Hey all,
I’ll be honest that I have no idea how the Bolsheviks won the war considering the Red Army was newly formed, had no funding, WWI had already destroyed the countryside and led to millions of deaths, the White Army possessed most loyal and experienced top military from the former Russian Empire, the 13 most powerful and wealthiest empires and countries in history invaded on behalf of the Whites, rogue leftist anti-Bolshevik armies and gangs formed, sabotage and counter-revolution, etc. It seemed like the Red Army was fighting on every single possible front for the mere existence of the fledgling socialist nation.
So how did they win? Out of all this chaos how did the Bolsheviks retain power and, ultimately, were able form soviet republics across the former Russian Empire? I genuinely do not understand.
Of course I’m glad they won, but can an understanding of why and how they won still be illustrative to modern movements? Not in terms of copying all tactics, the Bolsheviks had to contend with their particular material conditions which led to their particular approaches, but rather in any underlying ethos or ideological tendency in building and maintaining power after the initial revolution which can be helpful to future and contemporary revolutionaries?
Also any good book recommendations would be helpful too!
This is a very good question! I consider myself decent at understanding military history but i have also frequently marveled at this myself. It is such an incredible political and military achievement that (along with the Chinese and the Cuban revolutions) this question really deserves to be studied in depth by any revolutionary movement that truly wants to win. My own understanding only scratches the surface so i look forward to reading what other comrades have to say and looking into book recommendations as well.
One thing that comes to mind that i have heard was kind of a “secret weapon” of the Bolsheviks was their control over the transportation network of Russia, in particular the railway system (with a majority of railway workers being solid Bolshevik supporters despite the old union leadership being more inclined toward the Mensheviks/SRs) that allowed them to deploy their logistics much more efficiently than their enemies over the vast distances of Russia.
They also learned very quickly how to efficiently organize and mobilize large numbers of people (though what they were able to achieve at this time pales in comparison to the truly monumental scale and efficiency of mobilization that was achieved some decades later in the Great Patriotic War, which to my knowledge is unsurpassed in history).
As well the revolutionary fervor they were able to inspire gave them a big morale advantage over their enemies and allowed them to absorb temporary defeats and losses that might have unraveled other armies.
Finally, unlike the other various anarchist and non-Bolshevik social revolutionary groups, the Bolsheviks understood the necessity of discipline (learned over years of political struggle prior to the revolution).
