To the 60th anniversary of Great October

The CPSU, as a party of scientific communism, has always based its activities on an accurate account of the objective correlation of class forces and the specific features of each historical period. "We Bolsheviks," Lenin emphasized, " have always tried to be faithful to this demand, which is absolutely obligatory from the point of view of any scientific justification of politics."1 Thanks to this, the activity of the CPSU, which was always strictly scientific in nature and expressed the deepest needs of social development, had great vitality.

Having led the three revolutions in Russia, the Leninist party fully took into account the fundamental fact that they took place under new historical conditions, with a qualitatively different alignment of class forces than the revolutions that preceded them in the West. The new era of imperialism brought with it an enormous growth of militarism and a monstrous expansion of the apparatus of armed violence against the working masses. The arming of the bourgeoisie against the proletariat, Lenin emphasized in this connection, is one of the most important, fundamental, and most important facts of modern capitalist society. 2 From the new historical reality, Lenin and the Bolshevik party drew a cardinal conclusion that in the new era of imperialism, with a huge aggravation of primarily class and other contradictions, an unprecedented increase in the military-police state apparatus of violence in the hands of the ruling classes, revolutions can in most cases acquire the character of the most acute armed confrontation of opposing class forces.

From the very beginning of their activity, the Bolsheviks clearly stated that the working class would, of course, prefer to peacefully take power into its own hands. But at the same time, according to Lenin, they considered it very likely, even most likely, that the bourgeoisie would not make a peaceful concession to the proletariat, but would resort at the decisive moment to defending its privileges by force .3 Therefore, the party prepared the proletariat for any form of confrontation with the bourgeoisie, both peaceful and non-peaceful. And on the eve of October, when behind the shoulders of the Russian flight-

1 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 132.

2 See V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 30, p. 135.

3 See V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 4, p. 264.

page 3

Although there were already fierce class battles in 1905 and 1907, the February victory over tsarism, and the period of dual power, Lenin again emphasized that the peaceful development of the revolution was an opportunity "extremely rare in history and extremely valuable."4 Hence it was necessary to create a military organization of the proletariat and to justify the ways and means of its successful application in the struggle for the overthrow of the rule of capital. "Our slogan," Lenin wrote, " should be: arming the proletariat in order to defeat, expropriate and disarm the bourgeoisie. This is the only possible tactic of the revolutionary class, a tactic that follows from the entire objective development of capitalist militarism and is prescribed by this development. " 5 The course of history has confirmed the correctness and far-sightedness of this Leninist policy. Our Party was the first to fully appreciate the importance of military questions in the class struggle, to develop a coherent military program for the proletariat in the bourgeois-democratic and socialist revolutions, and to ensure its implementation. At the same time, the Bolsheviks have always resolutely dissociated themselves both from right-wing opportunism, which denies the need for revolutionary violence, and from "left-wing" extremism, which absolutizes armed forms of class struggle and puts them forward out of connection with the socio-political conditions of the revolutionary movement's development. Our party gained particularly valuable experience in the military field during the stage of preparation for the Great October Socialist Revolution. The Bolsheviks ' military work during this crucial period took on an unprecedented scale and depth. Defining its significance for the victorious outcome of October, Lenin pointed out: "Without this we could not have won." 6 This article attempts to highlight a number of main directions of the Bolshevik Party's military work in the struggle for the victory of the socialist revolution. In Soviet historiography, there are a large number of works covering the specific history of the military and combat activities of the Bolsheviks on the way to October. Less attention is paid to the disclosure of the party's military program, the analysis of its components, the organic connection between them, and the study of many important problems of the October military training. Therefore, the author tried to focus on some of these aspects of the topic that are not yet sufficiently covered in the literature.

*

The new situation in the country after the overthrow of the autocracy also required the development of a new strategy and tactics of the party. This historical problem was solved by Lenin in the April Theses and developed in his other works. The Seventh All-Russian (April) Conference of the RSDLP (b) fully approved Lenin's course towards a socialist revolution. In Lenin's plan for the conquest of power by the proletariat, the party's military program occupied an important place. It was included in this plan as an integral part of it and, as always, was subordinated to the solution of general political tasks. Lenin's genius as a theoretician and practitioner of the class struggle was shown by the fact that when the revolution entered a period of peaceful development, on the one hand, he did not allow the slightest underestimation of military issues in the new conditions, on the other hand, he just as resolutely rejected attempts to use armed forms of struggle against the bourgeoisie, so long as the revolution could develop peacefully. In the post-July period, the party was led by its leader

4 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 34, p. 135.

5 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 30, pp. 135-136.

6 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 40, p. 10.

page 4

I have done everything possible to prevent premature armed demonstrations by the workers. Thanks to this, the Russian proletariat, on its way to October, managed to avoid many of the dangers prepared for it by the counter-revolution. The victory of the socialist revolution in our country, which took place through armed insurrection, and the subsequent revolutions in other countries, both by their successes and defeats, emphasized with all their force the significance of Lenin's military program for the conquest of power by the working people.

In the period from February to October, the party solved new tasks in the military field in terms of scale and content. On the agenda was the question of implementing on the widest possible scale its programmatic demand for universal arming of the people and concrete measures that would ultimately lead to the dismantling of the old army as the main instrument of power of the exploiting classes and to their disarming. The Bolshevik Party emphasized that without solving these fundamental problems, the success of the proletarian revolution could not be guaranteed. It considered it its first duty to prepare the proletariat for all forms of class struggle, both peaceful and non-peaceful. Lenin, while still in exile, in a telegram to the Bolsheviks who were leaving for Russia, pointed out: "Arming the proletariat is the only guarantee." 7 He promotes the urgency of this measure with increasing energy in a number of his works and speeches ("Letters from Afar", "Tasks of the Proletariat in our Revolution", "Speech to the soldiers at a rally in the Izmailovsky regiment on April 10 (23), 1917", "Political parties in Russia and tasks of the Proletariat", " Soldiers and the land", "On the Proletarian Militia", reports and speeches at the Petrograd City and VII (April) All-Russian Conferences of the RSDLP (b), etc.). The party leader tirelessly explained: "The revolution cannot be guaranteed, the success of its conquests cannot be guaranteed, its further development is impossible if this measure does not if it becomes universal, it will not be completed and will be held throughout the country... The people need to learn to use weapons and join the militia, which replaces the police and the standing army. The workers need that there should be no army separated from the people, that the workers and soldiers should merge into a single national militia. Without this, the apparatus of oppression remains in force, ready to serve today Guchkov and his friends, the counter-revolutionary generals, tomorrow, perhaps, Radko Dmitriev or some contender for the throne and for the creation of a plebiscite monarchy. " 8
After the February Revolution, the situation in the country was characterized by a maximum of legality, the absence of violence against the masses, and the existence of a system of revolutionary organs of the masses - Soviets, whose social nature denied the bourgeois apparatus of oppression and demanded its replacement by universal arming of the people. The Party has made the most of these extremely favorable conditions and has undertaken a great deal of theoretical and practical work, first of all to attract broad proletarian and non-proletarian sections of the working people to its side, and to create the armed forces of the revolution. 9 As a party of scientific communism, and taking strict account of the objective situation that has developed in the country since February, the Bolshevik party temporarily withdrew the slogan of becoming an imperialist party.

7 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 7.

8 Ibid., pp. 286, 287.

9 The best propaganda and organizational forces of the party actively participated in the implementation of the party's military program. Thus, in Petrograd, the following actively participated: Y. M. Sverdlov, I. V. Stalin, M. I. Kalinin, F. E. Dzerzhinsky, N. I. Podvoysky, V. I. Nevsky, V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko, M. S. Kedrov, N. V. Krylenko; in Moscow-G. A. Usievich, V. P. Nogin, M. S. Olminsky, A. S. Bubnov, V. N. Podbelsky, E. M. Yaroslavsky; in Ukraine-F. A. Sergeev (Artem), M. L. Rukhimovich, E. I. Kviring, V. K. Averin, S. I. Gopner, V. P. Zatonsky; in Belarus -

page 5

the civil war. "We," Lenin pointed out, " reject this slogan for the time being, but only for the time being. The soldiers and workers now have weapons, not the capitalists. As long as the government doesn't start a war, we preach peacefully."10 The continuation of the previous policy would now be blankism, for the call for the overthrow of the Provisional Government, which at that time still relied on the support of the Soviets, that is, of the majority of the people, threatened the class-conscious proletariat with isolation and defeat. Lenin emphasized with all his might that calling for civil war before the masses understood its necessity was fraught with great danger. The party's policy, he pointed out, should be based on objective, not subjective conditions. "You can overthrow someone," Lenin pointed out, " who is known to the people as a rapist. But now there are no rapists, the soldiers have guns and guns, not the capitalists, the capitalists do not take them by violence now, but by deception, and it is impossible to shout about violence now, this is nonsense. " 11 The Party and the class-conscious proletarians were to conduct peaceful, prolonged and patient class propaganda .12
The removal of the slogan of turning the imperialist war into a civil war was connected with the correct definition of the forms of class struggle in the new conditions, dictated by the real situation. However, this not only did not negate, but, on the contrary, suggested the need for intensive formation of the armed forces of the revolutionary classes. This measure provided the proletariat with the greatest possible guarantee against being caught unawares if the bourgeoisie tried to use armed violence against it in the future. The party's course was aimed at preparing the working people for any form of confrontation with the bourgeoisie, at creating in the armed masses a force that would maximally restrain the bourgeoisie's aspirations to use armed violence against the people and thereby contribute to the development of the revolution in peaceful forms. History has shown the importance and necessity of these steps.

For the party's military activity after the overthrow of the autocracy, it was also of fundamental importance to remove the slogan of the defeat of "one's own" government in the imperialist war. "We," Lenin noted, "were defeatists under the tsar, but under Tsereteli and Chernov we were not defeatists." 13 In putting forward such a slogan before February, the party regarded it as an important means of accelerating the victory of the revolution. The overthrow of the monarchy, which was effectively promoted by the slogan of the defeat of tsarism, radically changed the situation. After the victory of the bourgeois - democratic revolution, dual power was established in the country, but the real force was on the side of the Soviets - the organs of power of the workers and peasants. Russia, which was the freest of all the belligerent countries, had exceptionally favorable conditions for moving towards a socialist revolution. In this historical situation, a military defeat could lead to the defeat of the revolution and the elimination of its gains. In order to achieve this goal, the Russian bourgeoisie may well have colluded with Kaiser Germany (as Thiers did in the case of the Paris Commune in alliance with Bismarck).

Now promoting the development of the revolution consisted in explaining

M. V. Frunze, A. F. Myasnikov, V. G. Knorin; in the Baltic States-I. V. Rabchinsky, Ya. Ya. Anvelt, V. E. Kingisepp, S. M. Nakhimson, Yu. K. Danishevsky, K. A. Gailis, S. M. Dimanstein; in the Volga region-V. P. Antonov, M. I. Vasiliev, S. K. Minin, V. A. Tikhomirnov; in the Urals - I. M. Malyshev, N. G. Tolmachev, F. I. Goloshchekin, S. M. Zwilling; in Siberia and the Far East - A. Ya. Neibut, P. P. Postyshev, N. N. Yakovlev, V. M. Kosarev, B. Z. Shumyatsky; in the Caucasus - S. G. Shaumyan, P. A. Shumyatsky. Dzhaparidze, S. M. Kirov, N. A. Anisimov and others.

10 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 351.

11 Ibid.

12 See ibid.

13 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 36, p. 114.

page 6

to the mass of conscientious "defencists" that it is necessary to transfer all power to the Soviets and thereby put an end to the criminal war and the suffering of the people. The Bolsheviks called on the soldiers to hold the front and do everything possible to achieve the establishment of the autocracy of the Soviets in the country. "This," Lenin explained, "is the tactic of defending the fatherland, not the fatherland of the Romanovs, Kerenskys, and Chernovs, the fatherland with secret treaties, the fatherland of the corrupt bourgeoisie, but the fatherland of the working masses." 14 The policy of defencism of the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries had completely different goals. It was aimed at strengthening the power of the bourgeoisie and supporting its policy of continuing the imperialist war. These parties called on the Konovalovs and Tereshchenko to defend the fatherland. Speaking for the firmness of the front, agitating the soldiers not to retreat a single step, 15 the Bolsheviks did not and could not corrupt the army, as the bourgeois and Socialist-Revolutionary-Menshevik press trumpeted. Lenin emphasized that this was precisely what Tsereteli and Chernov were doing, all those who declared the war of conquest "great" and drove naked, barefoot, hungry soldiers to the offensive in the name of the interests of the money bag .16 The Bolsheviks were opposed to the flight of soldiers from the front, isolated spontaneous actions, and disorganization of the army. "Where Bolshevism is able to speak openly," Lenin wrote, " there is no disorganization. Where there are no Bolsheviks or they are not allowed to speak, there are excesses, there is corruption, there are false Bolsheviks... The Bolsheviks do not call the proletariat, the poorest peasants, and all the working and exploited people to riots and riots, but to a conscious revolutionary struggle. " 17
In the face of Bolshevik-minded units within the old, decaying army, the nucleus of a new, revolutionary army was born - the most efficient and disciplined force, ready, together with the Proletarian Red Guard, to defend the revolution from internal and external enemies. The heroic resistance of Bolshevik-minded soldiers and sailors to the German offensive during the breakthrough at Tarnopol, during the defense of Riga, during the Battle of Moonsund clearly confirmed this against the background of the general disorganization and decomposition of the armed forces. The bourgeoisie viciously slandered the Bolsheviks, trying to present the Bolshevization of the army as its disintegration, and the party of the proletariat as an anti-national force that allegedly undermined the country's defense capability. In reality, it was the bourgeoisie, together with the compromisist parties, that by their anti-people policies were destroying the army and undermining the country's defense capability. Moreover, on the eve of the October Armed Uprising, it conspired with Anglo-French imperialism "to give St. Petersburg to the Germans and to stifle the Russian Revolution in this way."18 These black plans were thwarted only by the revolution of the workers and soldiers, which overthrew the power of the Russian Versaillese. The experience of Russia has once again confirmed that the bourgeoisie is ready to betray national interests without hesitation in order to protect its privileges. The cries about the disintegration of the army by the Bolsheviks served only as a cover for this betrayal.

The Bolsheviks, by working to attract the masses of soldiers to their side, by preparing the use of the army against the imperialist government of their country, were thereby undermining the main support of the bourgeoisie. At the same time, they created a new force in the face of the Red Guard and the soldiers and sailors who passed under the banner of Bolshevism, capable of defending the cause of the revolution and the true national interests. "Of course," Lenin wrote, " they are traitors to socialism,

14 Ibid., p. 103.

15 See ibid., pp. 103, 115.

16 See ibid., p. 115.

17 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 32, p. 256. 257.

18 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 34, p. 347.

page 7

The Scheidemanns and Kautskys of all nations have dismissed it with phrases about the disintegration of the army through Bolshevik agitation, but we are proud that we have done our duty by disintegrating the forces of our class enemy, by winning back the armed masses of workers and peasants from him to fight against the exploiters."19
In implementing its programmatic demand for universal arming of the people, the party paid great attention to the theoretical and practical aspects of this problem. Lenin constantly stressed that the task of universal arming the people for the proletariat stems from the need to smash and break the bourgeois apparatus of oppression and replace it with an armed organization of the working classes themselves. This is exactly what the new type of state that was emerging in Russia, the state in the "face of the Soviets," demanded. Lenin pointed out that the People's militia, as one of the organs of State power, would combine the functions of the people's army with the functions of an organ of state order and state administration. 20 The universality of the tasks of the armed workers ' organization was determined by the fact that it was intended to become the executive organ of the Soviets and, by virtue of its national character, to educate the masses to participate in all state affairs .21
In forming the political army of the revolution and its constituent part, the armed forces, the question of their class composition, of the practical realization of the alliance of the proletariat with the poorest strata of the peasantry and the entire exploited population, became of the greatest importance. Only under this condition could the armed forces consistently fight against the bourgeoisie. The petty-bourgeois strata, seized at first by the frenzy of defencism, were not yet able to support the proletariat in creating a military organization opposed to the bourgeoisie. This support began to be carried out in practice only when the petty bourgeoisie, convinced of the falsity of the policy of compromise with big capital, turned towards the proletariat and began to integrate its most class-conscious part into the military organization led by it.

If in the bourgeois-democratic revolutions the armed onslaught of the proletariat against the autocracy was supported by the entire peasantry, first of all by the soldiers, then at the stage of transition to the socialist revolution the former class grouping in the armed forces no longer corresponded to the new political goals. That is why Lenin, while still abroad, put forward the idea of universal arming of the people in the form of a proletarian militia. In his " Letters from Afar "(Letter 3: "On the Proletarian Militia"), he emphasized: "The proletariat must organize and arm all the poorest, exploited sections of the population, so that they themselves will take directly into their own hands the organs of State power, and form the institutions of this power themselves."22 . For Lenin, the leading role of the working class and its party in the construction of the proletarian militia was an axiom. Such a militia, he noted, would be a proletarian militia, "because the industrial and urban workers would just as naturally and inevitably gain a leading influence over the mass of the poor as they naturally and inevitably took a leading place in the entire revolutionary struggle of the people in 1905-1907 and in 1917." 23 Only the proletariat, headed by the Bolshevik Party, with its consciousness, self-control and organization, could and did give the new armed forces a high combat capability.

19 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 40, pp. 8-9.

20 See V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 42.

21 See ibid., p. 43.

22 Ibid., p. 40.

23 Ibid., p. 43.

page 8

During the period of dual power, the factory proletariat bore the brunt of building a new military organization; it was the first to take the initiative in creating detachments of the Proletarian militia and the Red Guard, and allocated for them its best, most active and loyal cadres. During this period, detachments of armed workers began to operate in many of the largest industrial centers of the country. By October, they were established in 586 cities and counties and united in their ranks more than 100 thousand fighters .24 The Red Guard detachments represented, in Lenin's words ,the germ of a new army, the cell of a new social system. 25 As the alliance of the working class with the poorest strata of the non-proletarian masses became more and more consolidated, the armed forces of the revolution also began to attract more and more advanced representatives of these, and later of the middle strata of the working people. The party's struggle for the realization of democratic tasks that are close and understandable to the non-proletarian strata of the working people played a huge role in this. The Bolsheviks attributed their decision to the victory of the proletariat.

The Party actively promoted the arming of the working people, daily pointing out through the press and oral agitation the need for arming, and directing its most active forces to lead the Red Guard detachments. Of particular importance were Lenin's demands that the workers ' militia should be paid by the capitalists, that the revolutionary initiative of the masses should be fully developed, that the Soviets and other organs of the working people should be used for this purpose, and that they should rely as much as possible on the advanced part of the soldiers in arming the workers. "Comrades workers," Lenin urged, " convince the peasants and all the people of the necessity of creating a general militia to replace the police and the old bureaucracy! Introduce such and only such a militia " 26 . Lenin denounced the defection of the Russian and Western European opportunists from the programmatic demand to replace the standing army with universal arming of the people. He described as treason to the working people's cause the fact that "the majority of official social-democrats in Europe and the majority of our Menshevik leaders have 'forgotten' or rejected the party's program, substituting chauvinism ('defencism') for internationalism and reformism for revolutionary tactics. "27 The conciliatory policy of the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries, who were then supreme in the Soviets, created enormous obstacles to the general arming of the working people. The" leaders " of the Soviets declared, in particular ,that with a revolutionary army there was no need to arm the proletariat, and referred to the shortage of weapons. 28 In reality, they were afraid of arming the proletariat, for this, as the experience of the 1905 revolution showed, greatly accelerated the army's transition to the side of the people. The Bolshevik Party acted over the heads of the defencist" leaders " of the Soviets or forced them to retreat under the pressure of the revolutionary initiative of the masses.

*

The course of the socialist revolution determined a qualitatively new approach of the Bolsheviks to the problem of liquidating the old army. The annexation of a part of the army to the revolutionary people in 1905 - 1907, and then of its vast majority in the February days of 1917, undermined and shattered the foundations of this stronghold of landowner and capitalist rule. But at the bourgeois - democratic stage of the revolution, there were

24 V. Verkhos. The Red Guard in the October Revolution, Moscow, 1976, p. 256.

25 See V. I. Lenin, PSS. Vol. 37, p. 295.

26 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 289.

27 Ibid., p. 287.

28 See ibid.

page 9

Only a few steps have been taken to bring about a democratic transformation in the military. The main and most difficult part of the task of breaking up the army was to be solved at the stage of the struggle for the victory of the dictatorship of the proletariat. The main reason is that only a socialist revolution could and should have broken the state bourgeois machine, including the army. The most difficult one was because the peasant, petty - bourgeois mass of soldiers, who by their social nature were inclined to vacillate between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, had to be roused to overthrow the power of capital. It was precisely this vacillation of the soldiers ' masses towards an agreement with the bourgeoisie that manifested itself with particular force after February under the banner of "revolutionary defencism." Soviets dominated by the peasantry, soldiers dominated, and the petty bourgeoisie prevailed. 29 Soviets that relied on the strength of armed soldiers and workers themselves ceded power to the bourgeoisie and tied themselves to its government .30 This created enormous obstacles to the army's recapturing of the democratic majority from the bourgeoisie and its disarming. No revolution has ever experienced such a complex and intricate interweaving of class forces.

However, the Bolshevik party managed to find the right way out of this situation. The success of its policy in the struggle for the army was ensured primarily by the fact that it strictly considered the fact that the ideas of "defencism" and confidence in the power of the bourgeoisie were widely spread among the soldiers, and did not go to the call for the immediate overthrow of the power of the Provisional Government until the necessary conditions were ripe for this. "The government," Lenin pointed out, "must be overthrown," but not everyone understands this correctly. If the power of the Provisional Government is based on the Soviet of Workers ' Deputies, then it is "simply" impossible to overthrow it. It can and should be overthrown by winning a majority in the Soviets."31 . The Party was clearly aware that ignoring the petty-bourgeois, defensive-minded masses of soldiers would be left-wing adventurism. They had to be enlightened, persuaded, organized, and transformed from a reserve of the bourgeoisie into an active factor in the revolution, into a multi-million-strong armed ally of the proletariat. The Bolsheviks, as a party of mass revolutionary struggle, followed precisely this path.

Lenin's tactics in dealing with the defensively inclined masses of soldiers were based on the fact that their class interests were directed against a criminal war and against the authorities that waged this war. That is why they could be separated from the bourgeoisie and united around the proletariat. The basis for such an association was the commonality of the fundamental interests of workers and soldiers. "The objective class position of the capitalists," Lenin said, " is one. They are fighting for themselves. Soldiers are proletarians and peasants. This is different. Do they have an interest in conquering Constantinople? No, their class interests are against the war! That's why they can be enlightened, persuaded. The highlight of the current political situation is to be able to explain the truth to the masses. " 32 First of all, the party was required to reveal to the millions of soldiers that even under the Provisional Government the war remained aggressive, inextricably linked with the interests of capital, and that it was impossible to end the war simply by sticking a bayonet into the ground. To do this, it is necessary to overthrow the power of capital. Emphasizing the great importance of this task in the struggle for the army, Lenin put forward in his April theses the demand:: "Organization of the broadest propaganda of this view in the active army" 33 .

29 See ibid., p. 137.

30 See ibid., p. 140.

31 Ibid., p. 244.

32 Ibid., p. 243.

33 Ibid., p. 114.

page 10

The political skill of the Leninist party manifested itself in the fact that, taking into account the peasant character of the army, it placed in the first place in propaganda among soldiers and sailors, along with questions of war and peace, other general democratic slogans (the elimination of landowners ' land ownership, the democratization of the army, the elimination of national oppression, the fight against famine and devastation, etc.). When they were resolved with the transfer of power to the proletariat, the party thereby dispelled the frenzy of defencism and gradually won over to the proletariat's side ever wider masses of soldiers. The success of the struggle for the army was largely determined by the fact that the Bolsheviks were able to organically combine the tasks of the democratic and proletarian revolution into one whole, subordinating the former to the latter. In the army, the party adopted a general tactic of fighting for the non-proletarian masses who had temporarily succumbed to the influence of the bourgeoisie. It consistently pursued a policy of breaking away the proletarian, internationalist elements from the compromising swamp, of rallying the soldiers ' strata of the poorest peasants around these elements, and thus creating the force that was designed to wrest the defensive-minded armed masses of the people from the influence of the bourgeoisie. The centers of consolidation of this power were the party organizations in the army, the Bolshevik factions in the soldiers ' Councils and committees.

The process of dividing class forces in the army was increasingly facilitated and accelerated by the imperialist war's ability to reveal the fundamental differences between the interests of the working people and the bourgeoisie. In the third year of the war, this property manifested itself with particular force. The front was starving. According to official data of the field commissariat, in April 1917, the troops received from half to one-third of the food ration .34 The material support of the army was in complete disarray. The bloody sacrifices of the people have reached unprecedented proportions. By the autumn of 1917, almost half of the more than 15 million conscripted soldiers had dropped out (killed, maimed, sick, and captured) .35 Such results involuntarily forced to think about the meaning and goals of the war, first of all, those who bore its main burden. Bolshevik propaganda, which revealed the causes of the national disaster and the ways out of it, therefore met with increasing support among the soldiers.

After February, qualitatively new conditions emerged in the army. In the course of the uprising against the autocracy, the soldiers ' majority united with the revolutionary people. The army, represented by this majority, has ceased to be a force opposed to the people. Thus, one of the main foundations on which the armed forces of any bourgeois state are based was destroyed. The bourgeoisie, full of hatred for the revolution, could not now commit armed violence against the masses. This factor opened up the widest possible opportunities for the development of the revolutionary movement both in the country and in the army. It allowed the workers and peasants to launch the most active offensive actions against the capitalists and landlords. "The peasants, soldiers, and workers, "Lenin wrote in Soldatskaya Pravda," are the vast majority in the state... No one can interfere with the majority if it is well organized( united, united), if it is conscious, if it is armed. " 36 The soldiers, uniting with the working people, first of all with the workers, received great help from them in the struggle for the elimination of the omnipotence of the officers and the democratization of the army, for peace and land. The destruction of the wall between the army and the people was especially important because of-

34 TSGVIA SSSR, f. 2003, op. 1, d. 530, l. 60.

35 Ibid., d. 1481, l. 77.

36 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 267.

page 11

I believe that it brought the soldiers ' movement closer to the proletarian movement, and opened up the widest possible opportunities for the working class and its party to influence the soldiers in a revolutionary way and to guide their struggle.

While the Milyukovs and Guchkovs, with the assistance of the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary parties, tried in every possible way to protect the soldiers from the people and prevent their unity, the Bolsheviks selflessly fought for their ever-increasing unity, seeing in this the sure path to the complete dismantling of the bourgeois army. "Soldiers! - Lenin urged. - Unite yourselves more firmly and more closely with the workers and peasants! Don't let armed force be taken out of your hands!"37 . Under this slogan, the party, breaking the sabotage of the compromisers, selflessly strengthened the bonds of brotherhood between the soldiers and the working people. Thanks to the efforts of the Bolsheviks, in 706 Soviets the soldiers united with the workers, in 235 Soviets-with the workers and peasants. Only 33 soldiers ' councils existed separately in 1917 .38 The Party consistently advocated the closest possible unification of the system of soldiers 'committees with the Soviet organization, the widest possible sending of workers' delegations to the front and soldiers 'delegations to the workers' centers, and solidarity actions of the working masses of the front and rear in the struggle against the bourgeoisie and the upper command of the army. The reactionary forces never succeeded in separating the soldiers from the people again, in isolating them from active participation in the turbulent maelstrom of political events between February and October. This circumstance played a crucial role in revolutionizing the army.

On the way to breaking up the former army, the problem of its democratization was brought to the fore. The necessity of this measure was justified by Lenin as early as 1905 on the basis of the experience of the mass soldiers ' movement that was then unfolding. But in 1905-1907, only the very first steps were made in this direction. The overthrow of the autocracy and the annexation of the vast majority of the army to the people in 1917 brought this problem to its full height and created exceptionally favorable conditions for its implementation. The unity of the soldiers with the workers, the transfer of armed forces into their hands, the creation in the army of a comprehensive system of democratic organizations closely connected with the Soviets of Workers 'and Peasants' Deputies, the extreme weakening of the power of the officers over the soldiers, and the deep class antagonism between them all testified that the ground for the democratization of the army The interests of strengthening the class struggle demanded that this process should be accelerated in every possible way, in inseparable connection with the general arming of the people. The Party regarded the democratization of the army as a transitional measure on the way to its complete dismantling, as an essential requirement of the general struggle for the democratization of the bourgeois state apparatus. This measure corresponded to the bourgeois-democratic stage of the revolution, when the necessary alignment of class forces for the realization of socialist goals was still lacking. In this regard, it was necessarily limited in nature, although at the same time it acted as a natural and necessary step on the way to the elimination of the armed bulwark of bourgeois power. "The task of democratizing the army, therefore, cannot be conceived by social-democracy as anything other than a temporary one, until the complete triumph of the revolution and the subsequent destruction of the standing army and its replacement by universal arming of the people and a national militia." 39
The essence of the democratization of the army was to limit as much as possible the power of the bourgeois-landowner command staff over the ar-

37 Ibid.

38 D. A. Chugaev. History of creation and consolidation of the Soviet State, Moscow, 1964, p. 10.

39 "The CPSU in resolutions and decisions of congresses, conferences and plenums of the Central Committee". Ed. 8-E. T. 1. Moscow 1970, p. 470.

page 12

in order to prevent the army from being used for anti-popular purposes, and to achieve an organization "that would actually allow the organized mass revolutionary will from below to oppose the counter-revolutionary tendencies from above" .40 The consistent implementation of the democratic reorganization of the old army ultimately led to its collapse, to the merging of the democratic strata of the army with the armed masses of the working people. In this way the party combined into one whole the two components of a single task: arming the exploited and disarming the exploiting classes.

The objective basis for the democratization of the bourgeois army was the enormous preponderance in its ranks of people from the working classes. The success of democratic reforms was determined by the correspondence of their essence to the interests of the democratic majority of the army and all working people. This vividly illustrates the birth of Order No. 1 of the Petrograd Soviet and its huge popularity among soldiers .41 The scale and depth of democratic changes in the army primarily depend on the consciousness and organization of the soldiers, and these factors are determined to a decisive extent by the strength of the links between the soldiers ' movement and the proletarian struggle. Therefore, the help of the working class to the soldiers, the political leadership of the proletarian party-this is the main condition for the success of the democratization of the army.

Since the democratic changes in the armed forces affected the main instrument of power of the bourgeoisie, the Bolshevik party faced particularly fierce opposition from capitalists, landlords and command staff in their implementation. The exploiting classes were well aware that their loss of power over the troops, or even a significant weakening of it, called into question their dominance in the country as a whole. The compromise parties also hastened to the aid of the bourgeoisie on this most important question. Their reformist concept was based on the fact that, since the revolution in Russia is bourgeois in nature, the leadership of the army should belong entirely to the capitalists. Having temporarily found themselves at the head of the democratic soldiers 'organs, they did everything possible to weaken the soldiers' movement and turn it into an obedient appendage of the command tops. This created enormous difficulties in reorganizing the army on a democratic basis. However, the bloc of the bourgeoisie, the command staff, and the compromise parties never succeeded in restoring the army to pre-revolutionary conditions.

The only consistent fighter for the democratization of the army was the Bolshevik Party, because only it stood for the development and deepening of the revolution, and democratization was an integral part of such a process. This measure, when carried out consistently, opened up enormous opportunities for mobilizing the masses of soldiers to fight against the reactionary command elite, for ultimately overthrowing the power of the bourgeoisie and breaking its oppressive apparatus. Therefore, the democratization of the army has become one of the most important activities of the party at the stage of transition to the socialist revolution.

The Bolshevik program of democratization included the following basic requirements: elimination of the system of appointing commanders from above and blind subordination of soldiers to officers as the basis of all bourgeois armies; organization of troops on the principles of electivity, self-government and providing initiative from below: elimination of all restrictions on the general civil rights of soldiers; free access of military personnel

40 Ibid., p. 471.

41 For more information, see: E. S. Mikhailov. Order No. 1. "Questions of History" 1967 No. 2.

page 13

to participate in the political life of the country; full rapprochement and fusion of the army with the revolutionary people; introduction of elective command staff, soldiers 'control over the operational part; building all organizations in the troops on the basis of universal, equal, secret and direct suffrage, replacing appointed military officials with elected representatives, democratizing all institutions of a military nature, creating full-fledged soldiers' organizations. committees as representatives and defenders of the interests of the democratic majority of the army and leaders of the political life of the troops; the right to arrest and prosecute counter-revolutionary elements, and some other requirements 42 . All of them met the aspirations of the vast majority of soldiers. That was their strength.

During the February Revolution, the first step towards the democratization of the army was taken. The soldiers united with the people. The foundations of the old discipline were severely undermined. There was a split between the officers and the mass of soldiers. An irresistible movement for the creation of elected soldiers ' organizations was born in the troops. The Party has made every effort to expand and deepen this process. The Bolsheviks called for the immediate and universal organization of soldiers ' Soviets and committees and their closest association with the Soviets of Workers and Peasants. Lenin, while still in exile, in his Letters from Afar assessed the creation of such organizations in all strata of the working people as a task of "the first and most urgent importance." 43 In turn, the Bureau of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b) at the beginning of March 1917 categorically emphasized that it was necessary to "democratize the army in the rear and at the front with the election of company, battalion and other committees and superiors, guided by Order No. 1 of the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers 'Deputies"44 . It is important that the Bolsheviks went further than Order No. 1, demanding the introduction of elective command staff in the troops. Pravda45 and other party organs constantly called for the strengthening of soldiers ' committees, the expansion of their rights, and the strengthening of Bolshevik influence in them.

This line stood out in particular contrast to the backward policy of the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries. Under pressure from Guchkov and Co., they tried to stop Order No. 1, trying to limit its distribution only to the Petrograd Military District. But this soldier's manifesto became the property of the entire army. And this is the great merit of the Bolshevik Party, its press, local organizations, and all class-conscious workers. It was their efforts and example that gave a powerful impetus to democratic changes in the troops. The guarantee of democratization lay in the full development of the revolutionary amateur activity of soldiers and sailors. Only before their organized onslaught could the command elite give up power. Therefore, the Bolsheviks tirelessly roused the masses to act independently, to create their own organs and expand their power. The April conference of the party, emphasizing that the government supports counter-revolutionary agitation in the troops, organizes the command elite against the soldiers and proceeds to attempts to shoot workers, called for strengthening the alliance of soldiers with workers, seeking the unauthorized exercise of freedoms and the removal of counter-revolutionary authorities. The Conference demanded that the party members deepen their work within the Soviets and soldiers ' committees and increase their number.

42 " The CPSU in resolutions...", vol. 1, pp. 469-472; see V. I. Lenin's PSS, vol. 31, pp. 162, 164-165, 197-198, etc.

43 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 38.

44 Pravda, 10. III. 1917.

45 See Pravda, 1917, NN 5, 6, 7, 12, 14, 15, 25 etc.

page 14

to strengthen their strength by purging them of the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries by re-election and rallying the internationalist elements in them .46
Thanks to the revolutionary initiative of the soldiers, which the Bolsheviks actively supported, a system of revolutionary - democratic organizations-Soviets and committees - was formed everywhere in the troops during March-April 1917. Only in the active army, the number of committees reached almost 50 thousand, and the number of soldiers elected to them was about 300 thousand.47 No bourgeois army has experienced such a phenomenon since the Paris Commune. It showed how deeply the revolution had penetrated the old army, where the system of oppression and suppression of the "lower ranks" was manifested with particular cruelty. The apparatus of armed violence against workers was seriously broken. This success could only be credited to the Bolshevik Party, for it alone cleared the way for it and contributed to it in every possible way. The" government socialists "- the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries-were inevitably drawn into the process of creating soldiers ' Soviets and committees. In their hearts, they considered this phenomenon "evil", trying to eliminate it as quickly as possible. Raised on the crest of a wave by the lack of consciousness and political inexperience of the masses, the reformists headed the soldiers ' organizations only to behead them. This was openly stated by one of the defense leaders of the Petrograd Soviet: "Of course, committees are an abnormal phenomenon in the life of the army... There is no doubt that in the very near future the Russian army will be built on the same principles of autocracy and strict discipline... But evil for normal conditions was the only salvation given the situation of the army that the revolution received. " 48
However, it was not possible to bury the soldiers ' committees as planned by the compromisers. The mass of soldiers, with the strong support of the working class, led by the Bolshevik Party, defended them. But the compromise parties helped the commanding officers and the bourgeoisie to distort the essence of the soldiers ' organizations for a certain period of time, and to thoroughly emasculate their revolutionary content. They came out as allies of the Guchkovs and Denikins in attacking the political rights of the soldiers. When, on the initiative of the Bolsheviks, the creation of full-fledged soldiers ' organizations began in the rear and at the front in accordance with Order No. 1, the military Department and Stavka, with the assistance of the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary parties, urgently took countermeasures. They were well aware of the danger this movement posed to the foundations of the old army. Military orders No. 114 (March 4), No. 213 (April 16), No. 27 (May 8), Stavka's order No. 2137 (March 11), and its order No. 51 (March 30)followed49, the purpose of which was to put a rein on the soldiers ' committees. At the same time, the leaders of the defense industry even boasted that some of these documents were written by them .50 Since the committees could no longer be simply banned, the government and the generals tried to neutralize them as much as possible, to introduce them into the "legal" framework. The Stavka frankly demanded that the command staff "take the course of events into their own hands, and not helplessly face the phenomena that have been brought to life by a secret order" 51 .

The bourgeois authorities and reactionary commissars deprived the committees of the rights granted to them by Order No. 1, and sought to turn them into subsidiary, essentially powerless bodies, provided that they were properly regulated.-

46 See " The CPSU in Resolutions...", vol. 1, pp. 440-442.

47 The author's calculations based on materials from various sources.

48 "The people and the army". Ptgr. 1918, p. 62.

49 V. I. Miller. Soldiers ' Committees of the Russian Army in 1917 (Origin and initial period of activity). Moscow, 1974, pp. 73-115.

50 "Delo naroda", 21. V. 1917.

51 TSGVIA SSSR, f. 2087, op. 1, d. 1, l. 22.

page 15

their superiors. The task of the committees was only to assist the command staff in raising the army's combat capability and strengthening the old discipline, to monitor economic activities, conduct cultural and educational work, and so on.To ensure this line, officers were introduced to committees at all levels. Only on the Western and South-Western Fronts, more than 16 thousand officers and military officials (for 130 thousand soldiers)were included in the soldiers ' bodies52 . The compromise parties zealously assisted the implementation of the cadet - general course in relation to soldiers ' organizations. Their "contribution" to efforts to curb soldiers ' organizations is reflected in the Declaration of the Rights of the Soldier. It was prepared by the" leaders " of the Soviets, and Kerensky, the Minister of War, put it into effect in May 1917. A comparison of the declaration with Order No. 1 shows the depth of the treachery committed by the leaders of defencism against the soldiers ' movement.

The Bolsheviks daily exposed in the press and through oral agitation the policy of the command and the complicity of the compromising parties, and advocated the transformation of the soldiers ' committees into genuine representatives of the interests of the democratic majority of the army. "Only then," wrote Pravda, " when the weapons are in the hands of the soldiers, when these soldiers will be organized and will have their representation in the face of company, battalion and other committees; when officers will be chosen; when the head of the army will be people loyal to the revolution, and not the servants of the overthrown regime; when the soldiers are able to enjoy general civil rights, and when, in particular, there is freedom of agitation in the army, only then can the revolutionary army and the people expect that any attempt to turn the army into a tool in the hands of the enemies of the revolution, in the hands of the supporters of the old regime, will be shattered to smithereens."53 The Conference of Bolshevik Military Organizations (June 1917), on behalf of the entire party, denounced the anti-democratism of the "Declaration of the Rights of the Soldier", calling it a declaration of disenfranchisement. Reducing to zero the ability of soldiers to exercise their rights, granting superiors the right to use weapons against soldiers, prohibiting the election of commanders - these and other restrictions, the conference said, contradict the basic principles of democratization of the army. The Party demanded the repeal of the Kerensky Declaration and the elaboration of a truly democratic declaration. 54
Committees, especially grassroots ones, did not follow the instructions of the Stavka and the military Department everywhere and far from everything. Under the pressure of soldiers, they were often forced to take the side of the lower ranks, against the officers. Thus, the Congress of deputies of the armies and rear of the Western Front (April 1917), in the "Draft charter of the Western Front" adopted by it, abolished officer ranks, granted committees the right to control the combat training of units and the conduct of combat, the withdrawal and certification of command personnel, etc. The bid, having received this document, was enraged. "The project," she told the Minister of War, "is aimed at destroying the army." 55 The general staff was even more angered by the charter adopted by the Central Board, according to which, without its approval, any order on the fleet was considered invalid. 56 The revolutionary activity of the committees was directly dependent on the influence of the Bolsheviks on them. Soldiers 'and sailors' organizations of the Baltic Fleet were the most persistent in the fight against reaction.-

52 Ibid., f. 366, op. 2, d. 72, ll. 93-94; "Voice of the Front", 1. X. 1917

53 Pravda, 22. III. 1917.

54 See " The CPSU in Resolutions...", vol. 1, p. 472.

55 TSGVIA USSR, f. 336, op. 1, d. 583, ll. 16, 131.

56 See "Protocols and resolutions of the Central Committee of the Baltic Fleet" Moscow-L. 1963, p. 436.

page 16

other units of the rear garrisons, Latvian regiments, and a number of other units of the Northern and Western Fronts. Attempts by the command elite and the government to squeeze the committees into the Procrustean bed of orders written in the handwriting of tsarist generals did not lead to the desired goal. In the popular phrase of the soldiers, these orders and regulations gave "more than a little". In the trenches and barracks, the Bolsheviks ' call to act according to the revolutionary law, and not according to Tuchkov's instructions, was met with an increasing response. This is exactly what the ship committees of a number of Baltic Fleet ships, the committees of Latvian regiments and other revolutionary-minded units did.

In 1917, already at the first stage of the revolution, the soldiers ' committees, as N. V. Krylenko rightly emphasized, bore on their shoulders "the struggle for a broad democratization of the spirit of the army, expanded, and sometimes even completely broke the narrow framework of the Alexeyev and Tuchkov charters, and in some places managed to replace them with a truly democratic organization."57 Their merit was that during the period of dual power, with the support of all the revolutionary forces, they prevented the Kornilov and Denikin from using the army against the people. However, it still required heroic agitation and organizational efforts of the party, the sad experience of the June offensive, the July reaction, and the Kornilov mutiny, for the soldiers ' committees to be able to throw off the burden of compromise, break the shackles of Tuchkov, and become truly revolutionary organs of the masses. After the abolition of the dual power, when the top generals launched a frenzied persecution of the committees, demanding their destruction, the Bolshevik party sounded the alarm. Denouncing the Socialist-Revolutionary and Menshevik leaders for their servitude to the Kornilov generals, Rabochy I Soldat, the central organ of the Bolsheviks, emphasized in its article "March on the Army" that the counter-revolution cannot tolerate the soldiers ' elected bodies in the army, because they prevent it from turning the army into a blind instrument of reaction. "And if from below," the newspaper emphasized,"the soldiers do not say' hands off! 'the committees will perish." 58
The rapid Bolshevization of the committees, which began after the defeat of the Kornilov regime, inspired them, as well as the Soviets, with enormous new forces, opened up their revolutionary capabilities, thanks to which the struggle for the democratization of the army immediately rose to a qualitatively new level.

The most important principle of democratization of the army was considered by the party to be the election of the command staff. It was this measure that struck the most sensitive nerve in the power of the capitalists and landlords over the army. Only by limiting and then destroying this power in every possible way could the army acquire a truly democratic character. Therefore, when asked whether officers should be chosen by soldiers, Lenin replied: "Not only must one choose, but every step of an officer and a general must be checked by special electors from soldiers." 59 And when asked whether the removal of reactionary bosses by soldiers was useful, he categorically emphasized: "It is useful and necessary in all respects." 60 Lenin's instructions were confirmed by the April Conference of the party and the All-Russian Conference of its Military Organizations61, they were propagated in the Bolshevik press, and were heard at soldiers ' meetings, meetings, and congresses.

Guided by the appeals of the Bolsheviks, and in many cases simply by class instinct, the democratic lower ranks of the army, even in the course of the uprising that overthrew the autocracy, dealt sensitive blows to the reactionary officers, especially in the Petrograd garrison and in the Soviet Union.

57 N. Krylenko. Why did the Russian revolutionary army run? Ptgr. 1917, p. 24.

58 "Worker and Soldier", 6 (19). VIII. 1917.

59 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 198.

60 Ibid., p. 199.

61 See " The CPSU in resolutions...", vol. 1, pp. 441, 471.

page 17

The Baltic Fleet. In the first months after February, the onslaught of the mass of soldiers against reactionaries in general's and officer's uniforms continued. Thus, in the Kazan Military District, only in the first few days of the February Revolution, more than 20 generals and about 150 colonels and lieutenant colonels were arrested and deposed .62 In the reserve units of the Western Front, from March to July 1917, 20 regimental commanders, 4 brigade chiefs, and 2 brigade chiefs of staff were removed from their posts; in the combat units of this Front, 18 generals, 12 colonels, and 5 other officer ranks were removed .63 The Provisional Government and Stavka understood that these actions of the soldiers were cutting off their power over the army at the root. Therefore, they went to extreme measures to nip "arbitrariness" in the bud. Stavka at the disposal of the fronts in April 1917 indicated: "In the armies, cases of forcible removal of commanders by self-appointed military committees are repeated. Many of them come to the Headquarters to find out their situation"; it was categorically suggested that the most decisive measures of "moral and official influence" should be taken to return the remote bosses to their places. "Otherwise," the Stavka emphasized, "an elective principle will actually be established, disastrous for the army." 64
Once again, the compromise parties came to the aid of the former tsarist generals. It was with their decisive cooperation that the revolutionary purge of the command elite was temporarily suspended. Lenin denounced the servility of the compromise leaders to the Russian Cavaignacs, their disbelief in the masses, and their fear of the revolutionary energy of the soldiers. He wrote: "Take the history of the democratization of the army in the Russian Revolution of 1917... and you will see at every step the clearest evidence of what has been said above. Without full confidence in the elected soldiers 'organizations, without absolute implementation of the principle of elective leadership by soldiers, it turned out that the Kornilovs, Kaledins and counter-revolutionary officers were at the head of the army." 65 The Kornilov elite of the army first helped the cadets put an end to dual power in July, and then began to act decisively to establish a military dictatorship in the country. The Kornilov plot opened the eyes of the mass of soldiers to the abyss into which the reactionary generals were pushing the country and the army, to the utter falsity of the sermons of the defencist parties about the unity of soldiers with officers. And the pressure of the lower classes on the Kornilov officers unfolded with new force. And the proletarian revolution helped bring this purge to an end.

The fierce confrontation between February and October revolved around the principle of unity between the army and the people. This was one of the initial conditions for democratization, the "air" without which it could not develop. The unity of the army with the people gave the mass of soldiers the main thing - support on the part of the proletariat against the bourgeois-landlord command leaders. First of all, it determined the strength of the onslaught of soldiers in the struggle for their rights and freedom. During the first Russian Revolution, when the autocracy largely managed to maintain the wall that separated soldiers from the people, the democratization of the armed forces was only able to take initial steps. February has thoroughly destroyed this wall, and the reaction, with all its efforts, has not been able to restore it. The first impulse of the bourgeoisie and tsarist generals after the collapse of tsarism was an attempt to drive the rebellious soldiers into barracks and otgo-

62 A.M. Andreev. Soldier masses of the garrisons of the Russian Army in the October Revolution, Moscow, 1975, p. 44.

63 TSGVIA SSSR, f. 2290, op. 4, d. 1, l. 255.

64 Ibid., f. 2286, op. 1, d. 284, l. 5; f. 366, op. 1, d. 3, ll. 98 - 100 101 - 102

65 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 34, pp. 204-205.

page 18

to give birth to a front from the rebellious rear of the country. But it turned out that this does not depend on them anymore. The revolution dealt a crushing blow to the slogan "The army is out of politics." In opposition to this, the Bolshevik Party put forward Lenin's slogan of the closest possible unification and fusion of the soldiers with the revolutionary people .66 "The most pressing question of the present revolutionary period," Pravda wrote in April 1917, " is the unity of the workers and the army, both at the front and in the rear. The united workers and soldiers overthrew the autocratic system. The unity between them must remain unshaken. Only under this condition will the revolution be brought to a victorious end. " 67 The Bolsheviks initiated and organized a powerful campaign of demonstrations, rallies, and meetings, in which soldiers participated shoulder to shoulder with workers. This campaign spanned the entire country and continued virtually until October (with the exception of the July reaction period). It was particularly pronounced during the April, June and July crises. Meetings and demonstrations, where the party was able to make its program of revolutionary transformation widely known, became an effective means of strengthening the alliance of workers and soldiers, their political education and organizational cohesion.

The bourgeoisie and the reactionary generals, seeing in this a deadly threat to the plans for restoring the old order in the troops, launched a vicious campaign of inciting the soldiers against the workers. They exposed the hungry and exhausted workers as the culprits of all the troubles that the comfrey workers had to endure. The reactionaries, Pravda wrote, "want at all costs to separate the soldiers from the workers, and for this purpose they are throwing into circulation various dark unverified rumors." 68 The Bolshevik Party called for the most decisive rebuff to provocateurs and instigators. On her initiative, numerous trips of workers 'delegations to the front and soldiers' delegations to cities were organized. So, only from Petrograd and only in connection with the delivery of May Day gifts, delegations from 60 enterprises of 69 countries left for various fronts . Many delegations were sent from Moscow, Kharkiv, Yekaterinoslav, Kostroma, Baku, and other cities. Enthusiastically received by the trench mass, they revealed the truth about the situation in the country, showed the true culprits of the people's disasters. Despite all the obstacles, many Bolsheviks made their way to the front in the delegations, who managed to explain to the soldiers Lenin's program of a revolutionary way out of the war, the conquest of peace, land and true freedom. The commanding leaders were seized with a fit of rage. Telegrams flew from the front lines: "8 delegates arrived from the workers of the Putilov and Baltic factories, who destroyed the fruits of our labors with their speeches to the soldiers"; "The arrival of delegates can bring nothing but harm"; 70 "As a result of the absolutely harmful anti-militaristic agitation of comrades sent by the executive committee of the Kharkiv Soviet of Workers' Deputies... In the army of the South-Western Front with gifts and literature, I ask, "the front commander informed the Petrograd Soviet," for their immediate recall. " 71
To strengthen the ties between the front and the rear, a counter stream of soldiers ' delegations was sent to the cities at the call of the Bolshevik military organizations. After reading the living conditions and the struggle of the workers for the interests of all workers, they published hundreds of angry speeches in the press. -

66 See V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, p. 267.

67 Pravda, 11 (24). IV. 1917.

68 Ibid.

69 "News of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers 'Deputies", 4. V. 1917.

70 TSGVIA SSSR, f. 2067, op. 1, d. 92, l. 179.

71 "The revolutionary movement in Russia in May-June 1917. The June demonstration". Documents and materials, Moscow, 1959, p. 333.

page 19

they denounced the provocative fictions of the bourgeoisie and declared solidarity with the working class. Her reaction strategy was a complete failure. The alliance between the soldiers and the workers was further strengthened, destroying the Milyukovs ' hopes of using the army against the people. Since the problem of democratization rested primarily on the political consciousness of the soldiers 'masses, it was impossible to count on its serious success where the soldiers trusted the "defense" parties and entrusted them with the leadership of their organizations, where the dark and unconscious masses tolerated the power of tsarist generals and officers - implacable enemies of revolutionary change. On the other hand, experience taught that where the revolutionary consciousness of soldiers and sailors was higher, the process of democratization developed more successfully, helping to unite the advanced part of the army around the conscious proletariat.

The necessity of introducing revolutionary consciousness into the peasant army was imperatively dictated, on the one hand, by the widespread spread of defencist ideas, and, on the other, by the formidable growth of spontaneous protest against the anti - people policy of the bourgeois government. The army, which from the first days of the revolution had been waiting for democratic changes, became increasingly convinced that the bourgeoisie, in a bloc with the Menshevik and Socialist - Revolutionary parties, was preparing to give it only one thing-the continuation of the war. In response to this policy, spontaneous soldiers ' uprisings broke out, threatening to waste the accumulated revolutionary energy in parts and ultimately the triumph of reaction. So, in May, there were major uprisings in the 172nd Division and the 7th Siberian Corps of the Southwestern Front and in the 163rd Division of the Romanian Front ; 72 in early June, in the Black Sea Fleet 73 . The spontaneity of the movement was especially pronounced where the Bolshevik influence was weaker. "In every district, in every quarter, in every factory, in every company," Lenin emphasized, "there must be a strong, friendly organization capable of acting as one person." 74 The construction of Bolshevik organizations in the army was put forward as a primary and decisive task in democratizing the army and winning it back from the ruling classes. In the person of the "military enlistment offices", the party created the apparatus by which the ideological and organizational influence of the proletarian vanguard was carried out in the army systematically and most effectively. This form of struggle for the masses of soldiers, first tested by our party during the revolution of 1905 and 1907, fully revealed its enormous potential during the struggle for the victory of the socialist revolution.

Taking advantage of the conditions of legal activity, the Bolsheviks launched after February the construction of their party organizations in the army on an unprecedented scale. By October, about 100 large garrison military organizations had been created in the rear 75 troops and hundreds of collectives on the fronts. In the Western Front area alone, on the eve of the October Armed Uprising, about 400 party collectives were active, the overwhelming majority of which were military .76 Front-line military organizations (without the Caucasian Front) numbered in their ranks by October about 50 thousand members and up to 40 thousand sympathizers .77 In 1917 the party managed to unite all this mass of corps, army, and front-line (regional) military organizations into a coherent system. Their activities were directed by the Central Committee and the Military Organization attached to the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b).

72 TSGVIA OF the USSR, f. 2067, op. 1, d. 92, ll. 49-53; TsGAOR OF the USSR, f. 1235, op. 78, d. 27, pl. 15-17.

73 "The revolutionary Movement in Russia in May-June 1917. The June demonstration", pp. 355-357.

74 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 31, pp. 337-338.

75 Author's calculations based on materials from various sources.

76 "October days and their preparation in the Western region". Minsk. 1918, p. 48.

77 The author's calculations based on the materials of archives and periodicals.

page 20

The basic principle of the construction and operation of military Bolshevik organizations was their closest connection with the all-Proletarian organizations of the party and the leadership of the "military enlistment offices" by the all-party committees and the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b). In its instructions to the places of the Central Committee of the Party, it constantly emphasized: "When building a military organization, keep in mind that it must be closely linked to the workers' organization. The personnel of a military organization is class-wise an element less receptive to the ideas of proletarian socialism. Close communication with workers is therefore extremely important. " 78 The entire period leading up to October is full of examples of how proletarian party organizations, especially in such large working-class centers as Petrograd, Moscow, Kharkov, Yekaterinoslav, Baku, Kiev, Ivanovo-Voznesensk, Revel, and others, under the general leadership of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b), provided constant assistance to soldiers in creating and strengthening military Bolshevik organizations. in overcoming the strong unifying sentiments at the front and effecting a split with the "defencists", in preventing the manifestation of petty-bourgeois revolutionism on the part of some military organizations, and attempts to rouse the soldiers to premature actions against the bourgeoisie.

The construction of an extensive network of military organizations and their outstanding success in their activities are primarily the result of the proletariat's enormous assistance to the soldiers. It was in the large industrial centers and on the fronts closest to them that the number and combat effectiveness of the military Bolshevik organizations proved to be the highest. Military organizations have carried out colossal ideological and organizational work in the army. At thousands of meetings, meetings, demonstrations, corps, army, and front-line congresses, and from the pages of the party press, the Bolsheviks tirelessly called on the soldiers to unite most closely with the working class, to fight back the counter-revolution in a joint organized manner, to strengthen the soldiers ' committees, to implement the electoral principle and other revolutionary measures.

The Bolshevik military newspapers, which the advanced workers helped to create, also played a crucial role in preparing the transition of the democratic majority of the army to the side of October. They organized mass fundraisers for publications for soldiers, and did their best to help distribute them in the army. So, the workers of Petrograd only from mid-April to May 8, 1917, contributed 12 thousand rubles to the fund of Soldatskaya Pravda, and in May only the workers of the Novy Lessner plant allocated about 34 thousand rubles for literature in the trenches. In this regard, Soldatskaya Pravda wrote on May 18: "Labor pennies flow plentifully into the newspaper's editorial office and offices, and if it were not for this broad participation of the workers, comrades soldiers, our Soldatskaya Pravda would not exist." Fees for the newspaper Rabochy I Soldat (Worker and Soldier), which the Military Organization attached to the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b) began publishing at the end of July 1917, for the first two weeks amounted to more than 20 thousand rubles. Donations to the newspaper were made by about 100 thousand people, including 57 working groups and 13 soldiers ' organizations . The idea of the workers 'and soldiers' union was already reflected in the very title of the newspaper, the first issue of which emphasized: "The revolution grew and grew stronger to the extent that the union of workers and soldiers grew and strengthened... Only such an alliance can serve as a guarantee of the victory of the revolution, a guarantee of the conquest and expansion of lost freedoms, a guarantee of the complete defeat of the counter-revolution. " 80 In June 1917, eight Bolshevik newspapers for soldiers were published with a circulation of over 100,000 copies .81 They were helped to fight

78 "Correspondence of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b) with local Party organizations", vol. 1, Moscow, 1957, pp. 42-43.

79 Pravda, issue V. L. 1929, p. XV.

80 "Worker and soldier", 23. VII. 1917. 81 Calculations of the author.

page 21

for the minds and hearts of the soldiers, dozens of all-party newspapers, headed by Pravda, were sent in large numbers to the trenches and barracks, carrying out the great work of political agitation and mass organization there.

The working class, led by the Bolsheviks, carried out the historic task of winning back millions of soldiers from February to October with great effort and using a wide variety of methods and forms of influencing the army. In October-November 1917, in the garrisons of the Central Industrial District, more than 74% of the soldiers followed the Party of the Proletariat, in the garrisons of the Petrograd district - more than 71%, on the Western Front - more than 66%, on the Baltic Fleet-60%, on the Northern Front - more than 56% 82 . This was one of the main factors in the triumph of the proletarian revolution. Lenin placed the revolutionary forces of the army, after the proletariat, in the second most important place among the three conditions for the victory of Bolshevism .83 On the eve of October, the Bolsheviks were able to rally half the army under their banner. This meant that by the time of the decisive battle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, the latter was unable to use its main instrument of power. Lenin emphasized that there could be no question of any resistance on the part of the army to the seizure of power by the proletariat .84 The struggle of the Bolshevik Party for the democratization of the army played a very important role in leading millions of soldiers and sailors to the socialist revolution, in ensuring a decisive preponderance of forces over the counter-revolution, and in the rapid and extremely bloodless victory of the October Armed Uprising.

Thus, by October, the party had managed to create a powerful armed force for the revolution and at the same time almost disarm the ruling classes. The armed bulwark of the revolution consisted of detachments of the Workers ' Red Guard, numbering more than 100 thousand people, and more than 3 million Bolshevik-minded sailors and soldiers, 85 closely united with the armed proletariat. In this union of armed proletarians and revolutionary soldiers and sailors, the alliance of the working class with the working peasantry for the overthrow of the dictatorship of the capitalists and landlords and the establishment of the power of the Soviets was most clearly embodied.

After the formation of the political army of the revolution and its fighting core, the revolutionary armed forces, had largely been completed in the context of the national crisis that had engulfed Russia by the autumn of 1917, the Bolshevik Party again placed the military question, the task of correctly using the armed forces of the revolutionary classes, in the forefront, and intensively developed the Marxist doctrine of armed insurrection On this basis, it develops on a huge scale military-technical preparations for the seizure of power by the proletariat. "History,"Lenin emphasized at the end of September 1917," has now made the military question a fundamental political question. " 86 In this way, the Leninist Party provided a model of correct attitude to the armed forms of class struggle, placing them on the order of the day only when the armed forces of the revolution were guaranteed the support of the broadest masses of the working people. In contrast to Blanquism, the petty-bourgeois left-wing adventurism, the Bolshevik party, as a party of scientific communism, consistently assumed that the victory of the insurrection was secured primarily by the support of the insurrection

82 Calculations of the author based on the materials of archives and periodicals.

83 See V. I. Lenin, PSS. Vol. 40, p. 10.

84 See ibid.

85 This figure follows from the conclusion that the Bolsheviks conquered half of the army (see V. I. Lenin's PSS. vol. 40, p. 4). 9), whose number by October 1917 was approximately 7 million people.

86 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 34, p. 264.

page 22

the majority of the people. And when this condition was present, Lenin put forward the slogan: "The Bolsheviks must take power." In mid-September 1917, he stated:: "Behind us is the majority of the class, the vanguard of the revolution, the vanguard of the people, capable of captivating the masses. We have the majority of the people behind us... We have a sure victory"87 . Thus, with reference to the specific conditions of the development of the revolutionary movement in Russia, the party leader formulated one of the most important propositions of the Marxist doctrine of insurrection - the question of the determining role of socio-political factors and their maturity for the success of an armed insurrection.

Behind the party stood the multi-million-strong army of the socialist revolution, ideologically ready to go on the assault. It turned its eyes to the Bolsheviks, waiting for them to organize their forces and plan a decisive battle. The course of events assigned the party the role of military leader of the working people. The center of gravity of the Bolsheviks ' military activity shifted to the problem of the correct use of the armed forces, to the development and propaganda of the laws of armed insurrection among the masses, although attention also continued to the issues of ideological and political training of combat forces. Lenin, with his characteristic passion, exposed the vicious lie of the Opportunist Parties that treating insurrection as an art is "blankism," defended the Marxist doctrine of insurrection from opportunist perversions and raised it to a new level. The great merit of the party leader was his justification of the socio-political factors that determine the victory of the proletariat in an armed uprising. He pointed out that in order for an insurrection to be successful, it must meet three main conditions: first, it must rely not on a conspiracy, not on a party, but on the advanced class; second, it must rely on the revolutionary upsurge of the people; and third, it must rely on the turning point of the growing revolution, when the greatest fluctuations in the political situation are the ranks of her enemies and half-hearted, indecisive fellow travelers 88 .

Having shown and proved by the cardinal facts of reality that all these conditions are present in Russia, Lenin called the party to action. He put before the Central Committee the question of the plan for an armed insurrection and gave its initial rough outline: without losing a moment, create an insurrection headquarters, distribute forces, move a shock force - the Workers ' Red Guard, as well as the most loyal regiments-to the most important points of the struggle, establish reliable communication between them and the headquarters, block access to the decisive points the enemy's reserves, seize first of all the telegraph, telephone and other strategic objects, arrest the General Staff and the government 89 . All the main points of this plan were embodied in the October armed Uprising. In his published writings and letters, Lenin agitated for the insurrection with his characteristic energy; on the basis of an accurate account of the changing situation, he deepened, expanded, and detailed the plan of the insurrection; he fought against those who sowed constitutional illusions and opposed the immediate seizure of power, and for waiting for the Congress of Soviets. In his work Soviets of an Outsider, Lenin explained that armed insurrection is a special kind of political struggle, subject to special laws that must be strictly taken into account. He emphasized the following commandments: 1) never play with an insurrection, but, having started it, go to the end; 2) gather a large preponderance of forces in a decisive place, at a decisive moment, otherwise the enemy, who has the best training and organization, will destroy the rebels; 3) having started an insurrection, act with the greatest determination and, of course, go on the offensive; defense - the death of an armed uprising; 4) try to take the enemy by surprise, catching the moment while his troops are scattered; 5) daily,

87 Ibid., p. 244.

88 See ibid., pp. 242-243.

89 See ibid., p. 247.

page 23

hourly (if we are talking about one city) to achieve success, maintaining a moral advantage over the enemy 90 .

The strategy of Lenin's plan for armed insurrection was based on an analysis of the alignment of class forces, taking into account the vanguard role of the proletariat in the revolution, and the strength of its ties in the crucial areas of struggle with the non-proletarian strata of the working people, primarily with the revolutionary soldiers and sailors. The Bolsheviks, Lenin noted, had a gigantic majority of the proletariat behind them on the eve of the uprising .91 Its main forces were concentrated in the Petrograd and Moscow industrial districts, and the most hardened, combat-ready, organized part - in both capitals .92 But Petrograd and Moscow were also the centers of the capitalist state machine. Here were the bourgeois government and other most important state bodies. Here the vanguard forces of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie stood face to face. So, naturally, it was Petrograd and Moscow that occupied the central place in Lenin's plan of armed insurrection, and it was there that the main blow to the counter-revolution was planned.

However, while preparing an uprising, the party could not take Petrograd and Moscow in isolation from the rest of the country, especially those closest to the capitals. The experience of the Paris Commune in its struggle against the superior detachments of the Versaillese was not forgotten. In this regard, the role of the armed forces, first of all, the Baltic Fleet closest to Petrograd and Moscow, the Northern and Western Fronts, where the Bolsheviks had an overwhelming advantage, was put forward in one of the first places. The most important aspect of Lenin's plan was the simultaneous attack on the centers of bourgeois power in both capitals. This made it possible at once and to the maximum extent possible to disorganize the counter-revolution in the main direction, to break its united front, to defeat the enemy in parts, to seize state power and immediately use it against the bourgeoisie in order to win over new strata of the non-proletarian masses to the side of the revolution.

Concluding his work "The Crisis is Ripe," Lenin wrote:: "The victory of the insurrection is now assured to the Bolsheviks: 1) we can (if we do not "wait" for the Soviet Congress) strike suddenly and from three points: from St. Petersburg, from Moscow, and from the Baltic Fleet; 2) we have slogans that guarantee our support: down with the government, which is suppressing the peasant uprising against the landlords! 3) we are in the majority in the country; 4) the collapse of the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries is complete; 5) we have the technical ability to take power in Moscow (which could even begin to surprise the enemy); 6) we have thousands of armed workers and soldiers in St. Petersburg, who can immediately take the Winter Palace, and the General Staff, the telephone exchange, and all the big printing houses; we can't get us out of there, and the agitation in the army will be such that it will be impossible to fight this government of peace, peasant land, etc. If we struck at once, suddenly, from three points, in St. Petersburg, in Moscow, in the Baltic Sea ninety-nine hundredths for the fact that we will win with fewer casualties than on July 3-5, because the troops will not go against the government of the world. " 93
In the course of the preparation of the insurrection, the starting points of the Leninist plan were developed and refined; the role of the forces that were to act together with the workers and soldiers of both capitals was determined. At the beginning of October 1917, Lenin concluded that the fate of the workers 'and soldiers' insurrection would be decided in Petrograd and the surrounding area, although the Central Government still played a crucial role.-

90 See ibid., pp. 382-383.

91 See V. I. Lenin, PSS. vol. 40, p. 5.

92 See " Russia in the World War of 1914-1918 (in figures)", Moscow, 1925, p. 72.

93 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 34. pp. 281-282.

page 24

industrial district headed by Moscow. The Baltic Fleet and the revolutionary troops in Finland were to provide direct armed support to the Petrograd uprising, and the revolutionary garrisons and workers of the Moscow region were to provide direct armed support to the uprising in Moscow. At the same time, these units were tasked with creating two defensive rings around Petrograd and Moscow, together with the rear garrisons and Red Guard detachments of the districts adjacent to the capitals (especially between the capitals and the front), against the possible approach of troops loyal to the government from the front. The revolutionary soldiers of the Northern and Western Fronts closest to the capitals were to hold the Kornilov troops in place and prevent them from reaching the main centers of the uprising, and if necessary, directly support the rebels. The choice of the moment when the armed forces of the revolution should move to a decisive assault on the power of the bourgeoisie was a brilliant example of the Bolshevik Party's military skill. This choice was determined by Lenin on the basis of a deep and comprehensive analysis of the state of the opposing class camps, as well as the international situation. Lenin's plan for an armed insurrection is an outstanding contribution to the development of the party's military program and to the victory of the socialist revolution. This plan formulated the main tasks and directions of the upcoming struggle, determining the place of each of the detachments of the army of the revolution. It became a powerful accelerator of the enormous and purposeful activity of the party in the military preparation of the insurrection, thanks to which the armed forces of the socialist revolution, with the support of the entire revolutionary people, were able to simultaneously and in an organized manner deliver a crushing blow to the power of the bourgeoisie and win a quick and decisive victory in October 1917.

*

The course of development of the world revolutionary movement after October, both through its successes and temporary defeats, confirmed on an international scale the paramount importance of correctly taking military problems into account in the class struggle, and the universal significance of the main provisions of Lenin's military program for the international communist and labor movement. History has repeatedly shown that wherever the military problems of the revolution were underestimated, the working masses invariably paid the price with heavy sacrifices and defeats. On the other hand, the correct policy of the communist parties in the military field, based on the creative use of the experience of Bolshevism, largely contributed to the success of the people's democratic and socialist revolutions in a number of countries in Europe, Asia and Cuba.

At the present stage, when the military machine of imperialism is still being used to suppress the revolutionary and national liberation movement in many parts of the world, Lenin's military program of the revolution continues to remain relevant. At the same time, the change in the balance of power on the world stage in favor of socialism opens up ever greater opportunities for the transition of peoples to a socialist social system, both in a peaceful and non-peaceful way. Despite all possible forms of revolutions and the enormous growth of militarism, the revolutionary forces of our time still face the task of winning back the democratic strata of the army, creating the armed forces of the revolution, and preparing the working people for any form of class struggle. As the experience of history teaches, this is one of the primary conditions for ensuring both a peaceful and non-peaceful transition of power to the working people, a reliable guarantee for protecting the revolution from attempts by the bourgeoisie to defeat it by armed means.

page 25

Permanent link to this publication: