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Bolsheviks Quotes

Browse 74 quotes about Bolsheviks.

Bolsheviks Quotes

“This investigation has shown that many of the widespread interpretations about the Russian Revolution have either no basis in fact or, at best, are ideologically motivated exaggerations. We could find no evidence for example that there was anything in the DNA of Bolshevism that would lead it to consciously and deliberately undermine proletarian power from the start. On the contrary they did all they could to encourage it for the first 6 months. Such accusations of course are made by those who already know the story ended badly, but to leave out the positive achievements of those early months is a distortion which denies the achievements of the working class in Russia.”

SocialismCommunismSoviet RussiaBolsheviksRussian RevolutionOctober RevolutionLeft Communism
Book:Russia: Revolution and Counter-Revolution, 1905-1924. A View from the Communist Left
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“Some searched for metaphors to describe what had happened. Tetiana Pavlychka remembered that her sister Tamara “had a large, swollen stomach, and her neck was long and thin like a bird’s neck. People didn’t look like people — they were more like starving ghosts.” Another survivor remembered that his mother “looked like a glass jar, filled with clear spring water. All her body that could be seen . . . was see-through and filled with water, like a plastic bag.” A third remembered his brother lying down, “alive but completely swollen, his body shining as if it were made of glass”.”

CommunismUkraineStarvationFamineBolsheviksStalinCollectivizationHolodomor
Book:Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine
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“Wina za błędy bolszewików spada ostatecznie na międzynarodowy proletariat i przede wszystkim na bezprzykładną uporczywą nikczemność niemieckiej socjaldemokracji, partii, która za czasów pokoju udawała, że maszeruje na czele światowego proletariatu, miała czelność pouczać świat i próbowała go prowadzić, partii, która we własnym kraju liczyła przynajmniej 10 milionów zwolenników obu płci, a teraz oto od 4 lat niczym sprzedajny średniowieczny żołdak na rozkaz klas panujących 24 razy każdego dnia przybija socjalizm do krzyża.”

SocialismCommunismBolsheviksRussian RevolutionSocial DemocracyRóża Luksemburg
Book:O rewolucji
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“In early Soviet times, when Kharkiv was the capital of the Ukranian Soviet Socialist Republic, Moscow's policy of korenizatsiia - 'nativisation' - prompted a brief flourishing of a Ukrainian avant-garde, paywrights and poets and journalists attracted to this bustling city of industrial and trading fame, allowed to write in their own language at last. The policy was the Bolsheviks' attempt to endear this restive republic, and the others, to their rule. In this political environment, writers were elevated. This special treatment came, however, came with the heavy caveat of state control which was followed by repression - a story familiar across the Soviet Union. But in Kharkiv the axe fell quicker. Stalin grew tired of korenizatsiia and opted to wipe out the native intelligentsia instead. In the early 1930s, the party line shifted abruptly; Ukrainian 'bourgeois nationalism' was the new enemy. The purges began. The Soviet Union under Stalin's paranoid control regressed to Tsarist ways. Russification and centralisation, brutal orders issued by Moscow and carried out by its secret police.”

Soviet UnionUkraineBolsheviksJoseph StalinKharkivKorenizatsiia
Book:Night Train to Odesa: Covering the Human Cost of Russia's War
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“Prior to January 22, 1905, the revolutionary party of Russia consisted of a small handful of people, and the reformists of those days, derisively called us a 'sect'. Within a few months, however, the picture completely changed. The hundreds of revolutionary Social Democrats 'suddenly' grew into thousands; the thousands became leaders of between two and three million proletarians.”

BolsheviksRussian RevolutionVladimir LeninSocial Democrats
Author:Vladimir Lenin
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“There is no greater fallacy than the belief that aims and purposes are one thing, while methods and tactics are another. This conception is a potent menace to social regeneration. All human experience teaches that methods and means cannot be separated from the ultimate aim. The means employed become, through individual habit and social practice, part and parcel of the final purpose; they influence it, modify it, and presently the aims and means become identical.”

AnarchismBolsheviksOctober Revolution
Book:My Disillusionment in Russia
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“It may well be that the Bolsheviks' greatest strength in 1917 was not strict party organization and discipline (which scarcely existed at this time) but rather the party's stance of intransigent radicalism on the extreme left of the political spectrum. While other socialist and liberal groups jostled for position in the Provisional Government and Petrograd Soviet, the Bolsheviks refused to be co-opted and denounced the politics of coalition and compromise. While other formerly radical politicians called for restraint and responsible, statesmanlike leadership, the Bolsheviks stayed out on the streets with the irresponsible and belligerent revolutionary crowd. As the 'dual power' structure disintegrated, discrediting the coalition parties represented in the Provisional Government and Petrograd Soviet leadership, only the Bolsheviks were in a position to benefit. Among the socialist parties, only the Bolsheviks had overcome Marxist scruples, caught the mood of the crowd, and declared their willingness to seize power in the name of the proletarian revolution.”

BolsheviksOctober Revolution
Book:The Russian Revolution 1917-1932
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“The Socialist Party had a slight, sympathetic contact with the Bolsheviks. In March, 1915, the Socialist Standard had on its front page a statement headed A RUSSIAN CHALLENGE. The Russian party, finding itself uninvited to a London conference of social-democrtic parties of the Allied nations,sent a declaration which every left-wing paper refused to publish before it was recieved by the SPGB...the statement condemned the war and the 'monstrous crime against socialism' of the labour leaders who had entered war governments.”

BolsheviksLeninSpgb
Author:Robert Barltrop
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“Rewolucja rosyjska znajduje się zatem między Scyllą a Charybdą. Jeżeli zechce wyrwać się z pętli ludobójstwa zawierając odrębny pokój, zdradzi międzynarodowy proletariat i swój własny los na rzecz imperializmu niemieckiego. Jeżeli natomiast nie będzie mogła sama doprowadzić do powszechnego pokoju, pozostanie jej tylko do wyboru albo aktywne prowadzenie wojny, a wtedy będzie działała na rzecz imperializmu Ententy, albo bierny udział w wojnie, tzn. zachowanie pod względem wojskowym bezczynności, czym równie niewątpliwie poprze interesy imperializmu niemieckiego. Takie jest prawdziwe położenie republiki rosyjskiej – położenie tragiczne, którego w najmniejszym stopniu nie może zmieniać piękna formuła pokojowa, powitana przez wszystkich jako zbawienne, magiczne słowo.”

BolsheviksWwiRussian RevolutionRóża Luksemburg
Book:O rewolucji
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“The flouting of the greybeard is also a revolutionary sign. The absence of the men of experience from among revolutionary officials leads to many false moves that wiser heads would have avoided; but youth will have its fling, and in all ages and in all civilizations there is always a permanent undercurrent of revolution on the part of the young men who know everything, against the older men who are considered out-of-date and incapable of understanding their brilliant schemes of reform.”

World War IBolsheviksPersiaBritish ImperialismCaucasus
Book:The Adventures of Dunsterforce
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“Thus did the typewriters clack through the night, until that historic document had been crafted which guaranteed for all Russians freedom of conscience (Article 13), freedom of expression (Article 14), freedom of assembly (Article 15), and freedom to have any of these rights revoked should they be “utilized to the detriment of the socialist revolution (Article 23)!”

FreedomRevolutionRussiaSocialismUssrBolsheviks
Book:A Gentleman in Moscow
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“History repeats itself, though on a new basis. Just as formerly, during the period of the downfall of feudalism, the word "Jacobin" evoked dread and abhorrence among the aristocrats of all countries, so now, in the period of the down fall of capitalism, the word "Bolshevik" evokes dread and abhorrence among the bourgeois in all countries. And conversely, just as formerly Paris was the refuge and school for the revolutionary representatives of the rising bourgeoisie, so now Moscow is the refuge and school for the revolutionary representatives of the rising proletariat. Hatred of the Jacobins did not save feudalism from collapse. Can there be any doubt that hatred of the Bolsheviks will not save capitalism from its inevitable downfall?”

RevolutionMarxismBolsheviksStalinBolshevismNegation Of The Negation
Author:Stalin
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“Wszystko to, co dzieje się w Rosji, jest zrozumiałe i stanowi nieunikniony łańcuch przyczyn i skutków, których punktem wyjścia i zwornikami są: niedopisanie niemieckiego proletariatu i okupacja Rosji przez imperializm niemiecki. To znaczy, że żądano by od Lenina i towarzyszy czynów nadludzkich, gdyby spodziewano się po nich wyczarowania w takich okolicznościach najpiękniejszej demokracji, wzorcowej dyktatury proletariatu i kwitnącej gospodarki socjalistycznej. Oni i tak dzięki zdecydowanie rewolucyjnej postawie, przykładowej energii i niezłomnej wierności międzynarodowemu socjalizmowi naprawdę dokonali tego, czego w tak diabelnie trudnych warunkach można było dokonać. Niebezpieczeństwo zaczyna się wtedy, gdy robią oni cnotę z konieczności, gdy swoją taktykę, wymuszoną przez te fatalne warunki, petryfikują teoretycznie we wszystkich punktach i starają się narzucić je międzynarodowemu proletariatowi jako wzorzec socjalistycznej taktyki, który należy naśladować. W ten sposób, całkiem niepotrzebnie szkodząc sobie samym i skrywając swą rzeczywistą, niezaprzeczalną zasługę dziejową pod korcem wymuszonych potknięć, oddają niedźwiedzią przysługę międzynarodowemu socjalizmowi, o który i dla którego walczyli i cierpieli, ponieważ chcą wnieść do jego zasobów jako nowe poznanie wszystkie te narzucone w Rosji przez konieczność i przymus opaczności, które koniec końców były przecież tylko odblaskami bankructwa międzynarodowego socjalizmu w tej wojnie światowej.”

CommunismBolsheviksRussian RevolutionRóża Luksemburg
Book:The Russian Revolution
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“The mistake the Bolsheviks made was not in aiming at the modernisation of Russia. That was entirely sensible. Nor was it a mistake to ascribe a major role in the economy to the state. This is quite normal in the modern world. Their mistake was to suppose that successful modernisation required the elimination of the market and of private enterprise. They did not realise the role that the market and private enterprise can play in generating and maintaining self-sustaining economic growth. Looking at all economic activity as if it were a zero-sum game was very one-sided. Furthermore, the Bolsheviks failed to realise that for the state to attempt to micromanage every farm, factory and office is a very inefficient form of management, that wastes information and potential local initiatives and entrepreneurship. Furthermore, coercion tends, in general, to be less effective than market incentives in raising labour productivity, and to be indifferent to human suffering and loss of life (see Chapters 6 and 7).”

BolsheviksModernization
Book:Socialist Planning
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“The war against Russia is an important chapter in the German nation's struggle for existence. [...] The objective of this battle must be the demolition of present-day Russia and must therefore be conducted with unprecedented severity. Every military action must be guided in planning and execution by an iron resolution to exterminate the enemy remorselessly and totally. In particular, no adherents of the contemporary Russian Bolshevik system are to be spared.”

ImportantWarActionNationsExistenceEnemyStruggleMilitaryParticularBattlePlanningRussiaObjectivesContemporaryIronResolutionExecutionChaptersUnprecedentedPresent DaySeverityBolsheviksMilitary ActionStruggle For ExistenceDemolition
Author:Franz Halder
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“The language of these Soviet show trials... could only be understood in the Aesopian imagery of the closed Bolshevik universe of conspiracies of evil against good in which 'terrorism' simply signified 'any doubt about the policies or character of Stalin.' All his political opponents were per se assassins. More than two 'terrorists' was a 'conspiracy'.”

TwoCharacterShowsPoliticalUniverseEvilLanguageDoubtPolicyUnderstoodTerrorismTerroristTrialsOpponentsSovietConspiracyImageryAssassinsBolsheviksPolitical Opponents
Author:Simon Sebag-Montefiore
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“The West doesn't have to love us. In fact, we should ask ourselves more often why people are so suspicious of us. After all, the West isn't a charity organization. How have we been perceived for centuries? As a huge, warlike realm ruled by despots - first by the czars and then Bolsheviks. Why should anyone have loved us? If we want to be accepted, we have to do something in return. And it's an art that we have yet to master.”

PeopleIfsWantShouldFirstsArtFactsAsksCenturyMastersHugeReturnOrganizationWestCharityAcceptedRealmsSuspiciousDespotsBolsheviksCzars
Author:Vladislav Surkov
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“The Bolshevik revolution was a counter-revolution. Its first moves were to destroy and eliminate every socialist tendency that had developed in the pre-revolutionary period. Their goal was as they said; it wasn't a big secret. They regarded the Soviet Union as sort a backwater. They were orthodox Marxists, expecting a revolution in Germany. They moved toward what they themselves called "state capitalism," then they moved on to Stalinism. They called it democracy and called it socialism. The one claim was as ludicrous as the other.”

FirstsSaidStatesBigsMovingGoalSecretDemocracyRevolutionPeriodsCapitalismClaimsMovedUnionsSocialismTendenciesRevolutionaryGermanyOrthodoxSovietExpectingSocialistThey SaidSoviet UnionMarxistMoved OnStalinismBolsheviks
Author:Noam Chomsky
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