GCSE History > USSR > Flashcards

USSR Flashcards

(90 cards)

Study These Flashcards
1
Q

Trostky

Background

A
  • Jewish
  • The favourite to suceed Lenin
  • Head of Red Army and orchestrator of October Revolution
  • Became a Bolshevik 1917 (very late)
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
2
Q

Stalin

Background

A
  • Born in poverty in Georgia
  • Rude and agressive
  • Clever with allies and running government
  • Wanted to focus on socialism in USSR
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
3
Q

Kamenev

Background

A
  • Active since 1905
  • Major contributor to doctrine
  • Opposed April Theses
  • Wanted to end the NEP
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
4
Q

Zinoviev

Background

A
  • Active since 1903
  • Good orator but not intellectual
  • Opposed October revolution
  • Wanted to end NEP
  • Highly unpopular
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
5
Q

Bukharin

A
  • Joined 1906
  • Very popular
  • Lenin called him the “golden boy”
  • Supported the NEP
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
6
Q

Stalin Strengths

A
  • Had important positions
  • 1922 General Secretary (He could appoint his own supporters as officials)
  • Access to 26,000 personal files
  • Lenin Enrolment 1923-25 helped him
  • 500,000 workers who were loyal to Stalin for work
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
7
Q

Stalins wins

A
  • Tricked Trostsky over Lenins funeral
  • Lenins Testament hidden
  • Popular ideas (relatively central)
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
8
Q

Defeat of Trotsky

A
  • 1924, Zinoviev and Kamenev join Stalin against Trotsky
  • Destroyed Trotskys reputation
  • 1925 Stalin lost his job as Commissar for War, no longer a threat
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
9
Q

Defeat of Kamenev and Zinoviev

A
  • 1924 -1926 all three shared power
  • 1927 they both allied with Trotsky for the United Opposition
  • Stalin allied with Bukharin for media support
  • This was rejected and lost them all respect
  • 1927 they were expelled from the party
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
10
Q

Defeat of Bukharin

A
  • Stalin attacked the NEP and its supporters
  • Began Grain Requisitioning again
  • Ensured Bukharin lost government jobs
  • Bukharin not politically skilled so this was easy
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
11
Q

Lenins Testament

A
  • Written 1922/23
  • Hidden from public
  • Stalin - “I propose the comrades find a way to remove him”, “too rude”
  • Trotsky - “most capable”, “too arrogant”
  • Kamenev and Zinoviev - “opposed me when I tried to set the date for the revolution in October 1917.”
  • Bukharin - “golden boy”
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
12
Q

Reasons for 5YP’s

Fear of invasion

A
  • A strong economy + heavy industry for armaments needed if invaded
  • Churchill: “strangling Bolshevism in its cradle”
  • In 1927:
  • The British government accused the USSR of spreading revolutionary propaganda
  • In China, the Communists were attacked by their political opponents resulting in a civil war.
  • Pytor Voykov, Soviet diplomat, was assassinated in Poland.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
13
Q

Reasons for 5YP’s

Ideological reasons

A
  • Communism was appealing for workers BUT USSR mostly peasants
  • More workers = more support for communism
  • Get ride of NEPmen, stalin called them “enemies of the party”
  • Better living conditions could increase dwindling support
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
14
Q

First 5YP (Overrall)

A
  • 1928, Gosplan
  • Very ambitious goals
  • in 1929 Stalin decided goals were to be met by 1931
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
15
Q

First 5YP (Positives)

A
  • Industrial workers doubled
  • 1500 new enterprises
  • Electricity output trebled (3x)
  • Advisers: Ford experts caused 140k cars made in 1932
  • Entire cities founded around industrial complexs
  • New roads, canals, railways
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
16
Q

First 5YP (Negatives)

A
  • Unrealistic targets were not met
  • Lack of raw materials
  • Lack of skilled workers
  • Decline in living conditions
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
17
Q

Second 5YP (Overrall)

A
  • 1933
  • More concerned with improving efficiency and quality
  • Focus on heavy industry and communications
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
18
Q

Second 5YP (Positives)

A
  • Three Good Years (1934-6).
  • Greater emphasis on consumer industries (food processing).
  • Heavy industry grew because of complexes set up during the first plan.
  • Dnieper Dam produced electricity.
  • By 1937, USSR was basically self-sufficient.
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
19
Q

Second 5YP (Negatives)

A
  • Consumer goods were still lagging.
  • Limited growth of oil production.
  • No improvement in living standards
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
20
Q

Third 5YP (Overrall)

A
  • 1938
  • Focus on armaments
  • Halted by German invasion 1941
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
21
Q

Third FYP (Positives)

A
  • 1/3 of government spending on defence
  • 9 new aircraft factories
  • Heavy industry and armaments grew rapidly
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
22
Q

Third FYP (Negatives)

A
  • Hindered by purges (Gosplan officials and experienced managers)
  • Consumer industries, steel and oil production lagged
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
23
Q

Stakhanovites

A
  • Alexis Stakhanov, moved 102 tonnes of coal in one 6 hour shift
  • Head of a propaganda campaign to encourage hard work
  • Workers that exceeded targets got better housing, rations and called “Heroes of Socialist Labour”
  • 25% became Stakhanovites
  • Negatives: Workers hated pressure, Stakhanovites attacked, Stakhanovite “Pushy and Selfish person”
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
24
Q

Magnitogorsk

A
  • Founded 1743 but irrelevant until 1929
  • 750k people moved there
  • Average worker stayed for only 82 days
  • 40k political prisoners used
  • Closed to westerners in 1937
How well did you know this?
1
Not at all
2
3
4
5
Perfectly
25
# Reasons for collectivisation Economic
* Grain procurement crisis: 1927-28 government could not buy surplus grain = rationing in cities * Inefficient, old fashioned, Kulak-run farms * Unable to produce surplus to support economic growth
26
# Reasons for collectivisation Ideological
* Collectivisation extended socialism into the country * Eliminated Kulaks * Closer to ending NEP which was capitalist * 1928-29 bread+meat rationed in cities (bad for ideology)
27
# Reasons for collectivisation Political reasons
* Stalin aware food shortages caused Tsars downfall * Collectivisation would give Stalin upper hand against Bukharin
28
Impact of collectivisation (Overrall)
* Started Winter 1929-30 * 24 mil peasants in 240,000 kolkhoz * Very negative response from peasants (nearly civil war) * 1929-34 half of russian villages collectivised * 1929 "liquidate Kulak classes" = 2 mil sent to Siberia and thousands killed
29
Kolkhozes
Sovkhoz: Larger state farm where peasants paid wages Kolkhoz: Collective farms * 1940 there were 240,000 * 50-100 families * After 1935 peasants given small area of private land
30
MTS stations
* By 1940 one for every 40 farms * MTS given complete control of farms until abolished in 1953 * Hated by peasants
31
# Collectivisation Positive impacts
* 1937 90% of farmland collectivised * Grain output 80% higher than 1913 * 1934 end of rationing food and bread * 19m peasants moved to cities supplied lots of labour
32
# Collectivisation Negative impacts
* Much resistance, particularly Kulaks * in 1930, 14 million cattle slaughtered * Livestock figure did not return to 1928 number till 1940 * By 1934 3mil Kulaks sent to labour camos * Great Famine 1932-33
33
# Collectivisation Great famine
* 4-5m dead * Ukraine, hardest hit = "Breadbasket of Europe" * Propaganda against canibalism, still 2500 people convicted of it * People ate worms, bark, mice and humans * Stalin made this much worse by refusing aid and grain seizures - deliberate?
34
# Collectivisation Economic impact
* 1928 to 1933 cattle numbers halved * Fall in grain (73.3m tonnes to 67.6m tonnes) * Greater use of machinery in 1930s * Allowed for industrialisation
35
# Collectivisation Social and Political impacts
Social * Heavy resistance * Extended government control Political * Removal of non-government influences ( e.g village priests) * Removal of capitalist classes (15m Kulaks) * Abolition of Mir
36
# Reasons for purges Opposition to Stalin
* Opposition was growing due to harsh methods * Stalins own wife committed suicide in Nov 1932 * 1932, Ryutin circulated 200 page document calling Stalin "evil genius"
37
# Reasons for purges Murder of Kirov
* Loyal supporter, but Stalin saw him as a rival * 1st December 1934 Leonid Nikolayev shot Kirov * Stalin claimed a plot to overthrow him and said K+Z "Shed the blood of Kirov"
38
# KF of Purges Use of NKVD
* 1934 Cheka became NKVD * Stalin used them to arrest opponents, torture and threaten * NKVD themselves purged in 1938, leader Yezhov killed in Feb 1940 after torture
39
# KF of purges Gulags
* Common threat used to terrify people into obedience * 12 million died in them * 1920s and 30s very full of Kulaks * One camp used 250k to build the Belomor canal
40
# Show trials Trial of the 16
* 1936 * Based on Zinoviev and Kamenev * Chief prosecutor was Vyshinksy * Said to "shoot them like wild dogs" * K died with honour, Z begged for his life
41
# Show trials Trial of the 17
* 1937 * Focused on Trotskys allies * Charges: killing Kirov, delaying 5YPs, overthrowing gov * 13 killed, 4 sent to gulags
42
# Show trials Trial of 21
* 1938 * Focused on Bukharin * B tried to show how ridiculous it was but eventually pleaded guilty * Vyshinky called him "foul smelling heap of human garbage" * B died cursing Stalin
43
Purge of Wider Party
* 70% of 1934 General Commitee executed or imprisoned * Overral, 1 mil members purge
44
Purge of Armed Forces
* Stalin killed Tukhachevsky + 7 other generals in 1937 * 1939 all Navy admirals shot * 3 of 5 red army Marshalls shot * 25,000 Red Army officers shot
45
Purge of the People
* July 1937 stalin ordered removal of "all anti-soviet elements" * 250k people identified as state enemies * 18 million sent to labour camps where 13 million died
46
# Impact of purges Political
* Removed all opposition * 1930's Stalin admired as "dictator of people"
47
# Impact of purges Weakened Sovet Union
* 25% of mine managers purged, drop in production * Hitler's invasion in 1941 made lack of experienced officers a problem * 1939-40 Finland war causes 200k casualties
48
# Propaganda Cult of Stalin
* Started December 1929 * Showed Stalin as "father of the nation" * Posters, paintings and parades * Rewrote history to make himself seem second in importance only to Lenin * After WW2 promoted himself to "Generalissimo"
49
# Propaganda Official Culture
* Arts heavily censored to follow "Socialist Realism" * Only Soviet films and books allowed * Novels: Cement (Fyodor Glakov) 1925 * Movies: Chapaev, 1934, told of a peasant hero of civil war * Doctoring of photographs
50
Censorship
* 1936, 30 films and 10 plays banned * Poet Madelstam performed a poem about Stalin called "The Kremlin Mountaineer" * Arrested and died in gulag
51
1936 constitution
* Set up 2 chamber assembly: Supreme Soviet * Meant to guarantee rights (jobs, speech, voting) * Rights could be taken away for "national security" * Stalin still Chairman and General Secretary so had total power
52
Control of education
* Stricter in 1920s as Stalin wanted a good workforce * 1939 the majority could read * Political Youth Groups: Octobrists (8-10), Pioneers (10-16)
53
Revision of history
* Stories of Old Communists purged * Trostsky was removed and Stalin made more important in stories of revolution * 1938 Stalin ordered creation of: 1. Short Biography of Stalin 2. Short Course of History of All Union Communist Party
54
# Towns Housing
* Moscows pop = 2.2 mil in 1929 to 4.1mil in 1936 * Average family apartment from 5.5 m(2) in 1930 to 4 m(2) in 1940 * "Corner dwellers" = homeless waiting for housing * New towns had tents, mud huts etc.
55
# Towns Everyday items
* Everyday items seen as luxurious and in short supply * Queues sometimes than longer than 1,000 for shoes * Bread rationed until 1935
56
# Towns Leisure opportunities
* Gorky Park, built 1928: pool, music, bars * Cinema in magnitogorsk had annual audience of 600k * Magnitogorsk "Mini Olympics" workers of different factories compete
57
# Countryside Living Conditions
* Conditions had always been and remained bad * Basic one room housing * Some had to travel to nearest towns to get bread * No leisure opportunities
58
# Towns Working conditions: Negatives
* Internal passports to prevent job changes * "Progressive piecework" = workers paid by volume produced, not equal * 1940 Labour Code: Working day to 8 hours, 6 days a week, job changing was a criminal offence
59
# Towns Working Conditions: Positives
* Everyone had a job, during Great Depression * 73% unemployment in Jarrow * 0% unemployment in USSR * Factories gave workers basic clothing and some hot meals
60
# Countryside Working conditions
* Collectivisation: wages 20% of workers, no land or freedom, long hours * Slow work and little effort
61
# Women 1917-24
Good: * Zhenotdel made to help with womens issues * Legalised abortion + divorce * More freedom and rights Bad: * 1/2 of marriages ended in divorce * Abortions 3x more than live births * Divorce used by men to abandon
62
# Women Under Stalin
Bad: * Closed Zhenotdel * 1936 Family Code: divorce more expensive, abortions illegal, mother with 6+ kids got money * Wanted traditional family values Good: * Birth rate rose from 25 per 1k in 1935 to 31 per 1k in 1940 * Less divorce (less abandonment)
63
# Women Employment: NEP
* 1928, 3 million women working * Unemployment in NEP affected women first
64
# Women Employment: Stalin's industrialisation
* By 1940, 13 million women working * 1940, 41% of heavy industry workers women * Pasha Angelina, first female Stakhanovite
65
# Women Employments: Negatives
* Double Burden * Paid 60% less than men * Less chance of success * 20 of 328 factory directors in Leningrad were women
66
# Women Politics
* 1917 - Given same rights as men, could hold power * Alexandra Kollontai, first female People's Commisar * The Party failed to advance women 1924-41 (harassed and held back by old attitudes) * Great Retreat - Housewives Movement 1936, message was that women were for mothering (not politics)
67
# Education 1917-1924
* "Project method" - children followed workers to learn the trade * Traditional teaching, respect and values discarded * Led to undereducation and lack of academics in Uni's
68
# Education Under Stalin
* Compulsory to age 15 * Traditional subjects + Communist Ideology * Exams, discipline and official textbooks Consequences: Primary attendance 60% to 95% Literacy 55% to 94%
69
# Ethnic Minorities 1917-1924
* 1926 Census showed over 180 nationalities in Russia * Declaration of the Rights of the Peoples of Russia * Equality, acceptance * "Family of nations" was used to describe the ethnicities
70
# Ethnic Minorities Under Stalin
* New form of Russification: * No celebration of local languages or culture * Russian taught as a second language in all schools * 1937 171K Koreans deported
71
# Ethnic Minorities Stalin and Religion
* 1939 all factories had 7 day work week (no sabbath for religious) * 1939 only a few hundred churches in the USSR * Continuation of Lenin's policies
72
Nazi Soviet pact
* 1939, Stalin in a strong position but feared Nazi Germany * 23rd August 1939 Nazi Soviet pact signed * Poland divided, Nazis would not attack USSR * Both sides knew it was temporary
73
Nazis Attack USSR
* 22nd June 1941 Op. Barbarossa begins * 3 million Nazi soldiers (largest invading force in history) * Thought they would easily win by autumn * Most costly conflict in history (27 million Soviets dead)
74
# Reasons for Soviet's initial loss Purges
* Stalin had removed huge numbers of experienced officers from the army * Many were hastily released from gulags * End of 1941, 3 million soviet prisoners taken * Nazis in control of 45% of population
75
# Reasons for Soviet's initial loss Nazi strengths
* Huge and well trained * Blitzkrieg tactics * Red Army had the resources to stop them, but Nazi surprise tactics caused chaos
76
# Reasons for Soviet Victory Geography
* Start date of Barbarossa delayed by 5 weeks * Heavy rain in November, then snow and temps down to -35 * Nazis not equipped, vehicles stopped working * Dec 1941 General Zhukov counterattacked with Siberian forces (experienced+ equipped) * Stalin called "General Winter" their greatest ally
77
# Reasons for Soviet Victory Economy
* 3rd 5YP meant there was Industrial areas in the Urals and Siberia * 1500 factories and 16.5 million people moved east and followed scorched earth policy * Chelyabinsk nicknamed "Tankograd" because it produced T-34s * 1945 USSR produced 20,900 aircraft (Germany 7540)
78
# Reasons for Soviet Victory Stalin
* Slogans: "Great Patriotic War" and calling USSR the "motherland" * Stayed in Moscow in October 1941 to give confidence * Times Man of the Year 1942
79
# Reasons for Soviet Victory Propaganda
* Over 1000 writers and artists joined the army * 400 died in the fighting * Controlled by the Sovinformburo * 200 artists in Moscow alone producing propaganda
80
# Reasons for Soviet Victory Russian People
* 7 cities earned "Hero City" * War brought whole country together Siege of Leningrad: * September 1941, 3 mil people cut off * Lasted 900 days * Over 800k people died * Not one Soviet citizen retreated or evacuated
81
Stalingrad
* More than 1,000 tonnes of bombs dropped on it * Average life expectancy of a Soviet soldier was 24 hours * 1mil Soviet died by the end of the siege * Snipers - Vasily Zaitsev killed 225 Nazis * Went on till January 1943 when Nazi general surrendered despite orders not to
82
Significance of Stalingrad
Nazis: * 6th Army destroyed * Allies (Italy,Hungary etc.) shattered * Mood in Germany was fearful Soviets: * Great triump and huge psych. boost * "You cannot stop an army that has done Stalingrad" * Made a "Hero City" * Britain celebrated Red Army day in February 1943
83
Economic effects of WW2
* Economy was destroyed * 1945, 70% of industrial production lost * Dnieper Dam destroyed * 25 million homeless
84
# Post WW2 recovery 4th 5YP
* Announced 1946 * 88% of investment in Heavy Industry * 2 million POW's used * Workers had to do an additional 30 hours of work a month
85
# Post WW2 recovery Performance of industry
* 1947 Dnieper Dam rebuilt * Coal,oil,steel all above pre-war figures * Factories and mines quickly rebuilt * First atomic bomb test in 1949
86
# Post WW2 recovery Performance of agriculture
* By 1952 had not reached pre-war levels * Labour shortage * Lack of machinery and horses * Saw little investment and low wages (1/6th of workers)
87
# Post WW2 recovery Post-war purges: Military
* Key individuals got too much praise * They were removed from history e.g Zhukov sent to Odessa * 1.5 million POW's got worst * Order 290 declared them traitors * Stalins own son Yakov was taken prisoner and left to die in a concentration camp in 1943
88
# Post WW2 recovery Post War purges: Party
Leningrad Affair * 200 leading party members * 10-25 years in prison * 2,000 more officials exiled from Leningrad
89
Doctors Plot
* Stalin convinced his doctors were trying to kill him * 1953 over 30 doctors (mostly jews) arrested * Hundreds more later
90
Stalin's Death
* Stalin had a stroke after heavy drinking * Not found till 3am next morning * Doctors reluctant to treat him * Died a few days later * Huge response across USSR * Embalmed and displayed next to Lenin
GCSE History
flashcards
Decks in class (32)
# Cards
Brainscape helps you reach your goals faster, through stronger study habits.
© 2026 Bold Learning Solutions. Terms and Conditions