What qualities did Lenin have which helped him lead the Bolsheviks to power in Russia in 1917?

Answer 1

And who told you that Ulyanov was a "great leader"? The man could not resist the temptation of adopting a "nom de guère": Lenin, from the river Lena in Siberia, where he spent a few months in exile, before leaving to a life of comfort in the west, until the German military intelligence sent him home to rupture the allied front against Germany. A regular traitor of his country. He was, to be sure, a strong leader. He combined an enormous stubborn willpower, with a strong gift of persuasion and an insatiable hunger for power over people. He was a prejudiced person, what you would call a racist. He did not like... Russians! He preferred Russified Jews (who bent over backwards not to be seen as Jewish and were ashamed of their origin and culture) and also Georgians, Germans, and Latvians- among other non-Russians. When his sorry little regime was really threatened (December 1917), he specifically asked not be defended by a Russian guard, but by the disciplined and tough Latvian Rifles. When his main agent, Lev Trotsky (also a "nom de guère"- of a self-hating Jew) succeeded in ensuring the Bolsheviks power over the land, Lenin and the gang started the "Red Terror" (sic!) and began killing all people of talent and skills. Stalin and his minions continued the work - very successfully. This is why Russia, which before WW1 exported great quantities of wheat, by the time of Brezhnev imported food. It still does - a lot. Ukraine, the bread basket of Europe, became the scene of mass starvation in the early thirties. Lenin's main idea was power. And the second: social engineering - fighting human nature. Both continue til this very day and a likely to be around for a long time. Then Lenin died (January 1924) after a massive stroke. Stalin, who conquered power by conquering the Party apparatus - no party member vote, let alone popular vote, found it a good idea to make Lenin a demi-god. When Khrushchev decided to disavow his former boss Stalin, he needed Lenin's symbolic figure even more. From the demi-god he was under Stalin, Lenin became a real Our Father who art in Heaven. The former Soviet Union is still full of Lenin monuments, and a huge number of streets and metro stations still proudly bear his name. 18 years after the demise of the Soviet Empire, people are still afraid to do away with this monster figure. Imagine a major county in the Rhineland called "Kreis Hitlerburg". Or perhaps one of the Bundesländer called "Hitlerland". And another one in Austria...

Answer 2

He strongly believed in what he was doing; despite all the things that had happened to him he was still motivated. He was also extremely good at speeches, he gripped the audience. He told them what they wanted to hear.