The Russian Revolution

[FlakJacket]

Was having a read the other day and had one of those 'What if...' moments. What do people think would have happened if Russia had decided to stay neutral in the First World War- ignoring the fact that Russia mobilising was one of the main triggering factors?

How would it have affected the outcome on the other fronts? Would the revolution have gone ahead at a later date without a trigger like the massive losses to the Germans due to other internal pressures? Could Nicholas have clung to power or would he have screwed it up another way?

 

[Chairman Yang]

The revolution was caused not only by the 1st WW. Poverty and starvation was spread all over, the war with the japansese sprung the first protests and registration and harrasment of communists and anarchists by the tsars secret police.

Factory Soviets started occupying plants, peasants stormed big landowners estates. The revolution was well under way even before the outbreak of the war.
However, it was not until in WW1 when the tsar saw that he couldnt rely on his troops as they would even join protesters in the streets home in Moscow when ordered to shoot at them, and therefore resigned, giving the power to the provisional government, which comrades Lenin, Stalin and Trotsky later overthrew.

I would say that the revolution would have come no matter what, although perhaps somewhat later if Russia had never entered the war.

 

[joespaniel]

Without the war, the communists would not have come to power.

The logical leap is no Nazi Germany either.

Both countries were in dire straights when these radical groups took over.

Without major economic instability, massive unemployment and chaos thier chances were nil.

 

[Chairman Yang]

Originally posted by joespaniel
Without the war, the communists would not have come to power.

The logical leap is no Nazi Germany either.

Both countries were in dire straights when these radical groups took over.

Without major economic instability, massive unemployment and chaos thier chances were nil.

So you are saying everything was jolly and good in Russia before the war?

 

[Mongoloid Cow]

Russia was pretty much forced into war against Austria-Hungary. The Russians had called themselves the protectorts of slavs, but the Austro-Hungarians were in the process of taking most of the slavic countries. Russia's reputation and integrity would have been damaged beyond anything you could imagine had they not gone to war. What the Tsar needed to stay in power was military success against the Kaiser. That was probably the final straw, losing battle after battle to Prussia. Had the army conquered Konigsberg or Berlin, the Russian people would have been more forgiving.

But in answer to your question, the Tsar would have been deposed anyway. When war broke out, everyone had a sudden burst of nationalism which was lacking before the war. The Tsar could've been overthrown in 1914 or 1915 quite easily.

 

[wtiberon]

Russia entered the first World War in hopes of of gaining the coveted Balkans...Russia had been drooling over the Balkans and made several attempts to claim them but kept getting beat back by England and France. Anyway the war was the major catalyst for revolution and I think the Czar could have held out for at least a few more years...but eventually the wave of communism would have toppled them over and we would call it the May revolution.

 

[Saruman]

Originally posted by FlakJacket
...Could Nicholas have...

Nicolai

Oh, and how was the Ottoman Empire conected to WW1? Didn't they loose alot in the middle-east?

 

[Toasty]

Communism was as likely to happen as the First World War...all it needed was a good excuse...

 

[wtiberon]

Originally posted by Saruman


Nicolai

Oh, and how was the Ottoman Empire conected to WW1? Didn't they loose alot in the middle-east?

The Ottomans sided with the Germans in the first WWI and after the Peace of Paris treaty was signed they lost their whole damn country...Turkey and other nations were created after the Ottoman Empire (which was extremely weak anyway...Europeans called it the sickmans empire) was dissolved. The only reason it was kept alive even that long was because England and France kept it alive because it was scared if it dissolved then Russia would move into the Balkans.

 

[Mongoloid Cow]

No, Russia was also scared of an Ottoman Empire collapse. There would have been a few wars, but eventually a more powerful country would emerge which could have the potential to repel European advances. That's why Britain was so quick to crush Mohammed Ali in Egypt at the beginning of the 19th Century.

 

[wtiberon]

Originally posted by Mongoloid Cow
No, Russia was also scared of an Ottoman Empire collapse. There would have been a few wars, but eventually a more powerful country would emerge which could have the potential to repel European advances. That's why Britain was so quick to crush Mohammed Ali in Egypt at the beginning of the 19th Century.

Russia was not scared of the Ottomans collapse in fact there arose the question "how would we devide the Ottoman Empire once it collapsed." Europe was looking foward to when it did collapse. Soon Prussia replaced England and France as the primary supporter of the Ottomans which is how they became to support Germany in the first WW.

As for Muhammad...The Ottomans had begun to lose control of its provinces and local rulers were more or less ignoring orders from Istanbul. Muhammad had decided to create a completely independant nation and began to rebel. He was very successful and only after the intervention by the European powers in 1840 was he defeated. He and his family remained in power in Egypt but with restraints and under the Sultan's rule. So Europe was not scared of Muhammad they were simply allies of the Ottomans and didn't want an independant Egypt for economic reasons.

 

[Mongoloid Cow]

I clearly know and understand why the Ottomans supported Prussia and Austria-Hungary in World War I, and I know the politics and the thinking of Europeans in that era. And trust me, Britain and Russia and France had a lot to lose if Mohammed Ali succeeded.

 

[Hamlet]

Without WW1, there was no chance of The Bolsheviks gaining power. If you went and asked somebody in 1914 about the chances of The Bolsheviks running Russia in four years time, they would have laughed.

The Bolsheviks were catapulted to power during a serious national emergency, when in effect the entire Russia state had disintergrated. Baring another such occurance on that scale, The Bolsheviks stood no chance of gaining power. There was no widescale thirst for Communism amongst the populace in 1914, (Look how many deputies the radical groups had in the successive Dumas, for god's sake - albeit on a very limited franchise) and nor would there have been.

 

[MrPresident]

The Bolsheviks were catapulted to power during a serious national emergency, when in effect the entire Russia state had disintergrated.

The Bolsheviks revolution wasn't a popular one. They basically took power in the middle of the night. There were no running crowds as in the old Soviet propaganda film about the October revolution. They were a well-organised small milita force not a popular revolutionary movement.

The Tsar could've been overthrown in 1914 or 1915 quite easily.

I disagree. It was the complete failure of the WWI campaign that brought about the collapse of the Tsar without it he would have survived for much longer. Though his tendency (or his wife's) to want absolute power might have proved his downfall but that would have been later, much later.

However, it was not until in WW1 when the tsar saw that he couldnt rely on his troops as they would even join protesters in the streets home in Moscow when ordered to shoot at them, and therefore resigned, giving the power to the provisional government

The Tsar resigned because they would have shot him if he didn't, not because he saw he couldn't rely on his troops.

 

[Hamlet]

Originally posted by MrPresident
The Bolsheviks revolution wasn't a popular one.

This is a common mistake to make when discussing the subject. The Bolsheviks were not given explicit encouragement by the populace to seize power, yes.

However, it is a serious mistake to say that the Bolsheviks were just a small sect that seized power from nowhere. They had control, by this point, of The Moscow and St. Petersburg Soviets, to name but the two most important ones.

They were gaining immense support amongst the average Russian. They went on, let us not forget, to successfully rally an army behind them from basically nothing, and subsequently win a civil war.

When you consider all this, the point of whether or not the Soviets storming The HQ of the Provisional Government was directly subscribed to by the populace seems somewhat moot.

 

[Kamilian]

In my opinion, the Bolsheviks probably wouldn't have come to power, or at least it would take them longer, if one of these two things happened:
a) WW1 wouldn't break out - or it would break out but Russia would remain neutral.
b) WW1 broke out, Tsar was overthrown, and Kerensky's Provisional Gov't would've called for immediate elections to the Constituent Assembly or would've pulled out of war and began land/social reform, economic reform, etc.
a) My reasoning behind the first is that the Russian Tsar still had support in 1914. By 1915, it began to drop and the Tsarist regime under his wife in 1916 lost most, if not all, of its support. Had he remained neutral, then Russia would still have the Tsarist Monarchy. Of course, had the Germans launched an invasion on Russian territoriees in Poland, Ukraine, and the Baltic states, then the population probably would have supported a Russian war effort - it would've been, after all, for the defense of their homeland. Probably the February Revolution would be reduced to just petitioning and a few isolated demonstrations that the Tsar create a democratic, directly-elected Duma, in effect transforming absolutism into constitutionalism.
b) You must remember that, since the Provisional Gov't refused to pull Russia out of the war or carry out land/social reform to appease the peasant and farmers until the Constituent Assembly convened on these matters, anarchy ruled in the rural areas - the peasants and farmers began to carry out land reform on their own through violence by seizing the properties from the nobility. This severely hurt the Provisional Gov't ability to function, as it did not have the support of the majority of the Russian people. The Provisional Gov't also refused to call elections to a Constituent Assembly - it constantly pushed back the date that the elections would be held, giving the Bolsheviks and other extremists more time to rally support against the Gov't and gain control of the Soviets. In the summer, a right-wing military uprising broke out. Kerensky claimed that it was a counterrevolutionary rising and moved to suppress it. However, he had by then begun to lose the favor and support of the left wing. Basically, while the PG was running Russia into ruin, paralysis, anarchy, and inflation, the Bolsheviks began to take over Soviets to "complete the socialist revolution and bring Russia out of constant disorder and paralysis".