Our situation has never been so dangerous as it is now.

The imperialists were busy among themselves, but now one of the groups has been wiped out

by the group of the English, the French, and the Americans.

They consider their main task to be to smother world Bolshevism, to smother its main center,

the Russian Soviet Republic. Vladimir Lenin, speaking to the 6th All-Russian Congress of Soviets,

November 1918. Welcome to the history of the 20th century.

The 20th century. Episode 183,

1919, Russia, Part 1.

This is the eighth episode in our 1919 World Tour, and it brings us back to Russia, a nation and a topic we've been away from for too long.

We talked about Russia most recently in episode 163, when I told you the story of the

Czechoslovak Legion and the beginning of armed resistance to Bolshevik rule. That took us up to

about summer of 1918. Then in episode 166, I told you about political developments in Russia

and the landings of Allied troops in the far north and in Vladivostok.

But we're not yet fully in sync with our 1919 world tour. There's more to say about Russia in 1918.

For example, the other side, the armed anti-Bolshevik resistance in Russia that's just getting

organized as the white movement. I left that story hanging in the middle of 1918. So before we

push on into 1919, the decisive year of the Russian Civil War, we'll first need to circle back

to summer of 1918 and trace

the development of the white movement into a force that by the end of the year was ready to

challenge Bolshevik rule.

In episode 156, I told you about the early development of armed resistance to the Bolsheviks, which began

almost at once after the October Revolution. It began in the Cossack heartland, organized and led

...