Coups, Revolutions, and Political Struggles in the Light of Comparative Studies (Based on the Analysis of Lenin’s Vision and Modern Conceptualizations)

Abstract

The purpose of the research. The author makes an attempt to draw parallels between the methodological works of V.Lenin and the practice of the Bolsheviks and modern visions of Hybrid Warfare.

The novelty of the study lies in the endeavor to rethink V.Lenin’s intellectual heritage, in particular his views on the revolutionary war, and to determine their impact on the development of modern concepts of hybrid wars.

The research methodology. The following general historical methods have been used: hermeneutic, historical-comparative, and retrospective. Outlining comparative parallels in the works of V.Lenin and modern theorists of Hybrid Warfare (especially Russian) allows us to make assumptions about the existence of a certain tradition in the policy of the neighboring country towards Ukraine.

The issue. This article is an attempt to reevaluate V.Lenin’s personality and look at his contribution to history not so much as a politician who created a new state, but as a methodologist and developer of the strategy of seizure of power, which contained elements of theory refined and transformed by modern experts. now known as the Hybrid War. V.Lenin itself realized that his theory was pointed toward the goal of gaining and holding power, and operated the terms “dialectics”, and “war against capital” in contrast to “traditional war” and made a clear difference between traditional and non-traditional war. He considered that non-traditional war could bloodless, likewise educational, economical, “violent and peaceful, military and economic”. In other words, that type of war we can see currently, though was somehow changed accordingly to the capacities of modern devices and the lifestyles of our contemporaries. V.Lenin points out the constituents of his methodology. These are ideology, organization, propaganda, and agitation. Recent events demonstrate to us that initially Hybrid War is determined to capture the human mind, and reaping the territories and countries come after that. Absolutely definitely we see the exceptional role in V.Lenin’s methodology. That’s why V.Lenin never starts the debates without referring to the ideological questions. Ideology is always the thing from which he starts. But subjugation is not enough for the Bolsheviks, they go far – to persuade their adversaries of the wrongness. Propaganda and agitation helped V.Lenin to disseminate his influence over the population. And a strict, really military discipline in the party, the high level of the professional demands to the members of the Bolshevik organization, and the condition to be the expert in revolution helped to realize the plans.