The Bolsheviks

The Austrians thought the arrival of the Bolsheviks would mean freedom- for they had no idea what the Bolsheviks were.  One day I spoke to an Austrian solder guarding one corner of the officer's camp in Antipikha.  He said, "I will explain you what Bolshevism is: What you have belongs to me, but what I have doesn't belong to you!"  This was this man's theory!

The Bolsheviks were originally members of the Marxist Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party;  they broke from the Mensheviks and established themselves in 1903 as an independent party. Their name comes from the Russian word for majority:  bolshinstvo.  They later became known as the Communist Party.  

The Bolsheviks believed that the working class should lead the revolution against the Czarist government in an alliance with the peasantry. The aim being to establish a democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry. This idea was very popular because it sounded like power would be shared with the people.

During the early WW1 years anger mounted against the inneffectual Czarist regime and both the Bolsheviks and Lenin (circled in photo), their leader, grew in popularity.  In 1917, the Bolsheviks seized power and ended Russia's involvement in WW1.  For the next three years Russia endured civil war between the Bolsheviks (Red Russians) and the Czarists (Tzarists), also known as the White Russians.  Under Karensky, the White Russians were not an organized force; they had no positive agenda, their only thought was to counter the Bolshevik takeover. 

Checkout the great 1920 propaganda- some pro and some anti-Bolshevik: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolsheviks  (credit for above photos to Wikipedia)