After Russia had signed the Brest-Litovsk treaty which took them out of World War I, the country first went into a decline, and then later, an uprising of the economy. In December 1918, after World War I has ended, Russia was having many internal problems. One problem was since the Bolshevik revolution took place, Allied troops including Untied States of America, France, Britain, Japan, and some liberated Czech prisoners held land in and around Russia, partially blockading the country. This was to keep the fighting Russians inside their own country, and to prevent another world war from happening. The internal problems Russia was having at this time however were conflicts between political parties. The Bolsheviks, who were the communists, held most of central Russia, but surrounding provinces rose up against them. These revolutionaries did not like the way the Bolsheviks were running the country since it was on a decline, and many did not want communism. Anti-revolutionary troops that were led by former tsarist officers were supported by the Allies and obtained weapons and supplies from them. Years these sides fought, and they burned crops, and ruined the economy and caused a famine on the large country. The famine killed more than three million people, which were more losses than World War I. Bolsheviks eventually triumphed over the never united Anti-Bolsheviks and this was due to the discipline of the Red Army. Leon Trotsky led the Red Army which then conquered some territory which was previously under tsar control. Vladimir Lenin, after he realized his country was in a depression, and the economy was one sixth of its pre-war level, announced the New Economic Policy (N.E.P.). This allowed peasants to own land and sell their own crops, private merchants to trade, and private workshops to produce goods and sell them themselves. Only the biggest businesses remained under government control. This reduction of control by the government showed promise, and went into effect right away.

Everyone saw change immediately in that production began to climb, food and other good became scarcer as well. Though in cities, farmers were feeding their livestock the food they grew instead of selling it, which slowed the Policy a little bit. The communists who now controlled Russia were seeking to create a modern industrial economy without ownership and guidance of businesses. This meant that the economy was now centered on heavy industry and electrification and the movement of farmers to the cities to work in factories and industrial sites. This led to the providing of food for the urban workers without spending scarce resources to purchase it from the peasants. This resulted in peasants, the largest majority of people in Russia, hate the communists because they had to pay for the industrialization of Russia. When Lenin died in January of 1924, Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin were looking to fill his place. Trotsky was the leader of the Red Army and had the support of many of the “Old Bolsheviks” who joined the party before the revolution. He wanted to start a world revolution of the working class, which did not work. Stalin was the leading Communist and the only one who had never lived abroad. He insisted that socialism could survive “in one country.” Stalin took office later and then expelled and soon sent Trotsky out of the country. Stalin then wanted the industrialize Russia at breakneck speed. Hence, the Russian Civil War was terrible for the country because it put the country in a deep depression killing three million as a result of the famine. It was good that the communists won though since Lenin brought the country out of the depression and famine with the New Economic Policy and later started industrializing Russia. This was then completed by Joseph Stalin who took power.