The truth: Under "socialism", those people were mostly killed. Their deaths made participation in the national economy and eventual "assimilation" impossible. Don't you agree that the dead have a tough time participating?
This claim disregards the fact that restrictions on the resettled kulaks were gradually lifted and that the kulaks were drawn into the national economy and assimilated into Russian society.
The truth: The Tambov Uprising happened during the Civil War. Deaths were approximately 250,000 people, mostly women, children, and the elderly. I don't know anyone who could possibly call this "insignificant casualties". It was also a brutal suppression of the peasantry outside Moscow (you know, those "working people" that "socialism" was supposed to help?) and yet another demonstration of Soviet willingness to use violence and terror against her own people.
Casualties during the Antonovshchina in the Tambov area amounted to about 5000 dead bandits and likely an equal number of Red Army troops. There was nothing peaceful about the methods of the bandits. Some 3000 workers and soviet functionaries were murdered and there was extensive material damage in the area. The bandits made use of the tactics and methods of partisan warfare, resorting to ambushes and surprise attacks. Against this violent war of aggression declared by the kulaks against established soviet authority, the working people through the Red Army had no choice but to defend themselves.
With the implementation of the New Economic Policy, the revolt lost any basis for its continuation. When Tukhachevsky, Uborevich, and others were sent to combat the bandits in May 1921, they had orders to finish off the bandits within a month. By July, the size of Antonov’s forces diminished by some 40,000 men, down from a peak of 50,000. By August 1921 the revolt was completely suppressed.
There was not anything extraordinary about a peasant revolt in Russia, for there were thousands of peasant disturbances in 1917 when the land held by the nobility were seized. When measured with the partisan activity against the White Guard and the interventionists, the Tambov revolt seems insignificant. In December 1919, more than 50,000 partisans operated in the rear of Denikin’s troops in Ukraine. Many cities were liberated, including Poltava, Kaztin, and Kremenchug. Around Novorissisk and Tuapse, some 15,000 red and green partisans fought successful battles against the White Guard and disrupted transportation on the Maikop-Tuapse line. The partisan movement in the northern Caucasus diverted a considerable portion of Denikin’s forces and helped Soviet troops the foil the enemy offensive in Astrakhan. The partisan movement attained an even broader scope in Siberia. In the summer of 1919, the partisans in Altai province numbered 25,000. About 100,000 partisans in Siberia liberated vast regions even before the approach of the Red Army. In February 1920, some 20,000 partisans liberated the Amur region.
The targets included Left SRs who originally supported the October Revolution and the Menshiviks, who were true Socialists
Remember that it were the right-wing SRs and Mensheviks, who were in the minority, that walked out of the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets in the fall of 1917. A broad socialist coalition government thus became impossible due to the reactionary attitude of these groups. The Left SRs voted in favor of transferring power to the Soviets and were represented in the new government. They clinged onto social chauvinist positions and then decided to defect after February 1918 when they refused to adapt to the realities of the international situation, insisting on the continuation of the disastrous war with Germany. The Left SRs later that summer then tried to renew a war with Germany by assassinating their ambassador and then proceeded to try and seize power in Moscow, which ended in failure. The Bolsheviks cannot be blamed for the refusal of SRs and the Mensheviks to reconcile themselves to soviet power, which had become the supreme authority in Russia.
