The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission, abbreviated as VChK, and commonly known as Cheka, was the first of a succession of Soviet secret-police organizations known for conducting the Red Terror. Established on December 5 1917 by the Sovnarkom, it came under the leadership of Bolshevik revolutionary Felix Dzerzhinsky. By late 1918, hundreds of Cheka committees had sprung up in the Russian SFSR at all levels.
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party civil war in the former Russian Empire sparked by the overthrowing of the social-democratic Russian Provisional Government in the October Revolution, as many factions vied to determine Russia's political future. It resulted in the formation of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and later the Soviet Union in most of its territory. Its finale marked the end of the Russian Revolution, which was one of the key events of the 20th century.
The Green armies, also known as the Green Army or Greens (Зелёные), were armed peasant groups which fought against all governments in the Russian Civil War from 1917 to 1922. The Green armies were semi-organized local militias that opposed the Bolsheviks, Whites, and foreign interventionists, and fought to protect their communities from requisitions or reprisals carried out by third parties. The Green armies were politically and ideologically neutral, but at times associated with the Socialist-Revolutionary Party. The Green armies had at least tacit support throughout much of Russia. However, their primary base, the peasantry, were largely reluctant to wage an active campaign during the Russian Civil War and eventually dissolved following Bolshevik victory in 1922.
The Tambov Rebellion of 1920–1922 was one of the largest and best-organized peasant rebellions challenging the Bolshevik government during the Russian Civil War. The uprising took place in the territories of the modern Tambov Oblast and part of the Voronezh Oblast, less than 500 kilometres (300 mi) southeast of Moscow.
Penza is the largest city and administrative center of Penza Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Sura River, 625 kilometers (388 mi) southeast of Moscow. As of the 2010 Census, Penza had a population of 517,311, making it the 36th-largest city in Russia.
Vasily Konstantinovich Blyukher was a Soviet military commander and Marshal of the Soviet Union.
The Red Terror was a campaign of political repression and executions in Soviet Russia carried out by the Bolsheviks, chiefly through the Cheka, the Bolshevik secret police. It officially started in early September 1918 and lasted until 1922. Arising after assassination attempts on Vladimir Lenin along with the successful assassinations of Petrograd Cheka leader Moisei Uritsky and party editor V. Volodarsky in alleged retaliation for Bolshevik mass repressions, the Red Terror was modeled on the Reign of Terror of the French Revolution, and sought to eliminate political dissent, opposition, and any other threat to Bolshevik power.
Prodrazverstka, also transliterated Prodrazvyorstka, alternatively referred to in English as grain requisitioning, was a policy and campaign of confiscation of grain and other agricultural products from peasants at nominal fixed prices according to specified quotas. This strategy often led to the deaths of many country-dwelling people, such as its involvement with the Holodomor and Kazakh famines of 1919–1922 and 1930–1933.
Party of Revolutionary Communism was a political party in Russia 1918-1920. It was formed by a Narodnik group which broke away from the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries after the latter's mutiny in July 1918. The party favoured co-operation with the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks), and pledged support for soviet power.
Lenin in 1918 is a Soviet biographical drama film released in 1939. It gives the background of the Russian Civil War after the October Revolution.
Alexander Dmitryevich Tsiurupa was a Bolshevik leader and Soviet politician.
Dekulakization was the Soviet campaign of political repressions, including arrests, deportations, or executions of millions of kulaks and their families. Redistribution of farmland started in 1917 and lasted until 1933, but was most active in the 1929–1932 period of the first five-year plan. To facilitate the expropriations of farmland, the Soviet government announced the "liquidation of the kulaks as a class" on 27 December 1929, portraying kulaks as class enemies of the Soviet Union.
Yevgenia BogdanovnaBosch was a Ukrainian Bolshevik revolutionary, politician, and member of the Soviet government in Ukraine during the revolutionary period in the early 20th century.
The White Terror in Russia refers to the violence and mass killings carried out by the White Army during the Russian Civil War (1917–23). It began after the Bolsheviks seized power in November 1917, and continued until the defeat of the White Army at the hands of the Red Army. The Red Terror started a year after the initial White Terror in early September 1918 in response to several planned assassinations of Bolshevik leaders and the initial massacres of Red prisoners in Moscow and during the Finnish Civil War. According to some Russian historians, the White Terror was a series of premeditated actions directed by their leaders. although this is contested by most Russian historians who view it as spontaneous and disorganized. Estimates for those killed in the White Terror vary between 20,000 and 100,000 people.
Sergey Ivanovich Syrtsov was a Russian Soviet politician and statesman. Syrtsov is best remembered for having served as the head of the republic government of the Russian SFSR from 1929 until his removal in 1930 for plotting to remove of Joseph Stalin as head of the All-Union Communist Party (bolsheviks).
Kulak, also kurkul or golchomag, was the term which was used to describe peasants who owned over 8 acres of land towards the end of the Russian Empire. In the early Soviet Union, particularly in Soviet Russia and Azerbaijan, kulak became a vague reference to property ownership among peasants who were considered hesitant allies of the Bolshevik Revolution. In Ukraine during 1930–1931, there also existed a term of podkulachnik ; these were considered "sub-kulaks".
Under the leadership of Russian communist Vladimir Lenin, the Bolshevik Party seized power in the Russian Republic during a coup known as the October Revolution. Overthrowing the pre-existing Provisional Government, the Bolsheviks established a new administration, the first Council of People's Commissars, with Lenin appointed as its governing chairman. Ruling by decree, Lenin’s Sovnarkom introduced widespread reforms confiscating land for redistribution among the permitting non-Russian nations to declare themselves independent, improving labour rights, and increasing access to education.
Robert Indrikovich Eikhe was a Latvian Bolshevik and Soviet politician who was the provincial head of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in Siberia during the collectivization of agriculture, until his arrest during the Great Purge.
An index of articles related to the Russian Revolution and the Russian Civil War period (1905–1922). It covers articles on topics, events, and persons related to the revolutionary era, from the 1905 Russian Revolution until the end of the Russian Civil War. The See also section includes other lists related to Revolutionary Russia and the Soviet Union, including an index of articles about the Soviet Union (1922–1991) which is the next article in this series, and Bibliography of the Russian Revolution and Civil War.
The Chapan rebellion was one of the largest peasant uprising against the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War. Taking place in March-April 1919, the uprising covered the territory of Syzran, Sengileevsky, Karsunsky districts of Simbirsk and the Stavropol and Melekessky districts of Samara. It got its name from the clothes of the rebels: the chapan - a winter coat, made of sheepskin, a special robe belted with a sash, a popular clothing among the peasants of the region during cold weather. The uprising was brutally suppressed, and its participants, mostly peasants, were subjected to terror and mass repression.
