‘October* Socialist revolution started a new era not only in the history of Russia but in the history of the world.’
– Mao Zedong
On 7th November 1917, the workers and peasants of Russia under the leadership of the Bolsheviks led by Comrade Lenin overthrew the government and the power of state passed into the hands of the Petrograd Soviet. The November Revolution is the foremost revolution in the world that brought down the old exploitative ruling classes and established a state of the workers, peasants, and other toiling masses. This was a qualitative leap in the history of class struggle. On the 40th anniversary of the Great Russian Revolution in 1957 Comrade Mao said, “The Great Russian Revolution that our great revolutionary teacher Comrade Lenin started and the Soviet people took forward started a new era in the history of the world… There were many kinds of revolutions in history. Anyhow there is none that could be compared with the October Socialist Revolution. All the toiling masses and progressive forces of the world have been speaking about establishing a society where one cannot exploit another. These dreams came true only when for the first time October Revolution was successful in one-fourth part of the world…Dear comrades, the fact that representatives of the working class and masses of the people of various countries of the world are here today to attend this grand meeting of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, held to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the October Revolution demonstrates in itself the great solidarity of the people’s forces of the world and symbolizes the flourishing condition of the international socialist movement. Let us continue our efforts to strengthen the solidarity of the socialist countries, and of the working people and oppressed nations of the world, in order to attain new and greater victories.”
The Revolution of 1917 was not a success in a single step, it became successful only in the process of three revolutions – January 1905- first phase of Bourgeois Democratic Revolution, February 1917- Completion of Bourgeois Democratic Revolution, and November 1917 Socialist Revolution.
The first 1905 Russian revolution ended in defeat because strong co-operation was not established between the workers and peasants against the Tsarist monarchy. A large section of the peasantry was not prepared to extend cooperation to the workers to eliminate the monarchy. The working class was the important and main force in the revolution but was divided. The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) that was the embryo of a truly Proletarian Party – was divided into two groups Bolshevik and Menshevik. Bolsheviks always took a stable revolutionary path but Mensheviks created hurdles for revolution with their compromising tactics. They created doubts in a large section of the workers and disturbed the working class. Russia being a backward capitalist country, a revolution would have been impossible without the alliance of the workers and peasants. Even the proletariat were yet to develop as a class-for-itself. In such a situation, these counter-revolutionary tendencies within the RSDLP created by Mensheviks led to wedges in the united struggle of the workers. Although, this upheaval decisively weakened the Tsardom leading to greater influence of the capitalist class in the state power.
The second revolution took place in February 1917. It was a bourgeois-democratic revolution and successfully overthrew the autocracy of the Tsar. A ‘Provisional government’ was formed. Dual power came into existence. The RSDLP (Bolshevik) stated, ‘The Revolution was successful only because the proletariat led it. The proletariat led the struggle of lakhs of peasants in military uniform demanding “peace, bread, and land”. The success of the revolution was ensured only due to the strong proletarian leadership.’ In the initial days of the revolution, Comrade Lenin said, “Workers made revolution. Workers demonstrated courage. They spilled their blood. They integrated toiling masses and poor people with them.” The 1905 revolution paved the way for the success of the 1917 February Revolution. Comrade Lenin said, “Soviets were formed only in three years 1905-1907. The Soviets of workers and military representatives contributed to the success of the revolution. The workers and soldiers rebelled and formed the Soviets of workers and military representatives.
Military Soviets were formed with the initiative of the Bolsheviks. The leaders of Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks in the Soviet Executive Council handed over the power to the capitalists. Thus a new state power emerged in Russia. As per Lenin, there were the representatives of ‘Capitalists and the landlords who were to become capitalists’. But along with the capitalist power, another power – the Soviet of workers and military representatives was in existence. Most of the military representatives in the Soviet were peasants recruited into the Army for the sake of war. The Soviet of workers and military representatives is the organization against the monarchy of the Tsar with the cooperation of workers and peasants, it is their organization of power and it is the organization of worker-peasant dictatorship. Thus two powers and two dictatorships were strangely mutually entwined – the dictatorship of capitalists representing the temporary government and the dictatorship of workers-peasants of the Soviets representing the workers, peasants, and soldiers. Dual power is the result of this.
The third revolution (the November Socialist Revolution) successfully overthrew the provisional government representing the capitalists. In his speech in April 1917, Comrade Lenin gave a call to the vast masses to fight for the success of the Socialist revolution. Comrade Lenin ended this speech with the slogan ‘Long live Socialist revolution’. His ‘The Tasks of the Proletariat in the Present Revolution’ a.k.a. April Theses changed the direction of not just the Russian revolution but also the international communist movement. In essence, Lenin in these theses laid down the political as well as economic bases for a socialist state. The Soviet Revolution spread from October, 1917 to February, 1918 and Comrade Lenin said it to be the ‘success journey’ of Soviet power. One of the objective reasons for the success of the revolution was that the Russian Capitalist class was quite weak, unorganised, and lacked political experience. It did not have the strength to politically make a decision on its own and the initiative to search for a way to overcome this situation. For example, it did not have the experience of the French capitalists to make large-scale political groups. It did not learn the art of making agreements comprehensively using tactics like the British capitalists. The February Revolution brought down the Tsar from power. Capitalists captured power but they did not have any alternative but to implement the same policies. People and the Army were severely at a loss due to the imperialist war. The capitalists continued the cruel policies of the Tsar as it was and made them more severe. As far as the impact of the Socialist Revolutionary and the Menshevik parties on the people, the temporary government utilised it as a veil to sustain its power. But when the Mensheviks and Social revolutionaries clearly came out as class-collaborationist agents, they lost their influence among the masses. The people no longer supported the provisional government of the capitalists.
A revolutionary class like the Russian working class led the November Revolution. It is a class that was tempered with struggles. It saw two revolutions in a short time. Before the beginning of the third revolution, it had recognition as the leader of the people in the struggle for peace, land, freedom and Socialism. In the revolution, the Russian proletariat gained a strong alliance of the poor peasants who were the utmost majority. By the time the November days began, they had come over to the side of revolution. Without this alliance the November Revolution would not have become a success.
A Party like the Bolshevik Party that was tempered in political struggles led the proletariat. The Bolshevik Party was a daring Party that could lead the people for a decisive offensive. The November Socialist Revolution established a proletarian dictatorship and began a new era in the history of the human race, the era of proletarian revolutions.
The historic lessons of the Russian Revolution is that the success of the proletariat and the dictatorship of the proletariat are not possible without a proletarian revolutionary Party, the Party that can prepare the proletariat to take up a decisive war against the capitalists can become such a kind of Party. Marxist-Leninist theory is the guiding science regarding both natural phenomena and social development. It is the science of progress of worker-peasant, toiling masses. History is the evidence to say that the final victory is always of the people.
*In 1917, Russia was still on the Julian calendar lagging behind by 13 days to the Gregorian system.
