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War Communism

The aim:
1) Keep red army supplied with food and weapons.
2) Introduce system of communism

The factors:
1) All factories with more than ten workers were nationalised. Vesenkha decided what each factory should produce.
2) All workers under government control. Millitary discipline in factories included death penalty for strikers. The unemployed joined ‘labour armies’ which had jobs such as cutting down trees.
3) Private trading was banned. Peasants gave surplus food to government. No selling for profit.
4) Government allowed money to lose value through inflation. Rents were abolished. Instead of using money peasants were encouraged to barter.
5) In cities food was strictly rationed.

The result:
Successful in 1 aim = kept red army fed and supplied.
Failed in 2nd aim = share Russia’s wealth equally.

Why: Peasants decided there was no point in growing more food than they needed themselves. Therefore in 1919 sowed less grain and bred less animals therefore there was less food in 1920 and in 1921 famine killed 7 million.

Consequence:
Less food
Starvation
Less industrial output.

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