Location: Eastern Europe & northern ASIA
Size: largest in world,
Climate Regions:
Tundra (permafrost) + Taiga (forests) = Siberia
Steppes (grasslands)
Deserts
Mountains
Considered "landlocked" because of frozen north
Kiev: settled by Slavs & Vikings (Rus); became trading center
Byzantine Influence: autocracy - alphabet - architecture - Orthodox religion
Mongols: invaders from east; isolated Russia from Western Europe
Autocrats: absolute, divine right monarchs
Ivan the Great: (not a Ram.); freed Russia from Mongols
Peter the Great:
"Westernization" - more like Europe; trading; manufacturing; military power;
port on Baltic Sea (Window to the West)
Catherine the Great:
"enlightened despot" - use power to help people;
expanded Russian power; ports on the Black Sea
Nicholas II: last czar; didn't understand need for reform; influenced by wife (Alexandra) and son' s illness
Causes:
Autocratic government;
Discontent of workers & peasants;
Disastrous involvement in WW I - starvation & death
February (March) Revolution: 1917; Provisional Government overthrows czar, but stays in the war
October (November) Revolution: 1917.
Bolsheviks: Russian Communists
V. I. Lenin: leader of Bolsheviks
Influence of Karl Marx: Workers unite (in soviets) to overthrow govt
"Peace, Land, Bread": Lenin's promises; wins peasants' support
Civil War: Reds (Communists) v. whites (Czarists). Reds win. Czar & family killed. Lenin declares "Dictatorship of the Proletariat"
Rule of Lenin:
NEP allows some capitalism to revive economy
Rule of Josef Stalin
The "Man of Steel"
Totalitarian: total control of all aspect of life
Command Economy
5 Year Plans: forced industrialization; few consumer goods
Collectivization: peasants forced to work on collective farms
Human rights Violations: purges of Stalin's enemies. Millions killed/exiled
World War II: attacked by Hitler; Russians held strong -drove to Berlin from east; after war controlled Eastern Europe
Superpowers :. US v USSR
Arms, race: nuclear weapons; nuclear deterrent: race for space
Detente: friendlier relations: SALT Agreements
Glasnost -"openness" - more freedom: speech, travel, religion
Perestroika: "restructuring" - experiments with capitalism
Eastern Europe: Lech Walesa (Poland); overthrew communist govt
Soviet Republics: broke away from USSR; set up own govts
Russia: 1991: communist coup failed: USSR dissolved into 15 countries
Boris Yeltsin's Problems: inexperience with democratic process; change from command to free market economy = inflation, shortages. Opposition.
Eastern Europe : After WW II became satellites of USSR. Freedom in 1989. Problems inexperience with democracy - capitalism. Ethnic warfare (Bosnia)