Russia S Home Front In War And Revolution 1914 22

For soldiers on the Great War's Western Front the term home front suggested a degree of coziness, a place of retreat from the horrors of battle visualized by the poet Rupert Brooke in idyllic terms shortly before the war, a place where the "lilac is in bloom" and "is there honey still for tea?" Russia was not overendowed with coziness even before the war, but the early defeats, extensive conscription, deepening economic crisis, and growing political instability meant the elimination of any traces and the replacement of coziness with food shortages, strikes, disturbances, and, in 1917, full-blown revolution. Then the situation became even worse. Catastrophe piled on catastrophe. Food shortages became famine. Economic crisis became collapse and, in 1918-20, flight from hellish cities like starving Petrograd. Political struggles became civil war. Terrible antisemitic pogroms occurred. The multiple crises engendered cholera, typhus, and influenza which ravaged malnourished bodies. On top of the war dead some ten million died in the Civil War, mainly from illnesses. The 34 contributions to the RGWR Home Front Books 3 and 4 shine a piercing light on these events.

This book-the first part of an entire volume about military affairs in Russia's Great War and Revolution-is based on the premise that the military history of World War I in the Russian theater and the subsequent Civil War cannot be sufficiently understood by focusing exclusively on descriptions of war plans, strategy, and operations and that pre-cisely because war is a human activity it is crucial to establish the place of humans in this military story. Moreover, this book interprets the notion of the military "front" very broadly, extending far beyond the lines of trenches and even beyond the army-controlled front zones. It was in all the vastly different circumstances where soldiers lived, fought, and died; it was where medical staffs worked around the clock to administer aid to the wounded; it was even in the POW camps. The common theme here is the military character of the experiences. Importantly, while Russia's Great War did share many of the characteristics of the campaigns in Western Europe, it was also characterized by a host of important factors that were significantly different from the war experiences in Western Europe. Aside from the greater mobility and fluidity of the front, these other factors included time and space, nationality, religion, gender, the vast numbers of casualties, status, and politics. And that means that while this book seeks to add to the growing literature about Russia's Great War and to a much lesser extent the Civil War by examining these types of theme through the prism of "human experiences," it does not aim simply to mimic the existing studies of war experiences on the Western Front.

This essential introduction synthesises the wealth of new material available on the Russian Revolution into a clear overview which is ideal for beginners. Leading expert Christopher Read treats the period 1914-22 as a whole in order to contextualise and better understand the events of 1917 and their impact.

The State versus The People provides the first detailed account of the role of revolutionary justice in the early Soviet state. Law has often been dismissed by historians as either unimportant after the October Revolution amid the violence and chaos of civil war, or, in the absence of written codes and independent judges, little more than another means of violence alongside the secret police (Cheka). This is particularly true of the most revolutionary aspect of the new justice system, revolutionary tribunals—courts inspired by the French Revolution and established to target counter-revolutionary enemies. Yet the evidence put forward in this book paints a more complex picture. The Bolsheviks invested a great deal of effort and scarce resources in building an extensive system of tribunals that spread across the country and operated within the military and the transport network. At their peak, hundreds of tribunals heard hundreds of thousands of cases every year. Not all, though, ended in harsh sentences: some were dismissed through lack of evidence; others given a wide range of sentences; and others still, suspended sentences. Instances of early release and amnesty were also common. This book argues that law played a distinct and multi-faceted role for the Bolsheviks. Tribunals, in particular, stood at the intersection between law and violence, offering various advantages to the Bolsheviks by strengthening state control, providing a more effective means of educating the population about counter-revolution, and enabling a more flexible approach to punishing the state's enemies. All of this challenges traditional understandings of the early Soviet state, adding to our knowledge of the civil war and, ultimately, how the Bolsheviks held on to power.

A compendium of original essays and contemporary viewpoints on the 1917 Revolution The Russian revolution of 1917 reverberated throughout an empire that covered one-sixth of the world. It altered the geo-political landscape of not only Eurasia, but of the entire globe. The impact of this immense event is still felt in the present day. The historiography of the last two decades has challenged conceptions of the 1917 revolution as a monolithic entity— the causes and meanings of revolution are many, as is reflected in contemporary scholarship on the subject. A Companion to the Russian Revolution offers more than thirty original essays, written by a team of respected scholars and historians of 20th century Russian history. Presenting a wide range of contemporary perspectives, the Companion discusses topics including the dynamics of violence in war and revolution, Russian political parties, the transformation of the Orthodox church, Bolshevism, Liberalism, and more. Although primarily focused on 1917 itself, and the singular Revolutionary experience in that year, this book also explores time-periods such as the First Russian Revolution, early Soviet government, the Civil War period, and even into the 1920’s. Presents a wide range of original essays that discuss Brings together in-depth coverage of political history, party history, cultural history, and new social approaches Explores the long-range causes, influence on early Soviet culture, and global after-life of the Russian Revolution Offers broadly-conceived, contemporary views of the revolution largely based on the author’s original research Links Russian revolutions to Russian Civil Wars as concepts A Companion to the Russian Revolution is an important addition to modern scholarship on the subject, and a valuable resource for those interested in Russian, Late Imperial, or Soviet history as well as anyone interested in Revolution as a global phenomenon.