In establishing a stable government, maintaining the people's happiness has always been a foremost issue. Although many governments relied on force to maintain control over their people, lasting governments have always provided peace and prosperity in return. Governments that have failed in this pact have seen their reigns end in an explosion of popular anger. Such discontent fueled the fall of the Athenian despots in the ninth century BC and led to the rise of the Athenian Republic. Nearly two millennium later, Tzar Nicholas II abdicated the Russian throne after popular riots in Moscow. Soon after, the Red Army swept the world's first communist government into power.