Though the Bolsheviks had succeeded in gaining power, in order for them to keep it they needed to find quick strategies to the problems that now faced them. Perhaps the most urgent of these was to acquire the support of the workers, on who all their plans were dependent. However the workers, like most of Russia, were in a desperate state. They were disillusioned by government of any description and were therefore unlikely to accept the planned dictatorship of one man; Lenin and one party; the Bolsheviks. They were starving and destitute as a direct result of the war that they were forced to fight and which had cost Russia the lives of millions of its men and stripped the country of money and resources. A lot of Russia also feared invasion, either by the Germans, who were pushing further and further into Russia in the South, or by the allies who were desperate to keep Russia in the war. Lenin’s solution was to get Russia out of the war at all costs and as quickly as possible. Named as Commissar of Foreign affairs, Trotsky was sent by Lenin to negotiate on behalf of Russia and the Peace meetings to end the war between Russia and Germany. Although the terms of Brest Litovsk Treaty were very harsh, the terms would have to be met. The Russian people were tired of war and Lenin feared that whilst the war was going on the Russian people would not be open to revolution and change. The treaty had to be signed. Despite Trotsky’s efforts Russia lost a lot of land, but the relief at the end of war for Russia was wide spread when peace was declared on the 3rd March 1918. Again, this was another crucial part that Trotsky played that ultimately secured the success of the Bolsheviks.
However, almost as soon as the Brest Litovsk Treaty had been signed, civil war broke out in Russia. The Bolsheviks had faced fierce opposition from the moment the provisional government had been ‘disposed’ of. However the most threatening of these were the Mensheviks. Although both parties shared the same common goal, of a communist, or Marxist, state run essentially by the workers, their means of getting there were very different. Whilst the Bolsheviks wanted essentially a workers revolution, the Mensheviks welcomed anybody that shared their vision. This included the middle class, who the Bolsheviks greatly distrusted. By the end of 1918 an assortment of anti-Bolsheviks had united. They were made up mainly of social revolutionaries, Mensheviks, Officers and supporters of the Tsar, landlords and capitalists who had lost a lot of land and money during the revolution and the Czech legion (former prisoners of war). Foreign troops were also sent over to join them from the US, Japan, France and Britain, who wanted Russia back in the war as well as wanting to prevent its formation into a communist state. They were known as ‘the Whites’.
The first big problem was that whilst the Whites had an army the Bolsheviks, or ‘the Reds’ did not. Having proven himself as a clever and tactical military leader, Trotsky was made chairman of the supreme war council by Lenin. His main task was to create quickly, an efficient and skilled army out of a rabble of workers and peasants that had the ability to equal and overcome the White army. At first, men were reluctant to fight. Trotsky, however, knowing how starving most of Russia was, made sure that the soldiers were the best fed people in Russia. He then proceeded to make it compulsory for men to join the Red Army. This gave Trotsky some 330,00 conscripted men, aged from eighteen to forty. However, what the Red army lacked and desperately needed, was experienced officers. Trotsky’s solution was to give former officers of the Tsar’s army an ultimatum - join the Red army, or die! Some choice! In some cases these officers would even find their family taken hostage in order to ensure that they did not attempt to desert. Trotsky, realizing that he could not possibly watch every single officer to make sure that they behaved, employed political commissars to work with the officers, keeping an eye on them and executing them if necessary. The result of all these perhaps drastic measures was a brilliant and fierce army with 22,000 officers to command Trotsky’s 330,000 soldiers.
Trotsky was an excellent military leader. He spent much of the war, hurrying from one battle to another, often from one side of Russia to another, in his own private train, equipped with everything imaginable, including its own communications tower, in order to deliver his orders, encouragement and supplies straight to the battlefield. As well as hugely boosting the morale of the troops, this was proof of Trotsky’s willingness to get his hands dirty. He was not afraid to be in the midst of the fighting. He also made extensive and effective use of propaganda to whip up enthusiasm about the war, and in just three years, the army had grown to a massive 5 million men.
Perhaps the reason for the success that the Red Army had was due to the ‘fist of iron’ with which Trotsky is said to have ruled over them. He brought back the death penalty and showed little mercy. In 1918, he issued an order that promised death to deserters. Shortly after this order was issued, an entire battalion attempted to desert from battle. One in ten of the soldiers were executed by a firing squad at the command of Trotsky. However, this was the approach that perhaps was needed to turn an unruly bunch of factory workers into a disciplined fighting machine.
Another example of Trotsky’s ruthlessness was the murder of the Tsar and his family on the 17 July, 1918. Fearing that the Czech legion would attempt to rescue them, the Cheka, or secret police, were ordered to take over from the guards. The Cheka proceeded to viciously murder the Tsar and his family. Trotsky later said that ‘The execution of the Tsar’s family was needed not only to frighten, horrify and instil a sense of hopelessness in the enemy, but also to shake up our own ranks, to show that there was no retreating, that ahead lay either total victory or total doom’. By eliminating the Tsar and his family, the Bolsheviks had eliminated the man, who whilst alive remained a symbol to some of the monarchy that might return. This event signalled both the end of the Monarchy in Russia and the beginning of a new, Bolshevik run, communist state.
Despite many earlier victories by the Red army, in the autumn of 1919, it seemed that the white army were sure to win. By 14th October, White armies were pushing into Moscow from the southwest, closing in on the eastern front, and by the 22nd armies had reached the outskirts of Petrograd. Trotsky, however, never the defeatists, rushed to Petrograd to take personal command. Trotsky described Zinoviev, the Bolshevik already in charge, as ‘panic personified’. A week later Trotsky helped organise a successful counter-attack forcing the white armies to retreat. This was the turning point of the civil war that was later won by the Red Army and was again solely down to Trotsky.
In conclusion, although seen by some as not a true Bolshevik, due to his early alliance with the Mensheviks, Trotsky soon proved otherwise. Whilst Lenin was the dictator, Trotsky was his right hand man. He proved himself to be both a trustworthy and irreplaceable member of the Bolshevik party. This was shown by the immense number of highly important tasks that he was made responsible for. Perhaps it was Trotsky’s ability to play so many different roles, negotiator, strategist, diplomat, and leader that made him so successful. Or perhaps it was his complete and utter belief. Belief in Lenin, belief in his army, belief in communism, his cause and the ideology of himself and others that gave him the determination and the ability to succeed. Whatever the reason, there is no doubt that Trotsky played a key role in the take over of the Bolsheviks.
