Trotsky, Fanatical Revolutionary

Leon Trotsky (1879-1940) was a close associate of Lenin during the Russian Revolution and Early days of the Bolshevik State. He held a seat on Russia’s powerful Communist Party eight member Politburo until 1926. He shared Lenin’s undying belief in the Dictatorship of the Proletariat through violent revolution and class struggle. He held to that fanatically until his last day. He wrote voluminously throughout his life in newspapers, journals and books, including his own biography and an extensive history of the Russian Revolution.

The Bolsheviks, who undertook a successful coup in Petrograd in November 1917, began immediately to stifle democratic governance. The first day that the popularly elected Constituent Assembly convened, of which the Bolsheviks were a minority, they used the military to shut it down and dispersed it (January 1918).  

Karl Marx promoted a hypothesis, based on Hegelian dialectics, which presumed historical determinism would inevitably be the end of capitalism. Feudalism is succeeded by Bourgeois society then subsumed by large capitalist enterprises that dominate the society. However, Capitalism’s increasing efficiencies will predictably impoverish the working class or rather Imperial competition will lead to international warfare, both would precipitate a revolution led by this Revolutionary Proletariat. This revolutionary proletariat over a period will produce a classless society.

Lenin advanced the idea a small, disciplined revolutionary Marxist Party could become the vanguard of the proletariat and conduct a society into a Communist utopia, skipping the stages that included Bourgeois parliamentary politics. Russia as you would know had a tiny working class of a couple million industrial workers and 100 million peasants. It was far from a state typified by Marx that was heavily industrialized and would be expected to see this transition into revolution and a communist classless society. Under Lenin’s ideas this revolutionary Proletariat would violently struggle against counter-revolutionary forces, using whatever means necessary for their success.

Trotsky, while ostensibly a Menshevik (Minority) since the 2^nd Party Congress of 1903, joined the Bolsheviks(Majority) in the 1917 after the overthrow of the Romanov monarchy and the institution of parliamentary government. From then on he clung to Lenin’s nostrum of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat and the justice of violent class struggle against counter-revolutionary forces. Bolsheviks had abjured any participation with parliamentary government, in opposition to the Mensheviks. Bolsheviks insisted on a party of highly disciplined, dedicated revolutionary workers, not simply political supporters.

The handles for each of the factions of the Russian Socialist Party were due to the boycotting of the 1902 Congress by the Mensheviks that left the Bolsheviks the majority of the party at the Congress.

Trotsky, who was already well known for his energetic work in the 1905 failed Revolution, participated in the coup d’etat of November 1917 that overthrew the Provisional government and for his leading military role in the Russian Civil war. His energy at rallying the Red Army Forces contributed significantly to the Bolsheviks regime to survive and led to great popularity with Russian people. In an army that lacked strictness, he was not above using violent measures including summary execution to enforce military discipline.

Trotsky had asked Stalin to be removed from the Southern Front for insubordination but Lenin and the leadership never consented for his removal. During this conflict Stalin had reached out to Trotsky to make some tentative amends but was rebuffed, according to Volkogonov in his biography, Trotsky, Eternal Revolutionary. This certainly contributed to the animosity between these two future candidates for the leadership of the Party. 

In March 1921 when it appeared that the Bolsheviks had won the Civil War, Trotsky endorsed the crack down on the Kronstadt naval rebellion that protested violent suppression of strikes in Petrograd and demanded democratic reforms. Kronstadt sailors had been one of the first to support the 1917 Revolution. The Bolsheviks took 12 days of fighting to suppress the rebellion. 3,000 sailors were killed or wounded and more than 1,200 were executed afterwards. For many this was the end of the hopes for a truly democratic revolution. Trotsky, a member of the Politburo, condoned the crackdown. 

At that very same time in 1921 the 10^th Party Congress banned dissent; internal factions were forbidden. These included the Workers Opposition that promoted syndicalism and Democratic Centralists that desired more power to the Soviets (Councils). The party becomes dedicated to being monolithic. Discussion, dissent or disagreement becomes forbidden unless directed by the leadership of the Party. Lenin and Trotsky sanctioned this regime. By the Civil War (1918-1921) Lenin and the Bolshevik party, along with Trotsky, had built a one-party state, ready, willing and able to crush opposition. It would come to haunt Trotsky in the power struggles between him and the leadership in the Politburo.

Trotsky believed in the justice of using terror and repression in Class Struggle against counter-revolutionaries, as mentioned above with the crackdown on the Kronstadt naval base. And he was additionally amoral when it came to economic matters. Trotsky wrote in Terrorism and Communism (1920):

Repression for the attainment of economic ends is a necessary weapon of the socialist dictatorship.

The same Party he did so much to support would come to crush him, his family and his associates. Ironically, his prescription for Stalin’s ever increasing control over the party was to demand more democracy in the Party. It was this same Party he helped create that had violently suppressed opposition and had outlawed dissension, internal factions, within the Party at the 10^th Party Congress.

One of the first glaring missteps to claim Lenin’s mantel was Trotsky’s absence from Lenin’s funeral. He was on holiday in Odessa and was told that the funeral was Saturday when in fact it became Sunday. Nonetheless, Trotsky should have made all efforts to reach Moscow at the earliest hour, instead of consigning himself not to be present. Trotsky’s absence made a very bad impression on the Party.

After Lenin’s early death in January 1924, a power struggle began for leadership of the Bolshevik party and the leadership of Soviet Russia.  Earlier Lenin had asked Trotsky to be his deputy in the government (Sovnarcom), basically second in line, but he demurred; he was too busy with his publishing activities. This was a colossal blunder.

Stalin, named General Secretary of the party, had control of the membership and was ready to join with Kamenev and Zinoviev within the Politburo to outnumber Trotsky. Trotsky found himself outvoted 7-1 immediately in issues before the Politburo. Critically, Trotsky held himself above the fray and chose to absent himself for long periods from Moscow, mostly excusing himself for health reasons and occupying himself with his writing. He was a haughty, prima donna and I wonder if he in some way expected the party to recognize he was Lenin’s successor by acclamation, due to his popularity based on roles in the Revolution and the Civil War.

Nearing death, Lenin had written a testament with negative characterizations of Stalin, calling for his removal from the General Secretariat, but the testament was never allowed to be released to the party faithful. The Testament was read out to the 13^th Party Congress Central Committee after Lenin’s death, but Party members were not allowed to take notes. Little was made of it, contrary to Trotsky’s expectations. Enough criticism was leveled to others in the leadership beside Stalin that few wanted dwell on his testament. Stalin’s position in the Party was not shaken.

Trotsky, ever the revolutionary, insisted that Soviet Russia needed Permanent revolution to be successful, a revolution rolling across national boundaries. This view was not nearly as popular with the Party as Stalin’s claim that Russia could successfully build socialism in the one country of Russia without an expanded Permanent revolution. Trotsky assumed without it, Soviet Russia would be in the throes of militarism, defending itself from capitalist attack.

Not engaged in any effective political coalition building, he was continually outmaneuvered my Stalin. Trotsky was ousted from the Politburo in 1926; he was removed from the Central Committee in October 1927. Trotsky hadn’t made alliances in the military, either, despite his leading military role in the Revolution and the Civil War.

Trotsky and his small faction of Oppositionists resorted to attempting to ignite an uprising against the Party, so securely ensconced in power. His supporters went to factory gates, trying to stir up the workers. At the 10^th Anniversary of the November 1917 revolution parade in Moscow supporters of Trotsky, Kamenev (his brother in law) and Zinoviev attempted to publicly protest. The troika is said by Trotsky to have been driving around Moscow, stopped by police, they were led to the Platform to the accompaniment of cheers. These types of demonstrations were utterly futile and Trotsky was deluded to think otherwise.

This public disruption (November 1927) was not taken kindly by the leadership of the Party. Trotsky, Kamenev, and Zinoviev were expelled from the Communist Party. Kamenev and Zinoviev recanted their opposition soon after and was graciously allowed to return to the Party; they will fall under Stalinist oppression nonetheless in 1936 at the Show trials.

Trotsky had little respect people of lesser intellect, unless they were assisting him with his writing. Note Trotsky, Jewish from Odessa region, had to enhance his Russia, and went on to learn to speak and write German and French and some English; he studied mathematics and physics until politics took over his life. He had a brilliant intellect. This is a classic case of high IQ and mediocre emotional intelligence, something Stalin was superb at. In his ascent to dictatorship, no one allied with Stalin thinking here is some sinister monster who’s going to kill us all. Later in the purges in the 1930’s he eliminated all of his prior allies and a couple of his secret police henchmen like Yagoda and Yezhov, who were executed as well after they had fulfilled their usefulness. Stalin was a master manipulator. 

Trotsky was essentially a polemicist and historian. Not a great theoretician, his one contribution to Communist thought was the aforementioned idea of Permanent Revolution. He wrote voluminously, much of which was to pay the bills after his exile.

After his expulsion from Soviet Russia, Trotsky began to advocate violent overthrow of the Stalinist regime. He had virtually no means to see this accomplished, but paranoid Stalin was incensed at his rhetoric and insisted on him being silenced. Stalin’s paybacks were legendary. Trotsky himself had to take ever increasing safety measures and often moved. He first took up residence, after being expelled from Soviet Russia, on the island Prinkipo, in the Sea of Marmara in Turkey in 1929, deemed sufficiently safe. But there were exiled White Russians who would have loved to see his death as well. Something Stalin would love to blame Trotsky’s death on. He remained there for 4 years hoping some western country would accept him. He subsequently went from France to Norway then in 1937 to Mexico and lived with Diego Rivera, the famous Mexican painter for two years. They had a falling out, due to it seems his too intimate relationship with his artist wife Frieda Kahlo.  In May, 1940 a group of assassins led by the KGB, shot up his house with over a hundred bullets and a couple bombs that failed to explode. He miraculously survived. He was assassinated in August 1940 at his heavily guarded house by an ice pick of an associate of his trusted female assistant, she being unaware of his true identity as KGB agent.

Stalin wouldn’t be satisfied with Trotsky’s death. His entire family fell under the wheel of Stalin’s organs of oppression except for his second wife, Natalia. His youngest daughter succumbed to tuberculosis for lack of medical care in 1928. His eldest daughter Zinaida committed suicide in 1933, out of despair in Berlin. Zinaida left her young daughter in Russia, never to be heard from again. His first wife, Alexandra Sokolovskaya, who introduced him to Communism and he abandoned in 1902 in Siberia with two children, was swallowed up by the Gulag and died sometime around 1938. His son, Lev Sedova, from his second marriage, who worked closely with him, died after complications from an operation for appendix, in a private clinic, in 1938. He went to the private facility under an assumed name fearing discovery by the NKVD. His operation, initially successful, turned to fatal complications. Some point to the NKVD as possible agent in his death. Sergei, his younger son, was apolitical became an engineer, but Stalin came for him nonetheless and died in the Gulag in 1937, charged with a trumped accusation of poisoning co-workers. His wife died in the Gulag. His sister, Olga, wife of Kamenev of Show Trial fame, was executed in 1941 in the Medvedev Forest. Her sons were executed in 1937 and 1938. Wives of his sons, uncles and aunts, sisters and their husbands all went under the maw of Stalinist oppression. His parents who help support him throughout his adult life died prior to the rise of Stalin’s full power, his father in 1920’s and his mother in 1910.

Finally, Trotsky was dedicated to violent class struggle, command control of the economy, a one Party Communist State. It is not very likely his rule would have been radically different than Stalin’s. He advocated collectivization of agriculture and the rapid industrialization of the economy before Stalin began to implement them in the late 1920’s after his exile. Even after being exiled from Soviet Russia and advocating leadership change, he makes no mention of the ghastly effects of the collectivization of agriculture or the extensive Stalinist purges.

 “Above all [the Proletariat] must be completely free from the fictions of religion, ‘democracy’ and transcendental morality- spiritual chains forged by the enemy to tame it and enslave it…..Welfare of the revolution – that is the supreme law!” He and his family died under that law.

Rise of the German Empire: 1864-1871

Two massive world wars were fought in the 20^th century that caused millions of deaths and permanent injury of millions more and widespread destruction. A united Germany was the center of it. Europe had always known that a united Germany would rival anything on the continent. France had joined the 30 Years War 1618-1648 to stymie Charles VI who as Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire represented a resurgent Germany. One result of this conflict France garnered Alsace and Lorraine from the Germans. Centuries earlier, the Popes fought the Holy Roman Emperor in the Investiture controversy back in the 11^th and 12^th centuries. Struggling over who had control over the appointment of Bishops, essentially the Popes generated chaos and upheaval in Germany in a 50 year Civil War; inciting German nobles to revolt against the central authority of the Emperor. That was the end of a united Germany that had been gradually falling apart after Charlemagne built his grand Empire in the 9^th century. The kingship began to be elective in 919. In contrast the French Capetians were fortunate enough to maintain their dynasty long enough through the centuries to gain a hereditary crown, avoiding the vagaries of election like the Germans. A loosely integrated Germany would be the rule for centuries.

Question here is who was asleep when Germany was allowed to unify in the mid-19^th Century? The united Germany created in the mid-19^th century would become a ticking time bomb in the center of the continent. 

The real tragedy is the malfeasance and neglect that allowed Germany to be united in the first place during 1866-1871. It wasn’t until the first decade of the 20^th Century that the United Kingdom suddenly discovered Germany as the menace to world peace, dare I say. Of a sudden addressing the issue of a dominant power in the heart of Europe becomes of paramount importance for the British Empire. The blunder was committed 50 years earlier in the period 1864-1871, when Germany was allowed to unite.

It was tiny Belgium to which the UK sprang to the aid in 1914, based on a treaty agreed to in 1839, ignoring the fact that they didn’t have an army to defend them. Of course the treaty was meant to protect them from the clutches of the French not the Germans who didn’t even have a nation at the time.  It reminds one of Britain’s pledge to Poland prior to WWII, that was utterly betrayed. The result was Poland completely devastated and crushed by the NAZI’s and Soviets and then placed under the thumb of the Soviets for close to a half a century with Churchill’s complicity.

In addition the British volunteer army before WWI was a fraction of one needed to defeat Germany. Their guarantee of Belgium’s security was largely mythical. They relied on France to bear much of the burden with conscription finally initiated in 1916.

That unleashed a war hitherto unknown in its ferocity and carnage. A war that toppled four empires. Resolved by American involvement in 1917, the first war simply created the environment for an even bigger war 20 years later. But I digress.

                                                              ***

France had been energized by nationalism subsequent to the 1789 Revolution; Napoleon used this popular force to conquer Europe. Germany as well as the rest of Europe had been overrun by the Napoleonic armies. After a great struggle Napoleon was finally subdued in 1815. The Congress of Vienna was an attempt to build a coalition of powers to restrain France. A Bourbon monarchy was reconstituted in France. But the nationalism that ignited France spread to other regions including Germany.

Would Britain notice? In 1832 the United Kingdom had widely broadened its franchise. No longer was it the anointed aristocracy imagined by Edmund Burke ruling the country. The Kings and Aristocracy of Europe in days past were fully aware of the need for balance of power of the continent and the danger a united Germany would represent. And as mentioned above, they did all they could to keep Germany divided, at one point composed of 300 various kingdoms and principalities. Napoleon reduced this to 38 separate jurisdictions, governing bodies. 

The broaden electorate in UK was not attuned to these things. The UK existed in its “Splendid Isolation” unconcerned with the power relationships of continental Europe. The UK rather was concerned with its vast colonial empire and even fought what is called Opium Wars in 1839-1842 with decaying Imperial China on the other side of the world and was engaged maintaining order in the Jewel of the Crown, India. Three hundred thousand British servants ruling three hundred million Indians, the British really did know how to run an empire. Consider United States, with some 150,000 troops struggling to run Iraq, a nation of 17 million. We, democrats, have little idea how to administer an empire. We desire to transform not administer.

France by 1851 was led by Emperor Napoleon III, a nephew of his famous namesake. He was sympathetic to nationalistic urges in Italy and Germany, symbolizing the curtailment of the Peace of Paris 1815 that was to straightjacket France. They would be fellow nation states sympathetic to France. This policy had critics. Thiers, future President of the Third Republic, tried to explain that it was against the interests of France to help Italy and Germany unite. But allowed to unite they were.

Despite UK’s Splendid Isolation they joined Napoleon III in the senseless Crimean War 1853-56 to stop Russia from having undue influence and control over the “Sick man of Europe”, the Ottoman Empire. The British public initially fully supported the military adventure, incensed by the slaughter that accompanied the sinking of 11 Ottoman battleships by the Russians at Sinop in November 1853 on the Northeast coast of Turkey. The main battlefront was the great fortress at Sevastopol on the Crimean peninsula. The French and British could do little else. It held out under siege for 11 months. Meanwhile French and British soldiers died in the thousands by disease. Deaths totaled around 118,000 for French and British. Russia is said to have encountered far more causalities. Military adventures are for keeps. Intervention to save the Ottoman Empire was considered critical…to the maintenance of the British Empire. The British will ignore the nationalism that was transpiring on the European Continent.

In contrast to the British Empires’ ardent interest with a decrepit Ottoman Empire, we will see some years later UK will ignore the process of the unification of Germany under the leadership of Prussia. Something that should have been deemed far more dangerous. A foolish geopolitical error that will have monstrous consequences decades later. Germany, united, would be a powerhouse poised to dominate Europe as the British Empire had dominated the globe.

After the Crimean War, Russia is duly chastised for its aggression toward the failing Ottoman Empire. Once the policeman of Europe after 1815, even saving the Austrian Empire by suppressing the Hungarian revolt in 1848, it remained isolated during the unification of the Germans under Prussia, licking its wounds. Another tragic result of that ludicrous War.

German Nationalism had been kindled by the Napoleonic armies, who conquered Germany. 30 years later 1848 nationalistic revolts broke out throughout Europe. Germany nationalists gathered itself together at Frankfort Parliament in 1850 with the desire to unite Germany under the aegis of Prussia to no result. Another effort under the Erfurt Union that excluded Austria, by the free agreement of the German princes, was put forward by Prussia Foreign Minister Radowitz. This scheme was squelched by the King of Prussia and Emperor of Austria-Hungarian Empire at the Punctuation of Olmutz. Prussia, acquiesced to Austrian concerns and power, backed out of any agreement for a constitutional monarchy of a united Germany. Austria, a multi-ethnic Empire alarmed at nationalism, wanted to retain its ascendant position in Germany and to continue to rule by divine decree not under a constitution with the consent of the governed. The fallout resulted in many German patriots, being forced to emigrate, most of whom to America.

You must understand that republicanism let alone democracy was looked upon with horror after the example of mob rule of the French Revolution. It was an executive branch led by a monarch under a constitution, produced under the consent of the governed that was the accepted form of European Liberalism. France had tried radical republicanism and produced mob violence then an emperor in 1799 and 1851. And even the France Third Republic teetered, on prospect of a very popular Right Wing strong man Georges Boulanger in 1889, who nonetheless lacked the courage to effect a coup d’etat. Note the fall of the monarchs in Europe after WWI resulted in mostly popular dictatorships NOT Jeffersonian Democracies. Even France had a feeble democracy, that couldn’t face the juggernaut of NAZI Germany.  Part of the success of your government depends on how willing your citizens are to fight for it. Soviet Russia demonstrated that its citizens for numerous reasons could fight to the death of millions for the Communist regime. France not so much, fell in 6 weeks to the Germans.

Despite the Prussian diplomatic retreat away from unification in 1851, when King Wilhelm I (ruling in his brother’s stead since 1857) took the crown in 1862 he appointed Otto von Bismarck as his President and Foreign Minister. Bismarck was a brilliant, unprincipled diplomat. In 1864 he first engaged to join Austrian in a territorial dispute with Denmark over Schleswig, a German duchy, of which Denmark had sovereignty. Contrary to the London Protocols of 1850, the King Christian IX of Denmark declared Schleswig part of Denmark, not simply a duchy ruled by the person of the prior King Frederick VII, who died without heirs.

In 1864 Austria and Prussia came to an agreement under the Gastein Convention to act in concert against Denmark. Austria and Prussia overwhelmed Denmark to force it to relinquish control of Schleswig-Holstein.

The diplomatic response to the dismembering of Denmark was censorious. The French Foreign Minister, Drouyn, said, “We regret to find no other foundation for the Convention than force, no other justification than the reciprocal convenience of co-sharers”. Lord Clarendon, Foreign Minister of Britain, called the annexation of the Duchies the most infamous act since the partition of Poland (1795). Here’s where Britain, in its “Splendid Isolation”, needed to intervene diplomatically or militarily with France. They had already allied with France in the mindless Crimean War. Tragically, the theft of Denmark was not requited.

As important as Bismarck’s brilliant diplomacy, it must be noted that King Wilhelm I had made major steps to upgrade the military, which will be used in the next decade to confront Austria, the leading element of Germany and before 1806 the Holy Roman Empire. (I know you’ve all heard it but I can’t resist: neither Holy, Roman nor an Empire.)

In 1866 Bismarck, brilliantly used Italian nationalist desires for control over Italian Venetia, under sovereignty of Austria since 1815, plus disagreements regarding Schleswig-Holstein to confront Austria about the future of a united Germany under Prussian leadership. Newly united Italy attacked Austria’s Venetia (Venice) territory. Meanwhile, Bismarck took over Austrian controlled Holstein, claiming meddling by Austria in Schleswig and Austria declared war on Prussia. The remainder of the states in the German Confederation (39 total), established in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna, remained neutral and Austria faced Prussia alone. Austria had already alienated Russia in the Crimean War by remaining neutral and France was sympathetic to Italian nationalist ambitions. 

Britain in its oblivious “Splendid Isolation” ignored continental issues. The French attempted to gain territory as a negotiating ploy, the German states on the left bank of the Rhine. This was dangled as a diplomatic enticement to keep France neutral, and then rebuffed after the Austrian Empire was defeated.

The Prussians soundly beat the Austrians at Koniggratz, July 3, 1866 in today’s Czech Republic. Bismarck quickly settled a peace in what is called the “Seven Week’s War”. Any promised French aid arrived too late. Prussia, enlarged itself and led a group of German States into what was now called the Northern Confederation, in which Austria was excluded. A military union was affected as well by separate treaties with the southern states of Germany outside the Northern Confederation.

And France is presented with a growing peril on its borders. As it happens, a Roman Catholic cadet branch the Hohenzollern, the dynasty of which King Wilhelm IV of Prussia was member, was offered the throne of Spain.  France objected to Hohenzollerns, the Prussian royal family, being on both sides their borders. The offer was withdrawn, but France wanted assurances from King Wilhelm himself. Bismarck was absent at Ems. King Wilhelm sent him a telegram describing the disavowal of claims to the Spanish throne. Bismarck altered the telegram to make the King sound more hostile to French desires. It was published. The seemingly hostile response from King Wilhelm outraged the French public of whom Napoleon III was sensitive. France declared war on July 16, 1870.  

Germany invaded three days later. The French suffered military defeat after military defeat, resulting in the Emperor Napoleon III himself being captured along with his army of over 100,000 at Sedan on September 2, 1870. The famous Commune in Paris with its republican elements carried on the hopeless war for another 5 months, and eventually capitulated. A lesser Germany was united under Prussia; Austrian Hungarian Empire was excluded from the union.

All of Germany including southern states outside the Northern Confederation joined the war. Austria remained neutral, having lost their northern Italian provinces, granted to them under the Congress of Vienna 1815 in the conflict with Prussia in 1866.  Britain in its “Splendid Isolation” didn’t discover Germany until the 20^th Century. Russia chastised by France and Britain in the ludicrous Crimean War of 1853-56 stayed on the sidelines. France was isolated against a united Germany.

Later in WWI, largely due to war time propaganda, Germany becomes viewed as an ogre, utterly opposed to higher civilization, represented by the allied democracies, which in fact included the Russian Czar ruling by divine right. Germany had a representative parliament and a constitutional monarchy, which made the misstep to compete against the pretensions of the vast British Empire. Admittedly it was not a Jeffersonian Democracy, but that includes virtually most of the world even today. Thanks to the military intervention of the United States in 1917 the allies won the war to make the World Safe for the British Empire, not as President Wilson claimed to make the World Safe for Democracy.  This only setup another war twenty years later, all the more terrible, that put totalitarian Soviet Russia in control of half of Europe for close to a half century. And Britain would soon give up their Empire, despite the wars they fought to save it. 

The Extermination: Armenian Genocide in The Ottoman Empire 1915.

I will not do justice to the horror of this crime. An organized massacre that beggars description. This is the first of the genocides of the Twentieth Century, implemented in wartime and within a collapsing Ottoman Empire, that was carried out from 1915 to 1920. And all but forgotten. Today what is known as Turkey lies empty of Armenians.

                                                   Armenians and Turks

The Armenians had been in the Middle East for millennia, speaking an Indo-European related language.  Long before the nomadic Turkic Steppe peoples ever arrived in Anatolia the 11^th Century. They were the first nation to declare Christianity the State Church in the early fourth century. Much of the time they subsisted as client states of the Romans, Persians, Arabs or the Turks and the Safavid Persian Empire with some periods of independence (885 A.D. to the 12^th Century).

The Turkic peoples range throughout the vast Asian Steppe and were one of a series of aggressive nomadic Steppe peoples that terrorized or destroyed Civilizations for millennia. The Steppe was a relatively narrow grassy expanse of geography from Mongolia to Hungry, a few hundred miles wide. Huns that devastated the Roman Empire and Xiang Nu that challenged the Chinese civilization were two examples of these devastating Steppe peoples. Their military prowess was unparalleled, such that it was only in their inevitable disintegration into competing tribes that caused them to cease being a threat: formerly united groups would inevitably fall upon each other. The Mongolian succession crisis upon the death of the Grand Khan Ogedei of 1240 may have saved Europe.

In several cases these Steppe nomads subsumed civilization, in the case of the Turks, invading the Anatolian plateau in the 11^th Century a province of the Byzantine Empire. Later heirs of the Seljuks, the Ottoman Turks, created a vast empire from the Baltics to the borders of the great Persian Civilization and included Egypt and some claim to sovereignty over Northern Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. By 1453 they had destroyed the Byzantine Civilization with the conquest of Constantinople and its massive walls, the final bastion of the Eastern Roman Empire, whose political existence in the West ended in 476 A.D but lived on another millennium in the East. The fall of Constantinople meant the control of the Ottomans over the Balkans was decidedly settled; their ascendency lasted over five centuries.

The Ottoman’s reign in the Middle East and Balkans was uncontested from the 15^th Century until the end of the 18^th. Even laying siege to Vienna in 1683. Within a century they were in retreat. Russia gained control over Crimea in 1783. Napoleon carried out a military adventure that briefly took control of Egypt and Palestine in 1798, but left with his army disintegrated, under siege by the British Navy.

Big cracks began to open in the Empire. Greece gained independence in 1818. Egypt rose in revolt in 1805 and was thereafter run by Muhammed Ali. Reverses against Ottoman Empire followed in Crimean War(1853-56), only to be propped up by France and England, and then the so-called Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78, resulted in additional loss of territory. Bulgaria became independent, Serbia’s de facto independence was recognized, Cyprus was taken by the British Empire and Russia gained territories in the Caucasus and Bessarabia (Western Coast of Black Sea). Later Romania gained independence in 1881 and Bulgaria incorporated Eastern Romelia in 1885.

The Ottoman Empire was shocked by the sudden collapse of its Balkan provinces in 1912, carried out by the indigenous Macedonians, Serbs, Bulgars and Greeks. They were not aided by the major powers. The Ottoman’s had been present in the European Balkans in some measure over parts of seven centuries, since the 14^th century. This was largely gone. After the Balkan War hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees left to reside in the remainder of the Empire mostly Constantinople and Anatolia. In February, 1914 a consortium of Powers forced Turkey to agree to the oversight by the Russian Empire of its Eastern Provinces with its large number of the populace Armenians. This was the backdrop of the Ottoman Empire entering World War I.

                                                    The Young Turks

The extermination of the Armenians in Anatolia is a monstrous crime, made more monstrous by its denial by the government of Turkey and its people. The genocide of the Armenians was the end result of a policy of a political movement called the Young Turks, presumed democratic. They had gained ascendancy in the Ottoman Empire in 1908, ironically allied with the Armenians; they were to have set up a constitutional government with the overthrow of Sultan Hamid Abdul.

Shortly after CUP took power in 1909 the Armenians suffered a massacre in Adana, much like the series of widespread massacres, suffered under Sultan Abdul Hamid in 1890’s where countless thousands died. The Adana massacres, largely propagated by the Turkish military, rattled the association that the Armenian democratic segment had with the Young Turk.

Leaders of the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) directed the genocide. Talat Pasha (1874-1921), born in what is modern day Bulgaria from lower civil service origins, became head postal clerk of Thessaloniki after 10 years. Starting his political career he became deputy from Edirne in 1909; he became minister of interior affairs (1913-17), secretary general of the CUP and Grand Vizier (1917-18). Along with physicians Behaeddin Shakir (1874-1922), head of the Special Organization, the genocidal arm of the CUP and Nazim Bey (1870-1926), also working with the Special Organization, were leading figures responsible for the genocide. In a speech to the CUP Dr. Nazim said: If we remain satisfied with the sort of local massacres which took place in Adana and elsewhere in 1909...if this purge is not general and final, it will inevitably lead to problems. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary to eliminate the Armenian people in its entirety, so there is no further Armenian on this earth and the very concept of Armenia is extinguished.

”

And continued by saying, "the procedure this time will be one of total annihilation-it is necessary that not even one single Armenian survive this annihilation".

General Enver Pasha, Minister of War, was the key proponent of cooperation with Germany and thus led the Empire into War against Russia. He was fully implicated in the genocide. He advocated pan-Turkism (an Ideological pipe dream in which all Turkish speaking peoples would unite, much of whom reside in Russia). In the Battle of Sarikamish his life was saved ironically by an Armenian who carried his wounded body back through enemy lines to safety. Later he fought against the Soviets in the Russian Civil war, where he was killed in 1922.

Before long it became apparent to most that the Young Turks began to exercise authoritarian control, not democratic governance. In fact it became evident that the Young Turks biggest fear was the continuing dissection of the Empire and would do what was necessary to maintain the geographic integrity of the Ottoman Empire that was to be made uniformly Turkish. They were in fact Turkish Nationalists, not Democratic Liberals.

Ziya Gokalp (1876-1924) was their luminary. They were in fact a secular nationalist movement, using the propensity of Islam for insistence on ascendancy, and claimed that the progression to ascendancy of the Turkish peoples as rightful and something to be expected in their fancied struggles of peoples. Much akin to the National Socialist idea of the Darwinian struggles of peoples. Gokalp was influenced by the sociologist Durkheim, where the group was superior to the individual: "the individual becomes a genuine personality only as he becomes a genuine representative of his culture". Gokalp hinted that the Turks were the Ubermensch, spoken of by Friedrich Nietzsche, the 19^th Century German Existentialist. A state not based on shared consciousness cannot survive, he said. It was then of prime importance that the Turk should assert themselves within the Empire, violently if need be. Basically, their thought was a toxic concoction, which became deadly to the Armenians.

At the conclusion of the Balkan Wars in 1913 Muslims some hundreds of thousands (413,992 Toynbee’s calculation) were expelled from the Balkans and arrived in Constantinople and Anatolia. This gave pretense for the killings. In 1914 the Ottoman government feared dismemberment of the Empire, especially after the collapse of the Balkans, and thought that Germany could provide protection for them from the Entente and so they ineptly entered the War on Kaiser’s side. There were visions by some Young Turks of a war uniting the Turks across Asia. The Armenians were immediately made suspect of colluding with the Russians. Armenians lived across the border in the Russian Empire as well, and the Armenians in Eastern Anatolia were deemed to have sympathies toward Russia and its Armenia subjects. And some fought for the Russians, as could be expected being subjects of the Russian Czar. However, the Armenians, who yearned for equality in the Empire, were in no position to defend themselves.

There were progressive elements in the Armenian population whose interest was being treated as equals in the Empire. Dissent and perceived disloyalty was treated with naked, brutal and barbaric suppression by the Ottoman Government. In 1895-96 Sultan Abdul Hamid’s widespread massacres killed countless thousands, some estimates as high as 200,000. The Ottoman Empire operated under a governing principle that subject peoples existed at the sufferance of the ruling Ottomans. Any grumbling or discontent by these peoples was given a knee jerk cuff, so to speak. Not finding any positive development in their quest for equality some Armenians began to look European powers for independence.

The Young Turks came to a conclusion that the Armenian Peoples had to be attended to for the preservation of the Empire. The Empire was pressured time and time again by the European Powers and saw in the loss of the Balkans in 1913 that Anatolia itself was about to be dismembered or at the least provide a protectorate for the Armenians in eastern Anatolia. Note at the conclusion of the Balkan Wars in 1913 Muslims some hundreds of thousands (413,992 Toynbee’s calculation) were expelled from the Balkans and arrived in Anatolia.

Best solution, dare I say Final solution, in the mind of the Young Turks was destruction of the Armenians, co-habitants of the Anatolian peninsula for nearly a millennium, residents of the Middle East for millennia. Then the Powers would lose the object of their intervention into the Empire, the oppressed subject peoples, largely Christians. The objectives real purpose, as they saw it, was the partition of a collapsing Empire. The real prospect of the annihilation presented itself under the cover of World War I.  

Initially the progressive elements of the Armenian community allied with the seemingly progressive Ittihadist movement, commonly known as the Young Turks, only to be betrayed. The Young Turks’ primary goal was preservation of the Empire. Once they had overthrown the Sultan and setup the semblance of a parliamentary style government, they had no need of their former allies the Armenians who presented a threat to the homogenization of the Empire.

In October 1914 as Ottoman Empire initiated war with Russia, the Armenia male population was inducted into the Turkish Army. After the devastating defeat by the Russians at the Battle of Sarikamish in December 1914 to January 1915 in Eastern Anatolia, where 60-90,000 Turks died, many froze or starved to death. The General in Command, Enver Pasha blamed Armenian disloyalty rather than his own deficiencies in leadership for the defeat. Afterwards the Armenians within the Army were disarmed and placed into unarmed labor battalions and later starved, overworked or bludgeoned to death. In April 1915 the Armenian elite, many would be shocked to find out, were betrayed by the Ittihadists their former allies and seeming friends, were rounded up and arrested then executed.

                                                       
                                              THE “DEPORTATIONS” 1915

Shortly thereafter the “Deportations” would begin in the Eastern Provinces of Turkey, the region of the majority of the Armenian peoples. Deportation was a euphemism for destruction by starvation, overexertion, brutal death by marauding bands of released criminals, kidnapping and rape of young women, some forced to accept Islam and on occasion allowed conversion under threat. The Armenians were not permitted to bring with them anything other than that they could gather and carry in a matter of a few minutes. They were given no provisions on the way and often had to bribe their “caretakers” for essentials to continue to survive. NO provision was made by the Young Turks for care and sustenance of the “deportees”. Groups largely composed of women, children and the aged did nothing to resist. There are instances of hundreds of “deportees” herded by 2-3 gendarmes; 10,000 by a squadron. In addition to the “Deportations” mass drowning of up to 50,000 were reported by the Italian Consul of Trabzon on the Black Sea. Innocents sent on boats and then the boats would be sunk, all to be drowned.

All Armenian property, untold amounts, was confiscated as well. In large part the Christian minorities were the merchant and financial class of the Empire, although in the Eastern Anatolia there were hundreds of thousands of Armenian peasants. Part of the appeal of the widespread confiscation of Armenian property was an attempt by the Young Turks to create a Turkish Middle Class.  “Assistance offered by Germany, America, and international aid organizations was all refused.”* 

Despite the destruction of much of the documentary evidence of the genocide by the government of the Ottoman Empire, there is still much evidence of the crimes. US Ambassador to Ottoman Empire, Henry Morgenthau recounted much of the atrocities that were occurring. The German Protestant missionary, Johannes Lepsius, reported widespread atrocities. The German military, allies to the Turks in WWI , also made note of these barbarities. The Germans worked closely with the Turkish Military High Command, who relied on them ultimately for leadership in their military operations. Trials after the end of WWI compiled documentation, some of which has survived, as well. Significantly, Taner Ackam’s Killing Orders:Talat Pasha’s Telegrams and the Armenian Genocide, confirms Talat Pasha’s genocidal orders to subordinates. No longer can deniers claim that the killings were not coordinated for the center.

 As anyone knows there are but a tiny few Armenians in the Anatolian peninsula today. This is evidence after the fact of the ethnic massacre perpetrated upon them, despite all the denials. 

It must be noted that the killing didn’t stop in 1915. “Deportations” continued into 1916. In March 1918 the Soviet Russians left the War with the Russian State itself in disintegration. The Turks invaded Russian Armenia; several massacres and atrocities took place in which hundreds of thousands of Armenians lost their lives, one of which in Baku in September 15-17 in which 30,000 Armenians died. Under a later repatriation 5-12,000 Armenians were slaughtered in 1920 in Marash in Turkey’s War of Independence.

There are several parallels to the Holocaust of WWII. The Young Turks were largely an imbedded Ideological party behind the Ottoman Empire after 1908 with agents acting throughout the Empire. Instructions by the Young Turk hierarchy were sent to their functionaries to initiate the “deportations”. Jails were emptied to form criminal gangs that preyed on the deportees. Special Organization, the genocidal wing of the Young Turk political organization led the “deportations” which in most cases led to starvation, exhaustion or butchery. It was systematic and punitive consequences of their crime were largely absent. A pitiable few responsible saw retribution. This undoubtedly influenced the NAZIs’ thinking later that they could escape punishment in their horrific destruction of the European Jewish population.  

Nearly as disturbing, a century later Turkey, its government and the population at large, continue to deny there was genocide. One argument runs; yes, hundreds of thousands died but they, being a Fifth Column, really deserved it. Turkey was simply fighting Armenian Fifth column uprisings. There was no general uprising or civil war involving the Armenians. In additional argument Armenia got what it deserved because thousands of Muslims were expelled from the Balkans and so the Armenians were “expelled” and the displaced Muslims took their place. In fact virtually all violence that Armenia committed was in a futile attempt to defend themselves against slaughter. Little blame can be assigned on the instances where Armenian’s allegiance in Eastern Anatolia leaned to the Russians, who didn’t have a recent history of slaughtering them. The vast majority of the Armenians acted peacefully toward the Ottoman Empire.

How many died? Estimates run from 800,000 to 1.5 million with a million being a figure that’s most often employed. Considering just as in Eastern Europe there are frightfully few Jews, where once were millions, one must presume a vast number of people were killed. There was 1.3 to 2.4 million Armenians in Anatolia prior to the Genocide. Currently one will not find Armenians in their former homeland in Eastern Anatolia, or the Region once known as Cilicia. Istanbul is empty of Armenians as well, except for a few thousands. Somehow they all disappeared, I guess.

It must be noted that the Greeks, resided in Anatolia for three millennia, were forcibly expelled from Anatolia as well, after World War I.

I admit I haven’t done justice to the crime. Individual testimony of the barbarity is nearly unspeakable. And simply recounting it seems only to trivialize it. And few have heard of the atrocities against the Armenians. The silenced don't speak. There are those who hope no one speaks for them. 

*Ackam, Taner, A Shameful Act, pg 10.

Reconstruction 1866-1877: An Assessment

The Reconstruction period is comparatively ignored, when judged by how much interest there is in other periods in American History like the Civil War upon which massive amounts of books have been and continue to be written.  The Reconstruction was the struggle of the American Republic to once again re-integrate the South. A vicious war was fought in which hundreds of thousands were killed in battle and many more wounded as well. The North was vindictive and wanted to punish the South for the rebellion. The South wanted to return to the pre-war economic and political system. They agreed to relieve the Black man from involuntary servitude. They concurred with President Johnson (1865-1868) that reunion should be simple. The Southerner should once again proclaim allegiance to the Constitution and concede the destruction of institution of slavery. And all would be good. The economic system would remain same as it was just without involuntary servitude and the Southerner would begin to govern as he saw fit. The states largely sovereign and retaining a measure of autonomy, leaving the Federal government the powers delimited in the Constitution.

Thus soon after the surrender in the Spring of 1865, the Southerner setup governments, proclaimed allegiance to the Federal government and legislated laws designed to consign the black to the plantation system: the plantation system that was the back bone of the economy. These laws were called the Black Codes. The Southerner was content that the Freedman had been granted right to own property, inherit, sit on a jury. The idea that the Freedman was a social equal was abhorrent to him, something unthinkable. The idea that you would invite the Freedman into your house to have social intercourse or worse yet the Freedman could consort with his daughter, would put the Southerner into apoplexy. Northern attitudes were not all that more different, it must be noted.

The Black codes, instituted just after the Civil War, included vagrancy laws for blacks who couldn’t demonstrate they were employed, whereby they would be consigned to convict leasing then they might find themselves back on the plantation. These laws required that Blacks sign Annual labor contracts and present them to authorities, at the risk of vagrancy. A special tax was levied on Blacks, left unpaid it placed the black in a legal state of vagrancy. Incidentally, Mississippi, Kentucky and Delaware first rejected the 13^th Amendment prohibiting slavery. In Mississippi blacks were restricted to being only able to rent land within the city. The significance of these laws was to consign the Freedman back to a state of involuntary servitude.

Once the North was apprised of the Southern disposition towards the Freedman, it immediately saw these actions as a betrayal of a bloody, terrible Civil War, where hundreds of thousands died.  The Southerner continued a pre-War understanding, claiming sovereignty of the states; meaning the Federal government should have little purview over the political compact of any particular state. In response the North enacted the 14^th Amendment guaranteeing Civil Rights to the citizens of each state, the 15^th Amendment granting voting rights to Blacks without regard to race, color or previous condition of servitude. The Freedman’s Bureau, hated by the White Southerner, was extended in 1866, as well. This provided protection, aid and education among other things to the Freedman. The White Southerner argued it fostered idleness and shiftlessness and fomented an overly aggressive Negro.

The Southerner saw the largely illiterate Freedman as in no condition to exercise the suffrage nor to lead politically. They were largely correct, but the backward state of the Freedman was due to the Southerner keeping them in a state of ignorance, poverty and servitude that was slavery. It could be surmised that a cultured black slave was not the most advantageous thing to be in Ante-Bellum South.

The Republican governments were universally corrupt. Practicing jobbery, selling off favors, funding large bond issues to benefit political allies, meant to be paid off by the White disenfranchised taxpayer. Taxes largely assessed on land rose dramatically in multiples. Large debt and deficits were run up by these states. In the Ante-Bellum political system the Planters kept taxation on land minimal. Funding Public schools was deemed an expensive burden. Once the Republicans began to govern Public Schools were established, although Whites refused to be educated with the Black, deemed their brutish, social inferiors. The White Southerner was soured with Republican rule for a century; even the Pro-Union Whigs went over to the Conservative/Democrats. The White Southerner was convinced that the Radical reform of suffrage to Blacks was a contrivance to insure Republican rule over the nation. 

The White Southern Confederate sympathizer was disenfranchised, under the Iron Clad oath. The Iron Clad Oath insisted the voter had never given help or granted assistance to the Rebellion, the Confederacy, which would encompass virtually all White males in the South. This was far harsher standard than the 14^th Amendment which excluded the political and military leadership of the Confederacy.

The Federal military, at one point in time after the Civil War composed of enlisted Black regiments, gave a measure of protection to the Freedman, from the unremitting hostility of the White. The militarized White supporter of the Confederacy had faced death and injury in the Civil War, then came home to live in a country in which the Black could lord over them. There were some 100,000 Black soldiers in the South shortly after the war. In South Carolina these Black regiments demonstrated their predominance on occasion, marching down Main Street driving the White citizens off the side walk. These would infuriate the White Southerner, the White Southerner fully militarized that had fought the North in an exhausting war for four years until conquered in a campaign of total war. Hostility was such these Black regiments were disbanded eventually. 

The pace and depth of the attempt at Reconstruction varied for each state. However it all finished the same with Blacks disenfranchised. The White southerner struck back violently at first after the Civil War, then more sophisticated political methods were employed not to encounter the wrath of the North. The Ku Klux Klan and the Knights of the White Camelia wrecked terror on the Black population for a brief period in the late 1860s. The Black population no longer created havoc.  Later in South Carolina in 1870’s and elsewhere the Southerner organized himself in armed political groups wearing Red Shirts. They would show up at Republican rallies, largely Black and insist equal time. Later in the Century rabid racism was used in a strange concoction to rally an all-White Populism in the late Nineteenth Century. The Black soil conservatives (Democrats), heir of Plantation political sensibilities, used Black votes either paid for or fraudulently obtained to secure political hegemony. In response by excluding Blacks a block of White votes was formed that allowed the Progressives to gain power at the turn of the next century. See the Strange Case of Jim Crow by C. Vann Woodward for the interesting story how the South became segregated.  Woodrow Wilson, sympathetic to Southern Progressives, a friend of Thomas Dixon who inspired Birth of a Nation, waged a campaign of segregation in the Federal government once he became President. Wilson went to John Hopkins University with his friend, Thomas Dixon, author of  Clansman: A Historical Romance of the Klu Klux Klan. It’s odd how academics rate his Presidency so high.

Of all the tragedies of the Southern race relations was the obliviousness of the fact in a significant way the American Black is a cousin to the White Southerner. Your cousin has 25% of the genes you do.  Geneticists estimate the Afro-American is something like 30% Caucasian. Blacks today when they take the now popular DNA tests discover much to their shock they might be 50% or more European. In Ante-Bellum South there really had been a large of measure racial admixture, subsequently deemed so abhorrent to the White. The Supreme Court in 1967 finally struck down the anti-miscegenation laws of State of Virginia. This of course was an ironic joke based on the ample mixing of races in the Ante-Bellum South.  The Southern Overseer callously used his position of authority to extract sexual favors. In other cases female chattel might became a recipient of the Plantation owner’s attentions, frustrated with the mother of his children who refused to once again risk the perils of child birth. The Southerner should have known the closeness of relation to his Black servant, but treated the Black as nearly a sub-species. The new Freedman, who was left ignorant and infantile, was hardly in position to run a state; but that was due to the condition in which they were subjected in Ante-Bellum South for generations; left in a condition of ignorance and poverty.

The depth of the notions of racial superiority can be weighed by the following quote: 

The Delaware legislature resolved in 1866, “The immutable laws of God have affixed upon the brow of the white races the ineffaceable stamp of superiority, and that all attempts to elevate the negro to a social or political equality of the white man is futile and subversive of the ends and aims of the which the American Government was established.”

I suspect the newly disseminated ideas of Darwin (Origin of the Species, 1859) had a significant impact on this type of thinking, as well. The same kind of thinking that could lead an entire German political party several decades later to surmise an Eastern European Slav was racially inferior; someone, whose physical characteristics appeared virtually identical to the German individual across the Polish border.

Southerners complaints of the Freedman were plentiful. There was enough report by the White Southerner of mis-behavior of the Freedman to grant credence to it being widespread. The Freedman left the Plantation for a life of freedom and largely undisciplined. The Freedman was not the submissive Step-n-fetch-it portrayed in early 20^th Century cinema; he was loath to take instruction. But previously on the Ante-Bellum plantation the Black slave was brutalized into submission and the fruits of his labor stolen from him and was excluded from any profitable independent opportunities. If you wanted to dis-incentivize someone against industry and entrepreneurial activities, this is the system.  Release from that system tended toward idleness, lawlessness, criminality and mischief. Thievery from such things as vegetable gardens and livestock were common.  There were mysterious fires as well that burned down house and barn.

One attempt to recover order was the establishment of the Klu Klux Klan that did so much to terrorize the Freedman. The economy was in ruin from war and the loss of the free labor of millions of Blacks. The White Southern, impoverished and disenfranchised saw their all too violent activities as justifiable attempt to restore order and suppress the power of the Freedmen and their Freedman Bureau and Union and Loyal Leagues. The terror restored order but also enlisted a response from the North in the enactment of the Enforcement acts 1870 to 1871. The Enforcement acts authorized the use of the Army to combat these para-legal groups. Military Districts were set up in authority above the state governments.  The KKK was suppressed, as a result.

The racial violence in the post-Civil War is shocking. The KKK is well known but actually operated only for a short while; it was never centralized and quickly became infested with criminal elements detached from the original intentions at least as described by the good Southerner. Overt expressions of it were suppressed by the Federal military in the early 1870’s. The KKK aside, there were out breaks of violence and additional violent political movements in the Reconstruction period.

The riots in Memphis in May, 1866 and New Orleans in July saw dozens of Freedmen killed and driven away. In Louisiana some 1,081, virtually all, Blacks were killed between April and November 1868 in Louisiana in political violence. Later in the 1875-1876 Red Shirts acted as a paramilitary arm of the Democratic Party in Mississippi and South Carolina. They broke up Republican meetings, disrupted their organizing, and intimidated black voters at the polls. 

During Reconstruction 1867-1877 there were several Radical administrations of course, that had a large number of Black representatives in the Legislatures, supported by the Federal Military districts that might incorporate disenfranchisement of White Southerner under the Iron Clad oaths. Plus there was a great deal of attempts at black voter suppression that required Federal intervention to counter act them. National politics ultimately intervened to take the focus off the plight of the Black. The sabotage of the Supreme Court insured that Blacks in America would remain a race apart and denied opportunity. 

Republicans were insistent on the suffrage for Blacks. Ultimately the Republicans didn’t deliver on a significant improvement in the economic situation of the Freedman. The idea of 40 acres and a mule was still born, despite Pennsylvania Senator Thaddeus Stevens’s support. Even the suffrage was taken away eventually. 

An astonishingly huge 200,000,000 acres were given to the rail roads. 1862 Homestead Act eventually gave away some 270,000,000 acres. 70,000 Plantation owners were said to have owned over 300,000,000 acres in the South. Yet, nothing was granted to the Freedman, left destitute and dependent on the Plantation for work. Nonetheless, the idea that land could be simply confiscated was a violation of property rights guaranteed by the Constitution. In contrast Radical Senator Thaddeus Stevens deemed the South a conquered province, not rebellious States that had NO right to succeed. Confiscation of the Planters, initiators of the Rebellion, was right and proper. Yet if a State couldn’t succeed then how could it lose its status as one, others retorted. Land grants to Blacks were left a fantasy.

Great blame must be laid on the Supreme Court, much revered in today’s society as a champion of social progress, for the crippling of the Civil Rights Legislation passed in the Reconstruction period. In 1876 Supreme Court pontificated in U.S vs. Cruishank that the Federal Enforcement Acts met to protect the Freedman were void.  This was in response to the Easter Sunday April 13, 1873 Colfax, Louisiana massacre, where over a hundred Blacks were murdered as they convened in the Colfax Court house. Arrests of the perpetrators were made under these same Enforcement Acts. The convictions were annulled under this ruling.

Later in 1883 the provisions of the 1875 Civil Rights legislation, banning discrimination in public venues like hotels and restaurants, were deemed Unconstitutional. The Supreme Court ruled from its Olympian wisdom that The 14^th Amendment pertained only to the actions of the States NOT to individuals within the States, thus opening the way to legalized segregation.

A democratic system in which in most cases Whites were in the majority didn’t induce a situation in which great social renovations could be allowed that would advantage the minority Black. Neither would a government of limits and laws allow for social revolution. Sadly, today we have a system that places the inner city Black in a state of dependency; schools failing and families in disarray and drugs and crime rampant. I can only wonder if a Radical plan of land distribution had been attempted and absent the Supreme Courts gutting of the 14^th Amendment and the Reconstruction Civil Rights Laws, the racial divisions and social division could have been avoided. But it likely would have taken a military regime decades to accomplish it against virulent opposition of the Southern White.

Eisenhower Presidency: An Assessment

Eisenhower (1953-1961) should be listed as one of the great Presidents. For their own reasons academics prefer Truman and Kennedy whose administrations pale in comparison. Just in the popularity with the American People they are sharply in contrast. President Eisenhower’s approval rating was close to 70%. Truman’s approval rating dipped into the 20’s% at the end of this administration. Obama’s averaged less than 50%. Kennedy’s approval in his short tenure was quite high at around 70%. There were no wars during his administration. The Federal Budgets were generally balanced, something that doesn’t currently appear to be realizable.  The economy grew 37% during his administration. Inflation was low as well. The country was tranquil at home and abroad.

Largely, upon veiled threat of use of tactical nuclear weapons he was able to end the Korean War. The threat was communicated to India who passed it along to the Communist Chinese. The Communist Chinese came to a negotiated agreement that split Korea at the 38^th parallel. The agreement was against the wishes of the South Korean leader Rhee who wanted to continue the propagation of the war but was informed if he wanted to continue the war, it would be alone.

Eisenhower insisted on balanced budgets. He fought the conservative wing of the Republican Party against tax cuts that might imbalance the budget. He fought back against increases in the defense budget, as well. In fact he sharply lowered the President Truman’s defense budget by several billion against the opposition of the chiefs of the three branches of the military. He saw military expenditure as coming out the hard earned labor of the common people.

While war was threated several times, only ONE soldier died in combat under his eight year administration. He refused to become involved in South East Asia as the French wished he would. . Kennedy would make the mistake of becoming more involved in South East Asia by inserting American troops into Vietnam that eventually led to catastrophic failure.  Truman initially drew down the military too much and failed to include Korean as within the American sphere of influence. This led to the aggression of North Korea in 1950. Of course with adept foreign policy he concluded the Korean War in 1953. He offered protocols to reduce the threat of nuclear war to the Soviets. Kennedy despite keeping a cool head brought USA to the brink of all-out nuclear war with the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Khrushchev’s secret speech in 1956 and propaganda from Radio Free Europe led the Hungarians into thinking assistance in the event of an uprising was forthcoming by the West in 1956. But Eisenhower stood pat as the Soviets sent in tanks to crush the revolution in Hungary in 1956. This was a tacit confirmation of the Yalta pact in 1945 that divided Europe into spheres of influence. It would have taken another world war to revise it and this it would be nuclear. Eisenhower sagaciously eschewed conflict. Four decades later the empire fell on its own incompetence and inefficiency.  Eisenhower was busy at the time in 1956 with the Suez Crisis in which France, the UK and Israel conspired to grab back the recently nationalized Suez Canal and secure the State of Israel. Eisenhower insisted they give up colonial aspirations. Nasir of Egypt was allowed to nationalize the canal and Britain and France stood down. 

Kiang Kai Shek, leader of the Nationalist Chinese on Taiwan, tried to force a war over two tiny islands, Quemoy and Matsu, within firing distance of Communist China. China threatened to use military force to occupy it. Kiang Kai-Shek hoped to re-ignite the civil war again mainland China with America’s assistance. Eisenhower would have none of it.

Monetary inflation was kept to a moderate level. In contrast during Truman administration inflation ran up to 9% in 1951. Inflation is a product of too much money chasing too few goods. Federal Reserve’s generation of money supply is determinate as to levels of inflation. Any price increase on a particular product like the shortage of oil will not in itself cause general monetary inflation, since an increase in price in one product will likely cause a decrease in other prices. It takes something like the Central bank to effect monetary inflation. Eisenhower’s bank exercised prudence.

Eisenhower won’t get credit for this but large urban areas were quiet and free of upheavals seen in the Sixties. Even crime was historically low. Eisenhower won’t get credit for that either. However, the prescription of Civil Rights legislation of the 1960’s, no matter how much it was justified, didn’t become the magic fix it was meant to be, as it appears from fifty years hindsight

Civil Rights legislation of the 1960’s raised expectations and resulted in race riots in many Cities, alienating Whites, who fled the cities and abandoned the African-Americans in segregated Ghettos. Today these inner cities remain pockets of poverty and crime. In Michigan where I live Detroit and Flint are prime examples. Both were huge centers for auto production and now are essentially devoid of any. Dozens of auto plants have been built in America in the last four decades, most by foreign manufacturers. None in the inner cities. Political solutions to racial issues are limited in their efficacy, when social elements play a large part of the problem. 

1957 the Soviets launched Sputnik to the shock of America. The tiny satellite broadcast a radio signal that could be picked up around the world. Due to budgetary constraints launching satellites were not high on priority, the Atlas missile was designed for delivering nuclear warheads intercontinentally. After being shown up by the Soviets, the space program began in earnest. Kennedy would spend billions on a trip to the moon. Something Eisenhower found largely quixotic, wanting to emphasize the military, scientific and technical aspects.

In 1959 two weeks before a Paris summit to discuss restraints on nuclear weapon, the Soviets shot down a U-2 spy plane. The Eisenhower administration not aware of the details assumed that both the pilot and planet had crashed and were destroyed. When the Soviets first reported the incident, the Eisenhower administration lied, saying it was weather plane that strayed off course due to a malfunction. A U-2 plane was hastily repainted with NASA colors and sent out to the media. The Soviets latter revealed that not only had the plane been retrieved, the pilot was alive as well. Eisenhower was caught in a lie and the peace conference was cancelled. Relations with the Soviets worsened.

U-2 spy flights did establish the state of the Soviets nuclear weapon competence. They lacked the Air Force and submarine capabilities that USA had, which was well know and had only a few ICBM’s. The USA had some 650 B-52’s, some 300 Polaris missiles deliverable by nuclear submarine plus many more ICBM’s than the Soviets.

Kenney was informed, once nominated for the Democrat Presidency, in 1960 that United States had a massive advantage in ICBM, plane and submarine nuclear capability over Soviet Union. Kennedy continued to lie about the putative missile gap in his campaign to gain voters.

Eisenhower is criticized for not addressing the civil rights issues. Yet, the first civil rights laws in some 80 years were passed in 1957. These were largely gutted by Senate Democrats specifically Lyndon B. Johnson, so they didn’t have the impact of latter Civil Rights legislation. The Dixiecrats held a strangle hold on the advancement of Civil Rights legislation since the Reconstruction ended in the 1870’s. So, Black voter suppression and Jim Crow segregation laws went unchallenged in the South. Something I experienced, as a child in the 1950’s in Missouri when I saw a White’s only drinking fountain and didn’t realize it referred to race.

Eisenhower in addition sent in Federal Troops to enforce school integration in Little Rock, AR in 1957, segregation ordered by the Supreme Court. Admittedly, Eisenhower had little sensitivity to Civil Rights; however his Attorney General Herbert Brownell had much input into these issues and including the nature of judicial picks. Neither Truman nor Kennedy worked actively for Civil Rights in terms of legislation. In fact Kennedy voted against Eisenhower’s Civil Rights act of 1957.  No Civil Rights legislation was passed under their administrations. Driven by events Kennedy became more sympathetic to Civil Rights issues later in his short tenure.

Eisenhower’s Supreme Court picks of Warren and Brennan were the forefront of judicial activism. The first ruling of the Warren Court was Brown vs. School Board of 1954 that struck down separate but equal school systems. The Warren Court went on to remove school prayer, insist on the recitation of Miranda Rights to the arrested and representation being appointed, when none was available, for the accused and the Court increased the standard for search and seizure among other things. Eisenhower seems to get no credit for his revolution in the Court.

Eisenhower has been criticized for secret machinations by the Dulles’ CIA in Iraq, Guatemala, and elsewhere but these underhanded measures where in lieu of a more upfront aggression that could have led to war. Fear of Soviet takeover played a part in both those coup d’états.

As for Truman, highly regarded by academics, he left the country with high inflation and what appeared to be a war without exit and an approval rating in the 20s percentile, lowest approval rating for Presidents since WWII. Truman also had to be forced to accept legislation that engineered labor peace: the Taft Hartley act, passed over his veto. Prior to this labor unrest was allowed to wreak havoc on the economy. 

In balance Truman’s Marshall Plan the provided aid to war torn Western Europe was historic and did much to restore Western Europe to peace and prosperity. A combined military command was created under his administration, NATO; Eisenhower was appointed to lead NATO at this time incidentally in 1951-1952. Truman got much criticism for the failure to support Chaing Kai-Shek Nationalists that led to the rise of Communist China and Mao Tse Tung: a symptom of America’s historic idealistic foreign policy, revisited several times with much failure. Examples being  Wilson’s Fourteen Points at the conclusion of WWI, Iran 1979 and Iraq in 2003, foreign policy that failed to face historical realities and the complexities of culture, religion and politics, only wanting to create a world made safe for Democracy.

Controversially Truman authorized the use of the atomic bomb (something Eisenhower opposed but arguably was NOT in the decision loop) against civilian populations in Hiroshima and Nagasaki: an act of war that continues to be controversial in its horrific barbarity.    

Tragic Fall of the Russian Monarchy, February 1917

Before the Bolsheviks attained power in October 1917, there was a prior popular revolution in which the Russian Romanov Monarchy fell in February 1917. It was replaced by the Provisional Government composed of democratic elements. This fall of the Russian Monarchy was a catastrophe in the making.

At the time Russia was in a terrible war. Some 1.7 million soldiers would be killed and many more wounded and captured by the enemy. Russia had experienced massive defeats, losing Poland and Western Ukraine. Russia was straining to maintain the massive cost of this war.

There are three basic ways to finance a war. Tax the country. Finance the war through war bonds or loans. Or print money. Governments chose the last option, since it requires only starting up the printing presses. Russia used that option. At first economic activity was booming as is the case when governments fool people with cheapened money, then it becomes known that the prices are rising all around and so people try to beat the rise by raising prices in anticipation. Prices rose by 4 times from 1914. Wages earners are hurt the worst since they can’t set their own prices and will begin to fall behind the inflation spiral. This was the case in Petrograd, where most of the war munitions were produced.

What precipitated the revolution was the food shortage. Fundamentally the Russian Government could not afford to feed both the soldier and the city resident. The peasant sold grain through middlemen and didn’t receive the requisite increase in price for their grain they required; inflation was raising prices of everything that the peasant bought. So the peasant had little incentive to sell grain; they reverted to subsistence farming and hoarded their grain. As an indication the economic system was collapsing, the Russian government had begun to requisition gain. This was no real solution and the cities continued to be short of food. Nonetheless, the Russian government had to feed the army as well. In addition the transportation rail system was strained as well. Transportation of goods had to be rationed between the war at the front and the populace further contributing to food shortages.

There was much political and labor unrest after the initial euphoria of the first year of war. In fact October 1916 was the heighth of political demonstrations by far with 177 strikes involving 175,000 strikers. In the last 18 months of war labor strikes were common ranging from 13 to 48 strikes a month involving 6,000 to 53,000 workers.

Already, experiencing regular shortages of food, on February 23, 1917 International Women’s Day triggers a strike of the women textile workers that spreads to the metal workers and then to demonstrations on the streets.

The Okhrana, the oppressive and omnipresent secret police, that had infiltrated virtually a aspects of society, warned of the danger of a social explosion. They gave word to the authorities the situation in the working class districts was a tinder box. Living with constant unrest had left the authorities deaf to the real peril that was forth-coming.

The only response by the authorities was crackdowns. Striking workers were being drafted and sent to the front. Labor leaders were arrested and imprisoned or sent into exile. It was at this time that the Bolshevik party was decimated, since all radical groups were infiltrated by Okhrana.

The Russian Empire was suspicious of civil society. So even, labor mutual aid groups were suppressed deemed to be vehicles of political activity and hives for radicals. Despite the authorities opposition Liberal charitable organizations like All-Russian Union of Zemstvos (Local Councils) organized for the sick and the wounded and the All-Russian Union of Towns for municipal self-governments became deeply involved in food supply.

Critically, the Cossacks, a southern Russian nomadic peoples frequently used as the regime’s enforcers, acted with indifference, when asked to suppress the strikes of February 23. Strikes mushroom across all districts of Petrograd on the next day. Cossacks are once again no use to the regime and even chased away the police.

On the third day of strikes, February 25 there is a general strike and the city of Petrograd is paralyzed. Police under provocation fire on demonstrations and 9 are killed. Some soldiers called to quell the rioting defect. Police chiefs, Shalfeev and Krylov are killed by the rioters. General Khabalov, head of the Petrograd military district, got a telegram from Czar Nicholas to quell the demonstrations by any means necessary. Police arrested 100 leaders of the demonstrations.

On the 26^th what were presumed to be loyal Troops began firing on demonstrators. There were some 300,000 troops stationed in Petrograd. Czar Nicholas was confident that they could restore order. Chairman of the State Duma (assembly) Rodzianko contacted the Czar to let him know “the situation is serious. The capital is in a state of anarchy” and to beg him to recognize a consultative body, a cabinet, in efforts to calm the populace. This of course was the weakest step towards reform regarding the upheaval of the populace. This tentative step of a consultative cabinet wouldn’t be close enough to quench popular unrest. Nicholas’ comment was, “Again this fat Rodzianko has written me all sorts of nonsense, to which I will not even reply.” Nicholas, forever the autocrat, refused this conciliation and called for the elected Duma to be prorogued or closed instead. Doing away with the Duma at this point was an ineffectual, belated move and the misguided thing to do anyway. Unbeknownst to him Nicholas would cease to be Czar in four days.

The next day the soldier’s insurrection began in earnest in Petrograd and the military began to disintegrate. Arms are seized, so insurrecting soldiers couldn’t be restrained by their officers. Officers were killed or forced to flee by their subordinates most importantly the NCO’s.  Discipline in the Czarist Army was very harsh, the officer core being alienated from their soldiers. The common soldier demanded to select his own officers. Additionally, prisons are forced open, releasing prisoners.

On February 28 all military units in Petrograd have joined the insurrection. The military leader of the Petrograd district, Khabalov, is arrested and the hated leader of the all too power Ministry of Interior, Protopopov, surrenders to the insurrectionists. The military high command decides to strike back and Nicholas feels compelled leave the war command center at Mogilev near the front to join his wife in the Tsarskoe Selo palace near Petrograd. He would begin a train journey that would end with his abdication.

Nicholas II was hidebound; he wouldn’t budge from the principle of ruling Russia as an autocrat. The Autocrat was designated by God, a divinely appointed regent, with freedom to rule with little or no constraint. He said he promised his father upon his death to maintain this autocracy. In the upheaval of 1905 a Duma, an assembly was granted but Nicholas always insisted it was at his pleasure. He refused to recognize a monarchy constrained by a constitution or allow any designated advisory body or council or any representative cabinet. Liberals urged this upon him throughout the war as a means to reduce the social tensions that were building up. Russia’s only reaction under Nicholas was to use surveillance and crackdown on unrest as a response to social unrest.  Ironically, Russia got her autocrat a decade later with Stalin as General Secretary of the Communist party. He would send millions to their deaths.

Czar Nicholas would spend part of two days attempting to reach Tsarskoe Selo, first heading directly to Petrograd but then shunted east to reach a village, Bologoe, southeast of the capital the next day only to be told the route to Petrograd was blocked as well. He traveled west to Pskov, arriving 8 pm on March 1.

During his meanderings the situation in Petrograd had completely fallen apart, a fragile Provisional government had been coalesced under the idea the Czar Nicholas had to go. This is the only thing that could conceivably quell the populace. With control of the railroad transport there was manipulation of the routing of the Czar’s train schedule to delay his arrival to the capital. They had been in communication with the military and convinced them that an attack on Petrograd would cause Civil War. Russia was in the middle of a war already with Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey. To preserve Russia they needed to jettison the monarchy.

Czar Nicholas II was convinced in Pskov that his abdication would bring the social unrest to an end. At first it would be his hemophiliac son who would be the next Czar but Nicholas decided his son would abdicate too and the crown would fall to his Uncle Michael Alexandrovich. Unfortunately, he acquiesced to the Provisional government, saying he would wait on them to determine the upcoming form of government. The Romanov Russian monarchy was over. They had written their own death sentences. Czar Nicholas and his whole family were butchered by the Bolsheviks in July 1918.

The fall of the monarchy precipitated a chain of events that led to the rise of the Bolsheviks, Lenin and Stalin and a mass of atrocities. This is the greatest tragedy of the twentieth century.

Much of the blame for the fall of the monarchy I am afraid to say can be placed on Czar Nicholas II himself. He insisted on rejecting any accommodation with reform, a reform that was desperately called for. It must be remembered that the society was tragically divided, which included a revolutionary element, the left Social Revolutionaries who engaged in assassinations of Russian governmental officials, as a matter of policy, which included the assassination of two ministers of interior and the Czars’ uncle Sergei. Nicholas’s grandfather, Alexander II, who freed the serfs and who had a benign policy towards Finland, was assassinated in 1881. Nonetheless, a constituent assembly, much like Germany’s Bundestag with a responsible cabinet would have given the Russian monarchy firmer footing. Czar Nicholas rejected it all and chose to rule with the secret police, Okhrana and oppression. I suspect Nicholas relied on his belief that the vast peasantry supported the monarchy, but they turned out to be simply spectators in the social upheaval. (Richard Pipes [See below.] provides a far more sophisticated analysis of Russia and its collapse, some of which highlights Russia’s unpreparedness for a deliberative parliament with which the Monarchy could work. For example nearly all elements of the political spectrum were quite sympathetic to Social Revolutionaries reign of terror on the Czarist regime administration. Thousands were said to have been assassinated before the War. The peasants on the other hand, which owned 90% of the land, were organized under thousands of communes, led under a patriarchal setup, that was devoid of patriotic allegiance to the monarchy.)

Nicholas in 1915 after devastating loses of Poland and western Ukraine decided to propagate the war at the front, dismissing his cousin Nikolay Nikolayovich. It was a mistake to remove himself from the capital and isolate himself at the front. And leave himself open to the vagaries of the military events. 

The entrance itself into World War I was nothing less than idiocy. Russia had no vital interests in the Balkans other than prestige, acting on the violation of the integrity of Serbia that ignited the conflict. It wasn’t ready for the war and shortly proved it really couldn’t afford a modern war, which caused the death and disability of millions and bankrupted the country. These were colossal blunders that destroyed Russia and brought down the monarchy.  Nicholas made that final decision to declare war, against not a few who cautioned restraint.   

I point you to the brilliant works of Richard Pipes, the Russian Revolution and Russia under the Bolshevik Regime. These offer far more nuance, insight and analysis than this humble monograph presumes to offer.