Chapter 2 - Lenin and Trotsky in the First Russian Revolution (1905)¶
Core Argument¶
In 1905, the first Russian Revolution provided a crucible for the divergent political development of Lenin and Trotsky, forging the strategic insights that would define the October Revolution twelve years later. Trotsky returned to Russia in February and became the central leader of the St Petersburg Soviet from its inception, gaining unique insight into working-class psychology and the dynamics of proletarian struggle. The Soviet, representing around 200,000 factory workers, functioned as a workers’ government in embryo—publishing its own newspaper, forming an armed militia, arresting unpopular police officers, and excluding bourgeois-liberal unions. It became the greatest workers’ organisation yet seen in Russia, serving as a model for over fifty towns. Trotsky became its president on 23 November, wrote most of its proclamations, and saw his newspaper Nachalo reach a circulation of half a million. His direct engagement with the workers confirmed his view that the proletariat, once in power, could not remain within the bourgeois framework of the revolution but would be compelled to make deep inroads into bourgeois property relations.
Lenin, by contrast, spent 1905 overwhelmingly concerned with reorienting and regrouping the Bolshevik party. He had to correct the conservative committee-men, persuading them to recruit young workers, participate in the Soviet, and accept the peasantry as the proletariat’s main ally. On this basis he developed the slogan of the Revolutionary Democratic Dictatorship of the Proletariat and Peasantry, outlined in Two Tactics. Returning to Russia on 4 November, Lenin pushed for reunification of the RDSLP factions, arguing the revolution had removed the basis for the split. He initially saw the Soviet as the embryo of a provisional revolutionary government but called for inclusion of the Union of Unions, aiming for a bourgeois-democratic republic. Trotsky’s perspective of permanent revolution was beginning to diverge from Lenin’s formulation.
The revolution’s defeat exposed its core weakness: the proletariat was exhausted before the peasantry moved into action. The St Petersburg workers’ unilateral introduction of the eight-hour day by direct action provoked a lock-out by employers, led by the government, leaving the proletariat isolated and forced to retreat. Trotsky won the vote for retreat on 12 November, a decision Deutscher describes as “faultless”. The Moscow uprising in December was crushed after barricades were erected spontaneously, but the Bolshevik leadership was arrested on the first night. Lenin concluded the revolution required a disciplined party, an alliance with the peasantry, and winning over sections of the army. Trotsky’s Results and Prospects argued the proletariat must lead, but lacked a clear recognition of the need for a Leninist party. The soviets emerged as a new form of revolutionary organisation—rudimentary organs of popular power capable of coordinating insurrection and assuming state functions—and their strategic lessons became foundational for 1917.