The Socialist Fatherland is in Danger: WI no Brest-Litovsk Treaty

How is the war going to go for the Bolsheviks? Especially if it means fighting something of a two-front war with the Whites? I'm not sure you can count on them lasting that long.
 
Because it didn't work IOTL. Workers were going on strikes, and in 1921 it was a general strike. Hence NEP.
Thing is, NEP was abolished in 1928, and the Soviet economy continued for another six decades. Yes, the return to some sort of currency makes sense, but there was more to NEP than that. Trotsky is often assumed to have gone straight to what came after NEP, and while I am not certain about that, I find it more likely than him adopting the whole NEP package.
 
How is the war going to go for the Bolsheviks? Especially if it means fighting something of a two-front war with the Whites? I'm not sure you can count on them lasting that long.
Well, badly. They'll get pushed back, lose ground. But by far not as badly as WW2 - TTL's Germans neither want to conquer and colonise Russia, nor can they spare the means to dedicate much resources to the effort, nor is the leadership as deluded as Hitler was. OHL wanted to push Russia out of the war, and to extract resources for the war effort. I'd expect them to cut through Bolshevik "defenses" like a hot knife through butter, comparable to Operation Faustschlag. Ukraine might indeed be one target, and Petrograd is the other. But - at some point, they will stop. If the Bolsheviks don't throw in the towel, maybe they attempt to get to the Caucasus' oil fields.
That would be tremendous economic losses - but only for a short while. The CPs are still going to lose in 1918, and when they do, Bolshevik Russia, even if militarily on its last leg and economically bereft of many vital resources, is going to limp after the collapsing and retreating CP forces and across the finish line as a "winner" - well, if Belgium was considered IOTL to have "won the war", surely Soviet Russia did in that TL, too...
 
How is the war going to go for the Bolsheviks? Especially if it means fighting something of a two-front war with the Whites? I'm not sure you can count on them lasting that long.

But how strong a "front" will the Whites be putting up to the east of the Bolshevik-led government when unlike OTL, the Czech Legion is working with the Reds instead of Whites, Socialist parties are not turning coat against Bolsheviks, and there's no Entente supplies being fed to White forces through the Pacific, Arctic and Black Sea ports? Here Whites will mostly be coming fr''
 
The Civil War began as a reaction to Brest-Litovsk. Without it, there may be not enough officers to form White troops without patriotic drive to fight "traitors", maybe no Civil War at all,
 
But how strong a "front" will the Whites be putting up to the east of the Bolshevik-led government when unlike OTL, the Czech Legion is working with the Reds instead of Whites, Socialist parties are not turning coat against Bolsheviks, and there's no Entente supplies being fed to White forces through the Pacific, Arctic and Black Sea ports? Here Whites will mostly be coming fr''

It's a good point. But the counter here is that one of the Bolsheviks' big promises was a prompt end to the war. Continuing to fight on is going to change the internal politics of the Russia considerably, and to the detriment of the Bolsheviks, who have now repeated the broken promises of Kerensky.

At that point, I don't have a really good sense of who might be poised to take advantage of that moment and overthrow Lenin. If the Whites take power back, it would have to be because of greater infighting and weakened morale on the part of the Bolsheviks. The Cheka and other instruments of Bolshevik power are also going to be weaker with more of their manpower committed to fighting Germany.

Plus, conditions on the ground might be different in Ukraine and other areas closer to the front than they would be in the interior of Russia.
 

NotBigBrother

Monthly Donor
It's a good point. But the counter here is that one of the Bolsheviks' big promises was a prompt end to the war. Continuing to fight on is going to change the internal politics of the Russia considerably, and to the detriment of the Bolsheviks, who have now repeated the broken promises of Kerensky.
"We offered them honest peace. They tried to enslave us instead. Svolochi."
 
With the Bolsheviks now assuming the mantle of defenders of Russia against German aggression, the vast majority of the officer corps and patriotic political parties (SRs, Kadets, etc.) will remain on their side at least until the war ends


I don't think so. The forces of reaction had allready gathered by March 1918, the Russian Civil War was allready ongoing. True, up to that point most of the fighting was limited to small skirmishes, but the soviet power had not yet gained control over large parts of the country.

White organising in the South had allready started by November 1917, (Old Style) under General Mikhail Alekseev. In December 1917, General Lavr Kornilov had taken over the military command of the newly named Volunteer Army until his death in April 1918. So by March 1918, the South was allready on fire.

The russian burgeoisie and what's left of the old feudal nobility would rather cooperate with the Germans (and even accept German dominance), than accept a socialist Russia. True, both would be undesireable to the ruling class, yet German overlordship would definetly be the lesser evil compared to expropriation by the soviet power.

The Czechoslovak Legion might not turn against soviet power (at least not as early as it did OTL), however you can be damn sure that reactionary officers (many of whom were part of the ruling class themselves) would still revolt. Most of the Right-SRs would defect to the Whites (something akin to the KOMUCH would still be founded, though be it a few months later than in OTL). So there would still be an eastern front, it might be opened a bit later and the White forces in the Siberia might be a bit weaker, but it would be opened eventually.

One of the major changes in this scenario would be that, as others have pointed out, the Bolsheviks would have broken their promise of "Peace". Furthermore, they would also have broken the promise of "Bread", as bread is not possible without peace. This would cause a lot of dissatisfaction, not only among the peasantry, but also among the Proletariat and the Soldiers, the Bolsheviks main base of support in the immediate post-revolution period. Not to speak of the catastrophic military defeats the Red Army could (and, considering how Operation Faustschlag went in OTL, most likely would) suffer in a continued war. The Germans might even be able to take Petrograd, the implications of which are hard to predict. The young soviet state was just unable to fight both the Central Powers and the White Movement.
As Lenin correctly pointed out: A refusal to make peace with Germany and Austria could lead to the overthrow of soviet power.

Another change is that there would be no Left-SR revolt. The Left-SRs wouldn't collapse as a party (or at least their collapse/merger with the Bolsheviks would be delayed). However, I don't think that this alone could prevent the collapse of soviet power in this scenario.
 
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White organising in the South had allready started by November 1917, (Old Style) under General Mikhail Alekseev. In December 1917, General Lavr Kornilov had taken over the military command of the newly named Volunteer Army until his death in April 1918. So by March 1918, the South was allready on fire.

The russian burgeoisie and what's left of the old feudal nobility would rather cooperate with the Germans (and even accept German dominance), than accept a socialist Russia. True, both would be undesireable to the ruling class, yet German overlordship would definetly be the lesser evil compared to expropriation by the soviet power.
The Volunteer Army under Alekseev and Kornilov was formed to "withstand the German-Bolshevist onslaught". They considered Bolsheviks to be paid agents of the German General staff.
 
The Volunteer Army under Alekseev and Kornilov was formed to "withstand the German-Bolshevist onslaught". They considered Bolsheviks to be paid agents of the German General staff.

The whites called the Bolsheviks and Left-SRs a lot of things. "German Agents", "Jewish Infiltrators", etc. Doesn't change the fact that the Volunteer Army had allready formed in late 1917, and actively fought the Red Army while the soviet power was still at war with Germany.

To quote from Wikipedia:

"The first attempt to regain power from the Bolsheviks was made by the Kerensky-Krasnov uprising in October 1917. It was supported by the Junker Mutiny in Petrograd but was quickly put down by the Red Guard, notably including the Latvian Rifle Division.

The initial groups that fought against the Communists were local Cossack armies that had declared their loyalty to the Provisional Government. Kaledin of the Don Cossacks and General Grigory Semenov of the Siberian Cossacks were prominent among them. The leading Tsarist officers of the Imperial Russian Army also started to resist. In November, General Mikhail Alekseev, the Tsar's Chief of Staff during the First World War, began to organize the Volunteer Army in Novocherkassk. Volunteers of this small army were mostly officers of the old Russian army, military cadets and students. In December 1917 Alekseev was joined by General Lavr Kornilov, Denikin and other Tsarist officers who had escaped from the jail, where they had been imprisoned following the abortive Kornilov affair just before the Revolution. At the beginning of December 1917, groups of volunteers and Cossacks captured Rostov."

Now don't get me wrong, the main reason the soviet government agreed to the harsh peace terms was the fact that their armies were literally melting against the Germans (and because Petrograd could not be defended for long afterwards). However, the Volunteer Army and various Cossack units were allready fighting the Red Army in the South, aswell.
 
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It's a good point. But the counter here is that one of the Bolsheviks' big promises was a prompt end to the war. Continuing to fight on is going to change the internal politics of the Russia considerably, and to the detriment of the Bolsheviks, who have now repeated the broken promises of Kerensky.

At that point, I don't have a really good sense of who might be poised to take advantage of that moment and overthrow Lenin. If the Whites take power back, it would have to be because of greater infighting and weakened morale on the part of the Bolsheviks. The Cheka and other instruments of Bolshevik power are also going to be weaker with more of their manpower committed to fighting Germany.

Plus, conditions on the ground might be different in Ukraine and other areas closer to the front than they would be in the interior of Russia.

Good point.

I didn't finish my sentence last night. Basically I don't see the potential for the Whites to mushroom in the Asian or Arctic part of the Russian Empire, but some Whites could grow in the south and west under the aegis of the CP. Unlike some other posters I don't think *all* the Whites of significance will be too patriotic purist to not side with the Germans. This could get most dangerous to the Bolesheviks if the Germans link up with the Don Cossacks.

The Czechoslovak Legion might not turn against soviet power (at least not as early as it did OTL)

Why would they at all, ever? Austria-Hungary is their mortal enemy.

I see them more likely see them being decimated and worse through combat and pursuit.

Most of the Right-SRs would defect to the Whites (something akin to the KOMUCH would still be founded, though be it a few months later than in OTL).

This I don't get at all, either.

The people willing to serve Germans (except for under duress for very short periods) will be somewhere in the middle of Kadets and rightward only. No Socialists..


Even in disaster-

What's going to prevent Boleshevik organization and cells from existing underground throughout European Russia? What and who is going to displace them from their Asian strongholds like Tashkent? The Germans only have from February to July to monkey around in Russia before they are rapidly, rapidly thinning out to plug holes elsewhere.

As the Germans thin out, will their collaborators have consolidated anything or made themselves popular? I doubt it. They've been forced to requisition for the Germans and requisitioned for themselves. As the Germans thin out, all the Bolsheviks even those disappointed, discouraged for months, who went in hiding or went in hiding, will get the courage to rise up and start taking revenge.

Even under the strains of defections and retreats, can anybody else in Russia compete with their political and administrative network as long as the Bolsheviks keep a critical mass of their leaders alive and moving?

In any case, how does a German-backed White regime manage to pull of surviving the German defeat? Are White odds of surviving into the early 1920s as dominant really greater than something that's a shade of Red, Pink, Green, or Anarchist Black?
 
Why would they at all, ever? Austria-Hungary is their mortal enemy.

I see them more likely see them being decimated and worse through combat and pursuit.

In this scenario they would continue to fight the Central Powers on the eastern front. What happens afterwards depends on just how long the Red Army can continue to fight the Germans and Austro-Hungarians, wheater the peace is only delayed or the soviet government manages fight untill the bitter end of WW1.

This I don't get at all, either.

The people willing to serve Germans (except for under duress for very short periods) will be somewhere in the middle of Kadets and rightward only. No Socialists..

Don't get me wrong, I didn't say that the Right-SRs would cooperate with Germany (at least not intentionally). But, come on, do you really think they would just be fine with a soviet government as long as it is at war with Germany? Do you really think the Right-SRs in OTL only supported the whites because the soviet government had made peace with Germany, and not because they wanted to restore burgeois-democracy (which was utopian, even if the whites had won the RCW. But that's a different question)? And, for all their rhetoric, the Right SRs were vehemently opposed to socialism (the Right-SR dominated KOMUCH returned all financial and industrial establishments to their former owners in the territory they controlled. They only paid lip service to socialization, and provided landowners with an opportunity to recover their confiscated lands from peasants and harvest the winter crops of 1917).

So, the Right-SRs would have turned against the soviet state in this scenario aswell. They would not be direct German pupets, but they would play in the hands of the Germans.
 
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I didn't finish my sentence last night. Basically I don't see the potential for the Whites to mushroom in the Asian or Arctic part of the Russian Empire, but some Whites could grow in the south and west under the aegis of the CP. Unlike some other posters I don't think *all* the Whites of significance will be too patriotic purist to not side with the Germans. This could get most dangerous to the Bolesheviks if the Germans link up with the Don Cossacks.

I'm thinking that I need to expand the scope of the alt-civil war here: I think you're right that the Whites would not be greatly empowered here, especially with the Reds doing a better job of claiming 'patriotism.' But I don't know if that results in a Bolshevik position overall, because it means more chaotic opposition from multiple sides, including internal anti-war factions, and of course, the Central Powers and their allies.

What's going to prevent Boleshevik organization and cells from existing underground throughout European Russia? What and who is going to displace them from their Asian strongholds like Tashkent? The Germans only have from February to July to monkey around in Russia before they are rapidly, rapidly thinning out to plug holes elsewhere.

I think this is where we're going to see a big change: now in charge of the war, Bolshevism itself is going to be in a much weaker position. That's not to say that Marxists themselves will be worse off for it, though I think fewer of the revolutionary groups in general are going to side with Lenin/Trotsky, especially outside of Russia and ethnic-Russian areas.

As far as the details go, I really have no idea, but I think Lenin is going to struggle to keep the army fed and loyal in the scenario where the war continues, and if the army does TOO well, then it's a rival power within Russia that presents a threat.
 
The whites called the Bolsheviks and Left-SRs a lot of things. "German Agents", "Jewish Infiltrators", etc. Doesn't change the fact that the Volunteer Army had allready formed in late 1917, and actively fought the Red Army while the soviet power was still at war with Germany.

To quote from Wikipedia:

"The first attempt to regain power from the Bolsheviks was made by the Kerensky-Krasnov uprising in October 1917. It was supported by the Junker Mutiny in Petrograd but was quickly put down by the Red Guard, notably including the Latvian Rifle Division.

The initial groups that fought against the Communists were local Cossack armies that had declared their loyalty to the Provisional Government. Kaledin of the Don Cossacks and General Grigory Semenov of the Siberian Cossacks were prominent among them. The leading Tsarist officers of the Imperial Russian Army also started to resist. In November, General Mikhail Alekseev, the Tsar's Chief of Staff during the First World War, began to organize the Volunteer Army in Novocherkassk. Volunteers of this small army were mostly officers of the old Russian army, military cadets and students. In December 1917 Alekseev was joined by General Lavr Kornilov, Denikin and other Tsarist officers who had escaped from the jail, where they had been imprisoned following the abortive Kornilov affair just before the Revolution. At the beginning of December 1917, groups of volunteers and Cossacks captured Rostov."

Now don't get me wrong, the main reason the soviet government agreed to the harsh peace terms was the fact that their armies were literally melting against the Germans (and because Petrograd could not be defended for long afterwards). However, the Volunteer Army and various Cossack units were allready fighting the Red Army in the South, aswell.

The Volunteer Army spent Winter-Spring 1917-18 getting its butt whooped by the Red Army. It was closer to a roving partisan band than a true army. B-L and the subsequent defections/revolts gave it a second wind which allowed it to survive near destruction. ITTL the Bolsheviks have a smychka with patriotic forces and the officer corps which makes it hard for the Volunteer Army to mobilize even reactionaries to its side.
 
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I'm thinking that I need to expand the scope of the alt-civil war here: I think you're right that the Whites would not be greatly empowered here, especially with the Reds doing a better job of claiming 'patriotism.' But I don't know if that results in a Bolshevik position overall, because it means more chaotic opposition from multiple sides, including internal anti-war factions, and of course, the Central Powers and their allies.



I think this is where we're going to see a big change: now in charge of the war, Bolshevism itself is going to be in a much weaker position. That's not to say that Marxists themselves will be worse off for it, though I think fewer of the revolutionary groups in general are going to side with Lenin/Trotsky, especially outside of Russia and ethnic-Russian areas.

As far as the details go, I really have no idea, but I think Lenin is going to struggle to keep the army fed and loyal in the scenario where the war continues, and if the army does TOO well, then it's a rival power within Russia that presents a threat.

Well here I agree. Boleshevik monopolization of the socialist coalition isn't made any easier.
 
All of the other socialist parties really, really hated Brest-Litovsk. The Bolsheviks had already demobilized the Russian Army in December-January, building a new Red Army to defend the country would be just as “from scratch” as it was for the civil war. Only this time they’d have a political consensus that they’re defending the country from unjust invasion after doing all they could to achieve peace. Given that one of the core motivations for the October Revolution was the fear that Kerensky intended to treasonously hand the city over to the Germans, it’s not as if Red Patriotism wasn’t a real motivation when properly applied. IOTL it was very effective at rallying people against the Entente interventions supporting the Whites - to the point that the Whites in Archangelsk were hesitant to go along with Entente troops on the ground because of the optics.
 
So IOTL, Lenin was able to unify various Bolshevik leaders against the two anti-peace positions - Trotsky's "no war, no peace" and Bukharin's "revolutionary war". In this case, let's say Lenin has a stroke and is incapacitated in January 1918. As a result, the Bolsheviks end up narrowly embracing a position of delaying the Germans at Brest for as long as possible while building a new Red Army to re-enter the war. Trotsky (Foreign Affairs Commissar at the time) reaches out to the Entente in mid-January asking for armaments and military support, as he did in March 1918 IOTL. Over the course of the next few months a sizable Entente buildup occurs, and by September you have 20,000+ Entente troops in Northwest Russia fighting alongside the Red Army.

The Germans repudiate the December armistice in February and pause at about where they halted IOTL when they realize that the Bolsheviks have no intention of negotiating further. The German forces in the East were incapable of managing what they held IOTL and rushing deeper into Russia only complicates the logistics of occupation. I could see Germany trying to occupy Petrograd, though IOTL the option was dismissed in summer 1918 for being undesirable (Lots more Russians to manage) and infeasible due to the manpower requirements.

The two biggest immediate changes I see are that the Entente recognizes the Bolsheviks by summer 1918 for political expediency's sake, with the royal family going into exile in Britain, and the worst of the Civil War is largely butterflied for the moment. With the Bolsheviks now assuming the mantle of defenders of Russia against German aggression, the vast majority of the officer corps and patriotic political parties (SRs, Kadets, etc.) will remain on their side at least until the war ends, giving the Bolsheviks much of 1918 to consolidate power and receive a major equipment boost from the Entente.

Also, Trotsky at Versailles sounds fun.


So Julian, it's your thread - where do you plan to take this idea? don't let us just bog you down in discussion and "thesis defense". If you wanted to extend this through an alt-Russian Civil War, Trotsky-in-Versailles, and beyond, go for it!

Was your thought basically a Boleshevik state as we knew it, just up-armed, less damaged, less diplomatic isolated, probably with better borders, etc.?

Or, is it also less totalitarian and more of a coalition as a result of the wartime anti-German coalition of necessity, and less willing and/or less able to end all participation and input by non-Bolshevik parties?

In my personal opinion, all sorts of things are possible, fighting the Germans at such a massive material disadvantage does create an additional opportunities for top Bolsheviks to die (even while saving them from other risks) or for other heroes to emerge from the revolutionary war. Theoretically you could have Left SRs benefitting, or you could Bolsheviks move in a slightly more "Maoist" direction, where they come out triumphant in the end due to their disciplined centralist organization, maybe with Lenin in charge or someone else, but based in the country-side while the Germans occupy the cities and then they come back triumphantly as the Germans fade away with their defeat at the hands of the west. Like with Maoism, maybe somebody who was not of the top 5 or 10 original Bolsheviks becomes the top Bolshevik under such circumstances.
 
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