Answer:
The Bolsheviks were a revolutionary party, committed to the ideas of Karl Marx. They believed that the working classes would, at some point, liberate themselves from the economic and political control of the ruling classes. Once they had achieved this, a genuine socialist society based on equality, could be established.
However, the Bolsheviks differed from the Mensheviks in that they believed that this revolution should move more quickly as the workers were not ready to rule themselves. Hence, the Bolsheviks would form a Dictatorship of the Proletariat to hold power until Russia was modernised. The Poletariat were the original supporters of the Bolsheviks and tended to be industrial workers.
At the time of the February Revolution, which overthrew the Tsar, the Bolsheviks were still relatively weak. Most of their leaders, including Lenin, were in exile in Switzerland. The chances of the Bolsheviks ever attaining power in Russia seemed remote.
But in late 1917, Bolshevik leader Lenin decided that the conditions in Russia were ripe for revolution.
Role of Lenin
