular among the sailors, but they were overly emotional, they trusted impulse and feelings more than painstaking, careful, everyday gathering of strength and sober consideration of circumstances. Such prominent figures of the Socialist Revolutionary Party as I.I. were also involved in preparing the rebellion. Bunakov, V.M. Chernov. It is known that a special group of young female Social Revolutionaries actively participated in the sailors’ agitation. The point of their “propaganda” was that the ladies fell in love with the authoritative sailors they needed, who were very flattered that they were cohabiting with educated metropolitan young ladies.
Since the end of March, the Socialist-Revolutionaries regularly proposed that the Social Democrats consolidate their efforts, put aside ideological differences, and unite. They resisted for a long time, but after the arrests in March-April they received the consent of their Central Committee, and on April 23 a united, non-party military organization was founded, which, alas, turned out to be not very viable.
If a year ago the plan for the uprising covered Sevastopol and Odessa, now Kronstadt and Sveaborg were supposed to rise at the same time, and if you were lucky, then Revel. The role of the detonator, which was assigned to the battleship Potemkin in the Black Sea, was to be played in the Baltic by the armored cruiser Memory of Azov. Of course, the outdated “Memory of Azov” could not be compared with the newest “Potemkin”. But the whole point is that in the Baltic the plans of the terrorist revolutionaries were somewhat different than a year ago in the south of Russia. If in 1905 in Odessa the calculation was made on the power of the Potemkin, then a year later in the Baltic everything was somewhat different.
