Upvote:1
I agree with the first comment of Semaphore, and can recommend a book: Orlando Figes, A people's tragedy. Russian revolution 1891-1924, 1996. On my opinion, this is the best book on the subject of those which I read. (Most books written by Russian authors are biased in one way or another).
Upvote:4
This is a good and easy question.
Lenin did not hesitate to order mass executions and incarceration (in concentration camps) of anyone "tangential" ("прикосновенный") to a counterrevolutionary plot.
Lenin did not hesitate to change his policies 180° when they could not be carried out. E.g., the change from War Communism to New Economic Policy or from "Peace Decree" to Brest-Litovsk.
Of course, his enormous personal charisma was critical in keeping his followers during such dramatic turns.
As Lenin wrote in "State and Revolution", any war conducted by a Communist state is just -- by definition.
He considered whatever he was doing at the moment to be blessed by History and its prophet Marx.