100 Years of Communism—and 100 Million Dead

The Bolshevik plague that began in Russia was the greatest catastrophe in human history. By David Satter

Bolshevik fighters pose with their guns in Petrograd, October 1917 (AFP/Getty Images)

Armed Bolsheviks seized the Winter Palace in Petrograd—now St. Petersburg—100 years ago this week and arrested ministers of Russia’s provisional government. They set in motion a chain of events that would kill millions and inflict a near-fatal wound on Western civilizat…