The Story of Russia:
Before and After WWI
Chapter 27, Section 3 and
Chapter 28, Section 5
Russian Revolution
PART 1
Keep these in mind!
Essential Questions
• What are the foundations of
economic theories?
• Why do nations adopt different
economic policies?
• How do individuals gain and
maintain power?
Russia in WWI
1. How did WWI show Russia’s economic
weaknesses?
– Not enough food, appropriate armaments, or
reliable roads to supply the army
– Russian people lose confidence in their
government and the czar (Nicholas II) by 1917
• Thought Tickler?
– What were the people of Russia looking for?
Struggle for New Leadership:
Russian Revolution
2. The Russia monarchy served for 350 years.
When Czar Nicholas II and his family fled out
of fear, what two groups of people starting
fighting for power?
– Mensheviks (moderates)
– Bolsheviks (radical)
3. Which group eventually won and what was
their winning slogan?
– Bolsheviks, “peace, bread, and land”
Results of the Russian Revolution
4. Who was the leader of the winners of the Russian
Revolution? Whose ideas was he inspired by?
– Vladimir Lenin
-Karl Marx
5. What did the Bolsheviks rename themselves in 1918?
– The Communist Party
Communists Flex their Muscles
6. What drastic step did the communists take in July of
1918 to stop the monarchy from coming back to
power?
– Executed the imprisoned czar and his entire family
7. What broke out for three years in Russia? What were
the two armies of this conflict?
– civil war, Reds vs Whites
8. Who did the U.S. (the Allies) support in this civil war?
Who eventually won anyway in 1921?
– U.S. supported the Whites with arms, money, troops
– The Communist won
A New Russia
9. What did the Communists change the name
of the country to in 1922?
– Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)
– Better known as the Soviet Union
Dictatorship in the Soviet Union
PART 2
“Workers of the world,
unite!”
1. What was “War Communism”?
–Policy of nationalizing Russian industries
between 1918-1921
a. Did it help?
• NO!!! Less grain and far less factory
production than before war
2. How did the New Economic Policy
change Russia?
– Major industries (heavy industry,
communications, transportation, credit)
still under government control
– Some free enterprise allowed, especially
with farm products
– Farmers encouraged to produce more to
become kulaks (wealthier people who
got to employ others)
– Small businessmen (Nepmen) traded
some
3. What is a collective farm?
– Land pooled into large farms where
people worked together as a group,
sharing supplies, machinery, etc.
Women
4. How did women’s roles change during the start
of the Communist reign?
– More equality (army, etc.)
– Women could get maternity leave
– Easier to obtain divorce (which was unusual in
Europe at the time)
– However, few women had high-ranking
positions, pay was unequal, female
unemployment higher
Education
5. How did education change during the start of
the Communist reign?
– Greater emphasis on education
– Goal was to increase literacy, teach socialism,
train tech workers through Vo-Tech schools
(BCIT, anyone?)
– But didn’t work because of limited funds
(pencils, notebooks, heat in winter)
– Also, greater emphasis on higher education
over elementary education
– By 1925, Soviet students averaged fewer than
3 years in school
Trotsky and
Stalin
6. Contrast the views of Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin.
– Trotsky believed that for socialism to succeed, revolution should take
place all over the world
– Stalin believed that for socialism to succeed, the Soviet Union needed
to serve as a model
a. Who ended up taking control of the Soviet Union, and why?
– Stalin won an internal power struggle, took over in 1928 (Lenin had died
in 1924)
b. What happened to the other guy?
– Trotsky was exiled, later murdered in Mexico on Stalin’s orders
Under Stalin
7. Did Stalin increase or decrease
government control over the
economy? Why?
– Increased (he thought economy was not
growing quick enough, peasants weren’t
charging gov’t-recommended low prices on
wheat)
– Created a command economy, in which
government controlled all economic decisions
Under Stalin
8. What was Stalin’s Five-Year Plan, and how did it affect
Soviet life?
– Plan for economic growth and industry; collective
farming would produce enough food for Soviets plus
enough to export, which would pay for modern
machinery, which would grow industry
– Government forced collective farms (execution, exile,
prison were possible alternatives)
– Decreased agricultural production; millions died of
famine and crop failure
– However, economy grew overall (especially steel
production)
– Second five-year plan gave more gov’t control, more
focus on industry, less on goods for people (not
rewarded for good economy)
Religion and Art
9. How did religion and art in the Soviet Union change during
Stalin’s rule?
– Soviets discouraged worship, seized property of Orthodox
Church
– Churches and synagogues destroyed or converted to public
buildings
– Ministers, priests, rabbis imprisoned, executed
– Artists, musicians, writers were censored… ordered to
produce works of “socialist realism” to prove loyalty to state
Dealing with the Opposition
10. How did Stalin react when an important
Communist Party official was assassinated in
1934?
– He ordered purge of party members who were
supposedly disloyal to him
– This spread to army, and then ordinary people
What does the world think of Stalin?
Dealing with the Opposition
11. How many people were arrested, imported, imprisoned in labor
camps or executed by 1939?
– 5 million
– "The investigators began to use force on me, a sick 65-year-old
man. I was made to lie face down and beaten on the soles of my
feet and my spine with a rubber strap... For the next few days,
when those parts of my legs were covered with extensive
internal hemorrhaging, they again beat the red-blue-and-yellow
bruises with the strap and the pain was so intense that it felt as
if boiling water was being poured on these sensitive areas. I
howled and wept from the pain. I incriminated myself in the
hope that by telling them lies I could end the ordeal. When I lay
down on the cot and fell asleep, after 18 hours of interrogation,
in order to go back in an hour's time for more, I was woken up
by my own groaning and because I was jerking about like a
patient in the last stages of typhoid fever." – a theatre director
accused of “spying”
Foreign Policy and
Gulags
12. How did the Soviet Union’s foreign policy change during the
1920s and 1930s?
– They tried to get other countries to accept them
– However, they also supported Comintern, which was founded to
spread revolutions throughout the world
13. What were gulags, and why were people sent there?
– Labor camps, many in Siberia, for those who spoke out against Stalin’s
rule
– Had to work in mines, on building projects, many died, others
executed
Answers please!
Essential Questions
• What are the foundations of
economic theories?
• Why do nations adopt different
economic policies?
• How do individuals gain and
maintain power?