The First World War destabilized the Russian Empire and undermined the old order. Numerous contradictions broke through and developed into a full-fledged revolutionary situation. In the fall of 1916, spontaneous unrest began in the capital of Russia. And part of the "elite" of the Russian Empire (grand dukes, aristocrats, generals, Duma leaders, bankers and industrialists) at that time weaved a conspiracy against Emperor Nicholas II and the autocratic system.
They planned to establish a constitutional monarchy following the example of England, which was close to them, or a republic based on the model of France, which would remove the restrictions of the autocratic system and gain "freedom." The cadre army, which was the mainstay of the empire and could easily sweep away the future "Februaryist" destroyers, had already perished on the fields of the First World War. The army itself became a source of confusion, and not a support for the autocracy. Thus, the "elite" of Russia itself was preparing to release the genie from the bottle. Although with the active support of our Western "partners" and allies in the Entente, and official opponents from the Central Bloc.
The "Februaryists" did not understand that the destruction of the autocracy would open the "Pandora's box", finally remove the bonds that hold back the deep, fundamental contradictions that tore apart the Romanov empire.
Major faults
- Under the Romanovs, an official Nikonian church was created, which crushed the "living faith." Orthodoxy has become a formality, the essence is enticed by the form, faith - empty rituals. The church became a department of the bureaucratic, state apparatus. A decline in the spirituality of the people began, a decline in the authority of the clergy. The common people are beginning to despise the priests. Official, Nikonian Orthodoxy is becoming shallow, it loses its connection with God, it becomes an appearance. In the final we will see blown up temples and temples turned into warehouses, the destruction of monastic communities. With complete indifference of the masses.
Wherein the healthiest part of the Russian people - the Old Believers, will go over to opposition to the Romanov state. Onor will they become the real heirs of the ideology of Sergius of Radonezh. Old Believers will preserve purity, sobriety, high morality and spirituality. They had nothing to do with the usual realities of Nikonian Russia - filth, drunkenness, laziness and ignorance. Moreover, the official authorities persecuted the Old Believers for a long time and turned them against the state. In conditions when they were persecuted for two centuries, the Old Believers withstood, retreated to the remote areas of the country and created their own economic, cultural structure, their own Russia. As a result, the Old Believers will become one of the revolutionary groups that will destroy the Russian Empire. The capital of the Old Believers, industrialists and bankers (who have worked honestly for centuries, accumulating national capital) will work for the revolution. Although the revolution itself will destroy the world of Old Believers.
- The Romanovs tried to turn Russia into a peripheral part of the Western world, European civilization, to recode Russian civilization. It is clear that the most people-oriented tsars - Paul, Nicholas I, Alexander III, tried to resist Westernism, the westernization of the social elite of the Russian Empire. But without much success. Which also became one of the main causes of the 1917 disaster. When the Westernized "elite" of the Russian Empire itself killed "historical Russia". In 1825, Nicholas was able to suppress the revolt of the Western Decembrists. In 1917, the Februaryists were able to crush the autocracy, and at the same time they themselves killed the regime under which they flourished.
Pyotr Alekseevich was not the first Westernizer in Russia. The turn of Russia to the West began even under Boris Godunov (there were separate manifestations under the last Rurikovichs) and the first Romanovs. Under Princess Sophia and her favorite Vasily Golitsyn, he completely took shape and the project would have developed without Peter. However, it turned out that it was under Peter the Great that Westernization became irreversible. It was not for nothing that the people believed that the king had been replaced during his trip to the West.
Peter made a real cultural revolution in Russia. The point was not shaving the boyars' beards, not in Western clothing and customs, not in assemblies. And in the planting of European culture. It was impossible to recode all the people. Therefore, they westernized the top - the aristocracy and the nobility. For this, church self-government was destroyed so that the church could not resist these orders. The church became a department of the state, part of the apparatus of control and punishment. Petersburg with western architecture full of hidden symbols became the capital of the new Russia.
Peter believed that Russia lagged behind Western Europe, so it was necessary to bring it on the "right path", to modernize it in a Western way. And for this to become a part of the Western world, European civilization. This opinion - about the "backwardness of Russia", will become the basis of the philosophy of many generations of Westernizers and liberals, right up to our time. Russian civilization and the people will have to pay a very dear price for this, millions of destroyed and distorted lives.
It is clear that such a view was formed in the mind of the young tsar, divorced from the traditional upbringing of the Russian sovereigns, under the influence of foreign "friends" and specialists. It was they who suggested to Peter the idea of creating a "new Russia", predetermined his understanding of the Russian state (Muscovy) as a backward country that needs to be radically modernized in a Western way, Westernize the elite - the nobility, in order to enter the "club" of the great European powers. Although the Russian kingdom had every opportunity for independent development, without Westernization and division of the people into a pro-Western elite and the rest of the people, the enslaved peasant world.
Thus, the Russian Empire had a congenital vice - the division of the people into two parts: an artificially withdrawn German-French-English-speaking "elite", noblemen-"Europeans", divorced from their native culture, language and people as a whole; on a huge, mostly enslaved mass, which continued to live in a communal way and preserved the foundations of Russian culture. There is a third part - the world of Old Believers.
In the 18th century, this division reached its highest stage, when the huge peasant mass (the overwhelming majority of the population of the Romanov empire) was completely enslaved and enslaved. In fact, the "Europeans" - nobles created an internal colony, they began to parasitize on the people. In doing so, they received freedom from their head of duty - to serve and defend the country. Previously, the existence of the nobility was justified by the need to defend the homeland. They were a military elite class that served until death or incapacitation. Now they were freed from this duty, they could live on the estate all their lives and mess around, hunt, go to balls, spoil the girls, etc.
The people responded to this universal injustice with a peasant war (the uprising of E. Pugachev), which almost escalated into a new turmoil. Petersburg was so frightened that it threw against the rebels the best commander, a man who preserved Russianness - A. V. Suvorov. True, we managed without him. After the suppression of the peasant war, the situation stabilized. In addition, in the first half of the 19th century, the serf noose was significantly weakened. However, the peasants remembered this injustice, including the land problem. Which ultimately ended in the disaster of 1917. After February 1917, a new peasant war began, estates burst into flames, and the "black redistribution" of land began. The peasants took revenge for centuries of humiliation and injustice. The peasant movement in the rear was one of the reasons for the defeat of the White movement. And the Reds with great difficulty put out this fire, which could destroy Russia.
- "Cannon fodder". The foreign policy of the Russian Empire, thanks to "Europeans" -westerners like Foreign Minister Karl Nesselrode (he held the post of Foreign Minister of the Russian Empire longer than anyone else, from 1816 to 1856), had a contradictory, pro-Western character, sometimes even anti-national. Thus, Russia often fought not for its own interests, but for the interests of its Western "partners", regularly providing the Russian "cannon fodder" to its allies.
We all know about the brilliant military past of the Russian Empire. We are proud of the victories of the Russian army and navy over the Swedes, Turks, Prussians and French. The battles of Poltava, near Larga and Cahul, Fokshany and Rymnik, the battles of Zorndorf and Kunersdorf, Borodino, the storming of Izmail, the heroic defense of Sevastopol and Petropavlovsk, the campaigns of Russian troops in the Caucasus, the Balkans, Italy, our Germany and France - all these are memory and pride. As well as the victories of the Russian fleet at Gangut, Chesma, Navarino, Athos, Sinop, the capture of Corfu.
However, despite the brilliant exploits of the Russian commanders, naval commanders, soldiers and sailors, the foreign policy of the Russian Empire was largely dependent and other powers took advantage of Russia in their own interests. Russia pursued the most independent policy under Catherine the Great, Paul, Nicholas and Alexander III. In other periods, Vienna, Berlin, London and Paris successfully used Russian bayonets in their own interests.
In particular, Russia's participation in the Seven Years War (tens of thousands of dead and wounded soldiers, time and material resources spent) ended in nothing. The brilliant fruits of the victories of the Russian army, including Königsberg, already annexed to the Russian Empire, were wasted.
In general, it should be noted that Russia focused all its main attention and resources on European affairs (a consequence of the westernization of Russia). With minimal results, but huge costs, often pointless and meaningless. So, after the annexation of the Western Russian lands during the divisions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Russia did not have major national tasks in Europe. It was necessary to focus on the Caucasus, Turkestan (Central Asia) with the release of Russian influence in Persia and India, in the East. It was necessary to develop their own territories - the North, Siberia, the Far East and Russian America.
Russia could have a decisive influence on the Chinese, Korean and Japanese civilizations in the East, take dominant positions there. Russia bordered on these great civilizations, that is, it had an advantage over the West in the Greater Far East. There was an opportunity to start "Russian globalization", to build their own world order. However, time and opportunity were lost. Moreover, thanks to the pro-Western party in St. Petersburg, Russia has lost Russian America and the potential for further development of the northern part of the Pacific region with the Hawaiian Islands and California (Fort Ross).
In the West, Russia got involved in a senseless and extremely costly confrontation with France. But it is extremely beneficial for Vienna, Berlin and London. Paul I realized that Russia was being dragged into a trap and tried to get out of it. They made peace with France, it became possible to create an anti-British alliance that would restrain the global ambitions of the Anglo-Saxons. However, the great sovereign was killed. Alexander I and his pro-Western entourage, with the full support of England and Austria, dragged Russia into a long confrontation with France (participation in four wars with France), which ended in the death of many thousands of Russian people and the burning of Moscow. Then Russia, instead of leaving a weakened France as a counterweight to England, Austria and Prussia, liberated Europe and France itself from Napoleon.
After that, Russia supported the Holy Alliance and anti-revolutionary policies in Europe, using its resources to support the decaying regimes. In particular, with the support of Russia, Greece gained freedom, where England immediately took the dominant position. Russia saved the Austrian Habsburg Empire from the Hungarian Revolution. All this ended in the catastrophe of the Eastern (Crimean) War. When our "partner and ally" - Austria, played a decisive role in the defeat of Russia, threatening war if St. Petersburg continues to resist.
It is also worth noting that the Western "partners" have been setting Turkey against Russia for two centuries. Paris, London and Vienna regularly used the "Turkish club" to contain Russia in the southern strategic direction, in the Balkans and the Caucasus, so that the Russians did not reach the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean. Russia gave freedom to Serbia. Belgrade thanked by dragging Russia into confrontation with Austria and Germany. The Russians liberated Bulgaria. The Bulgarians planted the German dynasty around their necks and during the First World War they sided with our enemies.
In 1904, the pro-Western party in the Russian Empire itself and the masters of the West played off the Russians and the Japanese. Which led to a heavy defeat for Russia and a weakening of its positions in the Far East. In addition, Russia's attention was again focused on Europe. In the interests of London, Paris and Washington, the Russians were pitted against the Germans. England and France fought to the last Russian soldier, solving their strategic tasks and weakening competitors - Germany and Russia.
- A resource and raw material appendage of the West. In the world economy, Russia was a raw material periphery. Petersburg of the Romanovs achieved the integration of Russia into the emerging world system, but as a cultural and raw material, technically backward peripheral power, albeit a military giant. Russia was a supplier of cheap raw materials and foodstuffs to the West.
Russia in the 18th century was for the West the largest supplier of agricultural goods, raw materials and semi-finished products. In the first place in the export was hemp (a strategic commodity for the British Navy), in the second - flax. The main export went to England and Holland. At the same time, in conditions when the British lost their American colonies, the flow of Russian raw materials was vital for England. It was not for nothing that when Nicholas I began a policy of protectionism, this was one of the reasons why the British unleashed the Eastern (Crimean) War with the idea of dismembering the Russian Empire. And after the defeat, Russia immediately softened the customs barriers for England.
Russia drove raw materials to the West, and the money received by landowners, aristocrats and merchants was spent not on the development of domestic industry, but on overconsumption, the purchase of Western goods, luxury and foreign entertainment (the “new Russians” of the 1990-2000 model repeated all this). Loans were also taken from the British. Not surprisingly, the Russians became England's cannon fodder in the fight against Prussia in the Seven Years War and Napoleon's empire for world domination (a fight within the Western project). Then the most important principle of British politics was born: "To fight for the interests of Britain to the last Russian." This lasted until the entry into the First World War, when the Russians fought with the Germans for the good of England and France.
In the first half of the 19th century, Russia exported timber, flax, hemp, hemp, bacon, wool, bristles. About a third of Russian imports and about half of exports came to Britain in the middle of the century. Until the middle of the 19th century, Russia was the main supplier of grain to Europe. Thus, the economy of the Russian Empire was a resource and raw material appendage of the rapidly developing industrial Europe (primarily England). Russia was a supplier of cheap resources and a consumer of expensive European products, especially luxury goods.
The situation did not change much in the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries. England was ousted by Germany and France. Under Alexander III and Nicholas II, Russia somewhat strengthened its economy, industry and finance, but in general the dependence remained, it was overcome only during the Stalinist five-year plans. Russia "got hooked" on French loans and worked them out in full during the First World War, rescuing the French over and over again.
The proceeds from the sale of raw materials were not used for development. Russian "Europeans" were engaged in overconsumption. Petersburg high society eclipsed all European courts. Russian aristocrats and merchants lived in Paris, Baden-Baden, Nice, Rome, Berlin and London more than in Russia. They considered themselves Europeans. The main language for them was French and then English. It is worth saying that in 1991-1993. this vicious system has been restored.
The problem of chronic industrial and technical backwardness was one of the prerequisites for the defeat in the Crimean War. We know the end of industrial, technical backwardness: the crisis of military supplies in 1915-1916, the lack of heavy weapons, the "shell shortage", the purchase of equipment, weapons and ammunition abroad. As the documents of those years testify, the Russian army lacked almost everything that was needed in the war, and first of all - rifles and cartridges.
General A. N. Kuropatkin, who became the personification of defeat in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, can probably be blamed for many sins, but not for lack of intelligence, observation and pedantry in his diary entries. On December 27, 1914, during the ód operation, he wrote the following entry in his diary: “AI Guchkov arrived from the forward positions. He talked a lot. The army cannot cope with food. People are starving. Many do not have boots. The legs are wrapped in cloths. The loss in the infantry and in the officers is enormous. There are regiments with several officers. The state of artillery reserves is especially alarming. He read me the order of the corps commander not to spend more than 3-5 shells per day on a gun. Our artillery does not help the infantry, showered with enemy shells. One rifle brigade did not receive staffing for 3 months. During the fighting, when the Germans broke out of the bag [during the ód operation], they sent 14,000 men without guns to the right flank. This column came close to the battle line and very constrained the troops."
It should be noted that chronologically this entry refers to the end of the fifth month from the moment of Russia's entry into the Great War and the tragedy of the “Great Retreat” is still far away. Thus, in almost six months of hostilities, the Russian Headquarters of the Supreme Command, headed by the Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, not only failed to organize the proper functioning of the rear of the army, but also found itself in the conditions of an acute crisis in the supply of ammunition and weapons - shells, rifles, cartridges.
“The spring of 1915 will remain in my memory forever,” General A. I. Denikin. - The great tragedy of the Russian army is the retreat from Galicia. No cartridges, no shells. From day to day bloody battles, day after day difficult transitions, endless fatigue … I remember the battle near Przemysl in mid-May. Eleven days of the brutal battle of the 4th Rifle Division - eleven days of the terrible rumble of German heavy artillery, literally tearing down entire rows of trenches along with their defenders. We almost did not answer - there was nothing. The regiments, exhausted to the last degree, repulsed one attack after another - with bayonets or point blank fire; blood poured, our ranks thinned, burial mounds grew - two regiments were almost destroyed by German artillery fire ….
At the beginning of July 1915, when the catastrophe of the Russian army had already become a fait accompli, and the "Great Retreat" was taking place on all fronts with Germany and Austria-Hungary, the commander of the North-Western Front, General MV Alekseev, presented to the Minister of War his report on the reasons for the endless defeats. Among the factors of "detrimental effect on operational considerations and the morale of the troops" the following were noted: 1) the lack of artillery shells - "the most important, most alarming drawback with a fatal effect"; 2) lack of heavy artillery; 3) the lack of rifles and cartridges for them, - “holding down the initiative in operational matters and leading to the collapse of the issue of new formations, etc.
For the sake of fairness, we note that the crisis phenomena in the First World War in combat supplies were experienced by all the armies of the belligerent powers without exception. However, only in Russia, this led not to temporary difficulties in supply, but to a full-scale crisis, in fact, to the collapse of the military supply of the front, which was overcome by a terrible method - the burning of many hundreds of thousands of human lives in the fire of battles. All these are the consequences of the government's lack of attention to the industrialization of the Russian Empire and the raw material nature of the economy.
As a result, in fact, the cadre imperial army burned down in the fire of the war, hundreds of thousands of soldiers died due to the technical backwardness and dependence of Russia on the West, and the weakness of industry. The empire lost an army that could save it from turmoil. The new army was no longer the mainstay of the empire and autocracy; it itself became the carrier of the virus of the revolution. The peasant soldiers dreamed of returning home and solving the land issue, the officers-intellectuals (teachers, doctors, students, etc.) cursed the authorities, joined the work of the revolutionary parties.
- National question. Petersburg was unable to establish a normal Russification of the national outskirts. Moreover, some territories (Kingdom of Poland, Finland) received privileges and rights that the state-forming Russian people, bearing the burden of the empire, did not have. As a result, the Poles rebelled twice (1830 and 1863), became one of the revolutionary units in the empire. During the First World War, the Poles began to be used by Austria-Hungary and Germany, which created the Russophobic "Kingdom of Poland", then England and France took up the baton, which supported the Second Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth against Soviet Russia.
Due to the lack of a reasonable policy in the national area, Finland became a base and a springboard for revolutionaries. And after the collapse of the empire by the Russophobic, Nazi state, which was going to create “Greater Finland at the expense of the Russian lands. Moreover, the most ardent Finnish Nazis planned to occupy the northern Russian lands up to the Urals and beyond.
Petersburg was unable at the right time to destroy the Polish influence in the Western Russian lands. He did not carry out the Russification of Little Russia, destroying the traces of Polish rule, the germs of the ideology of Ukrainians. Also, mistakes in national policy can be seen in the Caucasus, in Turkestan, in the Jewish question, etc. All this fiercely manifested itself during the Revolution and the Civil War.
