852 The year when the timeline of the Primary Chronicle starts

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  Duma ignored his order and decreed the establishment of a Provisional Government with Georgy L'vov as Prime Minister.
  
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  12th March /27th Feb Troops mutinies refuse to fire on demonstrators, deserters. Prisons, courts, and police attacked and looted by crowds.
  
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  Okhrana buildings set on fire. Garrison joins revolutionaries.
  
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  Menshevik leaders were freed from Peter and Paul Fortress and founded Petrograd Soviet.
  
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  Formation of Provisional Committee of the Duma by liberals from Constitutional Democratic Party (Kadets).
  
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  14th March/ 1st March Order No.1 of the Petrograd Soviet.
  
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  15th March/ 2nd March Nicholas II abdicates. Provisional Government formed under Prime Minister Prince Lvov.
  
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  Mar 17, Czar Michael abdicated after one day in favor of a provisional government under Prince Lvov
  
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  March 17 A legislative council, the Tsentralna Rada, was founded in Ukraine.
  
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  21st/8th March Nicholas put under arrest.
  
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  Mar 22, The U.S. became the first to recognize the Kerensky Government in Russia.
  
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  March 30 Provisional Government established autonomous province of Estonia and scheduled elections to Estonian legislative body, Maapäev.
  
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  Mar, Revolutionary soldiers dug up Rasputin’s grave and soaked his body in gasoline and set it ablaze.
  

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  16th April/ 3rd April Return of Lenin to Russia. He publishes his April Theses.
  
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  Apr 20, In the Pravda newspaper Lenin named Russia "Free land of world."
  

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  18th May/ 5th May First Coalition Government forms when socialists, representatives of the Soviet leadership, agree to enter the cabinet of the Provisional Government. Kerensky, the only socialist already in the government, made minister of war and navy.
  
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  May 10 The Rumcherod, the Soviet government of southwestern Ukraine and Bessarabia, was established.
  

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  Jun 17, Duma met in secret session in Petrograd and voted for an immediate Russian offensive.
  
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  23rd June /10th June Planned Bolshevik demonstration in Petrograd banned by the Soviet.
  
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  Jun 24, Russian Black Sea fleet mutinied at Sebastopol.
  
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  29th June/ 16th June Kerensky orders offensive against Austro-Hungarian forces. Initial success only.
  
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  Jun 29, The Ukraine proclaimed independence from Russia.
  

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  15th July/ 2nd July Russian offensive ends. Trotsky joins Bolsheviks.
  
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  16th July–17th/ 3rd July–4th "July Days"; demonstrations in Petrograd, encouraged by Bolsheviks, demanding "All Power to the Soviets"
  
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  19th July/ 6th July German and Austro-Hungarian counter-attack.
  
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  Arrest of Bolshevik leaders ordered.
  
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  20th July /7th July Alexander Kerensky became the premier of Russia.
  
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  July 14 The Maapäev took office.
  
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  July 21 Alexander Kerensky succeeded L'vov as Prime Minister.
  

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  4th Aug/ 22nd July Trotsky and Lunacharskii arrested.
  

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  8th Sep–12th /26th Aug–30th "Kornilov mutiny". Begins when the commander-in-chief of Russian army, General Lavr Kornilov, demands (or is believed by Kerensky to demand) that government give him all civil and military authority and moves troops against Petrograd.
  
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  /Aug 27 Kornilov Affair: General Lavr Kornilov ordered an army corps to Petrograd to destroy the soviets.
  
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  /Aug 29 Kornilov Affair: The Provisional Government armed tens of thousands of Red Guards to defend Petrograd.
  
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  13th Sep/ 31st Aug Majority of deputies of Petrograd Soviet approve resolution for an all-socialist government excluding the bourgeoisie.
  
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  /Aug 31 Kornilov Affair: Kornilov was arrested.
  
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  14th Sep/ 1st Sep Russia declared a republic.
  
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  17th Sep/ 4th Sep Trotsky and others freed.
  
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  Sep 17, The German Army recaptured the Russian [Latvian] Port of Riga from Russian forces.
  
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  18th Sep/ 5th Sep Bolshevik resolution on the government wins majority vote in Moscow Soviet.
  

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  8th Oct/ 25th Sep Third coalition govt formed. Petrograd Soviet elects Bolshevik Presidium and Trotsky chairman.
  
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  Oct 21, Petrograd's garrison accepted a Revolutionary Military Committee.
  
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  Oct 23, Lenin spoke against Kamenev, Kollontai, Stalin and Trotsky.
  
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  23rd Oct/ 10th Oct Bolshevik Central Committee meeting approves armed uprising.
  
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  24th Oct/ 11th Oct Congress of Soviets of the Northern Region, until 13 Oct.
  

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  7th November/ 25th Oct; Oct Revolution: Soldiers captured the Winter Palace,
  
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  Second Congress of Soviets convened. Menshevik and moderate SR reps walked out to protest Oct Revolution.
  

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  Congress established and elected Sovnarkom, and Lenin its first chairman.
  
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  Proclamation of Soviet Russia (unofficial name). 7 Nov 1917 - legal foundation of modern Russian Federation.
  
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  8th Nov/ 26th Oct Second Congress of Soviets issued Decree on Peace, promising an end to Russian participation in World War I, and the Decree on Land, approving the expropriation of land from the nobility.
  
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  Nov 8, The People's Commissars "gave" authority to Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin.
  
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  Nov 10, New Soviet government suspended freedom of the press.
  
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  Nov 15, Kerensky fled and the Bolsheviks took command in Moscow.
  
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  Nov 17, Lenin defended the "temporary" removal of freedom of the press.
  
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  Nov 21, Maxim Gorki called Lenin a blind fanatic and unthinking adventurer.
  
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  Nov 26, Bolsheviks offered armistice between Russian and the Central Powers.
  

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  December 6 The Finnish parliament issued a declaration of independence.
  
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  Dec 6, Former Czar Nicholas II and family were made prisoners by the Bolsheviks in Tobolsk.
  
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  Dec 7 The Cheka was established.
  
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  Dec 9, New Finnish Republic demanded the withdrawal of Russian troops.
  
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  Dec 12 A Muslim republic, the Idel-Ural State, was established in central Russia.
  
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  Dec 18, The Soviet regiment under Stalin and Lenin declared Finland Independent.
  
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  Dec 24, The Kaiser warned Russia that he would use "iron fist" and "shining sword" if peace was spurned.
  
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  Dec 25 Ukrainian Bolsheviks established the Soviet Ukrainian Republic in Kharkiv.
  
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  Dec 27 Russian Civil War: The counterrevolutionary Volunteer Army was established.
  
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  Bolsheviks tried banning money in favor of barter after the revolution, but chaos resulted.
  
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  After the Bolshevik revolution Lenin named Stalin commissar of nationalities.
  
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  Feliks Dzherzhinsky established the Cheka. It was transformed to the KGB in 1954.
  
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  Chechens formed their 1st independent state, the Confederation of North Caucasian Peoples.
  
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  Don Cossacks declared their own independent republic during the unrest that led to the Bolshevik Revolution.
  

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  Jan 12 The Tsentralna Rada declared the independence of the Ukrainian People's Republic.
  
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  Jan 14 The Rumcherod declared itself the supreme power in Bessarabia.
  
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  Jan 15 A decree of the Sovnarkom established the Red Army.
  
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  Jan 16 The Romanian army occupied Kishinev and evicted the Rumcherod.
  
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  Jan 24 The Moldavian Democratic Republic declared its independence from Russia.
  
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  Jan 28 The Transcaucasian parliament held its first meeting.
  
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  Jan 28, Leon Trotsky became leader of the Russian Communists.
  
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  After Jan 31 (O.S.), the Bolsheviks adopted the Gregorian calendar. The next day Feb 14. All dates hereafter are given in the New Style.
  
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  Feb 5, The Soviets proclaimed the separation of church and state.
  
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  Feb 16, The Council of Lithuania declared the independence of the State of Lithuania.
  
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  Feb 18 The Red Army conquered Kiev.
  
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  Feb 22, Germany claimed the Baltic states, Finland and Ukraine from Russia.
  
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  Feb 23 Mass conscription to the Red Army began in Moscow and Petrograd.
  
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  Feb 24, Estonia's Independence Day. Estonia proclaimed independence from Russia.
  
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  Feb 24 The Red Army retreated from Estonia in the face of the German armed forces.
  
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  Transcaucasian parliament announced the independent Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR).
  

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  Mar 5, Soviets moved capital of Russia from Petrograd to Moscow. St. Petersburg shrunk to 35% of its previous size.
  
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  March 6 Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War: Two hundred British marines arrived at Murmansk.
  
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  Mar 9, Russian Bolshevik Party became the Communist Party.
  
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  Mar 14, An all-Russian Congress of Soviets ratified a peace treaty with the Central Powers.
  
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  Mar 20, The Bolsheviks asked for American aid to rebuild their army.
  
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  March 25 The Belarusian National Republic was established by its German occupiers.
  

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  April 30 The Turkestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR) was established on the territory of the defunct Russian Turkestan.
  

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  May 28 Armenia and Azerbaijan declared their mutual independence.
  
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  June 8 Russian Civil War: An anti-Bolshevik government, the Committee of Members of the Constituent Assembly, was established in Samara under the protection of the Czech Legion
  
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  June 28 A decree by the Central Executive Committee made war communism, under which all industry and food distribution was nationalized, the economic policy of the Soviet state.
  
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  June 29 Russian Civil War: The Provisional Government of Autonomous Siberia was established in Vladivostok.
  

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  July 10 The Constitution of the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic (first official name) was adopted by the Fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets. The legislative power was transferred from the Sovnarkom to the Central Executive Committee, which also received the power to pass constitutional amendments.
  
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  July 18 Nicholas II and the rest of the royal family are executed on direct orders from Lenin.
  

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  Aug 15, Russia severed diplomatic ties with US.
  
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  Aug 16, US troops overthrew Archangel (Russia).
  
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  Aug 30, Lenin, the new leader of Soviet Russia, was shot & wounded after a speech.
  
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  Aug, Lenin gave a command to suppress a peasant revolt in Penza.
  

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  Sep 3 Red Terror: Izvestia called on the Russian people to "crush the hydra of counterrevolution with massive terror."
  
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  Sep 11, US troops landed in Russia to fight the Bolsheviks.
  
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  Sep 19, American troops of Expeditionary Force received their baptism of fire near the town of Seltso.
  
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  Sep 23 Russian Civil War: A meeting in Ufa established a unified anti-Bolshevik government, the Ufa Directorate.
  

Nov 11 World War I: An armistice treaty was signed, ending the war.

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  Nov 17 Two Latvian political parties founded a provisional legislature, the Tautas Padome.
  
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  Nov 18 A military coup overthrew the Ufa Directorate and established its war minister, Aleksandr Kolchak, as dictator.
  
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  Nov 19 The Maapäev returned to power in Estonia.
  
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  Nov 22 Estonian War of Independence: The Russian Red Army invaded Estonia.
  
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  Nov 24 Béla Kun, a friend of Lenin, founded the Hungarian Communist Party.
  
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  Nov 29 Estonian War of Independence: The Red Army captured the Estonian town of Narva.
  

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  Dec 8 The Communist Party of Lithuania established a revolutionary government in Vilnius.
  
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  "Special departments," later known as the FSB, were established to spy on the military as the Communist Party absorbed officers who had served under the just-deposed czar.
  
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  South Ossetians made a bid to break away from Georgia and thousands fled in the ensuing violence.
  

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  Jan 3 Latvian War of Independence: The Red Army invaded Latvia.
  
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  Jan 5 The Red Army occupied Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital, in support of the local Communist government.
  
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  The Red Army captured Minsk and pronounced it the capital of the Byelorussian SSR.
  
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  Jan 15, Peasants in Central Russia rose against the Bolsheviks.
  
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  Jan 16 The Orgburo was established to oversee the membership and organization of the Communist Party.
  
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  Feb 8, Lithuanian and German military forces forced the Bolsheviks from Kedainiai.
  
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  Feb 14 Polish-Soviet War: The Polish army attacked Soviet forces occupying the town of Biaroza.
  
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  Feb 27 Lithuania was absorbed into the Lithuanian-Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic.
  
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  Feb, The Polish–Soviet War began and continued to March 1921.
  
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  Mar 2, The 1st congress of Communist Int’l. opened at the Kremlin.
  
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  March 4 The First Congress of the Comintern began in Moscow.
  
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  Mar 19, A typhoid epidemic raged in Petrograd, Russia, killing 200 daily.
  
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  March 21 Hungarian Social Democrats merged with the Communist Party, released Kun from prison and appointed him Commissar for Foreign Affairs. Kun dismissed the president and proclaimed the Hungarian Soviet Republic.
  
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  Mar 23, Moscow's Politburo-Central Committee formed.
  
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  March 25 The Eighth Party Congress reinstituted the Politburo as the central governing body of the Communist Party.
  
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  April 16 The Romanian army invaded Hungary.
  
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  Apr 20, Polish Army captured Vilno (Vilnius), Lithuania from Soviet Army.
  
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  April 21 Polish-Soviet War: The Polish army consolidated its control of Vilnius.
  
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  May 30 An anti-Communist Hungarian government headed by Gyula Károlyi was established in Szeged.
  
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  Jun 6, Finland declared war on Bolsheviks.
  
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  June 16 Hungarian occupiers established the Slovak Soviet Republic.
  
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  July 7 The Czechoslovak army reoccupied its territory and dissolved the Slovak Soviet Republic.
  
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  Aug 1 Threatened by the approach of the Romanian army, Kun fled to Austria.
  
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  Aug 14 The Romanian army left the Hungarian capital, Budapest. Admiral Miklós Horthy stepped into the power vacuum with the army of the Károlyi government.
  
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  Aug 25 Polish-Soviet War: After its total occupation by Polish forces, the Lithuanian-Byelorussian SSR was dissolved.
  
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  Nov 14, Red Army captured Omsk, Siberia.
  
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  Dec 21, Hoover deported anarchist, feminist Emma Goldman to Russia for agitating against forced conscription in US.
  
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  Lenin created the Comintern to supervise the int'l. revolutionary movement.
  
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  Bolsheviks began repressions and millions of Cossacks died.
  

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  Feb 2 Estonian War of Independence: Treaty of Tartu, renouncing all claims on Estonian territory.
  
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  An insurgency in the Khanate of Khiva forced the abdication of the Khan.
  
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  Feb 7 Russian Civil War: Kolchak was executed by a Bolshevik military tribunal.
  
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  Mar 7, The Bolsheviks opened major offensive on the Polish front.
  
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  March 26 Russian Civil War: Volunteer Army evacuated to the Crimea to join the army of Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel.
  
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  Apr 5, Japanese forces landed in Vladivostok.
  
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  April 25 The Russian Eleventh Army invaded the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic.
  
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  April 26 The Khorezm People's Soviet Republic was established on the territory of the defunct Khanate of Khiva.
  
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  Apr 28, Azerbaijan joined the USSR. The Red Army invaded Azerbaijan and turned the country into a Soviet Republic.
  
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  June 12 The Soviet Union recognized Lithuanian independence.
  
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  July 8 Polish-Soviet War: The Galician Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR) was established in Ternopil.
  
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  Aug 11 Latvian War of Independence: Treaty of Riga was signed. Soviet renounced all claims on Latvian territory.
  
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  Aug 13 Battle of Warsaw: The battle began with a Russian attack across the Vistula.
  
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  Aug 26 The Bolsheviks defeated the government of the Alash Orda and established the Kyrgyz ASSR† (1).
  
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  Aug 31 Battle of Warsaw: The total defeat of Russian Fourth, Fifteenth and Sixteenth Armies marked end of the battle.
  
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  Sep 2 The Red Army attacked Bukhara, the capital of the Emirate of Bukhara.
  
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  Sep 21 Polish-Soviet War: The Polish army occupied Galicia and ended the rule of the Galician SSR.
  
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  Oct 8 The Bukharan People's Soviet Republic was established.
  
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  Nov 14 Russian Civil War: Wrangel fled Russia.
  
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  Nov 29 The Eleventh Army entered Armenia.
  
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  Nov, Chechens joined with other Caucasian peoples to form the Republic of the Mountain Peoples.
  
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  Dec 1 The Armenian Prime Minister ceded control of the country to the invading Communists.
  
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  During the Russian Civil War, Mongolia was invaded by a White Russian force of 5,000 men.
  
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  During Polish-Soviet war thousands of captured Red Army men were placed in the camp of Тuchola, Poland.
  
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  New Economic Policy (NEP) of Lenin was elaborated by Nikolai Bukharin.
  

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  Feb 22 Gosplan, the economic planning committee of the Soviet Union, was created by a decree of the Sovnarkom.
  
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  Feb 25 Red Army invasion of Georgia: Eleventh Army captured Tbilisi and announced formation of the Georgian SSR.
  
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  Feb 28 Kronstadt rebellion: Crews of Petropavlovsk and Sevastopol, harbored at Kronstadt, published a list of demands.
  
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  Mar 1, Sailors revolted in Kronstadt, Russia.
  
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  Mar 7, Red Army under Trotsky attacked the sailors of Kronstadt.
  
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  Mar 16, Britain signed a bilateral trade agreement with Russia.
  
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  March 17 Kronstadt rebellion: After over a week of fighting, government troops pacified Kronstadt.
  
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  Mar 21, Lenin’s New Economic Policy (NEP) was promulgated by decree.
  
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  March 18 Polish-Soviet War: Poland and Soviet Russia signed the Peace of Riga, ending the war.
  
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  Apr 9, Russo-Polish conflict ended with the signing of the Riga Treaty.
  
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  Apr 15, Georgi Timofeyevich Beregovoi, USSR cosmonaut (Soyuz 3), was born.
  
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  July The Red Army captured Ulan Bator, the Mongolian capital.
  
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  July 13 Russian famine of 1921: The writer Maxim Gorky brought world attention to the looming famine.
  
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  Sep 21, Pope Benedictus XV donated 1 million lire to feed Russians.
  
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  Oct 4, League of Nations refused to assist starving Russians.
  
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  Oct 18, Russian Soviets granted Crimean independence.
  
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  Aleksandr Rodchenko, artist, created his whimsical "Project for a Perpetual Motion Machine." He also painted his “Triptych” in this year.
  
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  Afghanistan signed a Treaty of Friendship with the Soviet Union.
  
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  Red Army forced the Chechen government into exile and took nominal control. Armed resistance continued.
  
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  In Mongolia Damdiny Sukhbaatar, supported by the Bolshevik administration in Moscow, organized a force that, with the help of Red Army troops, defeated the White Russians and drove off the Chinese.
  
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  A Soviet famine began with a drought that caused massive crop failures, including total crop failure on about 20% of Soviet farmland. a Soviet estimate put the death toll at 5.1 million.
  
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  March 12 The Georgian, Armenian and Azerbaijani SSRs were merged into the Transcaucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (SFSR).
  
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  Apr 3, Stalin was appointed General Secretary of Communist Party.
  
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  Apr 16, A German-Russia treaty was signed in Italy. It recognized the Soviet Union.
  
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  May 26, Lenin suffered a stroke.
  
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  May 16 Tikhon, the Patriarch of Moscow, was put under house arrest.
  
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  Aug 4 Basmachi Revolt: Enver Pasha was killed in Turkestan.
  
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  Oct 25 Vladivostok fell to the Red Army and the Provisional Priamur Government was extinguished
  
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  Nov 27, Allied delegates barred Soviets from Near East peace conference.
  
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  Dec 29 The Treaty on the Creation of the USSR united its signatories, the Russian and Transcaucasian SFSRs and the Byelorussian and Ukrainian SSRs, under the power of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The Declaration and Treaty of Creation of the USSR were adopted (approved) by RSFSR.
  
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  Dec 30 The Declaration and Treaty of Creation of the USSR were ratified (confirmed) and signed by USSR. Loss of independence of Russia.
  
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  Dec 30, Vladimir I. Lenin proclaimed the establishment of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
  
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  Red Oct Heat and Power Plant opened in St. Petersburg, Russia.
  
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  In the Rapallo Treaty Germany recognized Lenin's regime.
  
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  Soviet government divided the North Caucasus along ethnic lines, separating the Chechen Autonomous Oblast from the Republic of the Mountain Peoples and abolishing the republic itself in 1924.
  
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  Lenin deported 70 of the best minds in Russia along with their families. In 2006 Lesley Chamberlain authored “The Philosophy Steamer: Lenin and the Exile of the Intelligentsia.”
  
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  South Ossetia became an autonomous region within the Soviet Republic of Georgia.
  

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  Mar 4, Lenin's last article in Pravda (about Red bureaucracy) was published.
  
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  Mar 15, Lenin was felled by his 3rd stroke.
  
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  May 3 A council of the pro-government Living Church declared Tikhon an apostate and abolished the Patriarchate.
  
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  Oct 15 Declaration of 46 was written. The Declaration echoed earlier concerns expressed by Leon Trotsky, the Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council, that the Communist Party was insufficiently democratic.
  

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  Jan 24, St. Petersburg was renamed Leningrad.
  
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  Jan 27, Lenin's body was laid in a marble tomb on Red Square near the Kremlin.
  
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  Jan 31 The 1924 Soviet Constitution came into effect.
  
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  Feb 1, Soviet Union was formally recognized by Britain.
  
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  Feb 7, Mussolini government exchanged diplomats with USSR.
  
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  Feb 18 The Thirteenth Party Congress, led by Stalin, Comintern chairman Grigory Zinoviev and Politburo chairman Lev Kamenev, denounced Trotsky and his faction, the Left Opposition.
  
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  Nov 25 The Mongolian People's Republic was established.
  
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  Nov 27 The Bukharan People's Soviet Republic was incorporated into the Uzbek SSR.
  
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  Dec 15, Soviets warned the U.S. against repeated entry of ships into the territorial waters of the USSR.
  

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  Jan 16, Leon Trotsky was dismissed as CEO of Russian Revolution Military Council. Stalin took power over Trotsky.
  
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  Feb 19 The lands of the Karakalpaks became the Karakalpak Autonomous Oblast, an oblast of the Kyrgyz ASSR (1).
  
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  Mar 7, The Soviet Red Army occupied Outer Mongolia.
  
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  Mar 30, Stalin supported rights of non-Serbian Yugoslavians.
  
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  April 7 Tikhon died. Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsy became the Patriarchal locum tenens according to his will.
  
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  April 19 The Kyrgyz ASSR (1) was renamed the Kazakh ASSR.
  
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  May 13 The Uzbek SSR joined the Soviet Union.
  
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  Jul 10, The official news agency of the Soviet Union, TASS, was established.
  
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  Dec 10 Peter of Krutitsy was arrested. Sergius of Nizhny Novgorod, took the title of Deputy Patriarchal locum tenens.
  
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  Dec 18, Soviet leaders Lev Kamenev and Grigori Zinoviev broke with Stalin.
  
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  Dec 23 Fourteenth Party Congress endorsed leadership of Stalin and Bukharin, defeating New Opposition faction of Kamenev and Zinoviev.
  
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  Eisenstein made his classic silent film "Potemkin."
  

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  Mar 26, U.S. oil companies bought 190,000 tons of kerosene from Russia for $3.2 million.
  
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  Sep 27, Lithuania and the Soviet Union agreed to a 5-year treaty.
  
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  Oct 19, Russian Politburo threw out Leon Trotsky and his followers.
  
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  Oct 23 Trotsky was expelled from the Politburo.
  
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  Nov 19, Trotsky and Zinoviev were expelled from Politburo in the USSR.
  
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  Dec 5, Sergei Eisenstein's "Battleship Potemkin," debuted.
  

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  July 29 Sergius affirmed the loyalty of the Russian Orthodox Church to the Soviet government.
  
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  Nov 12 Trotsky and Zinoviev were expelled from the Communist Party.
  
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  Dec 2 The Fifteenth Party Congress expelled the remainder of the United Opposition from the Party.
  
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  Dec 14, China and Soviet Union broke relations.
  
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  Dec 27, Stalin's faction won All-Union Congress in USSR. Trotsky was expelled.
  
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  Stalin purged much of the Tatar intelligentsia in the Crimea.
  
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  Sergius, a Greek Orthodox bishop, signed an agreement accepting the Soviet Union as a “civil motherland.”
  
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  The monastery of Saint Serafim Sarofsky in the village of Deveyevo, Russia, was liquidated.
  
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  Prince John Kropotkin, son of Russian Prince Alexei Kropotkin, was beaten to death on a Paris street. Soviet agents were suspected.
  

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  March 7 Shakhty Trial: Police arrested a group of engineers in town of Shakhty and accused them of conspiring to sabotage Soviet economy.
  
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  Mar 22, Peasants in the Soviet Union protested food shortages there.
  
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  Oct 1 First Five Year Plan: Stalin announced the beginning of state industrialisation of the Soviet economy.
  
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  Stalin began his plans for the resettlement of Jews to Birobidzhan, an area of land the size of Belgium on the Russian-Chinese border.
  
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  Stalin reversed his view on rapid industrialization and Bukharin's power diminished.
  
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  In USSR a show trial of the North Caucasus Shakhty engineers paved the way for Stalin’s consolidation of power in 1929.
  
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  Bertram and Ella Goldberg Wolfe, activists in the Comintern, went to Moscow as guests of the Communist Party.
  

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  Jan 31, Leon Trotsky was expelled from Russia to Turkey.
  
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  Sep 21, Fighting between China and the Soviet Union broke out along the Manchurian border.
  
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  Nov 17 Bukharin was expelled from the Politburo.
  
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  Collectivisation in the USSR: A Central Committee resolution began the collectivisation of Soviet agriculture.
  
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  Nov 18, Stalin sent troops to Manchuria.
  
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  Dec 22, Soviet troops left Manchuria after a truce was reached with the Chinese over the Eastern Railway dispute.
  
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  Stalin began the liquidation of the kulaks, i.e. independent farmers.
  
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  1929-1932 For some revisionists Stalin’s brutal 5-year plan had its roots in a worker "cultural revolution" against the NEP.
  
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  1929-1953 Some 18 million people were sent to the Gulag, the vast Soviet prison system that included labor and concentration camps.
  

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  Apr 30, The Soviet Union proposed military alliance with France and Great Britain.
  
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  Soviet Union began deporting land holders, known as kulaks, along with their families as part of the rural collectivization process.
  
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  1930s The labor camp in Norilsk, Siberia, was built. It was later developed as a huge nickel complex.
  

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  Stalin ordered that Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral be blown up. It was rebuilt after the fall of the USSR and dedicated in 2000.
  
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  March 20 The Karakalpak Autonomous Oblast became the Karakalpak ASSR.
  
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  May 2, Walter Duranty of the NY Times won a Pulitzer Prize for his series on the Soviet Union that contained uncritical praise of Joseph Stalin.
  
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  Aug 7 Collectivisation in the USSR: The Central Executive Committee and the Sovnarkom issued the Decree about the Protection of Socialist Property, under which any theft of public property was punishable by death.
  
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  Sep 11 Holodomor: Stalin sent a letter to a Politburo ally, Lazar Kaganovich, demanding subjection of Ukrainian SSR.
  
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  Nov 9, Nadya Aliluieva (30), wife of Joseph Stalin, died.
  
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  Nov 28, France & USSR signed not-attack treaty.
  
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  Dec 27 A decree by Central Executive Committee and Sovnarkom established a passport system in the Soviet Union.
  
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  Dec 31 First Five-Year Plan: It was announced that the plan had been fulfilled.
  

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  Mar 29, The front page of the New York Evening Post said "Famine Grips Russia — Millions Dying."
  
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  Nov 16, US and the Soviet Union established diplomatic relations.
  
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  Nov 17, US recognized USSR and opened trade.
  
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  Dec 27, Josef Stalin called tensions with Japan a grave danger.
  
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  Stalin launched the Moscow Metro. It took 75,000 workers 3 years to complete the first 7-mile line.
  

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  May, Stalin’s regime officially set up the Jewish Autonomous Region of Birobidzhan.
  
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  July 10 The Main Directorate of State Security (GUGB) was established under the NKVD as a successor to the OGPU.
  
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  Sep 18, League of Nations admitted the Soviet Union.
  
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  Dec 1 Kirov was murdered by Leonid Nikolaev, possibly at the behest of Stalin.
  
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  There were 1,966 delegates to the 17th Soviet Party Congress. By the 1999 Congress 1,108 delegates were arrested and many shot as traitors.
  
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  Soviet Union’s secret police organization-the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs-was better known as the NKVD.
  
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  1934-1938 Alexander Troyanovsky served as the first Soviet ambassador to the US.
  

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  Mar 22, Russia sold the Chinese Eastern Railway to Japan.
  
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  Mar 30, Britain and Russia agreed on treaties intended to curb the power of the Reich.
  
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  Apr 28, The Moscow 81-km underground opened.
  
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  Aug 31 Stakhanov reported to have mined over one hundred tons of coal in single shift, sowing seeds of Stakhanovite movement.
  

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  May 2, "Peter and the Wolf," a symphonic tale for children by Sergei Prokofiev, had its world premiere in Moscow.
  
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  Aug 19 Moscow Trials: Trial of the Sixteen, in which Kamenev and Grigory Zinoviev were primary defendants, began.
  
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  Aug 25 Moscow Trials: The defendants in the Trial of the Sixteen were executed.
  
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  Dec 5 The Stalin Constitution came into effect. The Central Executive Committee was renamed the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union.
  
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  USSR began using Vozrozhdeniye Island in the Aral Sea to test deadly germs.
  

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  Jan 21 Renaming of Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic to Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic.
  
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  Jan 23 Moscow Trials: The Second Trial began.
  
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  Jan 30 Moscow Trials: The Second Trial ended. Of seventeen defendants, all but four were sentenced to death.
  
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  Apr 18, Leon Trotsky called for the overthrow of Soviet leader Josef Stalin.
  
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  May 22 Case of Trotskyist Anti-Soviet Military Organization: Mikhail Tukhachevsky, a Marshal was arrested.
  
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  Jun 12, The Soviet Union executed eight army leaders as a purge under Josef Stalin continued.
  
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  Jul 31, The Russian Politburo enabled Operative Order 00447. This led to the execution of some 193,000 people.
  
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  Aug 5, Stalin signed NKVD order no 00447 that mandated all prison camps across the Soviet Union to be emptied.
  
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  Aug 11 Polish operation of NKVD: Chief signed Order № 00485, classifying all potential Polish nationalists as enemies of the state.
  
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  Aug 15 Great Purge: NKVD Order № 00486 made relatives of accused traitors subject to imprisonment in labor camps.
  
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  Oct 10 Peter of Krutitsy was executed in solitary confinement.
  
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  Oct-Nov, A 3-man panel, the "Osobaya Troika," signed death sentences that were sent to thousands of gulags across Russia and led to the massacre of 9,000 victims in the Karelia Forest at Medvezhyegorsk.
  
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  Stalin deported some 180,000 Soviet Koreans from their homes and farms and sent them by cattle car to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.
  
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  USSR census of this year reported a decline in the population to 162 million and Stalin had the officials responsible for the count shot.
  

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  March 2 Trial of the Twenty One: The third Moscow Trial, at which Bukharin was the primary defendant, began.
  
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  March 15 Trial of the Twenty One: The defendants were executed.
  
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  July 29 Battle of Lake Khasan: The armed forces of Japanese Manchukuo attacked the Soviet military at Lake Khasan.
  
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  Aug 31 Battle of Lake Khasan: The battle ended in a Japanese defeat.
  
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  Nov 26, Poland renewed a non-aggression pact with the USSR to protect against a German invasion.
  
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  Dec 8, L.P. Beria followed Nikolai Jezjov as head of Russian secret police.
  

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  Mar 22, Germany marched into Klaipeda (Memel), Lithuania.
  
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  Apr 16, Stalin requested a British, French and Russian anti-Nazi pact.
  
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  May 19, Churchill signed British-Russian anti-Nazi pact.
  
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  Aug 19, Vyacheslav Molotov outlined the Soviet requirements to the German Ambassador, Friedrich von Schulenburg.
  
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  Aug 20, Russian offensive under Gen. Zhukov against Jap invasion in Mongolia.
  
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  Aug 20, Soviet and German trade agreements were signed.
  
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  Aug 23 The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was signed,
  
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  Sep 17 Soviet invasion of Poland (1939): The Red Army invaded Poland.
  
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  Sep 27, Germany occupied Warsaw.
  
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  Sep 29, Germany and the Soviet Union reached an agreement on the division of Poland. [see Sep 28]
  
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  Oct 5, The Soviets signed a mutual defense pact with Latvia that allowed 30,000 troops to be stationed there.
  
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  Oct 5, Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov invited the Finnish Foreign Minister, Elias Erkko, to come to Moscow for political discussions.
  
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  Oct 10, Lithuania signed a treaty that allowed a Soviet garrison of 20,000 troops.
  
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  Oct 12-Nov 8, Finnish special envoy, Juho Paasikivi, began negotiations in Moscow.
  
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  Oct 22 Elections were held to the Supreme Soviets of the Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union.
  
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  Oct 30, USSR and Germany agreed on partitioning Poland. Hitler deported Jews.
  
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  Nov 10-Mar 13,1940, Finland began to wage a defensive war against the Soviet Union for 104 days.
  
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  Nov 26, Soviets charged Finland with an artillery attack on border.
  
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  Nov 28, USSR scraped its non-aggression pact with Finland.
  
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  Nov 29, Soviet planes bombed an airfield at Helsinki, Finland.
  
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  Nov 30 Winter War: The Soviet army attacked Finland.
  
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  Dec 1 Winter War: Soviet Union established the Finnish Democratic Republic in the border town of Terijoki.
  
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  Dec 14, The Soviet Union was dropped from the League of Nations.
  
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  Dec 25, Finnish troops entered Soviet territory.
  

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  Feb 12, The U.S.S.R. signed a trade treaty with Germany to aid against the British blockade.
  
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  Mar 2, Soviet armies conquered Tuppura Island, Finland.
  
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  March 5 Katyn massacre: The Politburo signed an order to execute 27,500 imprisoned Polish nationalists.
  
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  March 12 Winter War: Moscow Peace Treaty signed, ending the war at great cost to Finland and anticipating the evacuation of Finnish Karelia.
  
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  March 31 The Karelian ASSR merged with the Finnish Democratic Republic into the Karelo-Finnish SSR.
  
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  June 15 The Red Army occupied Lithuania.
  
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  June 17 The Red Army occupied Estonia and Latvia.
  
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  June 28 Soviet occupation of Bessarabia: Bessarabia and northern Bukovina were occupied by the Soviet Union.
  
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  July 21 Lithuania became the Lithuanian SSR; Latvia became the Latvian SSR.
  
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  Aug 3 The Lithuanian SSR was accepted into the Soviet Union.
  
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  Aug 5 The Latvian SSR was annexed by the Soviet Union.
  
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  Aug 6 Estonia became the Estonian SSR and was incorporated into the Soviet Union.
  
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  Aug 20, Trotsky stabbed in the back of the head in Mexico City. Trotsky died the next day.
  
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  Aug 25, The ‘parliaments’ of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania declared themselves ‘provisional Supreme Soviets’ and adopted new constitutions.
  
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  Dec 18, Hitler dictated Directive No. 21 to crush Russia in a quick campaign.
  
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  Moscow imposed the Cyrillic alphabet over the Roman alphabet.
  

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  Jan 21, US lifted the ban on arms to the Soviet Union.
  
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  Mar 13, Hitler issued an edict calling for an invasion of the U.S.S.R.
  
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  Apr 3, Churchill warned Stalin of German invasion.
  
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  Apr 13, A Russian-Japan no-attack treaty went into effect.
  
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  April 13 Soviet-Japanese Border Wars: A Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact was signed.
  
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  May 6, Dictator Josef Stalin assumed the Soviet premiership, replacing Vyacheslav M. Molotov.
  
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  Jun 13, Thousands of Jewish community leaders in Bessarabia (Moldova) deported to Siberia as part of general purge.
  
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  Jun 14, Russian secret police gathered up some 40,000 men, women and children and exiled them to Siberia in cattle cars.
  
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  Jun 14, Over 10,000 people (10,861 according to some sources) were deported as whole families from Estonia.
  
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  June 22 Operation Barbarossa: Three million Axis soldiers invaded the Soviet Union.
  
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  Jun 22, Estonians started armed resistance against Soviet occupation.
  
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  Jun 22, Finland invaded Karelia.
  
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  June 24 Lithuanian 1941 independence: The LAF government took power in Lithuania.
  
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  Jun 24, President Franklin Roosevelt pledged all possible support to the Soviet Union.
  
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  Jun 24, Germans advanced into Russia and took Vilnius, Brest-Litovsk and Kaunas.
  
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  June 25 Continuation War: The Soviet Union launched a major air offensive against Finnish targets.
  
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  Jun 25, Finland declared war on the Soviet Union.
  
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  Jun 25-26, Russians counter attacked at Rovno, Poland.
  
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  Jun 26, Finland entered WW II against Russia.
  
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  June 28 Operation Barbarossa: The Germans captured Minsk.
  
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  Jun 29, Nazi divisions in a surprise assault made sweeping advances toward Leningrad, Moscow, and Kiev.
  
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  Jul 5, German troops reached the Dnieper River in the Soviet Union.
  
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  Jul 12, Moscow was bombed by the German Luftwaffe for the first time.
  
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  Jul 13, Britain and the Soviet Union signed a mutual aid pact, providing the means for Britain to send war materiel to the Soviet Union.
  
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  July 27 Operation Barbarossa: The German and Romanian armies entered Kishinev.
  

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  Aug 5, The German army completed taking 410,000 Russian prisoners in Uman and Smolensk pockets in the Soviet Union.
  
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  Aug 10, Great Britain and the Soviet Union promised aid to Turkey if it was attacked by the Axis.
  
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  Aug 11, Soviet bombers raided Berlin but caused little damage.
  
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  Aug 13, Red army evacuated Smolensk.
  
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  Aug 21 Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran: Three Soviet armies invaded Iran from the north.
  
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  Aug 21-Sep 26, The Soviet Union's greatest defeat in WWII occurred during the encirclement of the Ukrainian city of Kiev.
  
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  Aug 22, Nazi troops reached Leningrad.
  
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  Aug 25, British and Soviet forces entered Iran, opening up a route to supply the Soviet Union.
  
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  Aug 25, German troops conquered Novgorod, Leningrad.
  
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  Aug 29, The German Einsatzkommando in Russia killed 1,469 Jewish children.
  

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  Sep 17 Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran: The Soviet and British armed forces met in Tehran.
  
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  Sep 19 Operation Barbarossa: Kiev fell to the Germans.
  
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  Sep 21, The German Army cut off the Crimean Peninsula from the rest of the Soviet Union.
  
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  Sep 23, Germans staged an air raid on the Russian naval base at Kronstadt. The battleship Marat sank.
  
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  Sep, Shostakovich, a local fire warden, composed his Seventh Symphony, the "Leningrad," during the German siege of his native city.
  

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  Oct 6, German troops renewed their offensive against Moscow.
  
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  Oct 10, Soviet troops halted the German advance on Moscow.
  
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  Oct 12, Russian government moved from Moscow to Volga as Nazis closed in on Moscow.
  
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  Oct 15, Odessa, evacuated by Russian troops.
  
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  Oct 16, Germany advanced within 60 miles of Moscow.
  
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  Oct 20, German troops reached the approaches to Moscow.
  
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  Oct 25, German troops captured Kharkov and launched a new drive toward Moscow.
  

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  Nov 6, USA lent Soviet Union $1 million.
  
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  Nov 12, Germany's drive to take Moscow halted.
  
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  Nov 15, The German final attack on Moscow began. They advanced to within 25 miles of the center of Moscow.
  
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  Nov 20 Siege of Leningrad: The first food was carried into Leningrad across the Road of Life on the frozen Lake Ladoga.
  
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  Nov 23, German troops conquered Klin, NW of Moscow.
  
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  Nov 27, USSR began a counter offensive, causing Germans to retreat.
  
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  Nov 28, German troops vacated Rostov.
  

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  Dec 5, Russian offensive in Moscow drove out the Nazi army.
  
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  Dec 8, Russians took Krijukovo back from Germany.
  
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  The amber room in St. Petersburg was dismantled by German officers and shipped to Konigsberg for safekeeping.
  

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  Apr 8, The Soviets opened a rail link to the besieged city of Leningrad.
  
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  Apr 20, The battle for Moscow ended.
  
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  May 12, The Soviet Army launched its first major offensive of the war and took Kharkov in the eastern Ukraine from the German army.
  
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  May 29, German Army completed its encirclement of the Kharkov region of the Soviet Union.
  
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  Jun 1, America began sending Lend-Lease materials to the Soviet Union.
  
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  Jun 11, US and the Soviet Union signed a lend-lease agreement to aid the Soviet war effort in World War II.
  
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  Jun 28, German launched “Operation Blue,” an offensive to seize Soviet oil fields in the Caucasus and the city of Stalingrad.
  
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  Jul 1, German troops captured Sevastopol.
  
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  Jul 24, Rostov was captured by German troops.
  
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  Jul, Hitler made decision to split the armies engaged in the offensive and to occupy Stalingrad.
  

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  Aug 12, British premier Churchill arrived in Moscow to meet Stalin.
  
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  Aug 19, Gen. Paulus ordered the German 6th Army to conquer Stalingrad.
  
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  Aug 21 Battle of Stalingrad: The German Luftwaffe began a bombing raid against Stalingrad.
  
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  Aug 22, Mikhailmichel Fokine (b.1880), Russian ballet dancer, choreographer, died.
  
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  Aug 23, German forces began an assault on the major Soviet industrial city of Stalingrad.
  
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  Aug 26, A Russian counter offensive began in Moscow.
  

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  Sep 4, Soviet planes bombed Budapest in the war's first air raid on the Hungarian capital.
  
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  Sep 7, The Red Army pushed back the German line northwest of Stalingrad.
  
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  Sep 17, Churchill met with Stalin in Moscow as the German Army rammed into Stalingrad.
  
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  Sep 23, The Russian counter offensive at Stalingrad began.
  
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  Sep 27, Heavy German assault in Stalingrad.
  
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  Sep 28, Luftwaffe bombed Stalingrad.
  

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  Oct 5, 5,000 Jews of Dubno, Russia, were massacred.
  
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  Oct 7, A single salvo Katyusha rocket destroyed a Nazi battalion in Stalingrad.
  
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  Nov 19 Operation Uranus: The Soviet army began a pincer movement against the German forces besieging Stalingrad.
  
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  Nov 22 Operation Uranus: The German Sixth Army was surrounded.
  
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  Nov 23, Gen. Von Paulus asked Hitler's permission to surrender at Stalingrad. The German 4th and 6th Army were surrounded at Stalingrad.
  
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  Dec 12, German launched Operation Winter Tempest, the relief of the Sixth Army trapped in Stalingrad.
  
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  Dec 20, Soviet forces halted a German army trying to relieved the besieged city of Stalingrad.
  
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  Dec 22, The Soviets drove German troops back 15 miles at the Don River.
  

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  Jan 11, The Soviet Red Army encircled Stalingrad.
  
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  Jan 12 Operation Spark (1943): The Soviet army launched a military offensive to break the Siege of Leningrad.
  
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  Jan 18 Operation Spark (1943): The meeting of the Leningrad and Volkhov Front units opened a land corridor to Leningrad.
  
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  Jan 24, Hitler ordered Nazi troops at Stalingrad to fight to death.
  
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  Jan 25, The last German airfield in Stalingrad was captured by the Red Army.
  
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  Jan 30, Field marshal Friedrich von Paulus surrendered himself and his staff to Red Army troops in Stalingrad.
  
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  Jan 31, Battle of Stalingrad ended as soldiers of Sixth Army under Gen Friedrich von Paulus surrendered.