What if the Soviet Union Never Formed?

Lenin's arrival to Russia transformed the political history of the nation, and the world at large. But what if he...didn't. Say that train he was on, didn't make it to its destination. Turns out that might change the history of Russia in a far different way.

[angelo]

I’ve watched you since 2015 man, it’s 2024 and I’m still watching you

[EuGeez]

The three musketeers of AH:
What if X nation never formed?
What if X nation never collapsed?
What if X person never existed?

[thomasarnt]

Back in 2017 I got divorced, and in the time following I had problems falling a sleep. Too much noise in my head. So I begun listening to history-youtube-content at bedtime. Just to think at something ells than my own thoughts. I came across your channel, but your videos did not make me fall a sleep faster, but I was entertained ... and I have been here since. Thanks Cody

[TheSupremeTsar]

Great video! However, I have a few counterpoints to this scenario:

First, its unlikely that the Bolsheviks in particular would have come to power instead of some other socialist group in the absence of the October Revolution. The Bolsheviks were always a minority, even within the socialist movement. When elections for the Constituent Assembly were held, the Bolsheviks only won a quarter of the seats. The absence of strong Bolshevik leadership would have likely only empowered other socialist factions like the SRs and Mensheviks.

Second, even if the Bolsheviks had taken power, I doubt Trotsky would have ever become the leader of the provisional government. Most of the Bolshevik leadership deeply distrusted Trotsky. This was mainly because he did not become a Bolshevik until August 1917, while the rest of the leadership had been Bolsheviks for years. Without Lenin, its unlikely Trotsky would have even become a Bolshevik in the first place.

Third, Kerensky is unlikely to have been removed as the head of the provisional government without armed force. After the Kornilov affair, Kerensky essentially made himself dictator of the provisional government. It’s not like he could have just been voted out.

Fourth, I’m not clear on how the Bolsheviks taking control of the provisional government instead of overthrowing it would have made the Reds perform worse in the Civil War. If anything, coming to power through legitimate means instead of an armed coup would have given the Reds more legitimacy in the eyes of the Russian people. This would have given the Reds more support during the civil war from SRs, Mensheviks, and maybe even Kadets. The Whites were deeply unpopular during the civil war, even among critics of the Bolsheviks. Anything that would have given the Bolsheviks more legitimacy would have helped them.

[thFurno]

And worst of all, we’d be robbed of one of the greatest YouTube videos of all time: “Complete History Of The Soviet Union, Arranged To The Melody of Tetris”

[misiekfid]

its horrifying to imagine that, in this timeline, tim curry never escapes to the one place not corrupted by capitalism

[jsnap]

Hands up who wants a "If Japan invaded Australia" Video ✋️

[OptimisticAsparagus]

Lenin: "the ends will justify the means.."

The ends: *shoes made in Vietnam*

[TheSci-fiAnarchist]

What if the real revolutionary change was the friends we made along the way.

[MrInitialMan]

Here's a scenario:

What if Alexander III got his head out of his ass and actually trained Nicholas II to be Tsar? That's something that often gets overlooked. Alexander III hated his son, and never trained Nicholas to rule Russia.

[thelakeman]

I think you've poorly researched Russia's 19th century and early 20th century political and radical terrorists/revolutionary scene. Bolsheviks were largely held together by Lenin without him they'd be a lot less organised or able to co-opt the spontaneous worker-soldier bodies (soviets), if anything other socialist factions like the mensheviks and SRs would be in a far better position, because in our tl it was not that the bolsheviks were the most popular (the SRs were because Russia was an agrarian peasant state and the SRs and their progenitors, the norodniks, spent their entire existence building a socialist base among the peasants) but that they became the most organised and able to adapt quickly to the changed situation, considering a frequent criticism of the bolsheviks by mensheviks was that they were a Lenin cult, without him I don't see that happening. In our tl Lenin did hold elections but then dissolved the constituent assembly in less than a day because the bolsheviks did not get a majority nor were they the largest party. So even if the provisional government collapses in this tl (maybe but I think it's more likely that it'd dissolve itself and hold elections) power would go to the new constituent assembly, sure it wouldn't be stable but I doubt a civil war of the kind we had irl would happen, even the tsar's execution seems unlikely. People tend to forget that a lot of the menshevik and the SR leaders were talented politicians, Martov (a menshevik) even managed to win against Stalin in a revolutionary court case against him started by Stalin (stacked against him) and even humiliated the bolsheviks in the congress of soviets (they controlled) by playing to the gallery. Nations declaring independence would still happen and there might've been fighting to take them back and/or a lot of political back and forth, but in the absence of complete power being wrested by a group like the bolsheviks trying to build a vanguardist state, I doubt the whites would've been able to rise up or do so to a limited degree, considering a lot of their legitimacy and justification otl came from the loose big tent grouping of moderate leftists, liberals, monarchists/reactionaries and ultranationalists anti-semitic organisations working with them to bring the bolsheviks down, plus without measures like war communism peasants are not gonna rise up either (irl "green armies"). Instead of civil war it'd likely be terrorist activities, small scale uprisings and the like trying to destabilise the new state (minus nationalist movements and new states formed which could cause a full scale war after Germans are forced to leave, but if that happens there'd be even less justification for white generals to rise up), now whether this social democratic state would survive the 20s or 30s, I dunno, could very well end up like Weimar Germany.

[LSA]

A timeline so inconceivable it required a second upload!

[mrsammyg]

What if Kazakhstan never left the Soviet Union?

[Tgungen]

I really love how Cody's art really improved over the years, especially the character designs look so good

[DawudSandstorm]

@9:00 Kornilov never launched a coup. It was a miscommunication where one of Kerensky's secretaries deliberately misinterpreted one of Kornilov's communications as an attempt to get rid of him since he was a political rival. Instead of waiting for Kornilov to clarify what he mean, as his entire cabinet except for the deliverer of the letter recommended, Kerensky ordered Kornilov's arrest. Of course no one wanted to arrest Kornilov for a treason he never committed and so Kerensky, instead of backing down, decided to ally with the Soviets to get rid of him. It was not Kerensky choosing a lesser evil, it was him being a stubborn idiot.

[WorldArchivist]

"Lenin didn't take power."

Nicholas II: So I and my family will be spared right?



Nicholas II: We'll be spared, right?

[recognizesealand]

Make a part two please I feel like you only scratched the surface of this alt hist time-line

[PrussiaAustriaConfederal]

Dude I have been wondering about this forever! Amazing video! It’s been years since I started watching and your videos never fail to impress me.

[MG-zxjn]

If the Soviet Union never formed, we wouldn't have the amazing Command & Conquer: Red Alert series, and Cody wouldn't have made his Red Alert video. We would never have Tim Curry in a career defining role.

[thewidow]

Based on my limited knowledge, I believe Kolchak winning the civil war is totally unrealistic. Even if he was militarily succesful, wich was already unlikely, he would have been quickly overthrown anyway, for his political supppot was meagre and his enemies too many. I believe it would have been much more likely that both Kolckak and Trotsky were eventually overthorwn and that Russia ended it's civil war being ruled by the Mensheviks and the moderate socialists with a compromise between the red and the white armies.