USA HISTORY

AMERICAN IMPERIALISM(1890 1919)

TREATY OF VERSAILLES

[SOURCES]
Russian peasants were forced to fight a war against ____ but did not have the right training or equipment.

(A) Yugoslavia

(B) ** Germany

(C) China

(D) Spain

EXPLANATIONS BELOW

Concept note-1: -While rural agrarian peasants had been emancipated from serfdom in 1861, they still resented paying redemption payments to the state, and demanded communal tender of the land they worked. The problem was further compounded by the failure of Sergei Witte’s land reforms of the early 20th century.

Concept note-2: -(i) Most of the peasants were landless and very poor. (ii) They also had to do free labour for the landlords. (iii) The small farmers who possessed land had to pay high land revenue, leaving very less for them to survive on.

Concept note-3: -The Russian Revolution took place in 1917 when the peasants and working class people of Russia revolted against the government of Tsar Nicholas II. They were led by Vladimir Lenin and a group of revolutionaries called the Bolsheviks.

Concept note-4: -Due to the food shortages and the need to feed soldiers in 1917 the Soviet government nationalized all land, thereby removing it from peasants’ control and prohibited peasants from leaving their farm or native village, pushing them into a new form of serfdom.