Lenin and the Bolsheviks Replacing the Provisional Government as Leaders of Russia by November 1917

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Lenin and the Bolsheviks Replacing the Provisional Government as Leaders of Russia by November 1917

The provisional government had dealed with the issues of war and land

very ineffectively, which helped The Bolsheviks greatly in seizing

power. They would not give the peasants the land which they had

wanted, and expected when the Tsar was overthrown. War continued,

despite the majority of Russia wanting it to end. Food and fuel

shortages continued, and although no-one wanted to surrender to

Germany, most people felt that it was time to give in, and give up.

However, the provisional government wanted to keep the allies, and not

break away before the war had ended; this showed peasants that the

Provisional government were not considering the state of the country,

or the conditions of the peasants, and that they did not care. John

Reed, an American journalist described the situation in Petrograd in

'Ten days that shook the world':

"Week by week,food became scarcer.The daily allowance of bread

fell... Towards the end there was a whole week without bread at all.

Sugar one was entitled to at the rate of two pounds per month - if

one could get it at all, which was seldom... There was milk for half

the babies in the city; most hotels and private houses never saw

it for months. For milk and tobacco one had to stand in a queue

long hours in the chill rain"

Peasants wanted land, food, and peace, exactly what the Bolsheviks had

been promising to bring them. This put the Bolsheviks in a good

position to get a lot more support.

The Russian army had suffered from shortages, many were dying, and

many Russians had lost family to the war already. Many units were

ready to back the Bolsheviks, and the Military Revolutionary Comittee

would help to co - ordinate troops and organise a revolution. Even the

units that disapproved would not act against the soviets.

Alexander Kerensky became Prime Minister of the provisional

government, and was at once faced with a challenge, as the commander -

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