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| When It Seemed Like Communism Would Take Over the World | When It Seemed Like Communism Would Take Over the World |
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| On Dec. 21, 1919, this newspaper reported that Bolshevik forces in Russia had won a sweeping victory along the Estonian border, capturing 2,500 prisoners in a campaign to solidify their northwestern border. For a moment, their future seemed bright. The month before in Petrograd, about 100 miles to the northeast, the Bolsheviks had celebrated the second anniversary of the Soviet revolution with lengthy processions with red banners and brass bands. Grigory Zinoviev, chairman of the Petrograd Soviet, had stood on a podium in the cold fall air, with factory workers, soldiers and sailors from the Baltic fleet arrayed below him, to report on the regime’s accomplishments for the last two years and its prospects for the immediate future. | On Dec. 21, 1919, this newspaper reported that Bolshevik forces in Russia had won a sweeping victory along the Estonian border, capturing 2,500 prisoners in a campaign to solidify their northwestern border. For a moment, their future seemed bright. The month before in Petrograd, about 100 miles to the northeast, the Bolsheviks had celebrated the second anniversary of the Soviet revolution with lengthy processions with red banners and brass bands. Grigory Zinoviev, chairman of the Petrograd Soviet, had stood on a podium in the cold fall air, with factory workers, soldiers and sailors from the Baltic fleet arrayed below him, to report on the regime’s accomplishments for the last two years and its prospects for the immediate future. |
| The average Russian could be forgiven for feeling that she had lived through a great deal in those two years. All of Europe reeled from the Great War, but the Russians had suffered more than most, enduring revolution in 1917, followed now by a savage and chaotic civil war. Among the tasks facing Zinoviev as he took the stage was to create a triumphant narrative out of so much misery. | The average Russian could be forgiven for feeling that she had lived through a great deal in those two years. All of Europe reeled from the Great War, but the Russians had suffered more than most, enduring revolution in 1917, followed now by a savage and chaotic civil war. Among the tasks facing Zinoviev as he took the stage was to create a triumphant narrative out of so much misery. |
| Public opposition to the czarist government’s inept handling of the world war had forced Nicholas II to give up his throne in early 1917. The failures by the new Provisional Government to do much better than the fallen monarch had turned much of the country against it as well. By that fall, antiwar sentiment, combined with popular revulsion at a failed attempt to impose a military dictatorship, pushed the people increasingly to the left. Vladimir Lenin, the charismatic leader of the Bolshevik Party, orchestrated a seizure of power in the name of councils, or “soviets,” of workers, peasants, sailors and soldiers. | |
| Portly, curly haired and slightly disheveled, Zinoviev cut a curious figure for a hero of the revolution. Audiences were initially startled by his high, almost falsetto voice. But just as Lenin and the equally talented Leon Trotsky mesmerized listeners with the intensity of their oratory, Zinoviev knew how to sway a crowd. Simple logic, homey phrases, ironic biblical allusions and well-timed crescendos and pauses made him adept at solidifying the support of the committed and winning over the skeptical. This was a vital skill for a man who frequently found himself racing about Petrograd, cajoling disgruntled workers into returning to their machines, promising wage or ration increases, and convincing them that sacrifices in the present would be repaid in the future. | Portly, curly haired and slightly disheveled, Zinoviev cut a curious figure for a hero of the revolution. Audiences were initially startled by his high, almost falsetto voice. But just as Lenin and the equally talented Leon Trotsky mesmerized listeners with the intensity of their oratory, Zinoviev knew how to sway a crowd. Simple logic, homey phrases, ironic biblical allusions and well-timed crescendos and pauses made him adept at solidifying the support of the committed and winning over the skeptical. This was a vital skill for a man who frequently found himself racing about Petrograd, cajoling disgruntled workers into returning to their machines, promising wage or ration increases, and convincing them that sacrifices in the present would be repaid in the future. |
| Zinoviev was not only the de facto ruler of the city but, alongside Lenin, one of the party’s most widely recognized figures. He had been in exile in Switzerland with Lenin during the war, returned with him by train across German territory after the czar had abdicated, and fled with him again into hiding in August 1917 when the Provisional Government accused them of organizing a coup d’état. He briefly fell into disgrace for revealing the plot to take power in October, but his betrayal was (temporarily) overlooked once it was obvious how critical was the need for qualified administrators. | Zinoviev was not only the de facto ruler of the city but, alongside Lenin, one of the party’s most widely recognized figures. He had been in exile in Switzerland with Lenin during the war, returned with him by train across German territory after the czar had abdicated, and fled with him again into hiding in August 1917 when the Provisional Government accused them of organizing a coup d’état. He briefly fell into disgrace for revealing the plot to take power in October, but his betrayal was (temporarily) overlooked once it was obvious how critical was the need for qualified administrators. |
| Petrograd, renamed from the more Teutonic-sounding “St. Petersburg” when the war broke out in 1914, teetered on the edge of ruin in late 1919. Russia’s cultural capital had lost tens of thousands of its residents amid world war, revolution and now civil war. Those with relatives in the countryside departed for steadier access to food; former privileged elites fled the reprisals of open class hostility; factory workers sympathetic to the Bolsheviks — or, at least, fearful of what the victory of their opponents might bring — joined the Red Army to fend off the counterrevolutionary “Whites.” And, after the political capital was moved to Moscow in March 1918, thousands of bureaucrats — many of them holdovers from the czarist administration — headed south with the government. With coal and oil in short supply, factories now either stood silent or produced a trickle of their former output. City streets remained unlit at night. The once-bustling storefronts of Nevsky Prospect were either shuttered or offered their wares only intermittently. And work brigades, desperate for heating fuel, pried apart wooden houses and buildings all across the city. | Petrograd, renamed from the more Teutonic-sounding “St. Petersburg” when the war broke out in 1914, teetered on the edge of ruin in late 1919. Russia’s cultural capital had lost tens of thousands of its residents amid world war, revolution and now civil war. Those with relatives in the countryside departed for steadier access to food; former privileged elites fled the reprisals of open class hostility; factory workers sympathetic to the Bolsheviks — or, at least, fearful of what the victory of their opponents might bring — joined the Red Army to fend off the counterrevolutionary “Whites.” And, after the political capital was moved to Moscow in March 1918, thousands of bureaucrats — many of them holdovers from the czarist administration — headed south with the government. With coal and oil in short supply, factories now either stood silent or produced a trickle of their former output. City streets remained unlit at night. The once-bustling storefronts of Nevsky Prospect were either shuttered or offered their wares only intermittently. And work brigades, desperate for heating fuel, pried apart wooden houses and buildings all across the city. |
| The Bolshevik government in 1919 had a feeble hold on Russia, and it faced military challenge on all sides. Lenin, always insistent, had convinced his reluctant comrades in early 1918 that they had no choice but to accept an “obscene” peace with Germany. Angered that the separate peace in the East might allow Germany to tip the balance in the West, the Allied powers — England, France, the United States and Japan — turned their pledges of military aid to active (but eventually halfhearted) assistance to remnants of the czarist army, who were eager to take up the fight against the red menace. | The Bolshevik government in 1919 had a feeble hold on Russia, and it faced military challenge on all sides. Lenin, always insistent, had convinced his reluctant comrades in early 1918 that they had no choice but to accept an “obscene” peace with Germany. Angered that the separate peace in the East might allow Germany to tip the balance in the West, the Allied powers — England, France, the United States and Japan — turned their pledges of military aid to active (but eventually halfhearted) assistance to remnants of the czarist army, who were eager to take up the fight against the red menace. |
| In the north, British, French, American and Polish troops, originally sent to secure food and munitions in Murmansk and Arkhangelsk, soon found themselves in a campaign to link up with the anti-Bolshevik movement in Siberia. To the south, 40,000 to 50,000 French and Greek troops landed in Odessa to help keep Ukraine out of communist hands. And in the Russian Far East, 8,000 Americans landed alongside 57,000 Japanese troops to protect the rear of an armed legion of Czech prisoners determined to reach their homeland by reversing their trek across Siberia. In the end, however, the Whites and their Great Power supporters mistrusted one another, worked at cross-purpose, had little or no coordination among themselves and could not agree on a political program to win popular support (if they even cared about it). | In the north, British, French, American and Polish troops, originally sent to secure food and munitions in Murmansk and Arkhangelsk, soon found themselves in a campaign to link up with the anti-Bolshevik movement in Siberia. To the south, 40,000 to 50,000 French and Greek troops landed in Odessa to help keep Ukraine out of communist hands. And in the Russian Far East, 8,000 Americans landed alongside 57,000 Japanese troops to protect the rear of an armed legion of Czech prisoners determined to reach their homeland by reversing their trek across Siberia. In the end, however, the Whites and their Great Power supporters mistrusted one another, worked at cross-purpose, had little or no coordination among themselves and could not agree on a political program to win popular support (if they even cared about it). |
| Bolshevik efforts to control internal opposition, feed the cities and supply the Red Army also kept the territories under their control in a state of constant tension. In August 1918, an assassin murdered the chief of the Petrograd political police, known as the Cheka, and another in September took three shots at Lenin, hitting him twice. The Bolsheviks responded with the so-called Red Terror, in which hundreds were arbitrarily arrested or shot. Self-proclaimed revolutionary authorities acted first and asked questions later as they requisitioned apartments and detained “class enemies” in the name of revolutionary justice. Grain collection brigades from the cities often left peasants in rural areas with meager supplies for themselves. And when factory workers threatened to strike over wages, food rations or the arrest of their comrades, the city’s new leaders were not above sending in troops to restore order, a measure that unfortunately resembled the acts of the czarist state in its final years of desperation. | Bolshevik efforts to control internal opposition, feed the cities and supply the Red Army also kept the territories under their control in a state of constant tension. In August 1918, an assassin murdered the chief of the Petrograd political police, known as the Cheka, and another in September took three shots at Lenin, hitting him twice. The Bolsheviks responded with the so-called Red Terror, in which hundreds were arbitrarily arrested or shot. Self-proclaimed revolutionary authorities acted first and asked questions later as they requisitioned apartments and detained “class enemies” in the name of revolutionary justice. Grain collection brigades from the cities often left peasants in rural areas with meager supplies for themselves. And when factory workers threatened to strike over wages, food rations or the arrest of their comrades, the city’s new leaders were not above sending in troops to restore order, a measure that unfortunately resembled the acts of the czarist state in its final years of desperation. |
| But despite Petrograd’s enfeebled state, Zinoviev was in high spirits for the revolution’s anniversary. Under the general leadership of Trotsky — who proved himself a brilliant strategist — the Red Army had only a few days earlier repulsed a White Army that had reached the southwestern edges of the city while British ships in support bombarded the naval garrison on the island of Kronstadt. Though one account claimed that Zinoviev panicked at news of the Whites’ approach, now he could bask in light of victory. Territories well to the west of the city were back in Bolshevik hands, and Moscow had likewise escaped capture by armies from the south. And although this was no time to let down their guard, Zinoviev said, the communists should take a moment to remember those who had fallen defending the Soviet republic and look forward to the time when their sacrifice would be repaid in the inevitable victory of worldwide socialist revolution. | But despite Petrograd’s enfeebled state, Zinoviev was in high spirits for the revolution’s anniversary. Under the general leadership of Trotsky — who proved himself a brilliant strategist — the Red Army had only a few days earlier repulsed a White Army that had reached the southwestern edges of the city while British ships in support bombarded the naval garrison on the island of Kronstadt. Though one account claimed that Zinoviev panicked at news of the Whites’ approach, now he could bask in light of victory. Territories well to the west of the city were back in Bolshevik hands, and Moscow had likewise escaped capture by armies from the south. And although this was no time to let down their guard, Zinoviev said, the communists should take a moment to remember those who had fallen defending the Soviet republic and look forward to the time when their sacrifice would be repaid in the inevitable victory of worldwide socialist revolution. |
| What followed in Zinoviev’s speech was an elaborate characterization of the White generals and Russia’s neighbors as pawns of French, British and American capitalists, a cabal of imperialists determined not to tolerate a workers’ state in their midst. Such portrayals of “capital” in Russia’s press were also nearly a mirror of what the Bolsheviks themselves had created earlier in the year, when they founded the Third Communist International known as the Comintern, an alliance of left-wing parties dedicated to defending the revolution in Russia and advancing the proletarian cause across the globe. The first two international movements had fallen apart over sectarian disputes or over members’ support for the war in 1914. Now the first avowedly socialist state was to be the world headquarters for workers’ movements and Zinoviev, among his other heavy responsibilities, had been elected its first chairman. | What followed in Zinoviev’s speech was an elaborate characterization of the White generals and Russia’s neighbors as pawns of French, British and American capitalists, a cabal of imperialists determined not to tolerate a workers’ state in their midst. Such portrayals of “capital” in Russia’s press were also nearly a mirror of what the Bolsheviks themselves had created earlier in the year, when they founded the Third Communist International known as the Comintern, an alliance of left-wing parties dedicated to defending the revolution in Russia and advancing the proletarian cause across the globe. The first two international movements had fallen apart over sectarian disputes or over members’ support for the war in 1914. Now the first avowedly socialist state was to be the world headquarters for workers’ movements and Zinoviev, among his other heavy responsibilities, had been elected its first chairman. |
| And so he approached the stage to describe a world that he saw bending in Russia’s direction. The Bolshevik vision of world revolution may now seem a utopian fantasy, but it appeared much more plausible in the aftermath of the Great War. Exhausted men from every front returned to economies that could offer work to only a fraction of them. In Germany, the Kaiser’s regime had collapsed, and Soviet-style councils hoisting red flags popped up in northern cities, much as they had in Russia in 1917. To the south, Bavarian socialists announced the formation of a people’s republic. In Italy, workers poured into trade unions and set up factory councils, paralyzing the industrialized north in a wave of strikes. In England, police had been put on alert in January and February when calls arose for a general strike, followed by the initiation of a “Hands-Off Russia” campaign in London. American politicians faced their own growing labor movement with anxiety. In the newly independent Hungary, the communist Bela Kun announced the establishment of a Soviet Republic. And some of the most important socialist parties across Europe, whose numbers were growing steadily, soon affiliated themselves with the Third International. | And so he approached the stage to describe a world that he saw bending in Russia’s direction. The Bolshevik vision of world revolution may now seem a utopian fantasy, but it appeared much more plausible in the aftermath of the Great War. Exhausted men from every front returned to economies that could offer work to only a fraction of them. In Germany, the Kaiser’s regime had collapsed, and Soviet-style councils hoisting red flags popped up in northern cities, much as they had in Russia in 1917. To the south, Bavarian socialists announced the formation of a people’s republic. In Italy, workers poured into trade unions and set up factory councils, paralyzing the industrialized north in a wave of strikes. In England, police had been put on alert in January and February when calls arose for a general strike, followed by the initiation of a “Hands-Off Russia” campaign in London. American politicians faced their own growing labor movement with anxiety. In the newly independent Hungary, the communist Bela Kun announced the establishment of a Soviet Republic. And some of the most important socialist parties across Europe, whose numbers were growing steadily, soon affiliated themselves with the Third International. |
| A man of emotional extremes, Zinoviev optimistically predicted that within a year of the Comintern’s founding the world would have forgotten that there had ever even been a struggle for communism in Europe. Even the usually more sober Lenin ended his May Day speech in 1919 by proclaiming, “Long live the international republic of Soviets!” | A man of emotional extremes, Zinoviev optimistically predicted that within a year of the Comintern’s founding the world would have forgotten that there had ever even been a struggle for communism in Europe. Even the usually more sober Lenin ended his May Day speech in 1919 by proclaiming, “Long live the international republic of Soviets!” |
| But there were also signs that such hopes were premature. A communist uprising in Berlin in January had led to the murder of two of the movement’s most brilliant spokespeople, Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht. Germany’s president, Friedrich Ebert, had enlisted the aid of armed right-wing veterans’ groups, known as Freikorps, to suppress the rebellion. They followed that with the violent overthrow of the Bavarian Soviet state and the execution of its leaders. Successive Republican administrations in the United States deployed fears of Bolshevism as anti-American and kept labor’s causes at bay. Kun’s Hungarian republic proved short-lived, as French-supported Romanian troops crushed that experiment by Aug. 1. And although the popularity of socialist parties continued to grow, leftists everywhere were divided among themselves. Aside from a few sympathetic correspondents such as John Reed, reporters told of the chaos in Russia and the regime’s brutality, which made many in the West wary of associating themselves too closely with Moscow. | But there were also signs that such hopes were premature. A communist uprising in Berlin in January had led to the murder of two of the movement’s most brilliant spokespeople, Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht. Germany’s president, Friedrich Ebert, had enlisted the aid of armed right-wing veterans’ groups, known as Freikorps, to suppress the rebellion. They followed that with the violent overthrow of the Bavarian Soviet state and the execution of its leaders. Successive Republican administrations in the United States deployed fears of Bolshevism as anti-American and kept labor’s causes at bay. Kun’s Hungarian republic proved short-lived, as French-supported Romanian troops crushed that experiment by Aug. 1. And although the popularity of socialist parties continued to grow, leftists everywhere were divided among themselves. Aside from a few sympathetic correspondents such as John Reed, reporters told of the chaos in Russia and the regime’s brutality, which made many in the West wary of associating themselves too closely with Moscow. |
| As an additional burden, the Bolsheviks and their allies in the West had to face the fact that the prominence of Jews among their leaders made them fodder for representations of the international communist movement as a grand Jewish conspiracy. Zinoviev, Trotsky, Luxemburg, Liebknecht, Kun and many others — all were caricatured in conservative outlets in crassly stereotypical fashion. Lenin’s government consistently denounced anti-Semitism in its many forms, but it was endemic across Europe and especially inside Russia, where both White and Red troops used the disruptions of the conflict to carry out pogroms against Jewish communities. | As an additional burden, the Bolsheviks and their allies in the West had to face the fact that the prominence of Jews among their leaders made them fodder for representations of the international communist movement as a grand Jewish conspiracy. Zinoviev, Trotsky, Luxemburg, Liebknecht, Kun and many others — all were caricatured in conservative outlets in crassly stereotypical fashion. Lenin’s government consistently denounced anti-Semitism in its many forms, but it was endemic across Europe and especially inside Russia, where both White and Red troops used the disruptions of the conflict to carry out pogroms against Jewish communities. |
| But even the bonding effect of common enemies did not prevent egos, personal ambitions and conflicting views on policy from creating tensions among the party leaders. Few among them avoided Lenin’s ire at one point or another, but Lenin did not hold grudges for long. One consequential case, however, foretold inevitable conflicts once Lenin had left the scene. In the summer of 1918, Lenin sent the ambitious and uncompromising commissar of nationalities, Joseph Stalin, to take charge of efforts to secure the Volga River and improve food supplies to central Russia. Though Trotsky (whom several of the leaders mistrusted as a latecomer to the Bolsheviks in 1917) commanded the Red Army, Stalin disapproved of his use of former officers from the czarist military. Defying Trotsky’s orders, Stalin unleashed terror on his subordinates and on the areas around Tsaritsyn, the city that eventually bore his name as Stalingrad. Trotsky eventually had Stalin recalled, but the two butted heads again in the war against Poland in 1919-20. Stalin’s animosity toward all his perceived enemies, especially Trotsky — who was murdered on his orders in 1940 — grew together with his power in the coming years. | But even the bonding effect of common enemies did not prevent egos, personal ambitions and conflicting views on policy from creating tensions among the party leaders. Few among them avoided Lenin’s ire at one point or another, but Lenin did not hold grudges for long. One consequential case, however, foretold inevitable conflicts once Lenin had left the scene. In the summer of 1918, Lenin sent the ambitious and uncompromising commissar of nationalities, Joseph Stalin, to take charge of efforts to secure the Volga River and improve food supplies to central Russia. Though Trotsky (whom several of the leaders mistrusted as a latecomer to the Bolsheviks in 1917) commanded the Red Army, Stalin disapproved of his use of former officers from the czarist military. Defying Trotsky’s orders, Stalin unleashed terror on his subordinates and on the areas around Tsaritsyn, the city that eventually bore his name as Stalingrad. Trotsky eventually had Stalin recalled, but the two butted heads again in the war against Poland in 1919-20. Stalin’s animosity toward all his perceived enemies, especially Trotsky — who was murdered on his orders in 1940 — grew together with his power in the coming years. |
| No one could know what fate had in store for them on that cold November day in 1919. As his audience huddled closely against the cold, Zinoviev could offer sunny fantasies about proletarian emancipation and the worldwide collapse of capitalism. But though he identified so many foreign threats, he was slow to perceive a danger closer to home. In 1936, as he awaited execution by judgment of Stalin’s court on fabricated charges as an “enemy of the people,” his hopes and his will largely crushed, he might have done well to remember that November marks only the beginning of winter. | No one could know what fate had in store for them on that cold November day in 1919. As his audience huddled closely against the cold, Zinoviev could offer sunny fantasies about proletarian emancipation and the worldwide collapse of capitalism. But though he identified so many foreign threats, he was slow to perceive a danger closer to home. In 1936, as he awaited execution by judgment of Stalin’s court on fabricated charges as an “enemy of the people,” his hopes and his will largely crushed, he might have done well to remember that November marks only the beginning of winter. |
| Clayton Black is an associate professor of history at Washington College. | Clayton Black is an associate professor of history at Washington College. |
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