As its name suggests, the Red Terror was conducted to intimidate and force ordinary Russians to obedience, as much as it was to eliminate opponents. The pretext was a nearly successful attempt on the life of Lenin by a Socialist Revolutionary, Fannie Kaplan. Among the victims of the Red Terror were tsarists, liberals, non-Bolshevik socialists, members of the clergy, kulaks (affluent peasants), foreigners and political dissidents of all stripes. Publisher: Alpha History Copyright: The content on this page may not be republished without our express permission. Date accessed: October 19, 2020 He is the author of the History in an Afternoon textbook series. August 1918 was a critical month in the formalisation and expansion of the Terror. The pretext was a nearly successful attempt on the life of Lenin by a Socialist Revolutionary, Fannie Kaplan. This growing anti-Bolshevik sentiment had many parents. The people caught up in Russia in 1917 actively looked to the French Revolution for inspiration - the Bolsheviks thought of themselves as Jacobins - and the Red Terror is a direct relation to The Terror of Robespierre et al. Hundreds of thousands were locked up, tortured and executed. The violence consisted of the killing of tens of thousands of people (including 6,832 Roman Ca… 1. Authors: Jennifer Llewellyn, Michael McConnell, Steve Thompson Robert Wilde is a historian who writes about European history. A small force of just a few hundred men in early 1918, within two years the Cheka was one of the largest Soviet agencies, employing around 200,000 people. Kaplan was arrested, interrogated and tortured by the Cheka before being shot. This Russian Revolution site contains articles, sources and perspectives on events in Russia between 1891 and 1927. Lenin received immediate medical care and survived this assassination attempt, though his life hung in the balance for a time. As the Bolsheviks expanded their definition of who was an enemy of the revolution, they also expanded the Cheka.

To this end, a massive police state was created, which operated outside the law and which could arrest seemingly anyone, at any time, who was judged a class enemy. On the other hand, the Red Terror launched by the Bolsheviks in 1918, including the murder of the royal family, convinced many in the West that this new breed was beyond the pale. In 1917 several decades of institutional decay, chronic mismanagement, rising political awareness, and a terrible war caused the Tsarist regime in Russia to be confronted by such a large rebellion, including the loss of the military's loyalty, that two parallel regimes were able to take power in Russia: a liberal Provisional Government, and a socialist soviet. Many Western liberal and conservative historians, in contrast, claim that violence and terror were inherent in Bolshevik ideology and methodology. Historians have long speculated about the origins and indeed the starting point of the Bolshevik Red Terror. In the first days of September, several Bolshevik leaders and Cheka commanders made public statements about the threat of counter-revolution and the necessity of using terror as a necessary tactic. It contains 179,175 words in 288 pages and was updated on October 10th 2020. Historians have also debated both the nature and the inevitability of the Red Terror. The Terror wasn’t purely a creation of Lenin's, as it grew out of the hate-filled attacks which vast quantities of the Russian peasants directed against the perceived better off in 1917 and 18. By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. He is a traitor to the Revolution. As soon as he recovered from what could have been fatal wounds, Lenin ordered the Cheka to carry out mass executions….

Uritsky’s murder was a retaliation for the Cheka’s execution of one of Kanegeiser’s own friends. It was developed and implemented during mid-1918. The Red Terror was a program of mass repression, class extermination and execution carried out by the Bolshevik government in the Russian Civil War. Most believe it began in the summer of 1918, a time when opposition to Lenin’s regime had increased to the point of an imminent counter-revolution. Date published: August 11, 2019 “For the blood of Lenin and Uritsky”, said a pro-Bolshevik newspaper, “let there be a flood of bourgeois blood, as much as possible”. The Terror was soon expanded to include anyone who might pose a threat to the Bolshevik party or its policies: former tsarists, liberals, Mensheviks, members of the Russian Orthodox church, foreigners, anyone who dared to sell food or goods for profit. If you've read about the French Revolution, the idea of an extreme group introducing a government that ran through terror might seem familiar. Beyond those places, Bolshevik support was limited. Historians of this view believe the seeds of the Red Terror were sown weeks before the anti-Bolshevik violence of mid-1918. This site is created and maintained by Alpha History. Cheka agents targeted any individual or group considered a threat to Bolshevik rule or policies. 4. I lay the responsibility for the treacherous peace with Germany and the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly at his feet.”. They also aimed to remove whole classes of state ‘enemies’, to wage a war by the workers against bourgeois Russia. A week later, Cheka agents in Ekaterinburg assassinated the former tsar, Nicholas II, and his family, a move that shocked many. The wanton violence of the Terror soon surpassed the worst excesses of the tsarist Okhrana, the Nardonaya Volya and the terrorism of radical SRs in 1905. There were many causes for the Red Terror, including growing opposition to the Bolsheviks leading to the Civil War and the August 1918 assassination attempt on Lenin. Often it was individuals who had distant associations with the old regime or those who dared speak publicly against Lenin, the Bolsheviks or their policies. A historian’s view:

Channeling the Anger of the Russian Peasants, Timeline of the Russian Revolutions: 1918, Khmer Rouge: Regime Origins, Timeline, and Fall, French Revolution Timeline: 6 Phases of Revolution, Biography of Joseph Stalin, Dictator of the Soviet Union, World War I and The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Industry and Agriculture History in Europe, M.A., Medieval Studies, Sheffield University, B.A., Medieval Studies, Sheffield University. If I regret anything, it is only that. In time, this network of labour camps would become the notorious gulags used extensively by Stalin in 1930s. Be on the lookout for your Britannica newsletter to get trusted stories delivered right to your inbox. The true numbers of extra-legal killings were undoubtedly much higher, possibly approaching six figures. The Red Terror was a program of mass repression, class extermination and execution carried out by the Bolshevik government during the Russian Civil War. As soon as he recovered from what could have been fatal wounds, Lenin ordered the Cheka to carry out mass executions… Read More For more information on usage, please refer to our Terms of Use. Russian Revolution memory quiz – events 1907-1916, Russian Revolution memory quiz – events 1917, Russian Revolution memory quiz – events 1918-1924, Russian Revolution memory quiz – revolutionaries, Russian Revolution memory quiz – tsarists, Russian Revolution memory quiz: concepts (I), Russian Revolution memory quiz: concepts (II), Russian Revolution memory quiz: events 1906 to 1913, Russian Revolution memory quiz: events 1914 to 1916, Russian Revolution memory quiz: events to 1905. Revisionists and libertarian historians see it as a creature of its time, a frantic and panicked response to the anti-Bolshevik terrorism and opposition that erupted around Russia in the first months of 1918. U.S. Secretary of State Robert Lansing called Bolshevism “the most hideous and monstrous thing that the human…, The formal “Red Terror” began in September 1918. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Red-Terror, 20th-century international relations: Bolshevik diplomacy. A fortnight later, while Lenin was visiting a factory in Moscow, a young woman named Fanya Kaplan stepped forward from the crowd and shot the Bolshevik leader in the chest and shoulder. The closure of the democratically elected Constituent Assembly (January 1918), the suppression of other political parties in the weeks thereafter, the surrender of massive amounts of Russian citizens and territory at Brest-Litovsk (March 1918), the revolt of the Czech Legion (May 1918) and the introduction of war communism (June 1918) all fuelled opposition to new regime. On August 17th, Petrograd Cheka leader Moisei Uritsky was assassinated by a young cadet officer called Kanegeiser. Lenin's guilt is clear if once denied. On August 9th, the Bolshevik leader issued his famous ‘hanging order‘, instructing communists in Penza to execute 100 dissident peasants as a public deterrent. Looking suspicious, being in the wrong time at the wrong place, and being denounced by jealous rivals could all lead to imprisonment. Dzerzhinsky and the Cheka At the helm of this wave of state-sanctioned political violence was the Cheka and its fanatical leader, Felix Dzerzhinsky.Cheka agents targeted any individual or group considered a threat to Bolshevik rule or policies. The intrinsic nature of repression in his extreme version of socialism clear. There was no obvious government body that could hold back the work of the Cheka. Title: “The Red Terror” Though official figures were much lower, most historians believe more than 100,000 people were executed during the Red Terror, a figure that does not include casualties caused by the Civil War. The Red Terror was a campaign of mass torture, murder and systematic oppression conducted by the Jewish Bolsheviks during 1918.