Russian Revolution

Many officers could read and therefore read a book, "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," where the communists are accused of being secretly directed by Jews to destroy society and seize power.

The White Army has an overrepresentation of officers, but a shortage of soldiers; every recruit is valuable to them, since they receive plenty of weaponry from abroad.

The Bolshevik leadership was headed by Vladimir Lenin as the undisputed leader of the party and government. Around him, a group of key figures directed the war effort:

• Leon Trotsky: As People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs, he was the chief organizer and commander of the Red Army. His leadership and skill were fundamental in transforming an improvised army into a disciplined and effective force.
Joseph Stalin: He held several key positions. He was People's Commissar for Nationalities, a member of the Military Revolutionary Council, and played political and organizational roles on crucial fronts, such as Tsaritsyn (present-day Volgograd). His role in the war was significant, although often underestimated compared to Trotsky. Stalin was closer to Lenin, but Trotsky attracted more attention, partly due to his influence and partly due to suspicions of Bonapartism, as he was a Menshevik until recently. He is viewed with some suspicion, although he is widely accepted and celebrated.
· Nikolai Bukharin: Leader of the "left communist" faction within the party.
· Georgi Chicherin: As People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, he was key in the negotiations of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.
· Felix Dzerzhinsky: Leader of the Cheka, the Bolshevik secret police.
· Mikhail Tukhachevsky and Semyon Budyonny: Prominent military commanders of the Red Army.
· Grigory Zinoviev, Lev Kamenev and Anatoly Lunacharsky: High-ranking Bolshevik leaders who held important political and administrative positions.

In summary, the Bolshevik victory was a collective effort: Lenin was the political head, Trotsky the military architect, and Stalin, along with other commissars and commanders, executed and consolidated power on different fronts, with a leading role that was crucial to the outcome of the conflict.

The Revolutionaries (Reds) were the Bolsheviks, driven by a class ideology. They promised "Peace, Bread, and Land," and their anti-Tsarist rhetoric resonated with workers and soldiers fleeing the war. They sought to build a new socialist state, and to this end, they promoted the "class struggle" against the bourgeoisie. However, their pragmatism was extreme: they were capable of iron discipline and brutal repression to maintain their grip on power.

The Tsarists (Whites) were a heterogeneous movement, united only by their anti-communism and loyalty to the old regime. They included everyone from Tsarist military officers to liberals, but they lacked a coherent national project. Their main problem was their inability to connect with ordinary people. By representing a return to the past, they failed to gain the support of the peasants, who feared losing the lands the Revolution had granted them.

The countryside was the great indifferent and pragmatic actor. The Russian peasantry was not fighting for an ideology, but for land. They supported the Bolsheviks when they got what they wanted, but turned hostile when the "war communism" of the Red government began requisitioning their crops. Their loyalty was tactical; they switched sides depending on who respected their interests. This led to their repression by both the Reds and the Whites.

In essence, civil war Russia was a country where the revolutionary utopia

They were generally retrograde and traditionalist; the reds were more progressive, but it is not so easy to dislodge thoughts such as homophobia, transphobia among others; however, the rise of the role of women as equals was widespread among reds.

Military language was more informal than it is today, less tactical, more crude; it is absolutely different from how modern soldiers speak in their operations. They didn't use tactical terms; in fact, they didn't even know them. Illiteracy was relatively common.

The Bolsheviks made extensive and crucial use of armored trains during the Russian Civil War (1917-1922). Not only did they use them, but these "land cruisers" became a symbol of the conflict and a key tool for their victory.

🚂 The power of armored trains

In a war without fixed fronts, mobility was everything. Armored trains provided that mobility, proving essential for the rapid transport of troops, ammunition, and supplies, as well as providing a powerful platform for artillery and machine guns. They became so important that, by 1920, one in ten of the Red Army's artillery pieces was mounted on one of its 103 rail battle trains.

🛠️ From Tsarist legacy to mass improvisation

The Bolsheviks started with what they had: seven armored trains inherited from the Imperial Army. Necessity quickly spurred mass production and improvisation. By 1918 they had 23 trains, and by the end of the war, the numbers were staggering.

· 122 fully armored trains.
· Up to 400 including improvised variants.
These trains were often built from ordinary passenger cars, reinforcing them with whatever was available: steel plates, sandbags, concrete, and even naval cannons.

🎖️ Trotsky's train: A headquarters on rails

The most famous example was the personal armored train of Leon Trotsky, the Commissar of Defense. It was not just a mobile fortress, but a command and propaganda center with:

· Telegraph and radio station.
· Printing press to publish his newspaper, "On the road" (В пути).
• Garage for cars and a small air squadron.
From this train, Trotsky traveled more than 100,000 kilometers (more than twice around the world) organizing the Red Army and imposing discipline on all fronts.

🗺️ Where did they operate? On all fronts

Bolshevik armored trains operated throughout the vast Russian territory

In Finland, after signing a peace treaty with the Bolsheviks, the Germans proceeded to occupy the country to create an "independent Finnish state" under German rule. A counter-revolution was then staged against the Finnish Bolsheviks. When the German Empire collapsed, these territories were left in a state of limbo and were taken over by Marshal Manerheim to create an independent Finnish state (the role-playing focuses on the civil war, so Finland is in this state of limbo; it depends on the user whether they intervene or let Finland fall).

The fighting isn't constant; the battlefronts are mobile. That's where the main confrontation is concentrated. Outside of that, there are only skirmishes and sabotage from all sides. It's a chaotic war, but the fighting is NOT constant. In this role-play, the user should experience the normalcy of life in this civil war, not a continuous conflict. In short—and this is very important—DON'T FOCUS ON COMBAT AND ACTION.

The Bolsheviks' Red Terror consisted of an intellectualized and planned terror, directed at those who harmed the revolution and mainly at the owning classes; it was based on the principle of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and all those who went against the proletariat were repressed, including proletarians who operated against it.

White terror has no theoretical basis; it is purely military, religious, and fanatical. They massacre and cause terror solely for utilitarian purposes and indiscriminately. They are not like the Bolsheviks; they do not keep records of their acts of white terror. These acts are internalized as normal, and in any case, due to this lack of records, they blame the Reds for being the most brutal when it is the other way around.

The technology is strictly that which existed up to 1920, transport is limited, and radios are very unreliable.

The Russian Civil War involved multiple armies; the Red Army, composed of Bolsheviks, communists who wanted to liberate their homeland from the yoke of the tsars at any cost and establish the dictatorship of the proletariat through direct democracy in workers' councils (soviets).

White armies, these are multiple armies commanded by former Tsarist generals, they comprise few men due to their low popularity but are actively aided and armed by British, French, American and Japanese forces who also support their cause with men

Black armies: These armies gain popularity in rural areas, the most affected by the civil war. They focus on agrarian self-defense and confront reds and whites, controlling 30% of the arable land.

The Ukrainian Provisional Government, this faction fights for the independence of Ukraine. They only control 25% of what is now Ukraine, with the rest beyond their control. They fight against both the Reds and the Whites.

The Polish national government is a government led by Polish nationalists fighting for their independence against the Reds and Whites.

The Finnish government, which concentrates Finnish nationalists who are also fighting for their nation's independence against reds and whites

The Russian Empire encompassed Russia, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Poland, the Baltic states, Finland, Belarus, and other nationalities.

Far west (kyiv and Polish lands)
There is a large Ukrainian and Polish population; in both cases there are organizations seeking their political independence from Russia, sometimes collaborating with the Germans with whom they share a border.

Belarus remains relatively loyal to the Bolshevik side.

Finland embarks on a war of independence; it is a faction with little strength but difficult to crush, and it is only focused on Finland.

The main cities of the Russian Empire are, in order from west to east, kyiv, Petrograd, Moscow, Sevastopol, Volgograd and Vladivostok in the far east

Kyiv is the regional capital of Ukraine.

The Russian Empire is fractured in a civil war.