HISTORY - TSARIST, SOVIET, RUSSIA

Alexander II

 Secret committee considers serf emancipation 

Alexander II tours Russia giving pro-emancipation speeches - landlord prepare inventories of peasant holdings

von Reutern set up state bank in:

Emancipation Edict proclaimed

Dmitri Milutyn (Minister of War → Minister of Defence)

Emancipation Edict

von Reutern promoted municipal banks in:

Reform of education - University Statue passed

Zemstva law passed, reform of judiciary, Secondary Education Statute passed

Greater freedom of publication and press permitted, Elementary Education Statute passed

Attempted assasination of Alexander II

the Kingdom of Poland was destroyed and it became the Vistula Region of the Empire

reform of municipal government creates town dumas

military reforms

Assassination of Alexander II by People’s Will

Alexander III

Nikolai Bunge (first finance minister)

Ivan Vyshnegradsky (Finance Minister)

Medeleev Tariff Act of _ _ _ _

Great Famine in:

Sergei Witte (Minister of Finance)

Nicholas II

 Witte put rouble on the gold standard and stablised it

Russo-Japanese War

Japanese attack on Port Arthur

Russian commander of the sea (the most popular and successful) Admiral Makarov died

Baltic Fleet’s fail → Sent their Baltic fleet on 29000 km journey halfway around the world to challenge Japanese

Bloody Sunday

Port Arthur was eventually forced to surrender to the Japanese

Treaty of Portsmouth

Nicholas II signs October Manifesto

Vladimir Lenin

Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets creates government, Soviet of People's Commissars, led by Lenin

Armistice negotiated with Germans - Cheka is formed, Decree on Church

Treaty of Brest-Litovsk

 Murder of the tsar and his family

Part Secretariat and Politburo established, Comintern founded 

all White attacks defeated

NEP (New Economic Policy)

Lenin banned ‘factionalism’ within the Party. → this meant that discussion would be allowed, but once a decision had been taken, all sections of the Party had to stick to it.

Stalin became General Secretary

Treaty of Rapallo

USSR formed

The triumvirs’ campaign against Trotsky began in:

Lenin’s funeral

Lenin’s widow revealed his Testament to Central Committee and senior Congress delegates

Trotsky’s Lessons of October was published —> Stalin formally revealed ‘socialism in one country’

the triumvirs removed Trotsky from his position as a commissar of war

Stalin succeeded in having Trotsky and Zinoviev expelled from Communist Party, and Kamenev expelled from CC

Bukharin was removed from the Politburo

Joseph Stalin

Ryutin Affair

USSR in League of Nations

Kirov Assassination

Trial of the Sixteen - Zinoviev, Kamenev & 14 others were accused of the conspiracy against Stalin (all 16 were found guilty and executed) 

Trial of the Seventeen - 17 communist leaders were accused of plotting with Trotsky to carry out assassinations etc. → 13 were sentenced to death

Trial of the 21 - Bukharin and 20 others, who were accused of membership of a ‘Trotskyist– Rightist Bloc’ → most of the accused ‘confessed’, but not Bukharin. The court returned the desired verdict, and Bukharin, Rykov, and 15 others were sentenced to death.

Nazi-Soviet Pact [Ribbentrop-Mołotov Pact]

Hitler invaded the USSR. Stalin was brought into IIWW

COMECON (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance)

Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance (signed by Mao and Stalin)

Nikita Khrushchev

Virgin Lands policy/scheme (utilising farming land which was previously not used for agriculture (corn was planted mainly in Kazakhstan and in Siberia - young people worked there)

USSR-GDR (German Democratic Republic = East) treaty was drawn up, giving East Germany full powers to conduct its own foreign policy

Khrushchev and Bulganin’s tour through various Western countries, Yugoslavia and China (part of peaceful coexistence)

Khrushchev visited Tito in Belgrade

Warsaw Pact

Secondary education was extended for all (Khrushchev)

Hungarian Revolt

Sixth Five-Year Plan

Khrushchev’s secret speech

establishing 105 regional ministries based on existing administrative structures (under Khrushchev)

Introduction of minimum wages for urban and rural workers in an attempt to reduce wage differentials between jobs and professions 

Sputnik 1 (the world’s first artificial satellite)

Khrushchev carried out reform of Gosplan

Politburo members voted 7:4 to dismiss him, but Khrushchev insisted that the full Central Committee would have to agree before he would resign

Khruschev is both First Secretary of CPSu and premier

Khrushchev’s Notes’ accused the West of using West Berlin ‘as a springboard for espionage and anti-Soviet acts’ and said that the West had 6 months to recognise East Germany

New Criminal Code (during Khrushchev) - Citizens could no longer be tried by emergency or military courts & certain ‘crimes’ were abolished 

summit meeting , during which, when the West refused to comply with Khrushchev’s ultimatum, he withdrew it and, at accepted the right of the West in West Berlin

Khrushchev’s meeting with President Eisenhower at Camp David, which improved East-West relations and is known as the ‘spirit of Camp David’ [Eisenhower denied that the US used spy planes over USSR] 

USSR’s rocket lands on the moon

Seven Year Plan

Paris Summing (the positive spirit ended during it evoked by controversy around shooting down the US U-2 reconnaissance spy plane over USSR →  Eisenhower refused to apologise for the plane and the summit broke up)

China openly attacked Soviet foreign policy

Yuri Gagarin is the first person to travel in space

Meeting with Kennedy during which Khrushchev renewed the earlier ultimatum → that the West had 6 months to settle the question of Germany, or they would be required to leave West Berlin

Berlin Wall

Record Harvest under Khruschev

Cuban Missile Crisis

disastrous harvest under Khrushchev, as grain production dropped by 30%, creating an immense shortage in animal fodder and thus large amounts of North American and Australian grain had to be bought

Valentina Tereshkova is the first woman to travel in space

While Khrushchev was on holiday at the Black Sea, Politburo finally decided that he had to go

A special meeting of the Central Committee was held, and he was informed that:

•  he had ‘retired’ because of ill-health and age

• his positions had been filled by Leonid Brezhnev and Alexei Kosygin 

• Realising, he had no allies Khrushchev went into obscure retirement 

Leonid Brezhnev

Brezhnev insisted on bigger allocation of resources for agriculture (more chemical fertilisers and advanced mechanical equipment) → to overcome grain shortages 

Eighth-Five-Year Plan

Alexei Kosygin resurrected Khrushchev’s 1962 plans to give greater autonomy to factory managers over certain decisions 

Warsaw Letter, warning Alexander Dubcek to stop reforms in Czechoslovakia by Eastern European countries

Invasion of Czechoslovakia (Prague Spring)