The Idiot's Guide to the Russian Revolutions & Civil War

[Cypress]

The Idiot’s Guide to the Russian Revolutions and Civil War, with an Emphasis on anti-communist actions by Russian liberals and socialists

Democratic Russia, February 1917 to October 1917
Accomplishments of Russia’s liberal democratic provisional government which took power after the February 1917 revolution >> This was a government deeply committed to democracy, and its accomplishments were impressive:

1. Complete civil liberties were granted.
2. Thousands of political prisoners and exiles were released, and the old police was abolished.
3. Flogging, exile to Siberia, and the death penalty were all abolished.
4. Legal restrictions of individual rights based on nationality or religion were removed.
5. Social reforms were enacted.
6. Preparations for creating a new democratic, constitutional political system were undertaken.

The Bolsheviks Detested Russian Liberals and Democratic Socialists
Lenin and the Soviet Bolsheviks detested liberals and overthrew the Provisional Government via military coup in October.

In the elections to the Constituent Assembly in November 2017 moderate democratic socialists and liberals won the clear and overwhelming majority of the votes. The Bolsheviks only won 24% of the vote, a clear minority. The Russian people chose democratic socialism. Unwilling to give up power to democratic socialists and liberals, the Bolsheviks (who controlled the Soviets), disbanded the Constituent Assembly on January 5, 1918.

In 1918, Bolsheviks began arresting Russian liberals and socialists and imprisoning or executing them in the notorious Tsarist-era Peter and Paul Fortress, off the coast of Petrograd.

Russian Liberals and Democratic Socialists were the first to take up arms against the Bolsheviks and establish anti-Communist governments throughout Russia.
The moderate Socials Revolutionaries attempted an uprising against the Bolsheviks in the spring of 1918. Menshiviks and liberal Kadets established anti-Communist governments in various Russian cities in the late spring of 2018. While conservative oligarchs and rightwing aristocrats fled the country in a panic, Russian liberals and socialists committed to fighting the communists to the death.




Source Reference: Professor Mark Steinberg University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

 

[Cypress]

…the game plan of modern liberals. It is communism by incrementalism.

The "Smart Lib" has read all of the assorted Manifesto's, they have studied the works of great Communist leaders, and they fully understand how they must go about implementing the ideology here.

As Liberalism incrementally works its way into society….this is indeed the same Communist policies we fought two World Wars to prevent.

^^^ Teabaggers have ever had vested interest is trying to conflate socialism and liberalism with the totalitarian Leninist state epitomized by the Soviet Union…

For very obvious reasons.

Because the hybrid socialist-free market economies of northern Europe are preeminent shining examples of success stories in human history.


The garden variety wingnut is either too uneducated, too uninformed, or too dishonest to actually be bothered to learn about the history of communism and what exactly transpired in Russia during the time of the revolutions and civil war. Liberals, first and foremost, believe in democratic institutions, the rule of law, and human dignity. These values are antithetical to the totalitarianism the Bolsheviks strove for. And that is exactly what put liberals in the cross-hairs of the Bolsheviks.

 

[Cypress]

Lenin/Marx despised liberals and democratic socialists

Vladimir Lenin denounced liberalism.
Karl Marx was emphatically not a liberal, and cared not one whit for liberal democratic institutions.
Lenin and the Bolsheviks were avowed opponents of Russian liberals and democratic socialists.
The Bolsheviks overthrew a liberal-socialist provisional government in October 1917.

Following the abdication of the Tsar in 1917 a provisional government was formed by the Duma parliament, including liberal Constitutional Democrats and socialists of different orientations. Lenin demanded the overthrow of the Provisional Government. By the end of October, 1917, the liberal-socialist Provisional government was overthrown in a coup by the Bolsheviks.

Vladimir Lenin rejected traditional religion, denounced liberalism, and turned toward radical, revolutionary politics with remarkable single-mindedness.

Marx’s thought was not monolithic or unchanging, and he was not always consistent, which would complicate life for those who sought to put his ideas into action. He was emphatically not a liberal. He was not concerned with democratic procedure. Rather, he was concerned with his vision of the coming crisis that would produce the perfect future.

Source credit: Professor Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius
The University of Tennessee, Knoxville