The Incompetence of Leaders Led to the Outbreak of Revolution”
Essay title: The Incompetence of Leaders Led to the Outbreak of Revolution”
The incompetence of leaders is a pre-requisite in the outbreak of revolution. This can be seen clearly in both Russia in October 1917 under the leadership of Alexander Kerenskys Provisional Government and China in 1949 under the leadership of Chaing Kai Sheks Guo Ming Dang. As a result of this incompetence both the countries experienced the outbreak of revolution. Although the incompetence of the leaders leads to the outbreak of revolution it is not the sole issue. The outbreak of revolution in Russia was Lenin and the Bolshevik party seizing power by means of a coup de-tat from the provisional government of Kerensky in October 1917. In China the Chinese Communist Party seized power in their revolution in 1949, after a civil war with the Guo Min Dang under the incompetent rule of Chiang Kai Shek. In both countries the incompetence of the leaders, the Provisional Government and the GMD, both created discontent amongst the masses, failing to fulfil their roles to both the people and the country. The Incompetence of the leaders was vital to the outbreak of revolution however other factors such as wars, both civil and international, and reform escalated the growing discontent amongst the masses and support for Revolutionaries growing.
The incompetence of the governments leadership was a key factor in the outbreak of both revolutions. After the fall of the Tsar, Russia installed a Provisional government, whose only real policy was to maintain status quo until elections could be held. This idea proved inadequate to satisfy the discontents population want for change. The Provisional Government lead by Alexander Kerensky was unable to maintain law and order in Russia due to incompetence of leadership and realization of what the peasants wanted, “Bread, Peace and Land.” His Incompetent decision to continue with the war effort proved a vital factor in increasing discontent for his government and his launching of a new offensive under his name, only worsened the situation. The Keresnky offensive as it was labelled failed miserably, soldiers deserted in droves, returning home on vigilante missions to take land for themselves. Kerensky and the Provisional Government issued warnings and threats but were powerless to stop the peasants in the countryside redistributing land. Perhaps one of the most incompetent decisions Alexander Kerensky made was allowing basic civil liberties such as freedom of the press, the abolition of ethnic, religious discrimination and set free all political prisoners. In allowing this to happen Alexander freed his opposition from his grasp and allowed them to once again begin to spread the work of revolution. This eventually led to Kornilov affair, in which Kerensky was supported by the Bolsheviks then outsmarted by Lenin and the Bolsheviks and ultimately lost power of the government due to the outbreak of revolution. Similarly in China the GMD under the leadership of Chiang Kai Shek were a militaristic government that claimed to act in the national interest. However the true nationalist intentions of the party were often corrupt. The GMD was seen to be a western influenced right wing political party whose intentions for china were to establish a democracy, but in reality they were heavily corrupt, serving the interest of only themselves and the nobility of China. Chiang Kai Shek was a strong leader who used violence and intimidation to scare his people into following him, however the people had lost a lot of respect for his regime. Chiang Kai Shek s failure to suppress the invading Japanese only added to the growing discontent for the leader and allowed the CCP to gain mass support. Chiang also taxed the people heavily and forced the peasants to have very low standards of living, Chiang Kai Shek also drained the lifeblood of his rural country with forced conscription. A good example of Chiang Kai Sheks incompetence was allowing “The Four Families” who were wealthy and influential families related to Chiang, to amass great wealth through government protected monopolies, exploiting the population. All of these incompetent decisions