starter activity

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? starter activity
Propaganda poster typical of the civil war era,
showing Trotsky. What accusations would Trotsky
have to answer if was to win the propaganda war?
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Why was there a civil war in Russia (1918-1920)?
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? Your task

• Read p. 80 and note down the membership aims of
  each of main groups involved in the fighting.

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Reds

• Kronstadt sailors
• Red Guard
• Workers volunteers
• Soldiers from Russian army
• Pro-Revolution

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Whites

• Liberals
• Tsarists or supporters of military dictatorship
• Nationalists
• Separatists
• Socialist Revolutionaries
• Moderate socialists
• Yudenich (NW), Omsk govt. led by Kolchak
  including pro-monarchists (Siberia), Southern
  Volunteer Army (S) including Liberals army
  officers Komuch (former Const. Assemb.)
  including Soc. Revs. (Samara, E.)
• Anti-Bolshevik

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Greens

• Peasants
• Deserters
• Interested in protecting own land or bandits
• Nestor Makhno, anarchist, Ukraine
• Supported Reds, Whites or exploited chaos to loot
  property

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? Your task

• You are a cartoonist. You are going to produce a
  satirical cartoon, lampooning the aims and
  membership of one of the 3 main groups in the
  Russian civil war. Write some notes for your
  papers editor describing the cartoon you intend
  to draw in order to get his approval. If you are
  feeling artistic you could even have a go at
  drawing the cartoon.

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What were the key events of the Russian Civil War?

• 1918-20

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? Your task

• Watch the video clip and answer the questions in
  pairs. Student a answer all the odd numbers and
  student b the even number ones.
• Imagine you are a propagandist for the
  Bolsheviks. Write a short press release to
  justify the reasons why it is important for the
  Red Army to win the Civil War. You may wish to
  refer to the aims of the Reds, the role of key
  individuals and groups, and the treatment of
  Bolsheviks by the White Army.

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? Your task

• Read p.81. Identify the different causes of the
  war
• Long term factors (events, changes that had been
  increasing tensions in Russia)
• Short term factors (events that sparked the Civil
  War)

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• Long term factors (events, changes that had been
  increasing tensions in Russia)
• Bolshevik policies to create one-party state
  alienate allies (e.g. Soc Revs Mensheviks)
• Liberals Conservatives opposed closure of
  Const. Assembly Sovnakom

• Short term factors (events that sparked the Civil
  War)
• Clashes between Bolsheviks Czech Nationalists
  who were suspicious of Bolsheviks attracted
  White support

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? Your task

• Study chart 6B, on p. 81, 6C on p. 82-3 and the
  information on p. 84 to plot the changing
  fortunes of the Red Army on a timeline. Annotate
  your timeline with key events that mark advances
  or declines in the fortunes of the Reds.

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? Your task

• You each have 100 roubles. Read the statements
  on the Russian Civil War. If you think they are
  accurate and think they are worth keeping, you
  may decide to bid for them. If you bid
  successfully and the statement is correct you
  keep the sentence but of course you will have
  spend some of your money. If the sentence is
  incorrect you dont get the sentence and you
  still lose your money. The winning team is the
  one with the most correct statements and the most
  money left in the bank.

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Why were the Reds successful?

• The Russian Civil War, 1918-1920

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? Your task

• Read p.84-88 and complete a table similar to the
  one below

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Factors favouring Reds

• Support from abroad, e.g. Germany some cities set
  up Communist govt. e.g. Munich
• Russo-Polish War (1919-21) enabled Bolsheviks to
  portray themselves as defenders of nation
• Personality of Trotsky reorganised the Red Army
  along hierarchical lines, brought back Tsarist
  officers political commissars attached to each
  unit labour battalions of former people
  formed inspirational figure use of technology
  e.g. war train
• Red Army drew on workers peasant conscripts
  5 million troops by 1921 strict discipline, e.g.
  death penalty for deserting
• Geography Reds controlled key cities, moved
  capital to Moscow at centre of railway network
  centre of industrial production heavily
  populated
• Propaganda Reds won propaganda war as defenders
  of Russian territory, defenders of peasant land,
  prospect of new society
• War Communism provided food supplies

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Factors against the Reds

• Terms of the Treaty of Riga very harsh
  surrendered large areas of White Russia Ukraine
  to Poles
• Personality of Trotsky imprisoned families of
  White officers to ensure their loyalty betrayal
  of Bolshevik ideals return of hierarchy, use of
  Tsarist officers, ending of soldiers committees
• Red Army peasant conscripts were uncommitted,
  regular uprisings or joined Greens 1 million
  desert in 1918, 4 million deserted by 1921
  resentment of burzhui officers and anti-Semitism
  strict discipline led to poor morale
• War Communism favoured army, peasants resented
  requisitioning

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Factors favouring Whites

• Allied troops based in Russia in theory to reopen
  E front against Germany
• Churchill sent 100 supplies to help Whites
• Expertise of military generals, e.g. Deniken
  Yudenich Admiral Kolchak

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Factors going against them

• Opposition abroad, e.g. Lloyd-George PM British
  Labour Party
• French were anti-Bolshevik, but troops lacked
  commitment French fleet mutinied on Black Sea
• Japanese interested in gaining territory on
  Pacific coastline
• US troops preoccupied with stopping Japan
  annexing territories
• Divisions Soc Revs who set up Komuch (Comm. Of
  Membs. Of Const. assemb.) formed an unhappy
  alliance with Omsk govt. of conservatives
  appointed Kolchak as C-in-C, who then executed
  leading Soc Revs. Souther Volunteer Army fought
  with Cossacks, but in separate units and Cossacks
  unwilling to fight outside their territory
• Brutality ethnic cleansing, esp. by Cossacks
  pogroms against Jews
• White Army peasant conscripts uncommitted since
  Whites wished to restore land to landowners poor
  disciple, e.g. uniforms equipment sold on black
  market, alcoholism rife amongst officers
• Geography large distances between armies v.
  poor communications

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? Your task

• What do you think were the most important reasons
  why the Red Army eventually won the Civil War?
  Discuss them with your partner and write down
  your choice. Be prepared to justify your reasons.
• Write a judgement paragraph explaining your
  decision.

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What effect did the Civil War have on life in
Russia?
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Can you spot two famous faces in this crowd?
? starter activity
Do you think this is propaganda?
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? Your task

• Read p.94-99 and note down the impact of Civil
  War War Communism on the following groups
• Minority groups
• Factory workers
• Farmers peasants
• Political opposition groups
• Tsar his family
• Middle-classes
• Which group suffered the most?

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Minority groups

• Cossacks raped murdered Jewish villages
  115,000 died in Ukraine alone
• Whites challenged right of national ethnic
  minorities to independence

Anti-Jewish propaganda poster produced by Whites
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Factory workers

• Workers committees incapable of running
  factories often voted themselves pay rises
  stole goods
• Industrial output shrank, esp. consumer goods
  leading to price inflation
• Food prices increased, bread shortages Feb 1918
  bread ration in Petrograd reached 50 grams per
  person per day
• Food riots
• Workers fled from cities increasing problems with
  manufacturing industrial output Petrograd
  lost 60 of workforce by April 1918
• All industry nationalised and managed by Vesenkha
  (Supreme Council of National Economy)
• New laws on labour discipline, e.g. fines for
  lateness absenteeism, internal passports,
  piece-work rates reintroduced, bonuses
  workbooks for rations
• Working class army members given priority over
  rations

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Farmers peasants

• May 1918, Food Supplies Dictatorship estd. to
  forcibly requisition grain
• Cheka helped enforce grain requisitioning
• Resistance to requisition brutal attacks on
  Cheka grain collectors
• Class warfare Lenin encouraged Cheka to conduct
  public hangings of kulaks
• Many peasants stop planting seed in protest,
  agricultural production fell back

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Political opposition groups

• Socialist Revolutionaries responsible for
  assassination attempt on Lenin kidnapping of
  Dzerzhinsky
• Summer 1918, Red Terror SRs arrested,
  Mensheviks SRs excluded from soviets, Kadets
  imprisoned or went into exile
• 1918-20 13,000 prisoners executed (official
  records) unofficial records 300,000
• Concentration labour camps established

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Tsar his family

• 17 July 1918 Tsar family shot despite fears of
  antagonising Germany (Tsar cousin of Kaiser,
  Tsarina was German)

Anastasia
Why do you think each side deliberately fostered
the myth that some of the Tsars children
survived?
Room in which the family were killed
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Middle classes

• All private trade manufacture banned
• Black market developed to meet demand
• Former factory managers were put in charge of
  state-run factories instead of workers
  committees
• Middle-class professionals below lower class
  workers in terms of rationing priorities
• Burzhui referred to as former people
• Red Terror deliberately provoked class warfare,
  e.g. - some arrested for being near scenes of
  bourgeois provocation)
• Victims of personal vendettas

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? Discussion

• Hold a mini debate on the issue of which group
  suffered the most? Explain your opinions with
  detailed factual evidence.

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? Role play

• The Communist (Bolshevik) Party has decided to
  hold an enquiry into whether War Communism is
  justified in view of the impact it is having on
  Russian society. Nominate 3 people to be
  committee members whose job it is to question
  individuals summoned to speak. The rest of the
  class must imagine they are one of the
  individuals your teacher will assign you and
  prepare notes to help you answer any questions
  the committee members may pose. At the end of the
  enquiry the committee must reach a verdict on
  whether they think War Communism is justified.