Major political event of the XX ^E century, the revolution of 1917 meant for Russia the total abandonment of its old political structures to the profit of a new mode, which marks the victory of the socialist theses.

Of a spontaneous revolution which reverses tsarism with the seizure of power by the party Bolshevik create for themselves, in a few months, the conditions of the success of an active minority, whose action goes initially in the direction of the aspirations and the claims of the greatest number - peace, ground, freedom -, before taking a totalitarian route.

“The war is more the nice gift made with the revolution”: thus Lénine accommodates, in August 1914, the entry in war of the Russian Empire in the world war, at the sides of Great Britain and France against the central Empires.

The situation is however more moderate than lets it suppose this short phrase. Indeed, at the time when the war bursts, the near total of the social democrat parties of the belligerent countries votes the appropriations of war, which seals the Sacred union and the abandonment of the pacifist principles which were to lead to fraternization and the revolution in Europe. At the Russian Parliament, Bolsheviks and Mensheviks refuse to vote these appropriations, but the once engaged war, they are not long in tearing on the question of national defense, almost adopting all the effort of war. Plékhanov and Zassoulitch want the victory of Russia; Martov, Lénine or Kollontaï remain internationalists. Vis-a-vis the revolutionists thus divided, the Russian Empire appears to the contemporaries like a powerful and stable State. The secret police tsarist itself estimates, a few months before February, that “the revolutionary bands as such are about non-existent”. In France, one speaks with confidence about the “Russian loans” (more than one million and half of French small savers subscribed there) and about the “Russian road roller” which will crush the common enemy, the despized German. And yet, in less than three years, the war will cause the collapse of tsarism, acting like formidable revealing of its weaknesses and its blockings.

A Russian economy in crisis

Essence, however, is not exploited the face. In spite of the insufficiencies of the armament, the weakness of the command, the disasters military into Prussia-Eastern (Tannenberg, 26- August 29th, 1914), then in Galicie (May 1915), which shows million killed, casualties, prisoners and by the loss of Lithuania, Galicie and Poland, the Russian face does not crumble. It is the economy, the company and the political power which break up. Crossed European industry, its principal supplier, and monopolized by the production of war, the Russian economy cannot provide any more in sufficient quantity the consumer goods. In the cities, one misses of all. The prices flame, unemployment develops. In the campaigns, the peasants do not manage any more to convey their productions, which rotted on the spot. The relationship, always precarious and tended, between cities and campaigns worsens.

Dissolution of the power

The power, too centralized, does not control any more the situation. The tsar, of a weak nature, is discredited by the military setbacks (it took in person the supreme command of the armies in September 1915) as by the favorite of the tsarina, Raspoutine, an enlightened charlatan. While the duma sits only a few weeks per annum (August 1st - September 16th, 1915; November 13th - December 30th, 1916), governments and holders of ministries follow one another. In 1916, one does not count less than five different Home secretaries, four Ministers for Agriculture, three Ministers for the War, quite as inefficient and unpopular. The public rumor shows the influential coterie directed by the empress, of German origin, and by Raspoutine, to prepare a separate peace and to open the territory with the enemy invasion knowingly. It becomes manifest that the autocracy is not able any more to control nor to carry out the war. In front of the dissolution of the power, one sees of any share organizing “committees” which deal with the daily tasks, that the State is not able to ensure: care with the casualties, supply of the cities and the army. The Russians control themselves: the revolution, to some extent, already started.

At the end of the year 1916, the interior situation of the country becomes extremely confused: in an atmosphere of political crisis illustrated by the assassination of Raspoutine in December 1916, the strikes, fallen on an unimportant level at the beginning from the conflict, include width (a million participants in 1916), agitation gains the army, the disorganization of transport disturbs the supply of the face and the back, in particular in the cities, where the surge of refugees increases the precariousness of the provisioning. It is a mode at the same time discredited and weakened which will come to surprise the “days of February”.

On February 14th, 1917 (according to the Julien calendar used here, that is to say on on February 27th according to the Gregorian calendar, which will be adopted only one year later, on on February 14th, 1918), the session of the duma opens in Petrograd (name given to Saint-Pétersbourg since 1914), which involves a working class unrest, with the first strikes. Two days later, the authorities announce the installation of ration cards. The city has reserves of flour only for about ten days. Incidents burst, in several points of a city confronted with one particularly rigorous winter, in front of the empty fronts of bakeries, which are plundered 19. The 20, the largest factory of Petrograd, the arms factory Poutilov, in rupture of provisioning, puts at the street of the thousands of workmen. Effervescence gains the city, while the duma stigmatizes the “unable ministers once more”, claiming their departure. But nobody envisages whereas the disorders which point - endemic in this capital of Empire, working big city, which already knew several waves of spectacular strikes, in 1905 as in 1914 - will involve in a few days the fall of the imperial mode.

“Days of February”

The revolutionary days of February (23-27) burst spontaneously. The 23, then international Journée of the women, nearly 100? 000 strikers ravel, in the calm one, at the sides of a procession of women. The 24 and 25, the strike and the demonstrations extend gradually to all the working population. The 26, whereas the demonstrators move again towards the downtown area, the officers, who received the order of the tsar “to put an end to the disorders”, make shoot at crowd. One counts this day nearly 150 killed. While the demonstrators, discouraged, are turned over from there on their premises, the government triumphs, proclaims the state of siege, orders the reference of the duma, without taking account of the call that its president, Mikhaïl Rodzianko, had, the day before, addressed to the tsar, begging to name it a “government of confidence”. At this time, none the revolutionary parties - neither Bolsheviks, neither Mensheviks, nor Socialist-revolutionists - is ready to take the least initiative.

“At the first hours of February 27th, Trotski writing, the workmen imagined the solution of the problem of the insurrection much more remote than it was it actually. They very believed to have to make, whereas their task, for the nine tenth, was already accomplished. The revolutionary push of the workmen coincided with the movement of the soldiers who already left in the street.”

On February 27th is the decisive day. The mutinies extend, soldiers and workmen occupy the Pierre-and-Paul fortress, release the political prisoners who were imprisoned there, ransack the Arsenal, seizing stocks of weapons, and take the palate of Winter. In a few hours, Petrograd falls entirely to the hands from the insurrectionists.

A provisional government

Meanwhile, the deputies of the duma, who refused to subject to the decision taken the day before by the tsar to dissolve this representative institution, formed a committee for the re-establishment of the order and the relationship with the institutions and the personalities. On their side, joining again with the revolutionary tradition of 1905, a certain number of political directors, as a majority of the Mensheviks which have just been released from the Pierre-and-Paul fortress, set up, in one of the rooms of the palate of Tauride, where the duma sat, a Soviet of working deputies and soldiers. After protracted negotiations, an agreement concluded on on March 2nd in the morning between the committee from the duma and the Soviet allows, while waiting for the convocation of a constituent Assembly, the formation of a provisional government with liberal majority, dominated by the representatives of the party constitutional-democrat (KD, or “junior”). The Soviet recognizes the legitimacy of this government; this recognition is however supplied with a condition: it will support the government only insofar as this one applies a democratic program which would have its agreement.

Coexistence of two powers: tsarist and Soviet

This compromise marks the birth of a double power, the coexistence, enamelled conflicts, of two designs different from the legitimacy and future of the Russian company.

On a side, power of a provisional government, legitimated by the body of the representatives of the nation resulting from elections poll-tax based organized by the mode tsarist; a concerned power of order, whose logic is that of parliamentarism, and the objective capitalist, modern and liberal Russia.

Other side, power of the Soviets, which want to be a more direct representation, more local, more “revolutionary”, dominated by the Mensheviks and the Socialist-revolutionists, whose concern first is to found peace in a country completely exhausted by the war.

The first provisional government

Formed on on March 2nd, it is chaired by prince Lvov, is surrounded by a majority of eminent representatives of the party constitutional-democrat (Pavel Milioukov, Foreign Minister, Nikolaï Nekrassov, Minister for Transport, Andreï Chingarev, Minister for Agriculture) and party octobrist (Aleksandr Goutchkov, Minister for the War and Navy). The member of the Labor Party Aleksandr Kerenski, vice-president of the Soviet of Petrograd, principal craftsman of the compromise between this last and the committee of the duma, are Minister for Justice. However, as of on on March 9th, Goutchkov estimates that “the provisional government does not have any real power and its ordinances are not applied that insofar as allows it the Soviet of the working deputies and soldiers”. Thus, the government had of another choice only to approve the order nº 1 of the Soviet of Petrograd which removed most signs external of discipline in the army and introduced the election of the officers and the committees of units.

The abdication of Nicolas II

In the compromise of March 2nd, uncertainty on what would be the attitude of Nicolas II and staff played an important role. Defendant, the two days before, of the gravity of the events, Nicolas II had envisaged to join his palate of Tsarskoïe Selo, a few kilometres from Petrograd. But the railwaymen divert the imperial train towards Pskov (on the lake of Tchoudes). When it arrives there, after having rolled all the day of March 1st, the tsar learns complete success from the insurrection. With the invitation of the généralissime Alexeïev, the commanders of the armies send telegrams to him recommending to him to abdicate “to save the independence of the country and to ensure the safeguard of the dynasty”. His/her son Alexis, hemophiliac, having few chances to live, the tsar abdicates in favor of his brother the Michel grand duke. But, in the morning of March 3rd, Michel gives up the throne. The simultaneous news of two abdications marks the end of the reign of Romanov and the final success of the revolution - as unexpected as its release. A few weeks earlier, of its exile inhabitant of Zurich, Lénine had written: “We will perhaps not see, us others the old men, the decisive combat of this future revolution.”

The provisional government does not propose to upset the economic order and social, but to renovate the institutions and to gain the war, leaving with Constituent the care to proceed to reforms of structure. The governmental declaration published on on March 6th is restricted to ratify a certain number of measurements which the triumph of the revolution had made so obvious that nobody thought of putting them at the credit of the government: proclamation of the civil liberties; general on on March 6th amnesties; convocation of Constituent, abolition of the capital punishment on on March 24th; suppression of any discrimination of caste, race or religion; recognition of the right of Poland and Finland to independence; promise of autonomy for the national minorities. The tsar and his family are placed under house arrest on on March 20th.

Vis-a-vis the wait-and-see policy of a government which fears more than all the disorder, the Soviet of Petrograd invites the workers to be organized. In a few weeks, hundreds of Soviets, thousands of committees of factory and district, militia of “red guards” are organized. A public opinion is expressed there, of the claims are proposed: like the revolution of 1905, that of February 1917 causes a true release of the word. Jewish workmen, soldiers, peasants, intellectuals, Moslem women, Armenian teachers, via their organizations - committees of factory, committees of soldiers, district committees, assembled village, trade unions -, send to the Soviets thousands of motions, petitions, addresses, messages which say all the misery of the people and the immense hope raised by the revolution.

Working claims

The workmen ask, in priority, the eight hours day (which they will obtain quickly, as of the middle of March), the job security, the Social Security, the control of the recruiting and the dismissals, and a pay rise allowing them, modestly, to buy three pounds bread per day. Soon however, the problem of the war passes in the foreground of the concerns and the workmen become the burning partisans of a “peace without annexations nor contributions”. As for socialism, they then refer never there.

Country claims

The peasants express a major requirement: that the ground belongs to those which work it, that are immediately distributed the not cultivated grounds that the great landowners or the State leave with the abandonment. The vindication of the peasants against the administration and the great landowner is particularly sharp. But, made remarkable, none the watchwords of the various parties appears in country motions. Irreducible to the programs and the political diagrams prepared by the townsmen, the country movements will follow their own advance, which will not be less radical.

Claims of the army

As for the soldiers, as most combatants of all the belligerent countries, they wish above all the end of the war, without daring however to openly proclaim their desire of a “white peace”. While waiting, they require an easing of the discipline, the suppression of the abuses and ill-treatments, the liberalization and the democratization of the military institution.

Nationalist claims

The revolution of February gives finally a decisive impulse to the national movements attached by the policy russificatrice of the autocracy tsarist. In Kiev, Split it, at the beginning simple association of Ukrainian cultural organizations, claims soon internal autonomy, then, as from the summer 1917, the recognition of a true national independence. The national movement also develops among Poles, the Finns (to which the provisional government promises independence), then at the Baltic ones and the Georgians. The Moslems are divided into “unitarists”, who hope to carry out the unit under the aegis of Tatars, and into “federalists”, animated by Bachkirs, the Uzbeks and the Azeris.

“Revolutionary defensism”

Vis-a-vis this boiling of claims, with this profusion of movements, the provisional government, the military high command and the middle-class are on the defensive. The Soviet of Petrograd, dominated by the moderated Socialists, temporizes. On the crucial question of the continuation of the war, it adopts, on on March 14th, a text (Call to the people of the whole world) where the pacifist Utopia mixes with the “revolutionary defensism”. It invites the people “to carry out a decisive combat against the ambitions annexationists of the governments of all the countries in war <> to impose a peace without annexations nor contributions”. But he affirms, at the same time, that “Russia will continue the war, preserving the combativeness of the army for active operations”.

Bolshevik, even if its orientations are sometimes disputed within its own party; it is constrained to express its sights in writings which it forwards to the Bolsheviks present to Russia, of which most important are known by far under the name of Lettres and of Theses of April.

Letters by far

Only of all the political directors, Lénine, against the opinion even of the majority of the party Bolshevik, predicted the bankruptcy of the policy of conciliation which task to implement the Soviet. In its four Letters, written by far in Zurich from Friday to (and whose Pravda dares to publish only the first), Lénine requires to hold the party Bolshevik apart from any coalition and asks the immediate rupture between the Soviet and the government; thus, it wishes to pass to the active preparation of the “following, proletarian phase”, of the revolution. Decided to return to Russia, Lénine accepts the agreement concluded by the Swiss social democrat Platten with the German authorities, which, knowing the government scheme of the Bolsheviks well, counted on the force of destabilization of the socialist speech near an already hostile Russian population with the continuation of the war. With a group of revolutionists, Lénine leaves Zurich on on March 28th to cross Germany, in an armor-plated coach profiting from the statute of exterritoriality, and gains Sweden, then Petrograd, where it arrives on on April 3rd.

Theses of April

As of the 4, Lénine, in its Theses of April, proclaims its unconditional hostility with the “revolutionary defensism” preached by the Soviet, at the provisional government and the parliamentary republic. It makes a statement on the program Bolshevik: suppression of the police force, the army and the whole of the bureaucracy of State; confiscation of the land great landowners and integral nationalization of the ground; creation of a single national bank; control working. He recommends the seizure of power by the poor proletariat and peasants, policy which is expressed in the watchword “All the power with the Soviets”. He recommends finally the “fraternization” of the army with the enemy troops.

Accommodated with amazement and hostility by the majority of the leaders Bolsheviks of the capital (Kamenev, Kalinine), the theses of Lénine will however progress, with the progressive rallying returned Bolsheviks of exile (Zinoviev, Aleksandra Kollontaï) or the “minority ones” of Petrograd (Stalin, Chliapnikov). But it is the crisis of April, which divides the provisional government and the Soviet on the crucial question of the war, which will contribute to make triumph the Leninist position within the party Bolshevik and which will involve the latter with the conquest of the Soviets.

For the government, only a victory would succeed in firmly mooring the new mode with the Western democracies, consolidating the cohesion of the company, and, perhaps, to put an end to the revolution.

The Milioukov note with the Allies

On April 18th, Milioukov addresses a note to the Allies, affirming that Russia would keep to all its commitments towards them and would fight “until the final victory”. In this note, null mention of the position of the Soviet, which militates for “peace without annexations nor contributions”. The opinion is amazed. Kerenski threatens to resign. In the working mediums of the capital starts a vast campaign of petitions at once, requiring the resignation of Milioukov. Processions are formed, of tens of thousands of demonstrators tributary towards the downtown area. For the first time, some of them stress watchwords Bolsheviks: “Resignation of the government, all the power with the Soviets!” Clashes violent one oppose the Bolsheviks to counter-demonstrators - officer cadets, middle-class and notable young people of the beautiful quarters - which draw up a court to consider “the spies German and Lénine”. A wind of civil war passes on Petrograd.

Towards a coalition government

But, the government having publicly announced that Russia did not consider any annexation, the crisis seems, at the evening of April 20th, defused. The business of the Milioukov note raises nevertheless the question of the operation of the double power. A few days, whereas Milioukov, repudiated, resigns, followed later by the Minister for the War, Goutchkov, which estimates to have lost any authority on the army, the Soviet, under the influence of two leaders menchevic, Tchkheidze and Tseretheli, announces its rallying with the idea of a coalition government.

This participation resembles a fools' deal extremely: the moderate ones intend well to bind the Mensheviks and the Socialist-revolutionists by their participation in the governmental responsibilities and the control of the war, while using their conciliating influence on the masses; the Socialists hope to obtain reforms and the cessation of hostilities, while thwarting the counter-revolutionaries projects.

The second provisional government

In this second provisional government, laboriously made up, on on May 5th, after weeks of negotiations, the moderate ones of the party constitutional-democrat preserve the presidency (which is allocated to prince Lvov) and seven wallets, while the Socialists obtain six from them. By their political stature, three Socialists, eminent members of the Soviet - a Menshevik (Tseretheli, Minister for the Stations and principal theorist of the revolutionary defensism) and two Socialist-revolutionists (Tchernov, Minister for Agriculture, and Kerenski, Minister for the War and Navy) -, dominate the new cabinet.

The massive entry socialist ministers with the government calls into question the principle even of the double power. The lines of cleavage do not pass any more, as at the first times of the revolution, between the Soviet and the government. At the time when the conciliation carries it at the summit of the State, the social strains and national are exacerbated.

Bolsheviks criticizing all “collaboration of classes”, workmen gathered in their committees of factory, peasants seizing the seigniorial grounds without awaiting the meeting of Constituent, owners decided to resist the working pressure, alien populations expressing their will of independence - all are given to act, without taking account of the calls to the moderation of the conciliators with the power. Isolated, the latter take time to succeed.

Failures of the government

To put an end to the war, Tseretheli works out a plan in two shutters: intervention near the governments of the belligerent countries to rejoin them with the formula of a peace without annexations; organization of a conference of all the European socialist parties, in Stockholm, to convince them to impose a general peace plan on their respective governments. This project, utopian, falls through as of the month of June 1917.

But in same time, the government answers at the request of the Allies and prepares the “Broussilov offensive” in the area of Lemberg. Aleksandr Kerenski (called by the Bolsheviks “the driveller as a chief”) carries out a memorable round on the face in the hope of going up moral troops. But the great Russian offensive, started on on June 18th, 1917, sinks, after some initial successes, of material and ammunition.

A growing social agitation

Meanwhile, the social strains do not cease worsening, in the cities as in the campaigns.

Hardening its attitude, employers refuses at the working, increasingly radical and “bolchevized” committees, working control that they claim and answers the strikes by the lockout. In the campaigns, the agrarian committees set up by the peasants brought together in their communal assemblies (to mir) adapt the unexploited grounds, seize the farm equipment and the livestock of the land great landowners, revalue the beams with the fall.

Parallel to these joint actions the individual acts of violation of the order multiply. Imitating the industrialists who proceed to lockout, the great landowners react by stopping sowings and by calling upon the government so that it puts an end to “anarchy”. This one is solved, not without hesitations, to send troops to restore the order, and to convene the first session of the national agrarian Committee, charged to prepare the land reform.

In same time, the movements of the alien populations develop. For the government, this question is not with the day order: he is unaware of superbly as well Ier Congrès panmusulman which is held in Kazan on on May 1st as progress of Rada Ukrainian. The Ukrainians, who gave each other a General secretary and a Fundamental law, form national regiments and slip towards separatism.

Pressure of the Bolsheviks

While the tensions and the difficulties accumulate, the Bolsheviks accentuate their pressure, encourage the working toughening, enter in force the committees of factory of Petrograd. Minority in the trade unions and the Soviets, they acquire the majority, at the end of May, with the Conference of the committees of factory of Petrograd, by developing the idea of “working control”. Lénine, with the assistance of Trotski arrived at Petrograd on on May 4th, works to set up the revolutionary party which will be the instrument of the seizure of power.

At the time of Ier Congrès panrusse of the Soviets, joined together in Petrograd from Friday to and where the Bolsheviks are still very minority (a hundred on more than eight hundred delegates), they take the offensive, demanding that the Congress is transformed into revolutionary Convention and assumes the totality of the power. Tseretheli having affirmed that there did not exist any force which could supplant the government, it attracts itself one set out again remained famous of Lénine: “Such a party exists. No party has the right to refuse the power and our party does not refuse it. It is ready constantly to seize the power between its hands.”

A few days later, on on June 18th, an organized demonstration with Petrograd by the Soviet to support the policy of the government turns to the advantage of the Bolsheviks. Instead of slogan suggested by the Mensheviks and the Socialist-revolutionists (“By the constituent Assembly towards a democratic republic”), the majority of the banners carry watchwords Bolsheviks: “With bottom the offensive! ”, “Lives working control! ”, “All power with the Soviets!” For the first time, the street belongs to the Bolsheviks. On June 18th thus consumes the final scission of the Russian socialist camp.

Like in April, the problem of the war is the catalyst of the revolutionary days of the July 3rd and 4th, key moment of the process of 1917. The 2 arrives the news of the failure of the Broussilov offensive which folds vis-a-vis the German counter-offensive; the ministers constitutional-democrats, dissatisfied with the agreement signed by Kerenski with Split Ukrainian, resign; a certain number of regiments of Petrograd, favorable to the Bolsheviks and who fear to be sent on the face, decide to prepare an insurrection. Overflowed, the direction of the party Bolshevik lets develop demonstrations which degenerate when soldiers, sailors of Kronstadt and militants working go towards the palate of Tauride to ask the Soviet - in vain - to ensure the power.

The government calls upon the cossacks and brought back troops of the face. In the city in state of siege, the army disperses the demonstrators. These days of July, which show about fifty deaths, involve the arrest of many leaders Bolsheviks (Trotski, Zinoviev, Kamenev) and the prohibition of the newspapers of their party. Lénine, qualified “agent of Kaiser” and shown of high treason, flees in Finland on on July 8th; this escape accredits its culpability. The capital punishment is restored on the face. The party Bolshevik seems decapitated.

The “revolutionary government of hello”

At the conclusion of this episode, prince Lvov charges Kerenski with reorganizing the government. After a long cabinet crisis (6 July 23rd), marked by the hesitations of the constitutional-democrats to take part in the cabinet, Kerenski (which keeps the control of the ministry for the War) forms a “government of revolutionary hello”, where constitutional-democrats, returned in force, and the moderate Socialists (Mensheviks and Socialist-revolutionists) cohabit after a fashion, plain by their hatred and their fear of the Bolsheviks. Since the days of July, the political climate strongly changed. From now on, the preserving lobbies - the Company for the economic rebirth of Russia, gathering large industrialists and bankers close to the party constitutional-democrat, the Union of the great landowners or the Union of the officers of the army and the fleet - occupy the first rank in the alleys of the power.

Kornilov, the man of the recourse

During this turbid summer, a man emerges, whose figure-ground symbolizes well the power which is sought: the généralissime Kornilov. Of all the generals of Former regime, this son of country cossacks was the only one to hold of the republican remarks and to declare themselves favorable to a certain democratization of the army. In parallel, it had given of the order among the troops, prohibiting the meetings whereas it ordered the south-western face, and making shoot the deserters. Vis-a-vis the weakness of the civil government, Kornilov quickly seems the man of the recourse for the high command, the employers' mediums, even the Allies, all the more anxious of the chaos which gains Russia which the pacifist theses progress within their own troops.

The advisory conference of State - kind of “general states” which join together in Moscow, from Friday to, of the representatives of employers, the trade unions, the occupational classes, the body of the officers, the Churches and the political parties (excluded Bolsheviks) - turns in the confrontation between Kerenski and Kornilov, accommodated by the cheers of the conservatives. Firmly supported by the constitutional-democrats, Kornilov makes a statement on his program to leave Russia the crisis: dissolution of all the revolutionary committees, end of any intervention of the State in the fields economic and social, militarization of the railroads and, the re-establishment arms factories of the capital punishment to the back… As of this moment takes shape the prospect at a stretch for State military.

Political return of the Bolsheviks

Supported by the body of the officers and the conservatives, Kornilov requires, on on August 26th, a cabinet reshuffle. While the ministers juniors resign, Kerenski, released, dislocates the généralissime of its functions. But this one, which had already fixed on August 27th the date of its coup d'etat, advances its troops on Petrograd. In the trial of strength which begins, the Bolsheviks express soon their “revolutionary solidarity” towards the government. Denouncing the putsch, they create a network of “committees of revolutionary war” to organize resistance. Their experiment of clandestinity proves reliable. By the disorganization of transport and propaganda near the troops of Kornilov, they stop the advance of the généralissime, while in Petrograd, where Kerenski received the support of the Soviet, the city is put in a state of defense. Its released leaders, the party Bolshevik makes a spectacular re-entry on the political scene. The rising armed in Petrograd, on which Kornilov counted, does not take place; its troops trample, demoralized, near the capital, vis-a-vis those remained faithful to the government. In two days, the putsch is tiny room to nothing and the Kornilov general is stopped.

“Without the putsch of Kornilov, will say later Kerenski, it would not have had Lénine there.” At all events, on the political plan, the failure of the putsch reverses the situation. The juniors, who had openly supported Kornilov, are discredited.

Impotence of the Kerenski government

The resurrection of the Bolchevism, that the whole of the political community held for dead since the days of July, reflects two latent phenomena: toughening of the masses and the bankruptcy of the traditional institutions.

The social disturbances go up initially in the campaigns: of September 1st on October 20th, it remain trace of 5? 140 “violations of the order”, undoubtedly quantifies quite lower than the reality, but which reveals enough the extent of the agrarian disorders. Particularly many in Ukraine, Bielorussia and especially in five provinces of central Russia (Toula, Riazan, Penza, Saratov, Tambov), these disorders are more and more violent one: the peasants are not satisfied any more to seize the grounds, they plunder, burn per hundreds the seigniorial residences. In the cities also, the social climate hardens: to answer increasingly hard strikes, with sequestration of the owners, the company heads often stop the production.

The dark economy, the shortages spread, the prices flame (they triple between July and October), of the hundreds of thousands of workmen are found with unemployment, claiming working control on the production and, more and more often, the resignation of the government and the passage of all the power to the Soviets. However, aren't they very numerous to adhere to the party Bolshevik, which counts less than 200? 000 members at the beginning of October 1917. It is rather with a conquest by the Bolchevism of broad fractions of the company, disillusioned by the policy of a government which had not ceased exhorting with patience, that the authorities assist, impotent. But, in the institutional vacuum of the autumn 1917, the design of Lénine of a party organized and determined allied with the tactical know-how of Trotski are assets which will appear decisive.

The push Bolshevik

Anxious to political progress of the Bolsheviks, who conquer the majority in the Soviets of Petrograd - where Trotski is elected, on on September 9th, chair new executive committee -, of Moscow, of Kiev, of Saratov, as well as about fifty provincial towns, the government of Kerenski endeavors to set up of new institutions, alternative to the Soviets, such Council of the Republic, left charged préparlement to prepare the elections with the Constituent one. But, as of the first meeting of this organization (October 7th), the representatives Bolsheviks leave the room after Trotski denounced this “new duma , under the orders of the counter-revolutionaries and of imperialist, prepares the rendering of Petrograd and the defeat of the revolution”. The departure of the Bolsheviks constitutes the first act of the revolution of October.

The return of Lénine

This same day, Lénine returns clandestinely in Petrograd. For several weeks, of its Finnish exile, he had written at the central committee of the party of the letters (the Bolsheviks must seize the power) and of the articles (the crisis is ripe) appealing to the insurrection and condemning the revolutionary legalism of the leaders Bolsheviks scalded by the bitter experiment of the days of July. On October 10th, after ten hours of discussions, Lénine manages to convince the majority of the members of the central committee of the need for an armed insurrection, whose principle is approved by ten votes against two (those of Zinoviev and Kamenev). However, no practical measure is taken before October 16th, date on which meets a widened central committee, which votes for a text calling with the insurrection. The Bolsheviks create a revolutionary military Center charged to organize the practical methods of rising. On its side, Trotski causes on on October 9th the installation of a military organization emanating from the Soviet of Petrograd, of which he is the president: the revolutionary Military committee of Petrograd, which it also chairs and which quickly establishes its ascending on the troops. Thus, under the name of the Soviet, the Bolsheviks will direct the coup d'etat.

The scenario is ready, the imminent insurrection, but it is not completely any more secret. Indeed, on on October 17th, an article is published in Novaïa Jizn (New Life), re-examined directed by Maxime Gorki, who gives a report on rumors concerning of the dissensions of Kamenev and Zinoviev with the direction of the party. The latter confirm the following day that it is with an insurrection that they are opposed.

Unlike the revolution of February, spontaneous and unforeseen, the days of October are thoroughly prepared by the Bolsheviks vis-a-vis a government exceeded by the situation.

The “catch” of Petrograd

The trial of strength begins on on October 22nd, when the garrison of Petrograd is joined the revolutionary Military committee of Petrograd which she recognizes like only authority. The Bolsheviks declare that only IIe Congrès panrusse Soviets (envisaged for the 25) - and not a democratic convention - will be entitled to legitimate a new government. Kerenski can count only on the officer cadets to resist the insurrection which bursts the 24 at the evening, when detachments faithful to the revolutionary Military committee - a few thousands of red guards, sailors and soldiers - secure without resistance control of the strategic centers of the capital (bridges, stations, telegraph, banks, stations).

While Kerenski leaves Petrograd in search of reinforcements and of troops faithful to the government, Lénine, appearing for the first time as a public since June, declares with the session of the Soviet of Petrograd: “The revolution of the workmen and the peasants, for which the Bolsheviks did not cease showing the need, is carried out… A new stage opens in the history of Russia, and this third revolution must in the final analysis lead to the victory of socialism.”

The II ^E Congress panrusse of the Soviets

In the evening, the insurrectionists, with the assistance of the artillerists of the cruiser Dawn, seize the palate of Winter, where the ministers withdrew themselves, overcoming without sorrow the resistance of the young juniors and the female battalion who constitute the single one and ridiculous defense of an impotent government. At 11 p.m. IIe Congrès panrusse opens Soviets. After having condemned the “military conspiracy organized behind the back of the Soviets”, part of the Mensheviks and Socialist-revolutionists leave the room under the hootings of the Bolsheviks and the eloquence assassinates of Trotski (“Go where you must be: in the dustbins of the History! ”).

The Bolsheviks then make ratify their takeover by force by the Congress, which votes for a text written by Lénine, conferring “all the power on the Soviets”. Only menchevic Martov is opposed to it, the Socialist-revolutionists being satisfied to protest against verbal offenses of Trotski. This purely formal resolution - the power is in fact with the hands of their party - will make it possible to the Bolsheviks to control “in the name of the people”. A few hours later, the II ^E Congrès panrusse of the Soviets ratifies, before separating, the creation of the Council of the police chiefs of the people - the government Bolshevik - and approves the decrees on peace and the ground, founding documents of the new mode.

It will thus have taken only a few days for the Bolsheviks to triumph over moderate in Petrograd. Moscow falls in its turn between their hands on on November 3rd. It however remains to them to sit their power in a dramatic context.