The Bolshevik Party, led by Vladimir Lenin, took power in November 1917 by means of an armed seizure of power in a well-executed coup d'état.
The existing government, a provisional government that had taken over after the collapse of the Tsarist regime in March of the same year, was seriously undermined by the pressures of the First World War. Seizing power had been relatively easy for the Bolsheviks; holding on to it was to prove much more difficult.
By 1918 the Bolsheviks faced a civil war against a mixed association of groups known as the Whites.
Lenin and the Bolshevik Party were forced to extend the areas of the economy they directed in order to supply the newly formed Red Army with the resources to win the civil war.
This was achieved by 1921, but in the process the Bolsheviks alienated many of their own supporters.
This situation presented the Bolshevik Party with a dilemma that remained an issue for the Soviet Union throughout its history: that of a Party which declared itself as representing the interests 'of the people' but which, in reality, had limited popular support. Force was used to gain and sustain its control over the country.

Introduction