How far do you agree that success of the Bolshevik Revolution was due to the skill and determination of Lenin?

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How far do you agree that success of the Bolshevik Revolution was due to the skill and determination of Lenin?

There’s no doubt Lenin played a crucial role in the events of October 1917. As he is shown as the symbol the October Revolution, he must have been a figure of huge significance.

        The sole fact that Germany sent him to Russia indicates how important he was felt to be. Germans believed that his revolutionary actions would stir chaos throughout Russia and make it unable to continue the war or that, if he gets power, he will end war (which he promised to do). He spent his whole life thinking about ways to make the revolution in Russia happen, it was his lifelong aim. His oratory skills earned him people’s support. He skillfully manipulated their feelings with the phrase ‘all power to the soviet’, managed to disguise his real ambitions. People really believed him (it was after he gained power that it turned out he wasn’t intending to share power with anybody). The determination and confidence he showed evoked strong revolutionary feelings in people, they finally believed that revolution could happen, having a leader so strong and convinced about his goal. He was the most important figure was in the revolutionary struggle because of which the government tried to have him killed. Even Trotsky said that if Lenin hadn’t been there the Revolution wouldn’t have happened. Lenin was the one who commanded and led Bolsheviks. His April Theses entirely changed the aims of the Bolshevik Party. The October Revolution was his idea and he succeeded in persuading the partly reluctant  Bolshevik Central Committee that it was the right time to start it. After the revolution he was the head of the government so people knew about his contribution to the revolution.

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On the other hand, Lenin was absent from Russia most of the time while other Bolshevik revolutionaries were present. It can be said that he just got in on the act. Other factors that might have contributed to revolution are definitely problems of the Provisional Government. Apart from the fact that it could be considered Duma in a new garb, it was facing many other difficulties. Dual authority for a start. The power of the Provisional Government was only on paper while the Petrograd Soviet was supported by the power behind revolution - the workers. The dissatisfaction with the Provisional ...

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