No Communists in 1917

The year is 1917. Karensky is head of the Provisional Government of post-Czarist Russia. October is fast approaching, and then ZOOM! There it goes. No Lenin. No Stalin. No Trotsky. No Zinoviev. Why? Because in 1818 Karl Marx's mother was shoved down the stairs and her pregnancy aborted, that's why.

So....what happens with the Russian Revolution? Does Civil War still break out, or is it butterflied away because the illegal coup by the Bolsheviks never happens? Do the Romanovs live quiet lives in Tsarskoe Selo until a military coup brings them back for a glorious 11 minutes before they're ousted by raging fascists?
 
The year is 1917. Karensky is head of the Provisional Government of post-Czarist Russia. October is fast approaching, and then ZOOM! There it goes. No Lenin. No Stalin. No Trotsky. No Zinoviev. Why? Because in 1818 Karl Marx's mother was shoved down the stairs and her pregnancy aborted, that's why.

So....what happens with the Russian Revolution? Does Civil War still break out, or is it butterflied away because the illegal coup by the Bolsheviks never happens? Do the Romanovs live quiet lives in Tsarskoe Selo until a military coup brings them back for a glorious 11 minutes before they're ousted by raging fascists?

1. No Marx = no SDs and no SRs either
2. All revolutions therefore must be quite "bourgeois"
3. Which means that the peasants are still unhappy but have no clear ideology, which means random revolts
4. Which could well mean reliance by Parliament on the military
5. Who on average tend to be reactionary bastards at the time.

= Military dictatorship of some sort.
 
The year is 1917. Karensky is head of the Provisional Government of post-Czarist Russia. October is fast approaching, and then ZOOM! There it goes. No Lenin. No Stalin. No Trotsky. No Zinoviev. Why? Because in 1818 Karl Marx's mother was shoved down the stairs and her pregnancy aborted, that's why.

So....what happens with the Russian Revolution? Does Civil War still break out, or is it butterflied away because the illegal coup by the Bolsheviks never happens? Do the Romanovs live quiet lives in Tsarskoe Selo until a military coup brings them back for a glorious 11 minutes before they're ousted by raging fascists?

It is likely that there still will be revolutionary strains comparable to communism though. But assuming that they are still quite foetal at the moment it is not certain that the provisional government will restore the monarchy.

I would suggest that the Russian Republic/Restored Monarchy will not be a very successful state. Without the sheer brutality backed with an extremist murderous ideology it is not certain that Russia will undergo the massive industrialisation of Stalin and the USSR. Any attempts at reform and progress will likely be limited and thwarted by seperatist movements and public discontent. There is a chance it will be beset by coups and instability.

Come WW2 Germany will likely overrun it (though in the absence of communism will Hitler even rise to power).
 
I can imagine civil war by 1920 at the absolute latest. More than likely, Japan would push for lands won by Russia by the Treaty of Ainur and the expansion of Manchuria to the North. Without Communism, you don't get the Bavarian Revolution in Germany, and so Nazi ideology (if it exists at all) would look less towards Russia as an ideological enemy and you may or may not get the same Hitler if you get him at all.

The civil war would likely see the realization of some sort of independent Ukrainian, Kazakh, and Caucasian states. Then with the ongoing civil war (possibly lasting right up to 1935 or later) you definitely would see the intellectuals either looking to restore the monarchy in some capacity as a sign of Russian unity, or you get fascists modeling their government on Italy's (with notable changes such as Orthodoxy being the state religion rather than Catholicism). Things settle down by 1940 under a fascist regime in Moscow (or even St. Petersburg) backed by the Tsar (who holds little to no real power) and a revanchist government seeking to reclaim the Baltic, Poland, Ukraine, and Trans-Caucasus and anything else that tried to break away. WWI more than likely ends later and you have a repeat of the 1905 Russo-Japanese War over Japan's incursion into the Russian Far East.

But now I'm rambling and should put down the Strongbow.
 
The year is 1917. Karensky is head of the Provisional Government of post-Czarist Russia. October is fast approaching, and then ZOOM! There it goes. No Lenin. No Stalin. No Trotsky. No Zinoviev. Why? Because in 1818 Karl Marx's mother was shoved down the stairs and her pregnancy aborted, that's why.

So....what happens with the Russian Revolution? Does Civil War still break out, or is it butterflied away because the illegal coup by the Bolsheviks never happens? Do the Romanovs live quiet lives in Tsarskoe Selo until a military coup brings them back for a glorious 11 minutes before they're ousted by raging fascists?

Contrary to what you might think, Marx was not the creator of socialism. He's only it's most famous exponent. Had he not lived, Engels would have still developed a similar body of work, though without much of Marx's nuance. And Mikhail Bakunin, Proudhon, Lasalle and many other socialist thinkers who were Marx's contemporaries would have still lived.

The development of socialist groups had very little to do with Marxist intellectuals or Marxism. Socialism is a natural product of the conditions that capitalism imposes on working people. The ideology will exist in some form, and will likely still exist in Russia, with much of the same exponents, like Kerensky, Lenin, Trotsky, Bukharin etc.

But anyway, excising Marx from the socialist tradition is no easy task, so I can't begin to comprehend the nuances of what would happen. But it is highly likely that in spite of the changes in flavor, the events of the Russian Revolution would follow a very similar path with or without Marx's theoretical contributions.
 

yourworstnightmare

Banned
Donor
There would probably be other forms of socialism, Marx was not the creator of socialism. No marxist socialism could even be very interresting.
 
I don't know if the rest where less socialist. Some might have been, some less so. The main difference was that Lenin and his bunch where the strongest opponents to the war (and more effective/ruthless because they won). So the other groups stay in the war.

The outcome is AH in it's own right, I don't dare speculate so I ask the board. However, Pips claim that just hanging in would save Russia and put them better of.
 
I don't know if the rest where less socialist. Some might have been, some less so.
October 1917 wasn't a "Bolshevist" revolution, as claimed by many half-assed sources. Big fraction of Socialist Revolutionaries (Left SRs) joined in, as well as different anarchist and anarcho-syndicalist groups. It would be safe to say that all groups as socialist as (or more socialist then) Lenin's Bolshviks joined the revolution, and everyone who opposed it were less red.

The main difference was that Lenin and his bunch where the strongest opponents to the war
Nope, they were the ones who had strong party organization ("Order of Sword Brothers" in Lenin's own words) to take power in collapsing state and keep it.
 
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