Concise Russian history for a traveler

Soviet and post-Soviet Russia

The February Revolution of 1917 was spontaneous, leaderless, and fueled by deep resentment over the economic and social conditions that had prevailed in imperial Russia under Tsar Nicholas. In 1914 the country had been sucked into World War I with a premodern political and economic system.

Tsar Nicholas II was well-meaning but fell short as a war leader and was unable to cope with the burdens of being head of the state. Consequently the imperial order collapsed in February (March, New Style) 1917. The political government that had been formed was to

remain in office until a democratic parliament, the Constituent Assembly, was convened. The new government was bourgeois, or middle-class, representing a tiny segment of the population. It was weak, and it could not rely on the army. Being a temporary administration, it postponed all hard decisions.

As Bolshevik domination grew in Petrograd, Moscow, and other major cities, the Soviets accepted the idea that the revolution that would give them power would take place in two stages: the bourgeois and the socialist.

The Bolshevik slogan of "All Power to the Soviets" was very attractive. The struggle for power has begun.

October Revolution. The October Revolution was precipitated by Kerensky himself, when, angered by claims that the Bolsheviks controlled the Petrograd garrison, he sent troops to close down two Bolshevik newspapers. The Bolsheviks, led by Trotsky, feared that Kerensky would attempt to disrupt the Second All-Russian Congress, scheduled to open on October 25 (November 7, New Style); they reacted by sending troops to take over key communications and transportation points of the city.