What were the main problems facing Lenin after his successful October revolution?

Answer 1

Lenin and the Bolsheviks were experienced revolutionaries, but had no experience in running the government of a huge nation. Some of the main problems were:

1. How to organize Russia's industries. This meant that the problem of combining machinery, men, and raw materials needed to be figured out if the revolution was to succeed;

2. What these industries should focus on. Problems such as consumer good manufacturing versus heavy industrial activity;

3. Distribution methods to feed and cloth the population was a problem;

4. Were labor unions necessary, or should they be abolished was a extremely serious problem to be solved;

5. How to control the millions upon millions of peasants, and how to transport their crops to the cities; and

6. How should the former revolutionary Bolshevik Party now be organized. The Bolsheviks had been organized to create a revolution, not to operate a vast nation.

There were other problems as well, and the "other problem" was that Marxism did not have the answers to these specific Russian problems. This would have been averted in a highly developed industrial nation led by workers. The leaders were however, not workers but rather they were Marxist revolutionaries with a bloody background.

Additionally there soon would be the problem of the civil war in Russia.