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First Congress founds the Communist International in Moscow

On 2–6 March 1919 the First Congress of the Communist International met in Moscow and founded Comintern. In the causal graph this event sets in motion the driver Proxy-War Intensity.

Sources: [1][2]

Read the full account

On 2–6 March 1919 the First Congress of the Communist International met in Moscow and founded Comintern. Lenin was the principal Russian author of its orientation against the Second International.

Context

This is an international-organization Fact, not a Soviet statute. Later 21 Conditions (1920) are a related tightening Fact.

Shared responsibility with other offices is part of the record. Sharing is not a reason to drop this person's documented role, and it is not a reason to treat every later consequence as their handwriting.

Why it matters

Direct contribution.

Who was responsible

Contribution type and responsibility level for each recorded actor — not sole-author shorthand.

  • Vladimir Lenin

    Person

    Direct responsibility

    responsibility level 0.6 · verified

    Lenin and Zinoviev organized the founding congress. Foreign delegates were few; Moscow set the line.

What changed

Fact → Driver → Indicator. Relationship strength orders the paths; it is not the observed indicator movement.

    1. FactFirst Congress founds the Communist International in Moscow
    2. sets in motionDriverProxy-War Intensity

    impact weight 0.45 · Effect from 4 March 1919 · verified

    A Moscow-centred international licensed later foreign insurrections and splits, with multi-year lag and local agency.

Evidence

The sources behind this fact and its verification state.

Verified2 sources on file
  1. 1.Britannica — Communist International founded 1919Encyclopaedia Britannica · High credibility · verified
  2. 2.Lenin, The Third International and Its Place in History, 1919Marxists Internet Archive · High credibility · verified
What the sources establish

Congress documents and Lenin’s 1919 article are official. Britannica independently dates the founding. Delegate authenticity was thin and is so recorded.

Later commission estimates are attributed to those commissions.

Established: Comintern was founded in Moscow in March 1919. Not established: that Lenin commanded every later foreign party.

Central files can show that an order was issued; they cannot reconstruct every locality's implementation. Memoir and literary evidence is independent texture, never the sole causal source. Official statistics of the period are treated as claims with known incentives. Later archival openings and museum publications are independent or successor-state records. The contribution is direct where this person signed, chaired, or issued the act, and remains bounded by other offices that had to act. Readers who want the welfare path should open the named driver rather than treating a portrait as the mechanism.

Causal path

How this event connects to drivers and indicators in the graph.

  1. ActorVladimir Lenin
  2. contributed toFactFirst Congress founds the Communist International in Moscow
  3. sets in motionDriverProxy-War Intensity

Cite this page

Factrail. (2026). First Congress founds the Communist International in Moscow. Factrail. https://factrail.ai/facts/ru-comintern-1919

https://factrail.ai/facts/ru-comintern-1919

Accessed 15 October 2026.

By the Factrail desk · Method: how we source and score · Last reviewed

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