1. This chapter surveys the growth of organized political opposition to the tsarist autocracy. After the abortive Decembrist Coup in 1825 (by disaffected, idealistic but impractical young noblemen), there followed 30 years of severe repression under Nicholas I. When the climate became more open upon the accession of Alexander II, a number of political movements took shape. Their 19th century genesis and evolution is crucial to understanding the political fate of 20th century Russia.
2. During the late 1850's Alexander II (the Tsar Liberator) initiated the Great Reforms which culminated in 1861 in the Emancipation of the serfs (without, unfortunately, giving them possession of the land they had been tilling). Alexander also loosened censorship, initiating what his government called by the newly coined word glasnost (gla¡snost;), which meant open discussion of previously taboo topics and opinions (Gorbachev was to resurrect the word in the late 1980's for a similar campaign). This cleared the way for many liberal, socialist and eventually radical movements to enter Russia from Europe. Despite their liberalization, neither Alexander II nor Gorbachev (like Catherine the Great before them) intended to lose any of their monopoly on power. This created a contradiction that led to further unrest in each case.
3. Note the growth of rural gentry assemblies (zemsky sobor), a sort of countryside democracy. Alexander II thwarted the growth of this trend beyond the level of petty local politics and it never contributed toa democratization of the country as a whole.
4. Know that Nikolai Chernyshevsky wrote the first Russian socialist novel What is to be Done? (Hto de¡lat;*) in 1863, which advocated that workers should own all they produce and that logic and reason rather than hereditary power structures should rule. He spends 20 years in Siberian exile.
5. In class we will discuss the growth of nihilism (rejection of all social norms and values; a sort of moral and cultural anarchy) during the 1860's. Young radicals of this time were known as "men of the 60's". The Russian novelist Ivan Turgenev portrays the generation gap between old noblemen dissidents and younger nihilists and socialist in his novel Fathers and Sons.
6. Know the name of Mikhail Bakunin, an anarchistic revolutionary who spent years in exile outside of Russia.
7. Know the name of Alexander Herzen, founder of Russian socialism and editor of the émigré journal The Bell (Ko¡lokol).
8. Know that Populism (naro¡dnihestvo) grew up in the 1870's, combining socialist thought with an idealization of the traditonal Russian peasant commune (mir). The point of this movement was the belief that the Russian masses were by nature socialistic and only needed to be told so in order to effect radical social change in Russia as a whole. But a Going to the People (xo'denie k naro¡du) movement ended in total failure when suspicious peasants turned the agitators over to police.
9. Because of these failures, a radical wing of the populists called the People's Will (Naro¡dnaq vo¡lq) grew up and dedicated itself to political change through terrorist acts. In 1881 their members murder Tsar Alexander II.
10. Know the basic facts of the life and ideas of Karl Marx. Georgii Plexanov was the first native Russian to organize a Marxist group in Russia, which was called the Social Democrats or SD's. This group and its offshoots believed that the industrial workers (proletariat) were going to the the class that sparked revolution. Later, Vladimir Lenin would take over this movement, which broke up into two factions: the Bolsheviks (Lenin's group, which later renamed themselves the Communists) and the Mensheviks (all of whom were eventually killed in Russia during Soviet rule). Iulii Martov was the most prominent Menshevik.
11. Meanwhile, the Populists and others who looked to the country peasants rather than the city workers as the vanguard of revolutionary change in Russia, developed into another rival movement called the Socialist Revolutionaries or SR's. This group was more popular than the SD's in Russia because 90% of Russians were peasant farmers and less than 5% were industrial workers in the late 19th century. Victor Chernov was the most important SR. After the Bolshevik takeover in 1917, Chernov escaped abroad, but all SR's who remained in Russia were eventually hunted down and killed.
12. There were also liberal movements in Russia which advocated evolution to a constitutional monarchy or a parlimentary democracy ratherthan violent political change. Chief among these was the Kadet (Constitutional Democrat) Party and later the Octobrists. A chart on p. 369 juxtaposes all of these parties as they existed in 1905.
13. Know that after 1881, the murdered tsar's son, Alexander III (ruled 1881-1895), together with is reactionary advisor Pobedonostsev (po-bead-a-NOST-sev), who was also head of the Holy Synod, cracked down on dissenters and all of the above political movements. Many revolutionaries were sent to Siberian exile during this time. When Alexander died of natural causes, his weak-willed son Nicholas II (1895-1917) tried to continue these repressive policies but ultimately failed.
    

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Pp. 363-379. Why 1905 was a bad year to be tsar

1. In class I'll tell you the basic details of Nicholas II's early reign, including his marriage to a German princess Alexandra, the birth of his four daughters and one hemopheliac son Alexis, and the building of the Trans-Siberian Railroad under Sergei Witte (VIT-tuh).
2. I will also tell you the tsars personal prejudices and other factors that influenced his reign and will discuss Russia's relations with Germany. Know the names Otto von Bismarck (German statesman who masterminded the unification of Germany under Prussia in 1870) and Kaiser Wilhelm II, the king of Germany during Nicholas's reign.
3. We will also discuss Russian-Chinese and Russian-Japanese relations in the late 19th century, and the reasons for the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05. Know the basic details of how Russia lost this war: sinking of the Russian navy in the Battle of Tsushima Strait, Seige of Port Arthur. Know that the peace agreement Treaty of Portsmouth, which was brokered by American President Theodore Roosevelt, was kind to Russia and only took away the southern half Sakhalin Island, plus loss of Russia's influence in North China and Korea.
4. Know that the humiliating military defeat dovetailed with civil unrest to produce a country-wide peasant and worker rebellion known as the Revolution of 1905. Know: Father Gapon and his march to the Winter Palace which ended in a massacre called Bloody Sunday.
5. Know that this revolution resulted in the creation of a National Duma and, at least on paper, a Constitutional Monarchy. But soon Nicholas, goaded by his wife's advice and his own personal convictions, began ignoring these limitations, believing that God intended him to pass down the absolute autocracyunchanged to his infant son Alexis.
6. Note the agrarian reforms of the brilliant Minister Pyotr Stolypin (assassinated in 1911), which were gradually giving Russian farmers enough land for them to be prosperous.
7. Study the map on p. 379 to understand Russia's military and diplomatic relations with other European countries on the eve of World War I. Russia wound up allied with France and England (her traditional enemies) against Germany (her traditional friend). The reason was the dispute between Russia (Pan-Slavic friend of Serbia and other Slavic minorities) against Austria (persecutor of some of these minorities and Germany's staunch ally).
   

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Pp. 382-396. New cultural heights: writers, poets and artists

1. The period between the end of the Crimean War in 1856 and the outbreak of World War I in 1914 saw an incredible blossoming of Russian artistic expression. Russian artists and especially musicians became world-renowned and began to influence international trends. The period continuing from Pushkin through the 1880's is sometimes known as the Golden Age, with the period following known as the Silver Age. The latter was characterized by more introspective symbolism.
2. Great writers of this age include: Fyodor Dostoevsky, Ivan Turgenev, Leo Tolstoy, Anton Chekhov (Chekhov is usually considered a symbolist)
3. Great musicians include Pyotr Chaikovsky and the Mighty Handful (veli¡kaq ku¡hka), who included Nicholas Rimsky-Korsakov, Alexander Borodin, and Modest Mussorgsky. A later musician was Igor Stravinsky.
4. In art there was a movement to include native Russian and contemporary social scenes by a group called the Wanderers (peredvi¡'niki), who broke away from the Academy of Art. We will discuss Kramskoi, Vasily Perov and Ilya Repin (realist painters), Aivazovsky (seascape painter), Ivan Bilibin (painter of Russian folk scenes). Historical painting was also a major trend of the time. We will discuss Vereshchagin (anti-war artist). A symbolist painter was Mikhail Vrubel (a unique Russian quasi-impressionist who painted Lermontov's "Demon").
5. The important thing about this period is that different branches of Russian culture drew on one another: a Russian musician would set a Russian short story to music, a painter would depict scenes from Russia, etc., so Russia was not merely borrowing from external sources.
6. This great creative period was destroyed in the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution. Much is made of 20th century Soviet art and literature, but it was more news than art - much more important for its political or historical meaning than for anything universal ly capable of touching the average viewer or reader (this is my own biased opinion). There was a small amount of noteworthy Soviet art and literature, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's novels (the best of which were banned until the 1960's anyway) or the novel Quiet Flows the Don, by Mikhail Sholokhov (which may have been stolen from the writer Nikolai Kluyev, who died in the Gulag), but most of it was second rate at best. And now that the Soviet period has ended, people will concern themselves with it less and less. I will show you a film about the fate of art and literature under Stalin.
   

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Pp. 399-415. World War I and the extinction of tsarism

1. Know why WWI broke out in August 1914 and who was fighting whom: the Central Powers, consisting of Germany and Austria-Hungary (later joined by Turkey and Bulgaria) were arrayed against the Triple Entente consisting of Russia, France, England who were fighting to help Serbia (the Entente was later joined by Italy and in 1917 the United States, whose entry won the war). Russia was to leave the war in late 1917 after the Bolshevik takeover. This meant that although Russia had fought for the winning side, it would up being treated as a loser when the Peace of Versailles was concluded in 1919.
2. In class we will discuss the incompetence and confusion of the final few years of Romanov rule, including the interference of the Mad Siberian monk Grigory Rasputin (pronounced in Russian as "ras-POO-tin").
3. Know the difference between Old Style and New Style dates. The Old Style is the Julian Calendar created byJulius Caesar and followed by Russia until 1918. The Old style of time reckoning had no leap year and was 13 days behind the Gregorian Calendar, created by Pope Gregory in the middle ages and followed in the West since that time. When Russia adopted the Gregorian Calendar in 1918, these 13 days simply were skipped. Therefore, dates in 1917 are sometimes given in Old Style. According the the Old Style Julian Calendar , the collapse of tsarism was in February, but it was in March according to New Style; similarly, the Bolshevik coup was October 25 in Old Style, but November 7 in New Style. The Russian Orthodox Church still follows Old Style (Julian), so that Russian Christmas and Easter are about two weeks later than everyone else's.
4. Know what caused the fall of tsarism. I will strongly support those who claim that the rigors of total war, combined with the personal wimpishness and incompetence of Nicholas II were the decisive factors. The immediate events that led to Nicholas's abdication were sponaneous riots for food in hungry St. Petersburg. Lenin and other (later) prominent revolutionaries had no part in this (Lenin was then in Switzerland playing chess and only read about the fall of tsarism in the newspapers; within a month he returned to Russia with many Bolsheviks with the aid of Germany, who hoped to use Lenin to destabilize Russia's war effort. He did.)
   

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Pp. 417-433. 1917: A tale of two revolutions

1. Understand that there were TWO completely different changes of power in 1917. The March Revolution (February, according to Old Style) was spontaneous and popular and led to democracy. The November Revolution (October, according to Old Style) was a seizure of power (a coup) by a small conspiratorial group and led to another type of dictatorship.
2. Know the political and social effects of the March Revolution: complete abolition of all censoreship and freedom of the press for the first time in Russia's history; granting of universal voting privileges for all adult men and women; all political prisoners were freed; abolition of the Holy Synod and the subservience of the church to the state; reinstatement of a patriarch. But Russia remained at war and the economy was still terrible.
3. The coalition government that took control was called the Provisional Government. It was headed by Alexander Kerensky. Later in the year, the first free popular elections in Russian history are held to elect a Constituent Assembly inteneded to rule Russia as a sort of parliament. Since fewer than 5% of the population are industrial workers, the Bolsheviks do miserably in the elections.
4. Most Bolsheviks quickly return from prison and exile and make excellent use of the free press. Bolsheviks organized soviets (local councils of workers, each led by a member of the Bolshevik Party). Know the names of the prominent Bolsheviks: Vladimir Ulyanov (renamed Lenin); Joseph Jugashvili (renamed Stalin); Lev Bronshtein (renamed Trotsky); Lev Rubenstein (renamed Kamenev), Grigory Apfelbaum (renamed Zinoviev); Nikolai Bukharin (his real name!). Most leading Bolsheviks were not Russian but belonged to national minorities and during their career took more Russian-sounding surnames.
5. Bolsheviks inspire riots in July but fail to topple the Kerensky government. This abortive coup, which almost led to the breakup of the Bolsheviks, is known as the July Days.
6. In September a military officer named Kornilov (corn-EE-loff) tries to seize power. His supporters disintegrate before reaching St. Petersburg but the fiasco shows the complete vulnerability of the Provisional Government, which was helpless to defend itself.
7. In October (November, New Style). Lenin and Trotsky organize soldiers and sailors sympathetic to the Bolsheviks (in truth, most other leading Bolsheviks are hesitant to attack). On the night of October 25, when the cruiser Aurora gives the signal, the Winter Palace is stormed and most of the Provisional Government ministers are arrested. Kerensky flees to Finland disguised as a woman and eventually emigrates to the US, where he becomes a professor (he dies in 1970).
8. Lenin acts quicky, boldly and decisively to consolidate Bolshevik power. Among other things, the Bolsheviks, who soon change their name to Communists, do the following: 1) instate a very strict political and anti-religious censorship; only Bolshevik newspapers are allowed to publish and even many classics of Russian literature, such as Dostoevsky's novels, are banned; 2) all other political parties are banned and the people elected tot he Constituent Assembly are arrested; those who remain in Russia are eventually shot; 3) creation of a new secret police force, called the Cheka (chi-KA, or "Extraordinary Commission"); it was forerunner of the KGB; 4) creation of a modern concentration camp system, which later came to be known as the Gulag; 5) Russia pulls abruptly out of the war six months before their side wins and as a result. In the separate peace Trotsky signs with Germany, which is called the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, the Bolsheviks agree to the loss of territory much larger than France and Germany combined. The Treaty of Versailles, which ended WWI, treats Bolshevik Russia like a loser and holds her to the territorial consessions agreed to at Brest-Litovsk. Finland, Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania become independent countries. Ukraine, Armenia and Georgia try to become independent but are reabsorbed. Communist historians refer to World War I as the Imperialist War (Imperialisti¡heskaq vojna¡).
   

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Pp. 435-445. The Russian Civil War

1. The policies described above provoke outrage from all other political groups in the country. These groups begin to fight the Bolsheviks, who come to be called Reds in this conflict. All of their disparate and disorganized enemies, which include tsarist officers, liberal politicians and rival socialist groups, are traditionally called Whites. Both sides are utterly ruthless. The Whites lose because the Bolsheviks are better organized and unified. Western countries only half-heartedly try to aid the Whites, in an episode which Communist historians refer to as the Intervention (Interve¡nciq).
2. In class we will discuss the main events of the Civil War, including the Czech seizure of the Trans-Siberian railroad and the Bolshevik murder of the tsar's family. Know the names of the prominent White generals: Denikin and Vrangel (in Ukraine), Yudenich (near the Baltic), Kolchak (in Siberia). Most cossacks fight for the Whites and all the cossack bands are liquidated after the war.
3. At the end of the Civil War, which lasts from 1918-20, Lenin establishes the Soviet Union, or Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Russia is only one constituent. Lenin hopes the revolutions takes hold in Europe so that more "republics" can be added to the Soviet Union.
4. During the war and for a time shortly after, the Communists demand that peasants "donate" all of their surplus grain to the government for free. This policy, which was enforced by armed seizure of foodstuffs from the countryside, was called War Communism (voe¡nnyj kommuni¡zm). Major revolts, including one at the Kronstadt Naval Base in 1921, made Lenin rethink this policy. The Communists were too weak and had too small of a power base to enact these type of policies in the early 1920's. So Lenin enacted NEP (New Economic Policy) which allowed limited free enterprise and free ownership. This policy was continued after Lenin died in 1924 until the late 1920's, when the Communist Party had built its strength and numbers.
   

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Pp. 447-461. Russia under the Bolshevik regime

1. In class I will discuss how the regime dealt with 1) other communist revolutionary movements in Europe; 2) the old noble classes; 3) the Russian Orthodox Church; 4) the famines caused by the forced requisitioning of the peasants' grain several years in a row.
2. Although the Civil War was won, there were still savage peasant revolts in the early 1920's, particularly the movement under a peasant named Antonov (he and his followers were rounded up and shot). Also, the Japanese were not expelled from the Far East until about 1925 and Muslim guerillas in Central Asia,whom Soviet historians call the basmachi, were not subdued until about 1930.
3. I will also discuss Communist Party internal politics, as Lenin becomes sick in 1922 and dies in January 1924. There is collective party leadership for a time, but Stalin succeeds in playing the others against one another and by 1928 is completely in command. (See p. 451-2). Stalin eventually murders virtually all prominent Bolsheviks who had achieved their fame independently of him. These victims of Stalin are sometimes collectively called the Old Bolsheviks.
   

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Pp. 462-496. Stalin finishes Lenin's revolution

1. Lenin believed that seizing power in Russia would spark revolution in other, more industrialized countries. He predicted World Revolution. Trotsky added the phrase Permanent Revolution. But when communist coups in Europe either failed for never occurred, Stalin formulated the concept of "building socialism in one country".
2. In class we will discuss Stalin's collectivization of agriculture and his industrialization drive. Know: kolkhoz (soviet collective farm), kulak (a negative name for a rich peasant or anyone who resisted collectivization).
   

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Pp. 498-517. Communist culture and the "New Soviet Man"

1. We will discuss the differences between early Bolshevik vs. Stalin's policies toward nationalities and women.
2. Stalin virtually deifies Lenin, who is embalmed and displayed as a "holy relic" on Red Square.
3. We will discuss the various purges and show trials of the 1930's, as well as the growth of the Gulag. Know: Dzerzinsky, Yagoda, Yezhov, Beria (successive heads of the Soviet secret police).
4. I'll also describe the assassination of popular Leningrad leader Sergei Kirov in 1934.
5. Know also Stalin's later purges, such as the fight against "rootless cosmopolitanism", led by Stalin's henchman Zhdanov, and the so-called Doctor's Plot, which was apparently leading to an anti-Jewish purge at the time of Stalin's death in 1953.
   

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Pp. 520-548. The Great Fatherland War, or How the USSR became a superpower

1. We will compare and contrast Communist (international socialist) and Nazi (national socialist) practices and ideologies.
2. Know the Ribbentrop-Molotov Non-Agression Pact of August 1939 and the other main events leading up to World War II.
3. The Soviet-Nazi war is called the Great Patriotic War (Veli¡kaq ote¡hestvennaq vojna¡). The Soviets lost over 26 million. Leningrad endured a 900-day blocade. Know the major Soviet general, Zhukov, and the important Nazi losses that lead to their defeat: failure to win the Battle of Moscow in fall of 1941, failure to complete the Seige of Leningrad, defeat at Stalingrad (early 1943), the world's bloodiest battle , and defeat at Kursk (1943), the world's largest tank battle.
4. We will also discuss how Hitler's racial policies helped stiffen resistence against the Nazis in Eastern Europe, and I will describe to you Stalin's deportation of certain nationalities to Central Asia and Siberia during the war as punishment for their alleged (and sometimes real) pro-Nazi sympathies; these include the Kalmyk Mongols, the Chechens, the Crimean Tatars, and the Volga Germans (who were not pro-Hitler at all).
5. The victory over Hitler left Stalin towering over most of Eastern and Central Europe.
   

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Pp. 549-559. The "Cold War", or "The war that wasn't"

1. I'll review the main ups and downs of US/Soviet relations up to the death of Stalin in 1953, including the Berlin Blocade of 1949 and Soviet acquisition of atomic weapons with help from American communists.
2. Winston Churchill invents the term "Iron Curtain" for the political divide separating Stalin-Dominated areas from the rest of the world. Later, the term "Bamboo Curtain" came to be used to refer to China.
3. We will discuss the presidencies of Franklin Roosevelt (FDR), Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhauer, John Kennedy, as well as the policies of Nikita Khrushchev (ousted in 1964). Highlights include: formation of NATO vs. Warsaw Pact, the Korean War, building of the Berlin Wall, and the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962), Hungarian Revolution of 1956, Invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, Arab-Israeli Six-Day War (1967) and Arab-Israeli War of 1973.
4. We will also discuss relations between the USSR and Communist China, and the Vietnam War. A new twist to the Cold War was added when Mao broke with Khrushchev in the late 1950's, a rift that nearly led to war by 1969. Nixon opened US relations with China in 1971 and began detante (mutual diplomatic work toward permanent peaceful coexistence.

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Pp. 562-613. Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko: the law of diminishing dictators

1. Know Khrushchev's policies: partial dismantling of the Gulag (1953), cessation of purges and show trials, destalinization (1958). His era was characterized by various failed experiments in altering agriculture or the bureaucracy often referred to as "hairbrained schemes".
2. Brezhnev's tenure as Soviet head of state is now known as the era of stagnation (zasto¡j).
3. Neither Andropov (1982-84) or Chernenko (1984-85) were head of state long enough to enact major changes. For the period from the late 1970's to 1985, significant events and terms include: spread of communism in Africa and Latin America, Iranian Revolution, Afgan War, Poland's Solidarity movement, Reagan's Star Wars, shooting down of Korean jetliner flight in August 1983.
4. In class we will discuss the effect of Reagan's Peace through Strength policy on the Soviet Politburo (highest group of Communist leaders).
   

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Pp. 613-652 (optional, 655-678). From Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika to coup and disintegration

1. The Gorbachev years (1985-91) can be divided into: 1) Glasnost, or increased freedom of speech, period from 1985 to 1988; 2) the addition of perestroika, an attempt to restructure the bureaucrac y with a degree of democratization. This led to economic chaos and an upsurge of ethnic tensions. I will argue that both policies were flawed because Gorbachev attempted, as did Alexander II, to achieve the outward benefits of liberal democracy while in reality preserving the core of dictatorship unchanged.
2. Key event s of the Gorbachev years include: Chernobyl accident, collapse of the Iron Curtain, fall of the Berlin Wall, rise of Boris Yeltsin, coup in August 1991 and resignation on December 25, 1991.

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Pp. 679-738. Beyond communism?

1. Know the major events of Yeltsin's presidency: resistence tot he coup in Aug. 1991, dissolution of the USSR in December 1991 and the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States, crushing of a second coup attempt in Oct.1993, privatization campaign, fiscal and economic crisis, Chechen War, resignation on New Year's eve 1999.
2. Know the main parties and politicians of post-communist Russia: Communist Party headed by Gennady Zyuganov, Yabloko, headed by Grigory Yavlinsky, Liberal Democrats, headed by Vladimir Zhirinovsky. Yeltsin and his successor Vladimir Putin and their party are generally known as Democrats. None of these terms have any real parallel with American political party names.
3. Know the basic events of Putin's presidency: loss of the Kursk nuclear sub; accommodation with the US over strategic missiles; support of the War on Terrorism.

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**Discussion questions for TEST III (choose 3 of 5); to be written in advance and turned in with your test.

1. Why did tsarism collapse? And what were the main events in 1917 that led from the abdication of the tsar to a communist dictatorship?
2. What were the main differences between Lenin and Stalin policies?
3. Why did Stalin win "The Great Patriotic War"? In discussing this, review some of the major events of the war.
4. Discuss reasons why the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. What were the main events leading up to this tremendous historical change?
5. Discuss one way your perception of Russian history has been most changed by the material learned in this class.
   

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