Why were the Bolsheviks able to defeat their opponents by 1922?

The Civil War between the Red Bolsheviks and the Whites- the collective group of opponents to the Leftist methods of the Bolshevik was a major threat to Bolshevik power. The Bolsheviks willingness to use any force “the ends justifies the means” is best represented in War Communism- the radical policies used by the Party to sustain the Red Army. Under War Communism the resented food requisitioning was established to feed the Army. Despite the suffering and food shortages amongst the civilian population, the food requisitioning detachments confiscated grain at gunpoint from the farmers. Thus the Red Army was well fed, and had high morale. The Red’s control of the railways and the central highlands gave them a huge tactical advantage. They were unified, and quickly mobilized to the different fronts to defend Petrograd. Dissimilarly, the Whites were geographically as well as militarily divided. They had no central command and failed to establish a popular, recognizable government in opposition to the Bolsheviks. The Bolsheviks, despite being generally resented by the countryside were able to use propaganda to demonise the Whites, associating them with foreign imperialists, capitalist bourgeoisie and the Tzarist regime. Thus the Bolsheviks seemed to be the lesser of the two evils for the peasants. These different factors contributed to the overall victory of the Bolsheviks over the Whites.

The ability of the Bolsheviks to concede was also important to the Bolsheviks eventual consolidation of power. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk effectively saved Russia from German invasion, albeit at the price of a fantastical diktat. The Bolsheviks also took a “strategic step backwards” with the introduction of the NEP. The growing resentment of the Party had climaxed bin 1921 with the Kronstadt uprising. A group of sailors, previously called the “heroes of the October Revolution” spoke out against Bolshevik absolutism and War Communism. In the countryside, peasants had also started a potential civil war with the food requisitioning detachments. Thus the Party woke up to the severity of the crisis and introduced NEP, a partial return to capitalism, and more importantly, a steam valve to growing pressure against the Party.    

In summary, the Party was able to defeats its external and internal opponents with a combination of divide and rule, and strategic retreats. The Party’s desperation to survive the early years of government, and resolve and unity within the Party led it to its position of uncontested power in 1922.