Russian Revolution 1917-1927 Historical Inquiry: The Kronstadt Uprising

The Kronstadt Uprising was a 1921 insurrection of Soviet sailors, soldiers and civilians against the Bolshevik government in the Russian port city of Kronstadt.

Works by Alexander Berkman (November 21, 1870–June 28, 1936), a Russian-American anarchist and author.

Rebellions and protests accompanied the totalitarian Soviet rule throughout its history. Some of them, however, were so dangerous for the Kremlin that they had a real chance of ending Communism in Russia.

A century ago, Lenin's communists turned their guns on rebelling sailors once hailed as the "pride and glory" of the Bolshevik Revolution.

Shortly after the Russian Civil War, or as the Bolshevik view would have it, as a final chapter of the Civil War, there occurred an uprising at the Kronstadt Naval Base. The sailors whom Trotsky had dubbed “the pride and glory of the Revolution” rose in revolt against the very state they had helped into power.

The suppression of the Kronstadt rebellion served to illustrate the betrayal of the October Revolution and the degeneration of the Bolsheviks into tyrants.