Politics of War Communism

In the period from 19918 to 1921, the Soviet state pursued a tough policy of dictate and seizure of agricultural products from the villagers to meet the nutritional needs of the army and city workers. And this period was called "war communism."

Reasons for War Communism

War communism is the policy pursued by the Soviet state in the territory of its country in 1918-1921. the goal was to provide the army with food and weapons. If the government did not take such extreme measures in those years, it would not have defeated the kulaks and representatives of the counter-revolution.

Nationalization of banks and industry

In the early summer of 1917, a massive outflow of capital abroad began. First, foreign investors and entrepreneurs left the Russian market, who needed only cheap labor in Russia, and the young government introduced an 8-hour work day immediately after the February Revolution. Workers began to demand higher wages, strikes were legalized, and entrepreneurs lost superprofits. In conditions of labor sabotage, domestic industrialists also fled the country.

After the October Revolution, the transfer of factories to the workers was not planned, as was done with the land for the peasants. The state monopolized the emerging ownerless enterprises, and their nationalization later became a kind of struggle against counter-revolution. The Bolsheviks took control of the Likinsky manufactory first, and during the winter of 1917-1918. 836 enterprises were nationalized.

The abolition of monetary relations

In December 1918, the first Labor Code was adopted, introducing compulsory labor service. In addition to the 8-hour working day, workers received forced labor, for which they did not pay. These were subbotniks and Sundays. Peasants were required to surrender to the state, for which they were given goods produced at factories. But this was not enough for everyone, and it turned out that the peasants worked for free. A mass outflow of factory workers to the village began, where they tried to escape from hunger.

Food Survey

The imperial administration was introduced by the tsarist government, and the Bolsheviks honed all the stocks from the peasants, including what the family needed. Private trade in bread was banned. Thus, the government tried to deal with sackers and fists; for this, the People's Commissariat was given exclusive authority to procure food. And armed detachments began to plow villages and villages, taking away crops and other agricultural products. The famine of 1920-1921 came.

Peasant riots

The peasants were dissatisfied with the seizure of their property, they received almost nothing for it, since the bread was bought only by the state, and at prices set by them. According to Lenin, war communism is a necessary measure, since the country is devastated by war. Such a policy was in the interests of the workers and the army, but not of the peasantry. And one after another, riots broke out. In the Tambov region, the Antonovites revolted, and Kronstadt, who once served as a stronghold of the revolution, also revolted.

Under these conditions, the surplus appraisal of war communism paved the way for the NEP.