WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.919 Picture this. It's it is a freezing night in 00:00:02.919 --> 00:00:05.599 Petrograd. A massive warship sits out in the 00:00:05.599 --> 00:00:08.259 harbor and the physical tension across the city 00:00:08.259 --> 00:00:11.220 is just it's palpable. Just feel it in the air. 00:00:11.380 --> 00:00:14.439 Exactly. And suddenly a single shot rings out. 00:00:14.839 --> 00:00:18.339 The shot itself is a blank. Right. Yet that single 00:00:18.339 --> 00:00:21.640 empty boom from the cruiser Aurora signals the 00:00:21.640 --> 00:00:24.219 collapse of an entire government overnight and 00:00:24.219 --> 00:00:26.699 it effectively alters the trajectory of the 20th 00:00:26.699 --> 00:00:29.480 century. Welcome to The Deep Dive. We are thrilled 00:00:29.480 --> 00:00:32.079 you're joining us today to explore an event that 00:00:32.079 --> 00:00:34.859 reshaped the modern world, the October Revolution 00:00:34.859 --> 00:00:37.899 of 1917. And our source material for this analysis 00:00:37.899 --> 00:00:40.380 is a comprehensive Wikipedia article covering 00:00:40.380 --> 00:00:43.020 the timeline, the subsequent myth -making, and 00:00:43.020 --> 00:00:45.380 the enormous global aftermath of the Bolshevik 00:00:45.380 --> 00:00:47.679 takeover. So the mission for today is to strip 00:00:47.679 --> 00:00:50.960 away a century of intense propaganda, cinematic 00:00:50.960 --> 00:00:54.280 dramatizations and heavy historical bias. We're 00:00:54.280 --> 00:00:55.700 going to look at what actually happened on the 00:00:55.700 --> 00:00:57.960 ground in Russia during those days and unpack 00:00:57.960 --> 00:01:00.420 how a highly organized minority managed to seize 00:01:00.420 --> 00:01:03.179 control of the largest country on Earth. But 00:01:03.179 --> 00:01:06.180 before we begin mapping out that timeline, there 00:01:06.180 --> 00:01:08.540 is a necessary parameter I need to establish 00:01:08.540 --> 00:01:12.120 with you, our listener. The source material we're 00:01:12.120 --> 00:01:14.780 examining today contains highly politically charged 00:01:14.969 --> 00:01:17.709 content. Yeah, very much so. It details left 00:01:17.709 --> 00:01:20.950 -wing Marxist -Leninist ideologies, right -wing 00:01:20.950 --> 00:01:24.189 counter movements, totalitarian actions, and 00:01:24.189 --> 00:01:26.670 events that resulted in immense human suffering. 00:01:27.200 --> 00:01:29.879 I want to be completely explicit here. Neither 00:01:29.879 --> 00:01:31.799 of us is taking a side. Right, absolutely not. 00:01:32.120 --> 00:01:34.760 We are not endorsing nor are we condemning any 00:01:34.760 --> 00:01:37.400 of the political viewpoints, ideologies, or actions 00:01:37.400 --> 00:01:40.060 described in these texts. Our sole objective 00:01:40.060 --> 00:01:42.480 today is to impartially convey the historical 00:01:42.480 --> 00:01:45.120 facts, the sequence of events, and the varying 00:01:45.120 --> 00:01:47.340 historiographical arguments exactly as they're 00:01:47.340 --> 00:01:49.739 presented in our original source material. Our 00:01:49.739 --> 00:01:52.060 role is strictly to analyze the history. Okay, 00:01:52.060 --> 00:01:54.379 let's unpack this. To understand how a revolution 00:01:54.379 --> 00:01:57.120 of this magnitude actually materializes, We have 00:01:57.120 --> 00:01:59.120 to look closely at the pressure cooker that set 00:01:59.120 --> 00:02:01.680 the stage in 1917. And it really was a pressure 00:02:01.680 --> 00:02:04.739 cooker. Because by the time October rolls around, 00:02:05.000 --> 00:02:07.260 the situation in Russia is just catastrophic. 00:02:08.060 --> 00:02:09.740 The country had already been through the February 00:02:09.740 --> 00:02:13.719 Revolution earlier that year, which forced Tsar 00:02:13.719 --> 00:02:16.360 Nicholas II to abdicate. But the Russian provisional 00:02:16.360 --> 00:02:18.340 government that replaced the monarchy, eventually 00:02:18.340 --> 00:02:21.780 led by Alexander Kerensky, was failing under 00:02:21.780 --> 00:02:24.099 the weight of its own decisions. Yeah, the structural 00:02:24.099 --> 00:02:26.740 foundation of the country was collapsing. And 00:02:26.740 --> 00:02:30.840 much of that collapse stems from a single, a 00:02:30.840 --> 00:02:33.659 really fatal policy choice. The provisional government 00:02:33.659 --> 00:02:36.800 chose to keep Russia in World War One. Kerensky 00:02:36.800 --> 00:02:39.460 felt bound by financial and military obligations 00:02:39.460 --> 00:02:42.659 to Western allies, and he feared that surrendering 00:02:42.659 --> 00:02:45.139 or even pulling out would cede vast amounts of 00:02:45.139 --> 00:02:47.659 Russian territory and give Germany total dominance 00:02:47.659 --> 00:02:49.900 in the region. He attempted to project international 00:02:49.900 --> 00:02:52.479 strength. Right. But ironically, staying in a 00:02:52.479 --> 00:02:54.900 meat grinder of a war is exactly what broadcasted 00:02:54.900 --> 00:02:56.919 his government's internal weakness to domestic 00:02:56.919 --> 00:03:00.039 revolutionaries. And the economic realities detailed 00:03:00.039 --> 00:03:02.699 in the source material, they paid a stark picture 00:03:02.699 --> 00:03:05.580 of that weakness. If you were an average worker 00:03:05.580 --> 00:03:08.500 in a Russian city at this time, your real wages 00:03:08.500 --> 00:03:12.120 had plummeted by 50 % compared to pre -war levels. 00:03:12.620 --> 00:03:15.139 50%. Yeah. And the national debt had ballooned 00:03:15.139 --> 00:03:18.780 to an unfathomable 50 billion rubles. And the 00:03:18.780 --> 00:03:20.979 industrial sector was just grinding to a halt. 00:03:21.560 --> 00:03:23.879 If you lived in a major industrial hub, like 00:03:23.879 --> 00:03:27.240 the Urals or the Donbass, 50 % of all enterprises 00:03:27.240 --> 00:03:30.150 were completely shut down. So you have mass unemployment 00:03:30.150 --> 00:03:32.569 intersecting with severe inflation and a total 00:03:32.569 --> 00:03:34.849 breakdown of the supply chain. People in the 00:03:34.849 --> 00:03:37.530 urban centers simply could not acquire food. 00:03:37.969 --> 00:03:40.090 The agricultural sector was severely depleted 00:03:40.090 --> 00:03:42.129 because the workforce had been conscripted. And 00:03:42.129 --> 00:03:45.090 that labor shortage leads directly to one of 00:03:45.090 --> 00:03:47.909 the most I think haunting details from our source 00:03:47.909 --> 00:03:51.460 text. which were essentially violent hunger riots. 00:03:52.000 --> 00:03:54.300 Exactly. Nearly 50 % of healthy men had been 00:03:54.300 --> 00:03:56.939 sent off to the front lines. So the demographics 00:03:56.939 --> 00:03:59.439 of the cities shifted entirely. The people left 00:03:59.439 --> 00:04:01.659 behind were primarily the soldiers' wives. And 00:04:01.659 --> 00:04:05.240 these women were starving. Starving. Their government 00:04:05.240 --> 00:04:07.539 allowances were either arriving late or they 00:04:07.539 --> 00:04:09.520 were entirely insufficient to keep up with the 00:04:09.520 --> 00:04:12.379 hyperinflation. When their appeals to the government 00:04:12.379 --> 00:04:15.080 went completely ignored, they reached a breaking 00:04:15.080 --> 00:04:17.319 point. Had to do something. Right. So they began 00:04:17.319 --> 00:04:20.720 rioting against local shop owners who they suspected 00:04:20.720 --> 00:04:23.500 of hoarding goods or price gouging. And when 00:04:23.500 --> 00:04:25.360 the police intervened to break up the crowds, 00:04:25.629 --> 00:04:28.050 These women fought back in the streets with rakes, 00:04:28.310 --> 00:04:30.910 sticks, rocks, and just their bare fists. It 00:04:30.910 --> 00:04:34.329 is a raw, visceral display of societal desperation. 00:04:34.790 --> 00:04:36.889 And while the provisional government is floundering 00:04:36.889 --> 00:04:40.129 to manage this escalating domestic crisis, a 00:04:40.129 --> 00:04:42.490 fascinating geopolitical maneuver is unfolding 00:04:42.490 --> 00:04:45.209 in the background. The German plot. Exactly. 00:04:45.610 --> 00:04:47.610 The German government, seeking any advantage 00:04:47.610 --> 00:04:50.089 on the eastern front, sees an opportunity to 00:04:50.089 --> 00:04:52.769 destabilize Russia from the inside. They are 00:04:52.769 --> 00:04:55.189 aware of a highly influential Russian Marxist 00:04:55.189 --> 00:04:57.430 dissident living in exile in Switzerland named 00:04:57.430 --> 00:04:59.790 Vladimir Lenin. So they make a move. The German 00:04:59.790 --> 00:05:02.589 military high command deliberately permits Lenin, 00:05:02.730 --> 00:05:04.889 along with his inner circle, to travel through 00:05:04.889 --> 00:05:08.250 German territory in a famously sealed train carriage 00:05:08.250 --> 00:05:11.480 to get back to Petrograd. They effectively weaponized 00:05:11.480 --> 00:05:14.160 Lenin's ideology. They shipped him into the Russian 00:05:14.160 --> 00:05:17.439 capital knowing his presence and his demand for 00:05:17.439 --> 00:05:20.459 an immediate end of the war would severely disrupt 00:05:20.459 --> 00:05:22.939 the Russian military effort and just paralyze 00:05:22.939 --> 00:05:24.980 Kerensky's government. If we connect this to 00:05:24.980 --> 00:05:27.139 the bigger picture, the German strategy worked 00:05:27.139 --> 00:05:30.459 flawlessly, but it also created the perfect vacuum 00:05:30.459 --> 00:05:33.459 for the Bolsheviks to exploit. The provisional 00:05:33.459 --> 00:05:36.860 government kept launching failed military offensives, 00:05:37.259 --> 00:05:40.160 completely ignoring the desperate pleas for bread 00:05:40.160 --> 00:05:43.259 and peace. and Lenin capitalized on that specific 00:05:43.259 --> 00:05:45.459 anger. To understand the scale of their momentum, 00:05:45.879 --> 00:05:47.639 the Bolshevik Party went from having roughly 00:05:47.639 --> 00:05:51.579 24 ,000 members in February to a staggering 200 00:05:51.579 --> 00:05:54.779 ,000 members by September. They were highly organized, 00:05:55.220 --> 00:05:57.920 rapidly expanding, and entirely focused on dismantling 00:05:57.920 --> 00:06:00.480 the current state. Which brings us to the actual 00:06:00.480 --> 00:06:03.459 events of October. The spark. Right. The spark 00:06:03.459 --> 00:06:05.720 that ignited the final takeover happened on October 00:06:05.720 --> 00:06:08.709 24th. Kerensky makes a move to assert control. 00:06:09.110 --> 00:06:11.310 He sends loyal soldiers to shut down Bolshevik 00:06:11.310 --> 00:06:13.949 printing presses, specifically targeting a newspaper 00:06:13.949 --> 00:06:16.750 called Robokiput. Which translates to worker's 00:06:16.750 --> 00:06:20.569 path. Yes. The government troops smash the printing 00:06:20.569 --> 00:06:23.170 equipment and seize thousands of papers. This 00:06:23.170 --> 00:06:25.910 is a critical moment of miscalculation by the 00:06:25.910 --> 00:06:28.250 state. Wait. If the provisional government knew 00:06:28.250 --> 00:06:31.170 the Bolsheviks were an existential threat. Why 00:06:31.170 --> 00:06:33.730 send troops just to smash a printing press? Why 00:06:33.730 --> 00:06:36.110 not execute a coordinated arrest of leadership? 00:06:36.370 --> 00:06:38.870 They simply did not have the military capital 00:06:38.870 --> 00:06:41.709 to pull off a decapitation strike. The Petrograd 00:06:41.709 --> 00:06:44.410 garrison was heavily radicalized and largely 00:06:44.410 --> 00:06:47.220 loyal to the Soviets. The Workers' Council, not 00:06:47.220 --> 00:06:49.899 the government. I see. Kerensky tried to project 00:06:49.899 --> 00:06:52.240 state authority by attacking the presses, but 00:06:52.240 --> 00:06:54.439 he couldn't back it up with overwhelming force. 00:06:54.980 --> 00:06:56.920 So when the Bolsheviks simply sent their own 00:06:56.920 --> 00:06:58.920 aligned soldiers to retake the printing press 00:06:58.920 --> 00:07:01.860 just an hour later, the government had no response. 00:07:02.319 --> 00:07:04.319 It signaled to the revolutionaries that the state 00:07:04.319 --> 00:07:06.899 apparatus was practically defenseless. And the 00:07:06.899 --> 00:07:08.779 ultimate symbol of that defenseless state is 00:07:08.779 --> 00:07:12.399 Kerensky's escape plan. The source text highlights 00:07:12.399 --> 00:07:15.639 a detail that borders on the absurd. Alexander 00:07:15.639 --> 00:07:17.360 Kerensky, the head of the Russian government, 00:07:17.740 --> 00:07:19.899 realizes the capital is falling and he needs 00:07:19.899 --> 00:07:22.800 to physically leave Petrograd to find loyal frontline 00:07:22.800 --> 00:07:25.339 troops. But he doesn't leave in a heavily armored 00:07:25.339 --> 00:07:28.480 motorcade. No. The railways are blocked, his 00:07:28.480 --> 00:07:31.480 own military infrastructure is compromised, and 00:07:31.480 --> 00:07:33.660 he is desperately searching for any functioning 00:07:33.660 --> 00:07:37.500 vehicle. He ultimately flees the city in a borrowed 00:07:37.500 --> 00:07:40.160 Renault car. Procured from the American Embassy. 00:07:40.540 --> 00:07:43.600 Yes. Consider the implications of that image. 00:07:44.009 --> 00:07:46.870 The leader of a global empire fleeing his own 00:07:46.870 --> 00:07:49.470 capital in a borrowed foreign car because his 00:07:49.470 --> 00:07:51.970 own state infrastructure has entirely evaporated. 00:07:52.170 --> 00:07:54.649 It's unbelievable. Here's where it gets really 00:07:54.649 --> 00:07:57.790 interesting. Because the way the actual climax 00:07:57.790 --> 00:08:00.490 of this event is portrayed in our cultural memory 00:08:00.490 --> 00:08:03.089 is fundamentally at odds with the historical 00:08:03.089 --> 00:08:05.129 reality. Absolutely. When most people hear about 00:08:05.129 --> 00:08:07.430 the storming of the Winter Palace, they envision 00:08:07.430 --> 00:08:10.970 an epic, bloody, chaotic siege, thousands of 00:08:10.970 --> 00:08:12.910 revolutionaries charging the gates under heavy 00:08:12.910 --> 00:08:16.050 artillery fire. But the source text completely 00:08:16.050 --> 00:08:18.569 dismantles that narrative. The actual assault 00:08:18.569 --> 00:08:21.449 was remarkably anti -climactic. The operation 00:08:21.449 --> 00:08:23.790 was delayed for hours simply because the Bolshevik 00:08:23.790 --> 00:08:26.290 forces couldn't locate any functioning artillery 00:08:26.290 --> 00:08:29.470 to initiate the bombardment. Right. And that 00:08:29.470 --> 00:08:31.970 iconic moment we mentioned at the start, the 00:08:31.970 --> 00:08:36.090 cruiser Aurora firing its guns at 945 PM to signal 00:08:36.090 --> 00:08:39.149 the charge, was just a blank shot. There was 00:08:39.149 --> 00:08:41.470 no devastating naval bombardment of the palace, 00:08:42.370 --> 00:08:44.009 and the forces defending the seat of government 00:08:44.009 --> 00:08:47.649 were not elite, hardened guards. The defense 00:08:47.649 --> 00:08:50.549 consisted of military cadets, a few Cossacks 00:08:50.549 --> 00:08:52.429 who largely abandoned their posts as the night 00:08:52.429 --> 00:08:56.169 wore on, and a 140 -strong women's battalion. 00:08:57.070 --> 00:08:59.789 When faced with a crowd of roughly 40 ,000 attackers, 00:09:00.470 --> 00:09:02.830 these remaining defenders surrendered with barely 00:09:02.830 --> 00:09:05.539 a fight. The takeover of Petrograd was, for all 00:09:05.539 --> 00:09:08.000 intents and purposes, bloodless. It was not a 00:09:08.000 --> 00:09:10.600 chaotic riot. It was a methodical, administrative 00:09:10.600 --> 00:09:13.220 occupation planned by the Military Revolutionary 00:09:13.220 --> 00:09:16.059 Committee. They just walked in. Exactly. Bolshevik 00:09:16.059 --> 00:09:18.340 -aligned forces simply walked in and occupied 00:09:18.340 --> 00:09:20.700 the central telegraph stations, the railway hubs, 00:09:20.860 --> 00:09:23.139 the bridges, and the major power plants. They 00:09:23.139 --> 00:09:25.340 faced almost zero opposition because the Provisional 00:09:25.340 --> 00:09:27.720 Government had thoroughly alienated every demographic 00:09:27.720 --> 00:09:29.740 that might have otherwise defended them. The 00:09:29.740 --> 00:09:31.980 military occupation was quiet and efficient. 00:09:32.299 --> 00:09:34.799 But the political maneuvering the following day 00:09:34.799 --> 00:09:38.059 is what cemented their power. The Second Congress 00:09:38.059 --> 00:09:41.120 of Soviets convened its opening session. Now, 00:09:41.340 --> 00:09:43.820 a Soviet was essentially a grassroots council 00:09:43.820 --> 00:09:46.460 representing workers, peasants, and soldiers. 00:09:46.620 --> 00:09:48.340 Right. And because they were elected directly 00:09:48.340 --> 00:09:51.320 by the lower classes, the Soviets held immense 00:09:51.320 --> 00:09:53.620 legitimate authority in the eyes of the public. 00:09:54.059 --> 00:09:56.440 Far more than the unelected provisional government. 00:09:56.639 --> 00:09:59.720 So when the Congress opens, the moderate socialist 00:09:59.720 --> 00:10:02.039 groups like the Mensheviks and the right -wing 00:10:02.039 --> 00:10:05.000 socialist revolutionaries are outraged. They 00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:07.659 view the Bolshevik military action as an illegal 00:10:07.659 --> 00:10:10.940 unilateral seizure of power, and they walk out 00:10:10.940 --> 00:10:13.080 of the Congress in protest. And by walking out, 00:10:13.279 --> 00:10:15.539 the moderates effectively handed total legislative 00:10:15.539 --> 00:10:18.200 control of the Soviet apparatus to the Bolsheviks 00:10:18.200 --> 00:10:20.519 and their remaining allies. A massive tactical 00:10:20.519 --> 00:10:22.659 error. Truly. As the moderates are physically 00:10:22.659 --> 00:10:25.580 leaving the hall, Leon Trotsky delivers a legendary 00:10:25.580 --> 00:10:28.639 theatrical taunt. He shouts after them, You are 00:10:28.639 --> 00:10:31.019 pitiful, isolated individuals. You are bankrupt. 00:10:31.139 --> 00:10:33.379 Your role is played out. Go where you belong 00:10:33.379 --> 00:10:35.779 from now on into the dustbin of history. What's 00:10:35.779 --> 00:10:38.419 fascinating here is how immediately the new Soviet 00:10:38.419 --> 00:10:41.279 government realized that a quiet administrative 00:10:41.279 --> 00:10:44.480 occupation of telegraph offices does not inspire 00:10:44.480 --> 00:10:46.039 the working class. No, it doesn't look great 00:10:46.039 --> 00:10:48.379 on a poster. Right. To legitimize their rule, 00:10:48.419 --> 00:10:51.080 they needed a founding mythology. So they systematically 00:10:51.080 --> 00:10:54.720 manufactured one. In 1920, just three years after 00:10:54.720 --> 00:10:57.639 the fact, the state staged a massive historical 00:10:57.639 --> 00:10:59.779 reenactment of the storming of the Winter Palace 00:10:59.779 --> 00:11:02.620 involving thousands of performers watched by 00:11:02.620 --> 00:11:05.950 100 ,000 spectators. Massive theatrical performance 00:11:05.950 --> 00:11:09.809 then became the visual blueprint for Sergei Eisenstein's 00:11:09.809 --> 00:11:13.710 highly influential 1928 silent film, October. 00:11:14.490 --> 00:11:16.610 Eisenstein's brilliant cinematography spread 00:11:16.610 --> 00:11:19.429 this heavily dramatized, politically sanitized 00:11:19.429 --> 00:11:21.809 version of events around the globe. It convinced 00:11:21.809 --> 00:11:24.009 generations that the Winter Palace assault was 00:11:24.009 --> 00:11:26.850 a fierce, heroic, casualty -heavy battle of the 00:11:26.850 --> 00:11:29.509 proletariat overthrowing the elite. The falsification 00:11:29.509 --> 00:11:31.649 of history became a core utility of the regime. 00:11:31.799 --> 00:11:34.460 reaching its zenith under Joseph Stalin. The 00:11:34.460 --> 00:11:36.840 source material points specifically to the 1938 00:11:36.840 --> 00:11:39.399 publication of the history of the Communist Party 00:11:39.399 --> 00:11:41.700 of the Soviet Union. In this state -mandated 00:11:41.700 --> 00:11:45.000 text, the events of 1917 were completely rewritten. 00:11:45.440 --> 00:11:47.919 Key architects of the revolution, notably Leon 00:11:47.919 --> 00:11:50.620 Trotsky, were retroactively erased from their 00:11:50.620 --> 00:11:53.399 leadership roles and painted as opportunistic 00:11:53.399 --> 00:11:56.600 foreign spies. Unbelievable. Conversely, Stalin, 00:11:56.759 --> 00:11:59.059 who played a relatively secondary administrative 00:11:59.059 --> 00:12:01.860 role during the actual October events, was elevated 00:12:01.860 --> 00:12:04.580 in the text to appear as the chief disciplinarian 00:12:04.580 --> 00:12:07.100 and co -leader of the revolution alongside Lenin. 00:12:07.639 --> 00:12:10.100 They literally edited the architects of the revolution 00:12:10.100 --> 00:12:12.740 out of the history books. But while they were 00:12:12.740 --> 00:12:15.259 heavily managing their public relations, they 00:12:15.259 --> 00:12:17.820 were simultaneously enacting radical sweeping 00:12:17.820 --> 00:12:20.299 changes to Russian society overnight. Sweeping 00:12:20.299 --> 00:12:22.659 is almost an understatement. Yeah, the text details 00:12:22.659 --> 00:12:24.820 a dizzying array of reforms the new government 00:12:24.820 --> 00:12:27.779 instantly mandated. They nullified all civil 00:12:27.779 --> 00:12:31.500 ranks, aristocratic titles, and legal of class 00:12:31.500 --> 00:12:34.240 inequality. They eliminated the centuries -old 00:12:34.240 --> 00:12:36.519 tradition of saluting officers in the Army. They 00:12:36.519 --> 00:12:38.919 introduced a legal eight -hour workday, which 00:12:38.919 --> 00:12:41.279 was a monumental demand of the urban workers. 00:12:41.360 --> 00:12:43.559 But they also pushed into extreme structural 00:12:43.559 --> 00:12:46.440 overhauls. The decree on land and property was 00:12:46.440 --> 00:12:49.080 a total dismantling of the existing economic 00:12:49.080 --> 00:12:52.419 order. The state mandated the total expropriation 00:12:52.419 --> 00:12:55.519 of private property. Russian banks were nationalized. 00:12:55.799 --> 00:12:58.000 Everyday citizens had their private bank accounts 00:12:58.000 --> 00:13:01.220 seized by the state. Even the vast land holdings 00:13:01.220 --> 00:13:03.399 and financial accounts of the Russian Orthodox 00:13:03.399 --> 00:13:06.500 Church were completely expropriated. It was a 00:13:06.500 --> 00:13:10.059 fundamental, forced rewiring of how society functioned, 00:13:10.100 --> 00:13:13.240 executed in a matter of days. So what does this 00:13:13.240 --> 00:13:16.629 all mean? How do modern historians synthesize 00:13:16.629 --> 00:13:19.210 an event that was so heavily mythologized by 00:13:19.210 --> 00:13:21.990 the victors, so heavily censored for decades, 00:13:22.230 --> 00:13:24.549 and so radically disruptive to the daily lives 00:13:24.549 --> 00:13:27.049 of millions? It's tough. Our source outlines 00:13:27.049 --> 00:13:29.769 three primary historical camps, and they offer 00:13:29.769 --> 00:13:31.629 fundamentally different interpretations of the 00:13:31.629 --> 00:13:33.970 exact same timeline. This historiography of the 00:13:33.970 --> 00:13:36.809 October Revolution is intensely fractured. The 00:13:36.809 --> 00:13:38.950 first framework is the Soviet -Marxist view, 00:13:39.129 --> 00:13:41.149 which was the official state doctrine of the 00:13:41.149 --> 00:13:43.419 USSR. And what's their core argument? This camp 00:13:43.419 --> 00:13:45.700 posits that the revolution was not an accidental 00:13:45.700 --> 00:13:48.840 coup, but the predetermined, inevitable result 00:13:48.840 --> 00:13:51.960 of historical class struggle. They argue that 00:13:51.960 --> 00:13:54.019 capitalist alienation had driven the Russian 00:13:54.019 --> 00:13:56.779 masses to an inevitable breaking point and that 00:13:56.779 --> 00:13:59.940 the Bolshevik party, flawlessly utilizing Lenin's 00:13:59.940 --> 00:14:03.139 grasp of Marxist theory, acted as the logical 00:14:03.139 --> 00:14:05.639 vanguard guiding the working class to their natural 00:14:05.639 --> 00:14:09.179 destiny. Got it. On the opposite end of the spectrum 00:14:09.179 --> 00:14:12.240 you have the Western totalitarian camp, our perspective 00:14:12.240 --> 00:14:14.639 heavily shaped by the geopolitical tensions of 00:14:14.639 --> 00:14:16.879 the Cold War. Very different take. Extremely. 00:14:17.360 --> 00:14:19.360 These historians look at the data and argue that 00:14:19.360 --> 00:14:21.980 this was absolutely not a popular mass uprising. 00:14:22.159 --> 00:14:24.779 They define it as an opportunistic, highly violent 00:14:24.779 --> 00:14:27.960 coup orchestrated by a ruthless, hyper organized 00:14:27.960 --> 00:14:30.940 minority who manipulated a vulnerable population. 00:14:31.159 --> 00:14:33.779 Furthermore, the totalitarian camp draws a direct 00:14:33.779 --> 00:14:36.620 unbroken line between Lenin's authoritarian tactics 00:14:36.620 --> 00:14:39.860 in 1917, like shutting down opposition presses 00:14:39.860 --> 00:14:42.659 and bypassing democratic norms and the brutal 00:14:42.659 --> 00:14:45.299 centralized totalitarianism that Stalin unleashed 00:14:45.299 --> 00:14:47.779 in the following decades. They argue the seeds 00:14:47.779 --> 00:14:49.399 of the Gulag were planted the night they took 00:14:49.399 --> 00:14:51.850 the Winter Palace. But the historical narrative 00:14:51.850 --> 00:14:55.549 shifts again in the 1960s and 70s with the emergence 00:14:55.549 --> 00:14:58.870 of the revisionist camp. Why did academia suddenly 00:14:58.870 --> 00:15:01.789 pivot away from the totalitarian view during 00:15:01.789 --> 00:15:04.350 that specific era? The revisionist historians 00:15:04.350 --> 00:15:07.289 wanted to move away from the top -down, purely 00:15:07.289 --> 00:15:10.269 political focus of the Cold War era. They were 00:15:10.269 --> 00:15:12.769 interested in history from below. Meaning the 00:15:12.769 --> 00:15:16.110 regular people. Right. They dug into local archives 00:15:16.110 --> 00:15:18.389 and demographic data to argue that the revolution 00:15:18.389 --> 00:15:21.330 actually did possess genuine popular momentum 00:15:21.330 --> 00:15:23.690 driven by the working class and the peasantry, 00:15:23.950 --> 00:15:26.500 independent of Lenin's top -down directive. So 00:15:26.500 --> 00:15:29.039 they see it as a true social revolution. Yes. 00:15:29.320 --> 00:15:31.320 The revisionists tend to argue that Stalinism 00:15:31.320 --> 00:15:34.000 was not the inevitable predestined result of 00:15:34.000 --> 00:15:36.480 Lenin's revolution, but rather a tragic corruption 00:15:36.480 --> 00:15:39.179 of the original socialist ideals caused by the 00:15:39.179 --> 00:15:41.799 devastation of the ensuing civil war. The source 00:15:41.799 --> 00:15:43.700 material notes another massive turning point 00:15:43.700 --> 00:15:46.419 in 1991 following the collapse of the Soviet 00:15:46.419 --> 00:15:49.039 Union. When the state fell, the heavily guarded 00:15:49.039 --> 00:15:51.639 Soviet archives were finally open to global researchers. 00:15:51.950 --> 00:15:55.009 That access triggered what historians refer to 00:15:55.009 --> 00:15:58.450 as the anthropological turn. Rather than obsessing 00:15:58.450 --> 00:16:01.289 over the grand political narratives, the ideological 00:16:01.289 --> 00:16:04.750 debates between Lenin and Kerensky, or the theoretical 00:16:04.750 --> 00:16:07.730 purity of Marxism historians began focusing on 00:16:07.730 --> 00:16:10.269 the micro histories. Fascinating. They studied 00:16:10.269 --> 00:16:12.570 the daily lives of regular citizens attempting 00:16:12.570 --> 00:16:14.649 to navigate the sudden seizure of their bank 00:16:14.649 --> 00:16:17.470 accounts. They analyzed the diaries of prisoners 00:16:17.470 --> 00:16:20.230 of war and looked at how the personal psychology 00:16:20.230 --> 00:16:22.769 of individual soldiers shaped their loyalties 00:16:22.769 --> 00:16:25.210 during the collapse of the military command structure. 00:16:25.450 --> 00:16:28.529 They shifted the lens to the humans trapped inside 00:16:28.529 --> 00:16:31.370 the grand historical machinery. This raises an 00:16:31.370 --> 00:16:33.169 important question for you, the listener, to 00:16:33.169 --> 00:16:36.250 consider when analyzing any historical event. 00:16:36.830 --> 00:16:38.929 How much of the history we consume is shaped 00:16:38.929 --> 00:16:42.289 not just by the objective facts, but by the cultural 00:16:42.289 --> 00:16:44.909 and political agenda of the era in which the 00:16:44.909 --> 00:16:46.850 historian is writing? That's a great point. The 00:16:46.850 --> 00:16:49.090 Soviet historians wrote to justify the existence 00:16:49.090 --> 00:16:51.649 of their state. The Cold War historians wrote 00:16:51.649 --> 00:16:54.779 to condemn a geopolitical rival. The revisionists 00:16:54.779 --> 00:16:57.379 wrote to challenge the rigid Cold War consensus. 00:16:58.080 --> 00:17:01.139 The raw data of 1917 remains the same, but the 00:17:01.139 --> 00:17:03.440 interpretive lens is constantly shifting. And 00:17:03.440 --> 00:17:06.299 that shifting historical lens makes looking at 00:17:06.299 --> 00:17:09.440 the actual human cost of these events incredibly 00:17:09.440 --> 00:17:12.289 difficult to process. Because while we noted 00:17:12.289 --> 00:17:14.630 earlier that the actual tactical takeover of 00:17:14.630 --> 00:17:16.589 the Winter Palace and the telegraph stations 00:17:16.589 --> 00:17:19.529 was mostly bloodless, the immediate aftermath 00:17:19.529 --> 00:17:22.529 was a tragedy of almost unfathomable scale. The 00:17:22.529 --> 00:17:24.930 Bolshevik seizure of power did not bring peace. 00:17:25.190 --> 00:17:27.250 It immediately plunged the fractured country 00:17:27.250 --> 00:17:30.289 into the Russian Civil War. The source text outlines 00:17:30.289 --> 00:17:32.710 a cascade of violence. You had the Red Terror 00:17:32.710 --> 00:17:34.829 initiated by the new state security apparatus, 00:17:35.569 --> 00:17:37.750 massive violent anti -Bolshevik uprisings from 00:17:37.750 --> 00:17:40.369 the White Army factions, and military interventions 00:17:40.369 --> 00:17:42.849 from multiple foreign powers trying to strangle 00:17:42.849 --> 00:17:45.329 the new communist state in its crib. It was total 00:17:45.329 --> 00:17:47.950 devastation. By the time the Bolsheviks fully 00:17:47.950 --> 00:17:50.130 consolidated control over the resulting Soviet 00:17:50.130 --> 00:17:52.990 Union, the country's infrastructure was in ruins 00:17:52.990 --> 00:17:56.009 and up to 10 million people were dead. And the 00:17:56.009 --> 00:17:58.829 vast majority of those casualties were not soldiers 00:17:58.829 --> 00:18:01.470 killed in combat. They were civilians who died 00:18:01.470 --> 00:18:04.369 from execution, disease, and engineered famines. 00:18:04.509 --> 00:18:07.750 It is a profoundly sobering reality. If there 00:18:07.750 --> 00:18:10.529 is a definitive takeaway from analyzing the mechanics 00:18:10.529 --> 00:18:13.670 of October 1917, it is that this event serves 00:18:13.670 --> 00:18:17.349 as the ultimate masterclass in how a highly disciplined, 00:18:17.809 --> 00:18:20.230 highly motivated minority can systematically 00:18:20.230 --> 00:18:23.089 exploit a moment of severe institutional crisis. 00:18:23.630 --> 00:18:25.349 Absolutely. Furthermore, it demonstrates that 00:18:25.349 --> 00:18:27.470 whoever controls the infrastructure of communication, 00:18:27.869 --> 00:18:29.910 the printing presses, the telegraph, and eventually 00:18:29.910 --> 00:18:32.490 the movie cameras ultimately possesses the power 00:18:32.490 --> 00:18:35.269 to dictate reality itself. The Bolsheviks didn't 00:18:35.269 --> 00:18:37.549 merely conquer a nation, they successfully conquered 00:18:37.549 --> 00:18:39.869 the historical narrative of how that nation was 00:18:39.869 --> 00:18:42.670 won. I want to leave you with one final incredibly 00:18:42.670 --> 00:18:45.309 provocative thought detailed in our source material. 00:18:45.910 --> 00:18:49.150 Just weeks after the Bolsheviks seized power 00:18:49.150 --> 00:18:52.410 in Petrograd, an action they repeatedly justified 00:18:52.410 --> 00:18:55.349 by claiming they were enacting the absolute will 00:18:55.349 --> 00:18:58.230 of the people, the workers, and the peasants. 00:18:58.730 --> 00:19:02.410 Russia actually moved forward with long planned 00:19:02.410 --> 00:19:05.809 nationwide democratic elections for a constituent 00:19:05.809 --> 00:19:08.210 assembly. It was the democratic process the country 00:19:08.210 --> 00:19:10.630 had been anticipating since the Tsar fell. Right. 00:19:10.990 --> 00:19:13.849 A true gauge of the national sentiment. The results 00:19:13.849 --> 00:19:16.490 were definitive. The Bolsheviks lost the election 00:19:16.490 --> 00:19:19.390 badly. They secured only 24 % of the national 00:19:19.390 --> 00:19:22.140 vote. The overwhelming majority of the Russian 00:19:22.140 --> 00:19:24.279 populace chose a different vision for their future, 00:19:24.720 --> 00:19:27.380 primarily voting for the agrarian socialist revolutionaries. 00:19:27.700 --> 00:19:29.519 Faced with empirical proof that they did not 00:19:29.519 --> 00:19:31.880 hold the mandate of the masses, the Bolsheviks 00:19:31.880 --> 00:19:34.559 had to make a choice. When that newly elected 00:19:34.559 --> 00:19:36.799 Democratic assembly met for the very first time, 00:19:37.099 --> 00:19:39.460 they logically rejected the decrees the Bolsheviks 00:19:39.460 --> 00:19:42.380 had issued since their October coup. The very 00:19:42.380 --> 00:19:45.000 next day, the Bolshevik leadership dispatched 00:19:45.000 --> 00:19:47.319 armed guards to lock the doors and dissolve the 00:19:47.319 --> 00:19:49.799 Democratic assembly by military force. Just like 00:19:49.799 --> 00:19:52.740 that. Just like that. So as you finish this deep 00:19:52.740 --> 00:19:54.640 dive, take a moment to mull this over on your 00:19:54.640 --> 00:19:58.119 own. If a political movement claims its ultimate 00:19:58.119 --> 00:20:00.440 moral justification is fighting for the will 00:20:00.440 --> 00:20:02.839 of the people, but the moment those people vote 00:20:02.839 --> 00:20:05.400 against them, they are silenced at gunpoint. 00:20:06.180 --> 00:20:08.539 At what exact moment does a revolution for the 00:20:08.539 --> 00:20:11.059 masses transform into a dictatorship over them? 00:20:11.460 --> 00:20:13.900 A question regarding power and ideology that 00:20:13.900 --> 00:20:16.569 remains universally relevant. Thank you for joining 00:20:16.569 --> 00:20:19.049 us on this deep dive. Keep questioning the narratives 00:20:19.049 --> 00:20:21.069 you encounter and we will catch you next time.