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Journal of Contemporary European Studies

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Red Seas: A Study in Revolutionary Contagion

Theodor Tudoroiu
a a

The University of the West Indies at St. Augustine

To cite this article: Theodor Tudoroiu (2012): Red Seas: A Study in Revolutionary Contagion, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 20:3, 337-357 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14782804.2012.711158

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Journal of Contemporary European Studies Vol. 20, No. 3, 337357, September 2012

Red Seas: A Study in Revolutionary Contagion

THEODOR TUDOROIU*
The University of the West Indies at St. Augustine

ABSTRACT This article tries to identify the key elements that determine the success or failure of revolutionary contagion processes. Using three case studies of mutinies that took place in the rst half of the twentieth century aboard eets operating in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean, it concludes that the result of the revolutionary contagion depends mainly on the quality of the ideological and organizational effort undertaken by the primary revolution and its afliated revolutionaries in the target society. A successful process of revolutionary contagion, however, is a necessary but not sufcient condition for the victory of the revolution itself. The 2011 Libyan rebellion is used to test these ndings. KEY WORDS: revolutionary contagion, mutinies, Potemkin, French Black Sea eet, Greek navy, Comintern, Libya

Introduction This article assesses three mutinies that took place in the rst half of the twentieth century aboard eets operating in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean in order to analyze the process of revolutionary contagion. The goal is to identify the key elements that determine the success or failure of such processes. The case studiesthe mutinies aboard the Russian Black Sea Potemkin battleship (1905), the French Black Sea eet (1919), and the Greek eet at British-controlled Alexandria (1944)were selected because they are representative of different stages in the development of the revolutionaries capacity of planning and managing revolutionary contagion processes. Ironically, they all represent failed revolutions. In terms of revolutionary contagion, however, they cover a range going from very modest results to success on a local and then on a global scale. The model of revolutionary contagion developed on the basis of these case studies is then tested using the 2011 Libyan rebellion. The next section provides a general picture of the naval mutinies. Section three reviews the theoretical aspects of revolutions and revolutionary contagion. Sections four to six present the three case studies. Section seven uses their ndings to identify and analyze the key elements of the revolutionary contagion process. The nal section checks the validity of the resulting model in the case of the anti-Qadha rebellion.
*Correspondence Address: The University of the West Indies, Department of Behavioural Sciences, Faculty of Social Sciences, St. Augustine, Trinidad & Tobago. Email: theodor.tudoroiu@sta.uwi.edu 1478-2804 Print/1478-2790 Online/12/030337-21 q 2012 Taylor & Francis http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14782804.2012.711158

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From Mutiny to Revolution The three case studies presented in the following pages belong to the category of naval mutinies. There is hardly a general agreement on the latters denition. For the needs of this article, I will use the description provided by Britains Naval Discipline Act of 1957. It dened mutiny as a combination between two or more persons subject to service law: (a) to overthrow or resist lawful authority in Her Majestys forces; (b) to disobey such authority in such circumstances, or with the object of avoiding any duty or service against, or in connection with operations against, the enemy; or (c) to impede the performance of any duty or service in Her Majestys forces (Bell & Elleman, 2003, p. 2; for other denitions see pp. 1 3 as well as Frame & Baker, 2000, pp. 3 10). Naval mutinies stem usually from relatively minor causes related to the conditions of service. Sometimes they do originate from more deep-rooted and systemic problems. But even then, the more radical aims of the mutineers come to the fore only after the mutiny begins over a more mundane issue (Bell & Elleman, 2003, pp. 264 265). Mutinies tend to follow a pattern that includes four stages: rising action; inciting incident; climax; and denouement (Hathaway, 2001, p. xvi). Three types of mutiny can be identied: the promotion-of-interests movement; the secession movement; and the seizure-of-power movement (Lammers, 1969, p. 559, 2003, p. 477; Bell & Elleman, 2003, pp. 264 266). In certain cases, the latter can turn into revolutionary action. Both navies and naval mutinies reached a turning point at the end of the eighteenth century. During the French Revolutionary Wars, unprecedented numbers of men were forced into warships and made to work under the threat of savage violence. This led to the rapid development of a form of class consciousness among the sailors. The greatest wave of naval mutiny in European history ensued. Hundreds of crews revolted, sometimes paralyzing whole eets in the midst of the annual ghting season: Class war was no longer a metaphor in the wooden world of European warships (Frykman, 2009, p. 67 68; see also Neale, 1985; Frykman, 2010). In his analysis of the 1797 events, Jeffrey Duane Glasco went as far as stating that a (failed) British working-class revolution did occur on the decks of the Royal Navy in the 1790s (Glasco, 2001, pp. 13 14). It is generally agreed that mutinies can take place in conjunction with revolutions and can be symptomatic of revolutionary change (Hathaway, 2001, p. xv). Sometimes naval mutineers may become the very engine of a revolutionary process. In 1797, the plebeian seamen mutinied over material grievances. Some of their colleagues, the revolutionary seamen, attempted to use the resulting social chaos to redirect the mutinies to political and social revolutions (Glasco, 2001, p. 13). This is a typical example of the process of vertical escalation, in which the mutineers demands become more complex and far-reaching as events progress (Bell & Elleman, 2003, pp. 269 271). Such escalation can lead to a fully edged revolution. Another development took place as the nineteenth- and twentieth-century navies became increasingly technical. Hulls, means of propulsion, and weaponry were transformed in the machine age. Sailors came from the industrialized and urbanized working class and worked in an industrial type environment (Till, 2003, p. xvii). They started to behave as almost regular proletarians and became vulnerable to radical ideologies tailored for industrial workers such as Marxism (Raphael-Leygues & Barre, 1981, pp. 104 105). This is why naval mutinies of the rst half of the twentieth century had a higher probability of evolving toward revolution. This is the important aspect

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that made me choose three naval mutinies of that period as illustrations of the process of revolutionary contagion. Revolution and Contagion Obviously, the theoretical core element of this article is represented by revolutions. Marx famously called them the locomotives of history. Classical denitions such as those of Theda Skocpol and Anthony Giddens identify class and violence as their main characteristics (see Paige, 2003, p. 20). Class and violence, however, are not necessarily associated with all revolutions, especially with more recent ones. This is why a different denition was created by Jeffery Paige (2003, p. 24): A revolution is a rapid and fundamental transformation in the categories of social life and consciousness, the metaphysical assumptions on which these categories are based, and the power relations in which they are expressed as a result of widespread popular acceptance of a utopian alternative to the current social order. This seems to capture the essence of both past and present revolutionary processes. I will use it as the theoretical starting point of this article. Frequently, revolutions are assessed as national processes. Still, they almost always have an international dimension. Theda Skocpol was one of the authors who explored systematically the importance of the international context for both the causes and the outcome of revolutions. In her view, states are sometimes weakened by the international competition within the international state system. The weakened condition of the State, in conjunction with a particular agrarian structure, means the omnipresent underlying social conict cannot be contained. Consequently, the unrest sweeps away the ancien regime. Then, the creation of a new society is shaped by continuing international pressure at least in the same measure as by ideological principles (Skocpol, 1979; Bailey, 1986, p. 16). Moreover, these ideological principles are themselves related to the international sphere: revolutions are an international phenomenon . . . because the ideas and goals that inspire revolutions diffuse around the world (Katz, 2003, p. 150). Indeed, most revolutionary ideologies imply a logic leading to the afrmation of ideals that pertain to more than one country. On the one hand, revolutions legitimate themselves in terms of appeal to general and abstract principles that cannot be specic to a particular country or nation. On the other, revolutionaries share a view of oppressors or enemies as constituted internationally (as part of a global or at least multinational entity which conspires to maintain oppressors in power). They believe there is an international system of oppression and resistance, within which their particular country is one part (Halliday, 1999, pp. 59 60). And, at a more pragmatic level, the practical need for support from similar or related revolutionary forces abroad can encourage ideological convergence. Sometimes, this convergence and the political relationship it generates take the spectacular form of revolutionary waves. Indeed, the most disruptive type of revolution does not spread through invasion, but through one revolutions sparking afliate revolutions elsewhere. The revolutionary idea resonates in other countries, and signicant forces appear that seek to implement it. A revolutionary wave is therefore a group of revolutions with similar objectives containing a primary, central revolution and other actual or potential revolutions. Aspiring revolutionaries take their inspiration from the

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central revolution, attempt to emulate it, and usually seek its assistance in coming to power (Katz, 2003, pp. 150 152). It is in this context that the process of revolutionary contagion is most visible. By revolutionary contagion I understand the preparation and start-up of a new revolution under the ideological inuence and with the organizational assistance of an exterior, primary revolution. This already existing revolution helps put in place a mechanism that supports, coordinates, and sometimes controls the activity of local aspiring revolutionaries. The latter create local afliate revolutionary organizations that diffuse the ideology of the primary revolution within the local society. When both their ideological inuence over the society and their strength as an organization are considered sufcient, they initiate actions meant to overthrow the Government and install a revolutionary regime. These actions can be violent. In this case, the process includes a decisive military stage. If successful, the new revolution becomes an afliated revolution that maintains special relations with the primary one. A detailed analysis of the process of revolutionary contagion, based on the ndings of the three case studies, will be presented in the analysis section. Most major revolutions hope to initiate a series of revolutionary contagion processes that, ideally, will lead to the creation of a revolutionary wave. In theoretical-ideological terms, this contributed to the creation of internationalism. Its proponents see the revolutionary agent as at once national and global. This agent is charged implicitly with the responsibility of leading a challenge to the international structure of oppression (for more details see Halliday, 2008, p. 67). This ideological responsibility and less abstract survival strategies encourage revolutionary internationalists to export their own successful revolution. In the twentieth century, political support for similar revolutionary movements was sometimes organized in a formal manner that included the creation of international organizations reuniting the revolutionary state and its foreign allies (the Comintern was the most developed example of such an international structure). The assistance can take a political form, including diplomatic support and material assistance. It can also be military. Finally, the most active form of assistance is the direct participation by the armed forces of a revolutionary state in another country. For example, the Bolsheviks attempted up to 1920 to assist revolution in Poland, Iran, and Mongolia through military invasion (Halliday, 1999, pp. 9697). Marxist movements represent a rich source of examples and case studies illustrating the international aspects of revolutions. This is not an accident. Since Marxs 1848 Manifesto of the Communist Party and its famous Workers of the world unite, the Marxists have been resolutely internationalist. Along with the dictatorship of the proletariat and the revolutionary party, the concept of internationalism, formally qualied as proletarian internationalism, lies at the core of the Marxist tradition (Halliday, 2008, p. 70, Marx & Engels, 1848 [2004]). The communist theory of internationalism clearly meets the requirements of revolutionary internationalism as dened above. Lenin repeatedly stated that the Bolsheviks had to do the utmost possible in one country for the development, support and awakening of the revolution in all countries (Lenin, 1918, p. 292). Stalin (1928 [1921], pp. 46 47, emphasis added) suggested a very clear line of action: The tasks of the international proletariat are henceforth reduced to widening the Russian breach, to assisting the vanguard that has moved ahead, to preventing the enemies from surrounding this bold vanguard and cutting it off from the base. The key word here is reduced. The revolution was to become universal, but its worldwide followers were reduced to support the Russian Bolsheviks and follow their

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orders. The four decades initiated by the October Revolution were dominated by this asymmetrical relation. The main instrument of this dependence was the Third (or Communist) International, better known as the Comintern. It was created on 4 March 1919 by a First Congress including only nine foreign representatives. One year later, however, the Second Congress, held in Petrograd and Moscow between 19 July and 7 August 1920, reunited over 200 delegates from thirty-seven countries. Its approval of the organizational statutes and the adoption of the Twenty-one Conditions of admission to the Comintern effectively formalized Bolshevik hegemony over the International (McDermott, 1997, p. 17). Despite the existence of national groups, or sections, the new organization was not a federation of parties . . . but a single, highly organized, global party, in effect one world communist party (Halliday, 2008, p. 70). Its ofcial slogan, proposed by Lenin, was Weltklasse, Weltpartei, Weltrevolution (Global class, global party, global revolution; German was the Cominterns ofcial language). But such global ideals were in fact masking more local interests: From early times . . . the Comintern served as an instrument of Russian foreign policy (Halliday, 2008, p. 70, emphasis added). During its rst seven years, the organization became heavily bureaucratized. At the same time, it came under the control of the Russian party, which played an increasingly dominant role in determining policy (Jacobson, 1994, p. 35). The Russian Bolsheviks dominated the Comintern hierarchies, imposed strict centralization, and used the Soviet funding of foreign sections to support Moscows decisive interventions in the affairs of nominally independent parties. Under Stalins rule, this led to a process of bureaucratic degeneration (McDermott, 1997, pp. 14 15). The Kremlins total control of the Comintern is well illustrated by the latters end. It was formally dissolved on 10 June 1943 simply because Stalin decided to appease his western allies and remove one of the slogans for mobilization from Hitlers Anti-Comintern Pact (Halliday, 2008, pp. 70 71). However, this was only a deceptive measure as a new, similarly organized framework remained in existence in Moscow. It took the form of a special group of Comintern cadres created in 1943 and attached to the Russian Communist Party Central Committee. Three secret special institutes were also established to carry out organizational and technical activities (McDermott, 1997, p. 210). After the war, a formal nine-party successor organization, the Cominform (1947 1957) was also created (Halliday, 1999, p. 63). Leaving aside the Yugoslav exception, Moscow maintained control of the major communist parties of the world [until] after 1956 (Halliday, 2008, p. 71; see also McDermott, 1997, p. 201). The Russian dominance had a very clear effect on the world strategy of the communist movement(s). The seizure of power in Petrograd had been the result of armed insurrection. In a letter to the Central Committee Lenin claimed in September 1917 that it is impossible to remain loyal to Marxism, to remain loyal to the revolution unless insurrection is treated as an art (Halliday, 1999, p. 244). In the same vein, Trotsky (1932, pp. 125 148) included in his History of the Russian Revolution a chapter on The art of insurrection. It is not surprising that the armed insurrection became part of the model of revolution promoted worldwide by the Comintern. This organization even prepared in 1928 a handbook on how such actions were to be conducted, making armed insurrection the highest form of political struggle and an absolute, inexorable necessity for the proletarian movement in any given country. Consequently, the armed insurrection was the main form of attempted revolutionary seizure of power in the inter-war years (Halliday, 1999,

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pp. 244 245). This had major consequences for the process of revolutionary contagion which now included an important military dimension. The Russian Black Sea Battleship Potemkin (1905) The scene of the rst case study is the Russian battleship Potemkin. Ironically, the rebellion of its crew is famous not for historical reasons but mainly because of Sergei M. Eisensteins world acclaimed silent movie. This does not mean, however, that the event had exclusively artistic consequences. The context is that of Russias rst, 1905 Revolution. One of its important episodes took place in southern Ukraine. The port of Odessa was home to various revolutionary organizationsthe Bundists, the minority and majority cliques of the Social Democratic party, Poale Zionists and Anarchists (Hough, 1961, p. 73). Bundists and Social Democrats organized a rst strike in April 1905. On 15 June, one month after the destruction of the Russian navy by the Japanese in the Straits of Tsushima, local authorities in Odessa failed to suppress a workers protest march. Large-scale bloodshed followed (Zebroski, 2003, p. 19). The situation was equally tense among crews of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. In its effort to modernize, the Russian Navy had to draft increasing numbers of workers, many of whom had a radical past. Between 1899 and 1905, 59 percent of the Black Sea Fleet conscripts came from working-class backgrounds (as compared to only 20 percent in the army) (Zebroski, 2003, pp. 10, 27). Many came into the service with volatile strike experience. A 1903 navy inquiry concluded that the sailors causing the most trouble were former skilled workers who had worked in urban industrial centers (Zebroski, 1994, pp. 122, 130). Moreover, the navys insistence on training conscripts to work as a unied team gave them a new sense of common identity that was unique to naval service. Over time, this new collective identity grew into a sense of common purpose that favored protest movements (Zebroski, 1994, pp. 54 55). In April 1902, an order issued by a Russian admiral acknowledged the discovery of radical activity in the Black Sea Fleet. In November 1903, the police arrested three sailors for possessing illegal propaganda. Harsher repression from the authorities created the need for a centralized clearing-house where sailors from various circles could safely contact other activists. During the winter of 1903 1904, sailor organizers Alexander Petrov, Grigorii Vakulenchuk, and Afanasy Matiushenko, in conjunction with the Sevastopol Russian Social Democratic Labor Party, formed Tsentralka, a revolutionary organization that played a key role in planning the eet mutiny of 1905 (Zebroski, 2003, p. 13). In terms of numbers, out of a total of 14,000 Black Sea sailors 600 900 were active in the revolutionary movement (Bushnell, 1985, p. 271). The gure increased to almost 2,000 during the 1905 events (Zebroski, 1994, p. 115). Out of 763 there were seventy to 100 radical sailors on Potemkin (Zebroski, 2003, pp. 15, 18). Due to the limited contact with civilians, the sailors movement developed a very selfreliant relationship with the mainland revolutionaries. In 1903, the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party splintered into Bolshevik and Menshevik factions. The sailors, however, did not show any particular factional preference. In fact, many did not understand the difference between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks and continued to present themselves as Social Democrats. Within the eet, this had the effect of preserving the radicals unity. It nevertheless created frictions between the sailors and the mainland revolutionaries, preventing them from acting in concert during the Potemkin mutiny (Zebroski, 1994, pp. 141 142).

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Under the inuence of radical leaders such as Alexander Petrov on the Prut and Grigorii Vakulenchuk on the Potemkin, Tsentralka decided that action would be taken on 21 June 1905 during eet exercises near Tendra Bay. It also decided that control must be seized swiftly and aboard all ships simultaneously (Zebroski, 2003, pp. 14 15). In fact, a minor incidentthe famous rotten meat episodewas used before the planned date on the Potemkin. Its crew revolted on 14 June, killing seven ofcers and taking command of the ship and of the N267 torpedo boat. The leaders of the mutiny were the ofcially accredited Social Democratic representatives in the Potemkin. They ew the red ag and created a Peoples Committee whose sittings would be public, for the Kniaz Potemkin Tavricheskii was now a Peoples Democracy (Hough, 1961, p. 59). On the evening of 14 June Potemkin dropped anchor in Odessa harbor. The next day, the entire city was the scene of strikes and civil unrest. Protesters were extremely active as their demands could be now supported by the battleships tremendous repower. The tsar declared a state of martial law. On the Richelieu Steps, Cossacks massacred civilian protesters (the episode was later immortalized by Eisensteins movie). But Potemkins reaction was unconvincing. Its crew did not want to get involved in land skirmishes as it was expecting a seaborne attack. Proclamations and threats to bomb army and local authorities headquarters were followed by the ring of only three shells, which missed their target. The repression of Odessa revolutionaries continued (Hough, 1961, pp. 76 77; Zebroski, 2003, pp. 19 20). On 17 June the Russian Black Sea Fleet tried to attack Potemkin. Yet, its crews did not re; battleship St George even passed on Potemkins side, while the rest of the eet ed to Sebastopol in order to avoid further mutinies. The cautious commander in chief, Admiral Chukhnin, even took the unprecedented step of sending the entire personnel . . . home on indenite leave (Hough, 1961, pp. 130 151). However, this triumph was short-lived. The crew of St George changed sides and the ship was stranded on a concealed mud bank in Odessa harbor. Demoralized, Potemkins crew decided to quit. The battleship went to the Romanian port of Constantza where the rebels surrendered (receiving Romanian nationality as a guarantee they would not be sent back to Russia) (Zebroski, 2003, pp. 21 23). The mutiny had lasted for eleven days. Overall, the equally unsuccessful 1905 Revolution weakened the autocratic regime (Ascher, 2004, p. xi) but clearly failed to reach its goals. I chose the Potemkin episode as a case study because it illustrates well a very simple (one might say primitive) type of revolutionary contagion. It is not the situation of a victorious revolution that tries to expand abroad. It is the case of a revolution in process that tries painfully to expand to a separate section of the same society. Even the revolutionary ideology is not exactly the same. On the mainland, there is a mix of revolutionary groups with very different ideological orientations. The eet mutineers promote only one of those ideologies, the early 1900s Russian Social Democratic version of Marxist radicalism. Moreover, they do not understandor do not want to understand the major split of their party colleagues elsewhere in Russia. They present themselves as representatives of the Social Democratic Labor Party despite the fact that the Bolshevik Menshevik dispute is increasingly turning that party into a political ction. However, an important aspect is closer to a normal process of revolutionary contagion. The mutineers regard their actions less as part of the wider 1905 Revolution and more as a separate revolution taking place on the eet. The latter is perceived as a separate entity that is autonomousif not almost independentfrom the mainland. Potemkin becomes a Peoples Democracy. The exact sense of this term remains unclear, but it shows that

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the ship has a special, separate position with respect to the nation-wide revolutionary phenomenon. Consequently, it is legitimate to speak of a contagion between two parallel revolutionary processes that take place on the mainland and aboard the eet respectively. Within this framework, the reasons of the failure are obvious. First, the total lack of coordination with the revolutionary forces ashore largely facilitated the actions of the counter-revolutionaries. Potemkins passivity contributed to the failure of the revolution in Odessa which in turn diminished the willingness of the sailors on other ships to revolt. Second, lack of revolutionary experience led to bad organization and inefcient actions within the eet. Tsentralka had planned a general mutiny. In fact, it occurred only on the Potemkin. There, radicals could use a helpful triggering incident to start the vertical escalation that resulted in a successful seizure-of-power movement. But there was only limited and temporary horizontal escalation. The short-lived mutiny on the St George showed the revolutionaries inability to inuence and control the rest of the crew despite their initial success. On the other ships, no action took place. And Potemkin itself, despite its repower, simply did not know what to do. Overall, the dynamics that would have characterized a successful sailors revolution were blocked in their early phase, allowing the repressive forces to regain control of the situation after only eleven days. This was different from the equally failed but nevertheless longer and more complex primary, mainland 1905 Revolution. The causes of this halted contagion will be further analyzed in the analysis section. The French Fleet in the Black Sea (1919) The French navy mutinies in the Black Sea represent an episode of the Ententes antiBolshevik intervention in the aftermath of the First World War. In order to prevent the communist occupation of Ukraine, the French landed in Odessa on 18 December 1918. Later, 80,000 French, Greek, Romanian, and Polish soldiers occupied the Black Sea coast from Romania to Crimea (Hudson, 2004, p. 141). However, local and overall conditions did not favor intervention. The French association with Denikins forces, skillfully exploited by Bolshevik propaganda, had turned the Russian population against the Allied cause (Carley, 1983, p. 176). The only solution would have been a massive French intervention, allowing the conquest and control of all of southern Russia. But this was out of question because of opposition from public and parliamentary opinion in France. Workers and returning soldiers, exhausted by four years of war, were openly hostile to the Governments new call to arms against the Bolsheviks (Carley, 1983, pp. 115 116, 169). This atmosphere had direct consequences on the battleeld. In early February 1919, mutiny broke out among French military units along the Romanian Russian border. Four hundred and sixty-seven soldiers refused to attack the Bolshevik-controlled town of Tiraspol (Carley, 1983, p. 143). The war-weariness of French troops was ably exploited by the Bolsheviks. Their propagandists were at work among French troops within days of the latters arrival in Russia (Carley, 1983, p. 144). This activity was coordinated by the Propaganda Ofce of the Soviet of Peoples Commissaries, which made available the equivalent of 15 million French francs. Two very active local ofces were created in Odessa and Sebastopol. Three French language newspapers were published. The French communist group in Moscow also published many French language brochures and pamphlets (Raphael-Leygues & Barre, 1981, pp. 97 101). There are accounts of a Frenchspeaking Bolshevik propagandist being spirited aboard ships of the French eet to speak to

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groups of sailors. Bolshevik agitators even operated in the brothels of Odessa, which were, according to General Berthelot, the most dangerous centers of revolutionary propaganda in the French zone of occupation (Carley, 1983, p. 145). The arguments of Bolshevik propaganda were simple and convincing. The war was over, French soldiers and sailors should be free to go home. The government of France called the Bolsheviks criminals and bandits, but they aspired only to free the oppressed masses of Russia from tsarism. Comparisons were made with the French revolution. In fact, the French government only wanted to recover its billions loaned to the tsar. Capitalism and the bourgeoisie were the common enemy of the Russian and French people (Carley, 1983, p. 144). Bolshevik propaganda in southern Ukraine and French Socialists anti-war attitudes back home undermined the morale of French troops. In Odessa, the situation was complicated by the existence of opposing local forces. As France could not afford to increase the scale of the intervention, on 29 March 1919, Clemenceau had to order the towns evacuation. Odessa fell rst to the Cossack Ataman Nikifor Grigorev and then to the Bolsheviks (Carley, 1983, p. 170; Hudson, 2004, p. 141). But when a similar withdrawal from Crimea was ordered on 12 April, the local commander in Sebastopol used the guns of the French eet in the harbor to stop enemy advances. Bolsheviks were forced to accept an armistice (Jackson, 1972, p. 175; Carley, 1983, pp. 171 173). The French minister of the navy recommended that the city be held long enough to safeguard Allied interests and to assure the complete liberty of our movements in the Black Sea. French military commanders were contesting the evacuation order as they were convinced that Sebastopol could be defended (Raphael-Leygues & Barre, 1981, pp. 71 72; Carley, 1983, p. 174). It is at this point that a mutiny aboard the French eet at Sebastopol, similar in many respects to that of Potemkin, made any further resistance impossible. The rst signs of trouble came on 16 April, when an engineering ofcer and a sailor aboard the destroyer Protet were arrested for plotting to seize control of the ship and to take it over to the Bolsheviks. On the evening of 19 April, disturbances broke out on the battleship France and then spread to the agship of the eet, Jean Bart (Carley, 1983, p. 174). The next day, protests spread rapidly to the battleships Justice, Mirabeau, and Vergniaud. The red ag was hoisted and the Internationale was sung on the France and Jean Bart (Raphael Leygues & Barre, 1981, p. 28; Carley, 1983, p. 174). On 21 April, French commanders reported to Paris the gravity of the situation. There was a real threat of rebellion. They revealed the existence of Soviets among unruly elements of the eet, which were linked with revolutionary organizations ashore. It was obvious that resistance against Bolshevik advances was now impossible. The entire expeditionary force in Crimea was evacuated on 28 April (Carley, 1983, pp. 175 176). This diminished the support of the moderate seamen for the most radical mutineers, which in turn brought the end of the mutiny. News about it, however, reached French Navy ships elsewhere and ignited new disturbances. Between 26 April and 13 June, mutinies took place on the Waldeck-Rousseau, near Odessa; among crews of battleships in Cherbourg, Brest, Lorient, and Toulon; on the battleship Voltaire, at Bizerte; on the Condorset, in the Greek port of Tendra; and on the battleship-cruiser Guichen, in the Greek port of Itea. Mutinies were also organized aboard the French Baltic Sea naval division (end June), on the Touareg in the Black Sea (August) and on the Diderot, in the Cypriot port of Famagusta (October 1919) (Raphael-Leygues & Barre, 1981, pp. 111 114). It is obvious that this wave of mutinies was facilitated by the sailors desire to go home and its efcient exploitation by Bolshevik propaganda. However, while structural causes

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and Bolshevik propaganda were the same, soldiers of the expeditionary force in southern Russia were much less willing to rebel than sailors. This is due to differences in their respective environments. Before the war, many drafted French sailors had been industrial workers. The impressive machine room of a modern battleship was nothing less than a copy of the industrial workshop they were accustomed to. This familiar environment encouraged the reconstruction of workers trade unions, which were very developed in France and had been the scene of very intense pacist propaganda, especially after 1916. Aboard many ships, small trade unions had been created (Raphael-Leygues & Barre, 1981, pp. 104 105). In such conditions, it is not surprising that Bolshevik propaganda could easily spread, creating a large number of afliated revolutionaries. As long as a general grievance existed, they were able to take advantage of it in order to launch a process of vertical and horizontal escalation that could have led to fully edged revolution. Yet, this process did not advance enough before the grievance was eliminated. Ensuing diminished support from the moderates allowed the suppression of the mutiny. From the point of view of the primary, Russian revolution, the contagion of the French eet had two different goals. The rst was to evacuate the expeditionary force from southern Russia. In this, the Bolsheviks were clearly successful. The international antiBolshevik campaign lost momentum and the White Russians were nally defeated. However, the process of revolutionary contagion failed in what should have been its ultimate objective. It did not bring the general revolution the Bolsheviks hoped would change the face of the world. The mutinies contaminated other navy units, but did not extend to France itself. In a way, the French sailors were closer to the Russian society they had met on the Black Sea coast than to the society of their own homeland. Again, it is in the analysis section that I will further analyze the details of this revolutionary episode. The Greek Fleet at Alexandria (1944) The third and last example of a naval mutiny is not widely known, as the novel describing it (Tsirkas, 1971)1 did not reach the fame of Eisensteins movie. It is a rather obscure episode of the Second World War. It took place in 1944 in Egypt, but its actors were Greek. On 6 April 1941 Greece was attacked and rapidly occupied by German forces. The King, the Government, and a part of the army ed to Crete and then to British-controlled Egypt (Close, 1995, p. 55). The bulk of the Greek Navyincluding seven torpedo boats, three submarines, and a cruisermanaged to reach Alexandria on 21 April 1941. In all, there were forty-three warships and a much larger merchant marine which, until the end of the war, contributed continuously to the anti-Axis military effort (Spyropoulos, 1993, pp. 74, 136, 356). The traditional Greek political forces were completely discredited by the German invasion and the occupation. The resistance against the occupiers became an outlet for other political forces (Close, 1995, p. 60; Smith, 1995, p. 58). The most important radical group was the Greek Communist Party. An early member of the Comintern, it was the leading (and the best organized) political force in the National Liberation Front (EAM) and its military branch (ELAS), formed in September 1941 and April 1942 respectively. It was also numerically important; in 1944 it had 400,000 members (Papastratis, 1980, p. 32; Smith, 1995, pp. 58 60). In mid-September 1941, a handful of communist soldiers established in Palestine the nucleus of the Army Communist Organization (KSO). A parallel nucleus was established in Cyprus (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 191). In 1942,

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communist members of the Greek forces in Egypt founded an umbrella organization open to all antifascists, the Antifascist Military Organization (ASO). In a few months, it created cells in all army units and offshoots appeared in other military services: the Navy Military Organization (AON) and the Air Force Military Organization (AOA). All three remained secret, worked underground, and were organized in cells of threes and ves. They ran their own clandestine publications (newspapers, information bulletins, and proclamations). The ASOs Antifasistas, the navys Eleftheria/Liberty and the air forces Asteras/Star were widely read (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 192). To coordinate the activities of leftist organizations, the Central Bureau of Antifascists organizations was founded in late 1942. A parallel civilian organization, the Greek Liberation League (EAS), was established in January 1943. The EAS was created in Cairo, but soon it established branches at Alexandria and Port Said (Spyropoulos, 1993, pp. 192 194). Troubles started soon after the Greek First Brigades contribution to the victory of El Alamein. Many of its members were inuenced by communist propaganda. To give just an example, on one occasion the soldier citing the evening prayer replaced the nal God save our King with God save Stalin. The brigade was ordered back to the Suez area (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 80). Soon it camped in Syria, near Brigade II which was viewed and was called communistic. Its three battalions were commanded by communist ofcers. One of them had a picture of Stalin on his desk and was addressed by his men as comrade. Often, the hammer and sickle ew over the battalions compound (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 213). Ensuing conict between royalist ofcers and communist soldiers determined the ASO to take command of the two brigades. It demanded and, in March 1943, obtained a new structure for the Greek government in exile, which now included only republicans (Spyropoulos, 1993, pp. 219 220). But the British decided to intervene. Thirty communist commanders and ofcers were exiled to Kenya. In July 1943, renewed protests involved the army and, for the rst time, the navy (Spyropoulos, 1993, pp. 236 237). The latters inltration by the communists was the result of a complex process. Due to the prominence of the Greek shipping, the seamen represented an important sector of the countrys workforce. As such, they were targeted by the Comintern-coordinated Greek communists. In 1928, the communist and socialist sailors left the Panhellenic Seamens Federation (PNO) and formed the Seamens Union of Greece (NEE). Progressively, this trade union replaced PNO as the main defender of the seamens rights (Kitroeff, 1980, pp. 80 81, 84). Increased membership allowed the NEE to gain legal recognition as a trade union in Britain and, in January 1942, by the Greek government in exile. This led to a strengthening of its inuence. It gained control over all the constituent unions which had previously belonged to the PNO and in March 1943 formed the Federation of Greek Maritime Unions (OENO) (Kitroeff, 1980, pp. 85 86). In all the major ports this new organization opened ofces that became a meeting place for all Greek crews to discuss political developments. It also formed ship committees. Ideologically, OENO was hardly neutral. With the majority of its executive composed of communists or communist sympathizers, it adopted a radical, pro-EAM orientation (Kitroeff, 1980, p. 95). At the same time, there was an important ow of personnel from the merchant eet to the navy. A 1941 law even specied that all seamen not serving aboard ships would be drafted (Kitroeff, 1980, p. 82). This increased considerably the number of communists in the navy. A 1943 American military intelligence report claimed that the political agitation which swept the Royal Greek Navy during the War was due to the successful indoctrination by protagonists, who were drafted in from the Merchant Navy

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(Kitroeff, 1980, p. 89). Consequently, by early 1943 the AON had established at least a couple of cells in every navy unit (Spyropoulos, 1993, pp. 192 194) and communist-led political activity was intense. When renewed protests occurred in July 1943, the Greek government in exile decided to purge both the land and sea forces. In response, violence broke out on the warships Ierax and Miaoulis. Several sailors were court marshaled; about 300 men were removed from different ships (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 247). Nevertheless, by mid-1943, the AON had not only managed to organize several cells and committees on each navy unit but also had established an efcient network of communications with them even if the ships were far away from the center (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 246). This allowed it to prepare, in the spring of 1944, a well-organized large-scale action. On 4 April 1944, the sailors committee aboard ships and in the naval installations started passing around manifestos. In order to better coordinate its activities, a Central Committee of the Struggle (KEA) entrenched itself on the oating dock Hyphaestos at Alexandria. Ofcers and men who refused to sign the manifestos were placed under arrest and a few were wounded in scufes as the committees now were armed. On 5 April, rebels seized the Army Ministry and Headquarters, but were later evicted by British troops who also dissolved the General Assembly of the Seamens Union and arrested its leader. The rebels retaliated by taking hostages the captain and ofcers of the Kriti (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 357). On 9 April Greek minesweepers docked close to the mutinied ships and joined the rebels. The next day, all ships at Malta and Port Said joined the mutiny, as did eleven consigned merchant ships. Rebels at Alexandria and the Suez Canal hung the signs of the EAM and ELAS and displayed red banners (Spyropoulos, 1993, pp. 358 359). The rebels morale was boosted by an announcement from King George II on 14 April that a new government would be formed by politicians to be brought soon from Greece. However, the British gave an ultimatum to the Greek government in exile demanding that drastic steps be taken to suppress the mutiny in the navy. Otherwise, the British would sink Greek ships anchored at Alexandria (Spyropoulos, 1993, p. 366). Consequently, on 23 April in the early morning, Greek loyalists attacked by surprise rebelled ships, killing seven sailors and wounding seventeen. All ships surrendered. On 29 April they were followed by ships in Port Said. Those in Malta also gave up, while British tanks attacked on 23 April the Brigade I which had equally rebelled. Demoralized by the eets defeat, it surrendered after a weak resistance (Spyropoulos, 1993, pp. 369 371). This was the last episode of more than one year of unrest. Greek ofcers cooperated with the British in purging the navy and the armed forces of their communist sympathizers (Close, 1995, p. 109). At rst view, the Greek eets Egyptian rebellion is similar to the Potemkin episode as it ended in total failure. Moreover, its avowed objectives were rather limited. The mutineers demands concerned mainly the composition of the Government in exile. Even when the crews took control of the ships and displayed red banners and other communist symbols they restrained from proclaiming formally a revolution. However, the consequences of their limited demands were far reaching and were perceived as the rst stage of a revolutionary process. The adoption of this step-by-step approach was simply due to obvious military constraints. The rebels were surrounded by overwhelming British forces and could not expect any external military support. The fact that they nevertheless started a suicidal rebellion shows the effectiveness of the revolutionary contagion process put in place by the communist-led underground structures. The Greek mutinies represent a good example of international contagion

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coming from a geographically remote primary revolution that aimed to become a world revolution. Despite the failure in Egypt, the same contagion process was successful in mainland Greece. It was only due to British intervention, American support, and a long and bloody civil war that the communist takeover of that country was nally avoided. This was not exactly Lenins ideal Weltrevolution, but it nevertheless provided a good approximation of it. Analysis The three case studies share a number of common features. All the mutinies took place on eets located in approximately the same region and under relatively similar international circumstances. The latter include an element frequently associated with revolution: war. Potemkin rebelled immediately after the Russian Japanese war of 1904 1905. The French eet had taken part in the World War and was supporting anti-Bolshevik forces in the Russian Civil War. The Greek eet at Alexandria was ghting the Second World War. In section three Revolution and contagion, I mentioned Theda Skocpols view that states are sometimes weakened by the international competition within the international state system. They become unable to contain social conicts and cannot prevent the success of revolutions. The war represents the most brutal manifestation of this international competition. Its effects delegitimize states and weaken their coercive power while reducing the cohesion of society and sharpening social conicts. It is not surprising that wars act as a precipitant of revolutions (Halliday, 1999, p. 237). At least in the last two case studies, wars so altered the political and ideological situation and exacerbated state society conict that social upheaval ensued (Halliday, 1999, p. 238) (the less impressive effects of the Russian Japanese war may have contributed to the weaker 1905 mobilization). The existence of large numbers of drafted sailors, discontented with defeat or prolonged warfare, increased the probability of armed rebellion. The military means at their disposal made them able to confront the repressive forces with much more efciency than in the case of a civilian uprising. Overall, the war was one of the factors that facilitated the process of revolutionary contagion associated with the three mutinies. Another common feature is the fact that the three mutinies took place on eets under the effect of radical ideas of Marxist origin. First, I have already mentioned the fact that the sailors of modern navies act in a socio-professional environment that is industrial. Drafted industrial workers recognized in the machine room of their battleship the familiar environment of an industrial workshop. They had the logical trend of creating trade unions and were behaving as almost regular proletarians. Consequently, battleship crews were especially vulnerable to a radical ideology tailored for industrial workers. Second, organizational frameworks were created progressively by Marxist parties in order to facilitate the process of revolutionary contagion. Stimulated by the 1905 failure, the Bolsheviks achieved considerable progress in terms of organization and know-how. The conspiratorial activity became intrinsic to communism (Selznick, 1960, p. 53). In 1919, the inltration of the French eet was considerably better organized than that of Potemkin. Soon afterward, the theses of the second Congress of the Communist International (1920) were simply obsessed with the creation of communist nuclei: even though there may be only three people sympathizing with Communism, a communist nucleus must be immediately organized (Selznick, 1960, p. 66). The army was one of the main targets of the Bolshevik inltration (Chamberlin, 1946, pp. 6667). But the navyand, surprisingly, the merchant

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eetwere considered even more important targets. This is due to the enormous power which small crews can wield in embargo operations and to the remarkable opportunity they provide for international communications. Furthermore, there is the specic general way of life which detaches the sailor from society and may easily pit him against the forces of law and order. As all of these elements give the seamen an aura of revolutionary power (Selznick, 1960, p. 184), they could not be ignored by communist strategists. Of course, this does not mean that all the navies on the planet were successfully inltrated by the Comintern. However, the example of the Greek merchant eet and navy shows that in certain cases this action was very well prepared, which led to impressive results. The third common element, the geographical location, is less important. The three mutinies took place in the Black Sea and the Eastern Mediterranean as these regions were relatively close to the very active Russian revolutionary arena that, after October 1917, became a major exporter of revolution. Yet, the distance did not prevent similar experiments in revolutionary contagion to occur in remote parts of Asia or Latin America. Despite these common features, the three rebellions are in many ways different. The elements that differentiate them are indicative of three critical aspects of the process of revolutionary contagion. Type and Scale of the Contagion In the rst case study, the seamen of the Black Sea eet represent a separate, autonomous part of the Russian society. There is little contact between them and the civilians. The primary, 1905 Revolution uses afliate revolutionaries aboard the eet in order to initiate a revolutionary process that, given its total lack of coordination with the revolutionaries ashore, can be assessed as a separate, secondary revolution. The revolutionary contagion succeeds, but from the very beginning it is conceived as a local process targeting exclusively the 14,000 Russian Black Sea sailors. Fourteen years later, the picture is different. Again, the Russian primary revolution supports afliate revolutionaries aboard the eet, which this time is French. The contagion is successful at this local level. But the nal objective of igniting a red revolution in France is a failure. The contagion is halted before reaching the genuinely international level targeted by the Bolsheviks. This objective is reached in the Greek case. There is no local aspect as the mutinies take place far away from the Soviet primary revolution. Furthermore, the contagion is by no means limited to the Greek navy in Egypt. It affects also the exiled army and, more importantly, Greece itself, where a revolutionary civil war begins. Yet, despite these major differences, the three processes of revolutionary contagion are very similar. The type and scale, therefore, do not seem to inuence the contagion pattern. Ideological Coherence In the three cases, there are no ideological disputes between the mutineers. In 1905, they adopt the early 1900s Russian Social Democratic doctrine. In 1919 and 1944, the revolutionary ideology is Bolshevism/communism. Important differences exist, however, between the 1905 primary and secondary revolutions. Ironically, the problem lies with the former. There are many parties with diverging political orientations. Even the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party is divided beyond repair. This makes the cooperation between the multifaced primary revolution and the homogenous afliated revolutionaries

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difcult. In turn, this has serious negative consequences for the two parts. It can be concluded that successful contagion is favored by ideological coherence among the afliate revolutionaries as well as between them and the primary revolution. Organization The 1905 Black Sea episode starts with a process of progressive inltration. Six hundred to 900 activists are recruited among the 14,000 Black Sea sailors. A revolutionary organization, Tsentralka, is created to coordinate their moves. Still, the planned general mutiny occurs only on the Potemkin. Tactical coordination with revolutionary groups on other shipsas shown by the short-lived mutiny on the St Georgeis simply nonexistent. The successful mutineers do not seem to have any coherent plan and their ensuing lack of action results in failure. Unlike its preparation, the active phase of the revolutionary process is marked visibly by bad organization. In 1919, the preparatory stage benets from the support of an impressive organizational apparatus created by the successful primary revolution and its experienced revolutionaries. The equivalent of 15 million French francs is made available for propaganda. There are three French language newspapers and many French language brochures and pamphlets. Even the brothels of Odessa become centers of revolutionary propaganda while a French-speaking Bolshevik propagandist is placed aboard French ships to speak to the sailors. Moreover, the drafted French seamen have already created secret trade unions that are used to prepare the mutiny. When it occurs, good organization allows the coordination of the mutineers actions on all ships. Consequently, their demandthe withdrawal of the eet from south Russiahas to be accepted. The contagion does not expand to France itself simply because there the primary Bolshevik revolution has been unable to take similar preparatory actions. In the Greek case, the preparation is even better. The communist inltration actions target both the eet and the country behind it. The Egyptian rebellion appears to be the fruit of an ideological and organizational gestation, which took place simultaneously aboard the exiled eet and among resistance forces in the German-occupied home country. The Greek eets immediate environment is not involved; neither Egyptians nor British circulate Marxist ideas. But in Greece the communists become very active in the anti-German resistance movement (after Hitlers attack of the USSR). At the same time, they are very successful in using Comintern tactics and experience to inltrate the exiled Greek navy and army. Several secret cells and committees are created on each ship. They are linked by an efcient network of communications which is available even when the ships are at sea. Communist clandestine publicationsincluding three newspapers, information bulletins, and proclamationsare widely read. Their radical views are soon adopted by a large number of sailors. The revolutionary contagion is so strong that it ignites a naval mutiny with no logical chance of success. Its rapid suppression does not stop the communists from coming close to taking power in the home country. Good organization, therefore, might well be the decisive element of a successful process of revolutionary contagion. These elements allow the identication of a pattern common to all processes of revolutionary contagion. Of course, a formal model has to take into consideration the general causes that make revolution possible. In the absence of predisposition of respondents to revolution, successful contagion and revolution itself cannot take place. This is a vast and well-researched domain that I will not address as it falls beyond the scope of this article.

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The contagion itself starts with the diffusion of the revolutionary ideology. It originates in the primary revolution and is adopted by elements of the target society. Spontaneous diffusion is most likely accompanied or even replaced by organized diffusion. The latter is prepared by structures belonging to the primary revolution working in cooperation with local aspiring revolutionaries. Communist ideas can be diffused by Russian Bolsheviks spirited aboard French ships, but the propaganda is certainly more effective when done by Greek communists who are members of the targeted Greek crews. This is why the primary revolution tries to transform the local aspiring revolutionaries into afliated revolutionaries that are trained for propaganda activities. Know-how and material support are provided by the primary revolution in order to create well-organized local revolutionary structures that inltrate progressively the target society. When these structures are strong enough and the revolutionary ideology has attracted a sufcient number of followers, the nal stage of the contagion process can be envisaged. This is essentially a political takeover that can imply different degrees of violence. If the military solution is preferred, the afliated revolutionary organizations change: from propaganda agencies, they become military structures that prepare and lead armed actions to overthrow the existing government and replace it with a revolutionary regime. A more general model, however, has to take into consideration the possibility of a non-violent takeover. If the revolutionaries succeed in controlling the majority of the population, they can even win elections and take power without challenging, at least initially, the constitutional system. In that case, good political and not military organization is essential. In all cases, the victory of the secondary revolution will most likely lead the new government to establish friendly relations with the primary revolution. In addition to purely ideological factors, this is an important cause of the primary revolutions interest in supporting afliated revolutionaries abroad. The three case studies suggest that the result of the revolutionary contagion process depends mainly on the quality of the ideological and organizational effort undertaken by the primary revolution and the afliated revolutionaries. Basically, this is a question of planning and management. The rst stage of the contagion, the diffusion of the revolutionary ideology, has to be conceived and performed by a rapidly expanding, efcient organizational local structure well supported by the primary revolution in terms of know-how and material means. On the one hand, this structure has to inltrate efciently the entire target society and not only a geographically isolated part of it. On the other, it needs to become strong enough to lead the possible subsequent armed action against the government forces. Only then can the political/military takeover be initiated with reasonable chances of success. Consequently, ideological coherence, political unity, organizational efciency, and revolutionary experience are decisive. The result depends in part on local conditions, but the role of the primary revolution is very important as it is the only one to have both the resources and the revolutionary experience needed by afliated revolutionaries. The best link between the latter and the primary revolution is a Comintern-type structure that allows full support and coordination. Of course, this type of relation allows very little ideologicaland, frequently, politicalautonomy of the afliated revolutionaries. This is the price to pay for external support that can make the difference between the revolutions triumph and failure. Still, the Greek example suggests that a carefully planned, well-organized, and nally successful process of revolutionary contagion cannot guarantee the victory of a revolution. The communists were on the point of winning their revolution in Greece. They failed

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because the primary revolution in the USSR did not support them appropriately while their adversaries received generous British and American assistance. Even if domestic obstacles are overcome, the international revolutionary contagion is frequently accompanied by an international counter-revolutionary intervention. Success of the afliated revolution is closely related not only to the support of the primary revolution but also to the involvement of hostile foreign actors and to the associated international balance of power. Well-organized revolutionary contagion, therefore, is an important element of the revolutionary enterprise. But it can be overridden by other external and domestic factors. Testing the Model: The Libyan Rebellion (2011) The lecture of the previous section imposes a logical question: this model of revolutionary contagion is based on case studies from the rst half of the twentieth century. But is it valid today? In order to answer this question, this section assesses the 2011 armed rebellion against Libyas dictator, Moammar Qadha. While geographically located in the same Mediterranean/Levantine settings, the Libyan case study does not involve a eet or Marxist ideology. This is a considerable advantage. If it can be shown that the model is valid even under these different circumstances, its general validity is implicitly difcult to deny. The structural causes of the revolutionary wave known as the Arab spring are represented by the comprehensive political, social, and economic failures of the Arab regimes. At the end of 2010, most of the latter were consolidated authoritarian regimes with strong neopatrimonial or even sultanistic features (Goldstone, 2011). Aging dictators preserved the eternal status quo of corrupt, dysfunctional one-party states anchored on the security apparatus (Sakbani, 2011, p. 130). Arbitrary measures and wrong economic policies led to severe social crisis even in states with huge oil reserves. Ensuing popular protests were met with violent repression. As these brutal regimes had no potential of self-reform, major changes were possible only through revolution. The process of revolutionary contagion was facilitated considerably by a key element: new media. On the one hand, the development of satellite television led to the creation of transnational TV networks such as Al-Jazeera. Recent quantitative studies found evidence that the exposure to transnational Arab TV is so important that it has increased transnational Muslim and Arab political identication at the expense of national political identities (Nisbet & Myers, 2010, p. 347). On the other hand, there are digital media. Locally, their availability simply changed the tactics of democratization movements. Using the Internet, mobile phones, and social media such as Facebook and Twitter, protestors could build extensive networks, create social capital, and organize political action with a speed and on a scale never seen before (Howard & Hussain, 2011, pp. 35 36). Equally important, locally generated digital media coverage of protest actions became available globally. After 2000, for many Arabs reading foreign news online and communicating with friends and relatives abroad became habits. Consequently, they had direct access to detailed information on developments in other Arab countries. Moreover, transnational TV networks use digital media to collect information and images from countries in which their journalists are harassed or banned. They have also converted their traditional news product for use on social-media sites. To quote Philip Howard and Muzammil Hussain (2011, p. 42 43, 45), the revolution may be televised, and it is surely online.

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Common structural causes and new media favored the process of revolutionary contagion that connected countries as diverse as Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Syria, and Libya. Yet, special attention has to be given to the ideology of this revolutionary wave. While protestors were united in their efforts to topple the local dictator, they did not necessarily share the same ideological orientation. Indeed, some were genuine democrats promoting western liberal values. But others were Islamists with an ambiguous attitude toward western-style democracy. A good example is Egypt, the state with the largest NGO community in the developing countries (McGann, 2008, p. 32). The Egyptian civil society is a bifurcated one. There is a secular civil society, characterized by limited effectiveness, a weak social base, and access to outside aid; and an Islamic one, with greater efciency, a stronger social base, and no outside aid (Abdalla, 2008, p. 28). However, the antiMubarak protests were clearly initiated and led by secular, democratic civic activists. The Islamists cautious aging leaders at rst resisted calls to back the protests. They decided to act only after impatient younger members went ahead, joining secular groups that had launched the demonstrations. This is why the Muslim Brotherhood made up only a fraction of the protest movement and largely followed events rather than led them (The Economist, 17 February 2011). Something similar happened in Libya. The anti-Qadha movement includes liberals, social democrats, and religious conservatives (Van Genugten, 2011, p. 62). Yet, the latter have kept a low prole. Furthermore, representatives of religious foundations and even jihadist groups claim that they want a mainly secular constitution. In early March 2011, Libyans celebrating victory in front of Benghazis court-house provided an extreme example. At prayer times, in rows twenty deep, a large crowd chanted prayers. In the front rows, a few hundred secular-minded youths cried Free Libya! and played Arab pop music over loudspeakers. There was no negative reaction from the crowd behind them (The Economist, 5 March 2011). This might change in the future, implicitly endangering the process of democratization. But, until now, the rebellions in the Arab world have been overwhelmingly secular in character (Rabbani, 2011, p. 13). Their main ideology has been the western-inspired liberal, democratic one. This is an essential aspect allowing the identication of the primary revolution. At rst view, the Arab springs starting point was the victorious Tunisian revolt. One could be tempted to perceive it as the primary revolution that initiated the contagion process. It is true that Tunisiansand, after the fall of Mubarak, Egyptianswere strongly behind the Libyan rebels, dream[ing] of a democratic northern strip of Africa stretching from Morocco to Egypt (The Economist, 16 July 2011). But Tunisia itself was a secondary revolution and its new regimelike the Egyptian onewas too fragile to intervene abroad. The real source of the process of revolutionary contagion was different. In fact, the situation was somehow similar to that of the 1944 Greek rebellion. The latter took place in Egypt, but the primary revolution was in the remote Soviet Union. In 2011, it was the West which acted as a primary revolution for the Arab spring in general and the Libyan rebellion in particular. First of all, it was the source of liberal, democratic values that were diffused in the Arab countries both spontaneously and due to American and European programs of democracy promotion. These values were assimilated by a part of the Libyan middle class. It included the lawyers whose protest march on the Benghazi court-house initiated the revolt in mid-February 2011 as well as the merchants and western-educated intellectuals who joined eventually the National Transitional Council. The Libyan exiled opposition was also concerned. Some of the groups forming the London-based National Conference for the Libyan Opposition helped organize the critically important Day of Rage on

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17 February 2011 (Van Genugten, 2011, p. 66). All these middle-class and/or exiled Libyans became de facto afliated revolutionaries of the western primary revolution. They initiated the protests and then contributed to the creation of structures needed in order to overthrow the Qadha regime. Politically, the National Transitional Council was established. As the only possible path was the armed one, a secret ten-man military committee was rapidly formed and started to organize the rebel army (The Economist, 26 February 2011). Yet, the rebels were far from having overcome numerous problems related to organizational efciency, political unity, and lack of revolutionary experience. The overall quality of the organizational effort was rather poor. Militarily, the repressive forces were vastly superior. Libyan troops and African mercenaries brutally suppressed protests in Tripoli, reconquered some of the rebellious towns, and were ready to attack Benghazi. Their victory seemed imminent (The Economist, 19 March 2011). It is at this point that the primary revolution was able to do something impossible for the Soviets in 1944: it intervened directly in support of its afliated revolutionaries, thus saving the Libyan secondary revolution. France, Britain, and the more reluctant United States mobilized international support, including that of the Arab League; passed United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973, the legal basis for limited military intervention in Libya; led a seventeen-state coalition that enforced a no-y zone, bombed Qadhas military installations, and provided air support for the rebel forces. In late April, the attacks were stepped up on the palaces, military headquarters, and communications centers critical to the regimes ability both to sustain its military campaign and to convince its supporters that it would survive (The Economist, 30 April 2011). Under these circumstances, the increasingly well-organized rebel forces were able to stop their adversaries offensive and counterattack. In late August they entered Tripoli. In psychological and symbolical terms, this was the end of Qadhas regime. It is clear that the Libyan secondary revolution was successful only due to the support provided by the western primary revolution. The regime it overthrew, on the other hand, was defeated because the international context deprived it of allies willing to take part in a counter-revolutionary intervention. In the 1980s, Qadha would have been supported politically and perhaps militarily by the communist block and his regime might have survived. As already stated, the success or failure of the process of revolutionary contagion is largely dependent on the international balance of power. Some of the readers of this article might be puzzled by the description of the West as a revolutionary nucleus. However, the heirs of the American and French revolutions continue to promote and disseminate worldwide a democratic ideology that is undoubtedly revolutionary in societies ruled by Qadha-type authoritarianism. In any case, its revolutionary features are at least as genuine as those of the Soviet Union under the sinister rule of Stalin. A second possible criticism might concern the view of the Libyan rebellion as a secondary revolution inspired and supported by the western one. Of course, no Comintern-type structure was involved. The creation and development of the Libyan antiauthoritarian movement was in no way provoked or controlled by the West. Moreover, western and especially American connections are not popular in much of the Arab world. However, this did not prevent Libyan rebels from acting in the name of a western ideology. On the basis of this key ideological afnity they sought, obtained, and took advantage of western military support. At least for the time being, their political objectives are in line with the same liberal, democratic ideology. Consequently, the Libyan rebellion is a

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de facto secondary revolution clearly related to the western primary one. As such, it conrms the validity of the mechanism of revolutionary contagion described in the previous sections of this article. Many things have changed since 1944, but the patterns of revolutionary contagion are basically the same.

Acknowledgements
The author is grateful to Dr Sauveur Pierre Etienne (Ecole des hautes etudes en sciences sociales) and Stefanie von Hlatky-Udvarhelyi (Centre for International Peace and Security Studies) for their helpful suggestions.

Note
1

The three volumes of this novel were rst published in Greek between 1960 and 1965. The 1971 French translation has been recently reprinted by Seuil and is easily available.

References
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