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FWIW The Soviet Union never stated that it was communist. They were officially socialist with the constitutional goal of establishing communism. for that matter

• pavlov 3y ago
  Khrushchev, enjoying a short-lived post-Stalin economic boom in the early 1960s, did proclaim that the Soviet Union would achieve communism by 1980: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism_in_20_years https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism_in_20_years So for a while there was an actual date attached to the constitutional goal. I believe the deadline was quietly buried by his stagnation-oriented successors, but I’m not sure.
• klooney 3y ago
  Saying that the Mensheviks predate the Bolsheviks is kind of odd- there was one political party, then they had a big fight and split in two. Menshevik literally means "minority" and Bolshevik "majority", that's how intertwined the two are.
  • vkou 3y ago
    By the time of the October Revolution, the Mensheviks were actually a majority, and were a significant faction in the Russian Provisional government. The Bolsheviks were not. The Bolsheviks were a minority, but controlled key elements of the army. After months of civil unrest and violence, they staged an armed coup.
    • klooney 3y ago
      My understanding is that the Mensheviks were technically a majority on the first day of the split, because Lenin had pushed so many people out before the climax of the conference. The point still stands though, that's what the words mean.
• grotorea 3y ago
  They were ruled by the communist party, so they were communist by ideology.