Revolution and dictatorship: Russia, 1917–1953

Section A Source A (source written for this paper; the author is fictional but typical of the period): from a letter by a Petrograd factory worker to his brother, March 1918. 'They promised us bread, peace and land. We have peace of a kind — the Germans have taken half of Russia for it. The land the peasants took for themselves. Bread there is none. In the factory committee they say we must be patient and trust the Party. I am patient. My children are hungry.' Source B (source written for this paper; the author is fictional but typical of the period): from a Bolshevik pamphlet issued in Moscow, 1919. 'The bourgeoisie and their foreign masters have surrounded the Soviet Republic with fire. Every speculator who hoards grain is a soldier in their army. The Cheka is the sword of the revolution, and it will not hesitate.' Source C (source written for this paper; the author is fictional but typical of the period): from the diary of a former Tsarist officer serving in the Red Army, 1920. 'Trotsky's commissars watch us day and night. My family is held as a guarantee of my loyalty. And yet I must admit the army fights. These men believe they are defending something.' With reference to these sources and your understanding of the historical context, assess the value of these three sources to an historian studying how the Bolsheviks consolidated power in the years 1918 to 1920.

Section B 'Lenin's New Economic Policy was a betrayal of Bolshevik ideals.' Assess the validity of this view.

Section B To what extent was the Great Terror of the 1930s the result of Stalin's personality?