Saving Soviet Democracy: A Russian Revolution Timeline
by GiantMonkeyMan
Chapter 1:
It is with a sense of slight irony that both Tsar Nicolas II and the central figure of the revolutionary Bolsheviks, Vladimir Lenin, reacted somewhat similarly to the events of the February Revolution. Nicholas had taken it upon himself to command the war effort from the headquarters in Mogilev but he was as distant and blind to the front as he was to the deteriorating conditions amongst the Russian populace and, upon receiving news of chaos in the capital from his Chamberlain on the eve of the February uprising, simply said, "That fat fellow Rodzianko has again written to me with all kinds of nonsense, which I shan't even bother to answer". Lenin, upon hearing the news of the February uprising proclaimed to his wife Nadezhda Krupskaya in their exile in Switzerland, "It's staggering! It's so incredibly unexpected!". The events, which seem so obvious in hindsight, took nearly everyone by surprise.
Both individuals tried to return to the capital as soon as they understood the news but only Lenin would be successful. The Tsar would find his decorated, gold-leafed, train diverted away from St Petersburg first for his own safety and then out of political convenience. He would spend the time after his abdication a living metaphor of his failed governance, unable to even return to his palaces for fear of what his presence might inspire in the populace. In bursts of revolutionary fervour, the workers and peasants across the Russian Empire would tear down the symbols of Tsarism, burn his portraits and topple his statues but he remained in a comfortable existence, still waited upon by loyal servants and attended by various sycophants.
The path back to Russia for exiled revolutionaries was less glamorous. Leon Trotsky, in exile in New York, attempted to get passage back on a ship via Canada. The British Government, keen to keep Russia in the war and thus occupy Germany on multiple fronts, arrested Trotsky as a 'pro-German' and absconded with him to a prisoner of war camp at Amherst where, according to his wife Natalia Sedova, he "kept speaking to the interned workers and sailors about the significance of the Russian Revolution. The prisoners took to him at once, which led to continuous conflict with the British officers". Miliukov and the other ministers of the self-appointed Provisional Government tried their best to keep the internationalist socialists from ever returning and upsetting the balance of power. Only continued pressure allowed the former Chairman of the 1905 Soviet to return - already the Provisional Government was powerless to the Soviet.
Nikolai Bukharin, who had also been in New York with Trotsky, returned on a more circuitous route, journeying across the United States and then taking passage across the Pacific. He was detained briefly in Japan where the authorities were unsure of what to do with a open revolutionary but eventually he made it to Vladivostock. The authorities of the area, controlled mainly by Mensheviks, arrested him on the grounds of 'internationalist agitation amongst the soldiers' but he would eventually be freed to begin his journey across the breadth of Russia on the Trans-Siberian Railway to the his old arena of struggle in Moscow. Victor Serge spent the opening months following the revolution in the midst of a general strike in Barcelona. Very much inspired by the events of Russia, the trade unions in Catalonia were calmly discussing the deposing of the monarchy where months before they were struggling to increase membership. Rebellion broke out in August of 1917 but was crushed after the massacre of hundreds of workers and Serge, and most of the other Russian exiles in Spain, attempted to return to their homeland through France.
The French Government, mirroring their British allies, did all they could to prevent undesirable Russian revolutionaries from returning. They had had their own sparks of rebellion with mutiny in Champagne and increasingly militant strikes and were doing all they could to prevent the collapse of their military ambitions. Serge even attempted to join the Foreign Legion, who had promised to take a force of Russian exile volunteers back to Russia to fight on the front, but to no avail. Like many, he was known to the French state for his views and all of the Allies were working in concert to prevent any Lenins or Trotskys disrupting the war effort in the East. Soon, Serge and the other Russian revolutionaries were seized from their Paris abodes and taken to a concentration camp in Sarthe. Eventually, after suffering near-starvation in the camps, Serge and his comrades were traded in a negotiated deal for some members of the French military mission in 1919.
Within Russia many anti-Tsarists and revolutionaries found themselves liberated upon the February Revolution. Kamenev, Sverdlov, Stalin and other Bolsheviks who had been forced into internal exile in remote corners of Siberia found themselves part of an intoxicated tide of revolutionaries drifting away from their former prisons back to the West and the centre of politics. Maria Spiridonova, the Social Revolutionary assassin who had been imprisoned in Siberia for a good eleven years, likewise found herself suddenly liberated. Such was the mood all across Russia that the local people of Chita elected her Mayor. Her first act: to blow up the prisons.
The exiles in Zurich were desperate to return, to make their mark on history, even as nearly all safe means were denied of them. The Menshevik Julius Martov attempted to contact the British Government and request to be allowed to return by ship but he was promptly denied. Lenin even fantasised about taking an aeroplane and flying over the front but such thoughts could only be entertained during the sleepless dark of night. Eventually Martov concocted a plan through an intermediary in the former social democrat, Alexander Parvus. A Russian-born German, Parvus had been active in the revolution of 1905 but soon after turned to making money through the sale of arms and only remaining on the periphery of the revolutionary community. A stalwart supporter of German nationalism, he had previously concocted a plan to cause chaos in Russia by funding several strike movements in the industrial heartland but his efforts found little traction. His links, both with the Russian social democratic movement and the German government, meant he was well-placed to help the Swiss socialists negotiate a deal to exchange the Russian exiles for German prisoners.
By all accounts none of the Zimmerwaldists, as they were known for their participation in an international peace conference of socialists in the Swiss municipality, could be certain of the intentions of the German High Command and certainly none trusted the word of Parvus, although Swiss socialist Fritz Plattern was confident in the deal. The Russians would travel through Germany in a sealed train where they would then be transported to Sweden where they could cross the border to Finland. The train would not be literally 'sealed' but rather the passengers would be prevented from contacting any German citizen whilst travelling through the country. Lenin leapt at the opportunity but many of the other revolutionaries were more cautious. Eventually the Swiss social democrat Robert Grimm concluded that it was potentially a one time deal, convincing the Menshevik Martov and the Socialist-Revolutionary Mark Natanson to commit to the journey.
Karl Radek had stowed aboard the train in Switzerland with false papers declaring him an Austrian as the Germans refused to allow Polish revolutionaries through due to their occupation of Polish territory and their ambitions in that country and he had to hide amongst the luggage when German social democrats and trade unionists boarded the train in case they recognised him. The train quickly became seperated into political sections with the Bolsheviks having occupied the carriages closest to the locomotive, as if it would get them to the revolution faster, and the Internationalist Mensheviks occupying the rear carriages with the Socialist Revolutionaries between them and members of the Jewish Bund and various independent revolutionaries dispersed amongst them all. They were crowded on all sides by German officers. The German military kept a tight perimeter and there were times the Russians feared they were going to be transferred to a prison. Martov and Lenin argued tersely and bitterly, long time rivals they made uneasy neighbours, but Radek describes the moment the tension fell away when in Frankfurt "suddenly the cordon was broken, as German soldiers came rushing up to us. They had heard that Russian revolutionaries, who were in favour of peace, were travelling through. Each of them held a jug of beer in both hands. Excitedly they asked us whether and when peace was coming."
The prospect of international revolution suddenly became more concrete. Lenin, who had told a gathering of Swiss socialist students before they had departed that he doubted he would see socialism in his lifetime, suddenly became even more convinced of the necessity for the working class and the soviets to seize power and immediately end the war and it was hard for Natanson not to be swept up in his fervour. Mark Natanson was an old revolutionary who had been struggling against Tsarism and for the socialist movement all his life. A Lithuanian Jew, he had helped found workers organisations during his time as a student in St Petersburg in the 1870's, before becoming involved in the Narodnik movement and being forced in and out of prison by the Tsarist state for his politics. This was the second time he had returned to Russia from exile following a revolution having been exiled prior to the 1905 revolution where upon returning he had taken up a position on the Socialist-Revolutionary Party's Central Committee.
The revolutionaries were greeted by scores of their allies once they had reached Finland. Lenin was bursting with prodigious energy and his immediate response upon gathering with Kamenev was to lambast him, "What's this you're writing in Pravda?". Such was the greeting amongst old comrades. He was not alone in starting arguments with his fellow Party members. Martov was met by a delegation of Mensheviks and although their pleasantries were more cordial than Lenin's nonetheless the moment the conversation turned to politics their differences couldn't have been clearer. Martov was committed to establishing peace but many Mensheviks at this stage were dogmatically supporting the Provisional Government as the culmination of the bourgeois revolution, even in their execution of the war.
Nothing could be clearer to emphasise the break between the returning revolutionaries and their comrades at home than the scenes that played out at Finland Station in Petrograd. The Petrograd committee had arranged for the returning revolutionaries to be met by several thousand workers and soldiers and the Armoured Car division even displayed their vehicles in detail. Chkheidze, the Chairman of the Petrograd Soviet who was a Menshevik, came to meet Lenin who had been handed a bouquet of flowers which was cradled awkwardly in his arms. The old Menshevik greeted Lenin formally, if not warmly, and then concluding, "But – we think that the principal task of the revolutionary democracy is now the defence of the revolution from any encroachments either from within or from without. We consider that what this goal requires is not disunity, but the closing of the democratic ranks. We hope you will pursue these goals together with us." Chkheidze abruptly stopped speaking. Many of those gathered were dumbfounded by the conclusion of the speech, a tacit order for the Bolshevik leader to fall in line, but Lenin characteristically ignored him completely, turning away from the Soviet official to address the crowd.
"Dear comrades, soldiers, sailors, and workers! I am happy to greet in your persons the victorious Russian revolution, and greet you as the vanguard of the worldwide proletarian army. The piratical imperialist war is the beginning of civil war throughout Europe. The hour is not far distant when at the call of our comrade, Karl Liebknecht, the peoples will turn their arms against their own capitalist exploiters. The worldwide socialist revolution has already dawned. Germany is seething. Any day now the whole of European capitalism may crash. The Russian revolution accomplished by you has prepared the way and opened a new epoch. Long live the worldwide socialist revolution!"
---
Rodzianko telegraphed the tsar.
'The situation is serious.' His warning sped along the wires by the railway lines, across the hard countryside to Mogilev. 'There is anarchy in the capital. The government is paralysed. It is necessary immediately to entrust a person who enjoys the confidence of the country with the formation of a new government. Any delay is equivalent to death. I pray God that in this hour responsibility will not fall upon the sovereign.'
Nicholas did not reply.
The next morning Rodzianko tried again. 'The situation is growing worse. Measures must be adopted immediately, because tomorrow will be too late. The last hour has come when the fate of the fatherland and the dynasty is being decided.'
At the High Command headquarters, Count Vladimir Frederiks, Nicholas' imperial household minister, waited politely whilst his master read the message unspooling from the machine. 'That fat Rodzianko has written me some nonsense,' the tsar said at last, 'to which I will not even reply.'
- October: The Story of the Russian Revolution by China Mieville
The imperial police denounced us to the British, probably as being "pro-German". In Halifax, Nova Scotia, the military authorities, who understood nothing of the events in Russia and who had nothing to say except the inevitable "There's a war on", put us all under arrest, despite our protests, and though our papers were in order
- The Life and Death of Leon Trotsky by Victor Serge and Natalia Sedova Trotsky
A sea passage in wartime was difficult to arrange, and the delay must have been frustrating. Trotsky sailed in March, Bukharin in early April. His emigration ended as it began; he was detained briefly in Japan, and upon entering eastern Russia was arrested ("for internationalist agitation amongs soldiers") by Mensheviks who controlled the area. In early May, he finally arrived in Moscow
- Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution: A Political Biography, 1888-1939 by Stephen F Cohen
The camp’s regimen was reasonably fair, relatively free. The only trouble was that we were hungry. Spanish influenza was rife and death was our perpetual companion. An infirmary improvised in a ground- floor room held the dying, with those of us who had volunteered as nurses sitting up by them. They were left to wheeze and go blue, or else spotty like a panther’s skin, and then cold.. .What could we do? For my part I spent the night in the open, near the doorway of this stinking mortuary, getting up now and then to give a drink to some dying man. Our group did not have a single death: although we had nearly all been infected; our solidarity meant that we could eat better than the other poor devils. A quarter of the camp’s population was carried off in a few weeks; however, not one rich prisoner died. We looked after each other, refused to allow our sick to be taken to the infirmary- mortuary, and those who appeared to be completely gone—recovered. I learnt a few commonsense things about medicine: the essential treatment for the worst cases—food and comforting. Give them confidence: we won’t let you go, mate, hang on! During the epidemic we continued to assemble and conduct our studies. During one of the meetings, which I was holding purposely on that particular evening to distract the guards’ attention, one of our group tried to escape, under cover of a storm. He fell in the camp’s perimeter, under the livid glare of searchlights: “Twenty years old, and six bullets in his body,” it was remarked. On the following day we summoned the camp to revolt.
- Memoirs of a Revolutionary by Victor Serge
On 17 March he declared that the ‘only hope to get out of here is in an exchange of Swiss émigrés for German internees’. On 18 March he announced his own readiness to act, and invited any of his followers who wished to return, to contact him, declaring: ‘We must go at any cost, even through hell.’
In Russia the Foreign Minister, Miliukov, announced that any Russian citizen travelling through Germany would be subject to legal action. But nothing could deter Lenin from taking the only way open to him to get to revolutionary Russia. On 27 March a group of 32 Bolsheviks risked the route through Germany in a ‘sealed train’.
More than a month later Martov took his courage into his hands and followed suit. On 5 May he and a number of other Mensheviks, together with Natanson, the SR leader, Lunacharsky, Balabanova and Manuilsky, followed in Lenin’s footsteps. Altogether there were 257 passengers on this journey, including 58 Mensheviks, 48 Bundists, 34 Socialist Revolutionaries, 25 Anarcho-Communists, 18 Bolsheviks and 22 without party affiliation. On 7 June a third sealed train left Switzerland for Russia with 206 passengers, including 29 Mensheviks, 25 Bundists, 27 Socialist Revolutionaries, 26 Anarcho-Communists, 22 Bolsheviks, 19 unaffiliated, and 39 non-émigrés.
- Lenin by Tony Cliff
Here we have the POD: in OTL, Lenin goes on the train by himself with a small number of his fellows. In this timeline, the social democrat Robert Grimm, who was negotiating on behalf of the Mensheviks, convinced Martov that it could be their only opportunity. And so the 'sealed train' is a much larger, more packed, affair with more revolutionaries taking the risk including Mark Natanson of the SRs.
I think it was in Karlsruhe that Platten informed us that a member of the German trade-union leadership, Janson, was on the train, and that he brought us greetings from Legien and the German trade-union leaders. Ilyich instructed us to tell him to go to “the devil’s grandmother” and refused to meet him. Since Janson knew me, and since I as an Austrian was travelling as a stowaway, the comrades were afraid that it might become known that I was travelling with them. Clearly it was my fate from the very beginning to cause difficulties for comrade Chicherin in his diplomatic relations with Germany. So I was hidden in the luggage compartment and left with a supply of about fifty newspapers, so that I would keep quiet and not cause a scandal. Poor Janson was sent by Platten into the carriage of the German officers who were accompanying us. Despite this snub he showed great concern for us, bought the German newspapers for us at every station, and was offended when Platten reimbursed him for them.
- Through Germany in the Sealed Coach by Karl Radek
“Lenin walked, or rather ran, into the ’Czar’s Room’ in a round hat, his face chilled, and a luxurious bouquet in his arms. Hurrying to the middle of the room, he stopped still in front of Cheidze as though he had run into a completely, unexpected obstacle. And here Cheidze, not abandoning his previous melancholy look, pronounced the following ‘speech of greeting,’ carefully, preserving not only the spirit and voice of a moral instructor: ‘Comrade Lenin, in the name of the Petrograd Soviet and the whole revolution. We welcome you to Russia ... but we consider the that the chief task of the revolutionary democracy at present is to defend our revolution against every kind of attack both from within and from without ... We hope that you will join us in striving towards this goal.’ Cheidze ceased. I was dismayed with the unexpectedness of it. But Lenin, it seemed, knew well how to deal with all that. He stood there looking as though what was happening did not concern him in the least, glanced from one side to the other, looked over the surrounding public, and even examined the ceiling of the ‘Czar’s Room’ while rearranging his bouquet (which harmonised rather badly with his whole figure), and finally, having turned completely away from the delegates of the Executive Committee, ‘answered’ thus: ‘Dear comrades, soldiers, sailors and workers, I am happy to greet in you the victorious Russian revolution, to greet you as the advance guard of the international proletarian army ... The hour is not far when, at the summons of our comrade Karl Liebknecht, the people will turn their weapons against their capitalist exploiters ... The Russian revolution achieved by you has opened a new epoch. Long live the world wide socialist revolution!’”
- The Russian Revolution of 1917: A Personal Record by Nikolai Sukhanov
