Global InformationRed Terror information
| Part of the Russian Civil War | |
 Propaganda poster in Petrograd, 1918: "Death to the Bourgeoisie and its lapdogs – Long live the Red Terror"[1] | |
| Native name | Красный террор / Красный терроръ Krasnyy terror |
|---|---|
| Date | August 1918 – February 1922 |
| Duration | 3–4 years |
| Location | Soviet Russia, Soviet Ukraine, Bolshevik-occupied Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and Finland |
| Motive | Political repression |
| Target | Anti-Bolshevik groups, clergy, rival socialists, counter-revolutionaries, peasants, and dissidents |
| Organized by | Cheka |
| Deaths | Estimate:
|
The Red Terror (Russian: красный террор, romanized: krasnyy terror) was a campaign of political repression and executions in Soviet Russia and Soviet Ukraine, as well as occupied territories in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and Finland, which was carried out by the Bolsheviks, chiefly through the Cheka, the Bolshevik secret police. It officially started in early September 1918 and lasted until 1922.[5][6] Arising after assassination attempts on Vladimir Lenin and Trotsky along with the successful assassinations of Petrograd Cheka leader Moisei Uritsky and party editor V. Volodarsky[7] in alleged retaliation for Bolshevik mass repressions, the Red Terror was modeled on the Reign of Terror of the French Revolution,[8] and sought to eliminate political dissent, opposition, and any other threat to Bolshevik power.[9] The decision to enact the Red Terror was also driven by the initial 'massacre of their "Red" prisoners by the office-cadres during the Moscow insurrection of October 1917', allied intervention in the Russian Civil War and the large-scale massacres of Reds during the Finnish Civil War in which 10,000 to 20,000 revolutionaries had been killed by the Finnish Whites.[7]
More broadly, the term is usually applied to Bolshevik political repression throughout the Civil War (1917–1922),[10][11][12] as distinguished from the White Terror carried out by the White Army (Russian and non-Russian groups opposed to Bolshevik rule) against their political enemies, including the Bolsheviks.
- ^ The orthography used on the poster is generally in line with the 1918 Bolshevik reform except for ея, a pre-revolutionary form of её (female pronoun).
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Erlikhmanwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Melgunov (2008), p. 171 & 570.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Volkovwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Blakemore, Erin (2 September 2020). "How the Red Terror set a macabre course for the Soviet Union". National Geographic. Archived from the original on February 22, 2021. Retrieved 13 July 2021.
The poet was just one of many victims of the Red Terror, a state-sponsored wave of violence that was decreed in Russia on September 5, 1918, and lasted until 1922.
- ^ Melgunov (1927), p. 202.
- ^ a b Liebman, Marcel (1975). Leninism under Lenin. London : J. Cape. pp. 313–314. ISBN 978-0-224-01072-6.
- ^ Wilde, Robert. 2019 February 20. "The Red Terror." ThoughtCo. Retrieved March 24, 2021.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
:0was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Melgunov (1925).
- ^ Melgunov (1927).
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
BlackBook_chptr4was invoked but never defined (see the help page).