#russian-revolution

#russian-revolution

March 8 itself has been International Women's Day for just over a century, and although there are several versions of "why March 8?" the answers all lead back to early 20th-century socialists and communists. Soviet Russia in particular made a big thing of commemorating March 8 as the beginning of the first of the two revolutions that created their empire.

Soviets originated in the Russian Revolution of 1905 as worker councils, representing worker interests during strikes and advocating for improved conditions and pay.

The Mensheviks preferred a two-stage revolution led first by the bourgeoisie, then the workers, aligning more with Karl Marx's idea of revolution occurring in industrialized states.

When, in a last-ditch effort to save the Provisional Government, two liberal grandees demanded that they be let in, one of the sailors replied, 'We will spank you! And if necessary we will shoot you too. Go home now, and leave us in peace!'

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was a harsh agreement that forced the crumbling Russian Empire to withdraw from WWI, fundamentally changing the political landscape of Eastern Europe.