To begin with, the Petrograd Soviet – a group of workers and soldiers who had formed in 1917 - was very powerful and it built-up a nationwide network of Soviets who obeyed its orders. Order Number One forbade soldiers and workers to comply with the Provisional Government unless the Soviet agreed. Also, Lenin and his plans strongly relied on the Soviets, who were rather like councils; The Petrograd Soviet had supporters in the railway service (so they could stop trains if they wished) and the banks (so they could stop the flow of money if they wished). The Soviet was made up of workers and it hated the Provisional Government as it was made up of middle class men, who the workers believed had an unfair portion of the country’s wealth. The workers in Petrograd were in the majority and it was these people who supported The Petrograd Soviet. However, the Provisional Government made no attempt to end the power of the Soviets and therefore failed to gain the control that it wanted.
Another significant mistake by the Provisional Government was that they made an effort to continue the war, against the wishes of the Russian public. It attacked Austria in June 1917, but after initial successes the Germans moved in and the Russians were defeated; soldiers deserted the army and there was a naval mutiny, meaning the war was a disaster. The Provisional Government set up ‘death squads’ to execute deserters, which made things worse and made the Russian public resent them even more, and by October 1917 soldiers were deserting, killing their land lords and taking land for themselves. Then the peasants began to take nobles’ land; there was anarchy in the countryside. The Provisional Government sent troops to take back the land, and this made the peasants very angry because they felt that the Government was working against them and not alongside them.
One challenge presented to the Provisional Government was the Kornilov Affair, which was lead by a right wing army officer called . He wanted the government to deal much more harshly with the communists; he felt that the Provisional Government was too ‘soft’ and that it should go. He was supported by many other army officers, and demanded that all socialists and communists should be arrested. Kerensky, the Minister of Justice for the Provisional Government, refused to do this as he did not want to be seen to be weak; if anybody was going to order arrests it was himself and not anybody else. So Kornilov gathered troops together and marched on Petrograd, where he and his army were faced with those soldiers who had deserted Kornilov and a further 20,000 Red Guards. The Red Guards were a new force created by the workers of Petrograd to defend the city, and was built up by Leon Trotsky, without whom the revolution would have been crushed.
With this type of force opposing Kornilov, he did not stand a chance and the attempted coup failed. However, while it may appear that Kerensky came out of this well, the real winners were the communists. The Red Guards were credited with saving the city, and the workers who formed the Red Guards were sympathetic to the communists, as many were communists themselves. Lenin, ironically, was in Finland at this time, even though he was the man who gained most from the Kornilov Affair. Kerensky had lost a lot of support and his leadership was questioned, but Lenin's preparations still had to be perfect. He had to strongly rely on the Petrograd Soviets and their unconditional support in order for his plans to succeed.
Besides the people’s anger towards the Provisional Government, the Bolsheviks had their own reasons for success. Firstly, they had good slogans such as ‘Peace, Bread and Land’ and ‘all power to the Soviets’. Other parties claimed that the Bolsheviks could never deliver their promises, but their arguments were too complicated and the Russian people didn’t understand. This meant that the Bolsheviks got the support they needed. Furthermore, the party ran its own propaganda machine, including the newspaper ‘Pravada’ (Truth) which got the party’s ideas across to its supporters. Perhaps one of the most vital reasons why the Bolsheviks were successful was because of Vladimir Illich Lenin, who played such a significant role because he was an inspiring leader with vision, clarity and ability. His ‘April Theses’, from which the Bolsheviks got the slogans for their publicity campaigns, were based on Marx’s theory of communism.
Therefore, I believe that the main reasons for the success of the Bolsheviks in October/ November 1917 were, first of all, the fact that the Bolsheviks had their own armed forces, the ‘Red Guards’, trained by Trotsky. They were the strength and power of the Bolsheviks and, even with the brains of Lenin, none of his plans could have been realized without the Red Guards. Secondly, the Provisional Government was seen as weak and ineffective and, eventually, it became increasingly unpopular; the Bolsheviks were able to exploit this to their own advantage. Finally, I believe that another main reason for the success of the Bolsheviks must be that Lenin returned from exile at the opportune moment.
