Russia's Search for Liberty: Part III. Rebels and Riots

The 1905 revolution was doomed almost at its inception. On Sunday 9 January 1905 more than 300 people were slain at a rally meant to display peasant support for the tsar. The state security minister misinterpreted the intent of the demonstrators and thought the placards they carried featured derogatory portrayals of the tsar. Nicholas II ordered the military to attack the crowd. That seemed to justify his reputation as "Nicholas the Bloody".

After the Duma was suspended in 1907, SR leaders broke ranks with their Social Democrat Party allies. As the Social Democrat Party fragmented, the bolsheviki (majority) and mencheviki (minority) blocs emerged. Vladimir Lenin selected these titles. The bolsheviki were actually the minority bloc, but after they seized the government in 1917, they became the majority (and only) party. Their rise to power was aided by one thing they bitterly opposed: war among democratic capitalist European states.

Wars usually provide an incentive for failing economies, but that did not happen to Russia. The first foray towards military grandeur and economic havoc Nicholas II orchestrated as Commander-in-Chief was the Russo/Japanese War (1904-1905). This endeavor was a precursor of later Russian military debacles. Mainly confined to Naval engagements, Russia and its ruler emerged from the battles as a less-than-great power. The government tried to hasten railway and factory development to mend its eastwards supply lines, but the tools and labor were inadequate to the task. After its partial defeat at the hands of Japan, Russia vowed to develop and train a modern military. As part of this effort, the Russian government closed its official war college (1905-1909), and few officers gained promotions. When the bureaucrats and strategists finalized their plans, it was too late to prepare for a new crisis.

Like the war against Japan, the war against Germany (1914-1917) quickly lost public support. Labor shortages were one source of difficulty. Millions of peasants were conscripted to fill the trench-bound brigades. Bread rations inadequate to feed Russians during the bitter winter were imposed; Russians rioted in the streets. The political price of these riots was the abdication of the tsar, the rise and fall of the weak provisional government led by Aleksandr Kerensky, and the evolution of Soviet Russian communism.

Next week: Part IV. The New Regimes.

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