Bog, Vozhd, Rodina - The History of the All-Russian People’s State

Who do you think it’s the Vozhd gonna be ?


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Here’s my crack at it.


Kislitzin.jpg

Name: Vladimir Alexandrovich Kislitsin.

Gender: Male.

Age: 36 (January 9, 1883).

Birthplace: Bila Tserkva, Kiev Oblast, Russian Empire.

Occupation: Infantryman (Russo-Japanese War), Colonel (Great War), OOB Vice-Chief (present).

Political views: Right-wing, former Tsarist-turned pro-PNOR. Having served with distinction in both the Russo-Japanese War and the Great War, Kislitsin is a very patriotic man and the fall of the Romanov Dynasty combined with the Kerensky government’s disastrous Brusliov Offensive along with the humiliating surrender and peace treaty with the Central Powers drove the young colonel mad. With the tsar gone, Kislitsin hates the ruling governments of the so-called “Russian Republic” and see them along with the republic as weak and corrupt thus making the Russian nation weak and corrupt. Kislitsin sees the PNOR and its leader Mikhail Tukachevsky as a way for Russia to regain its greatness and destroy its enemies – be they internal or external.

Background: As a son of Admiral Alexander Kislitsin, Vladimir was educated at the Odessa Military Institution in 1900 and the Sandomir Officer Training School. He was assigned to the Special Frontier Corps on the Western border of the Russian Empire and served in the Russo-Japanese War.

During the course of World War I he was an officer of the 11th Dragoon Regiment, gaining the rank of colonel in 1916. Kislitsin was awarded the Order of St. George of the Fourth Degree (1915), the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Imperial House of Romanov) of the 3rd and 2nd classes, the St. George honor weapon, and the Order of St. Anna, the 4th and 1st classes. He was repeatedly wounded, many times in the head. The ex-colonel now has joined the PNOR as a loyal party member and is part of its security force and paramilitary arm, the Otryady Obespecheniya Bezopasnosti (OOB), and has quickly rose through its ranks it become OOB chief Boris Savinkov’s right hand man – though he is doubtful of his superior’s convictions to the party due to him being a former Social Revolutionary (SR).

Regardless of his feelings towards Savinkov, Kislitsin has done a great service for the PNOR’s paramilitary wing – using his experience as a battle hardened veteran of both the Russo-Japanese War and the Great War to give the OOB more military-like structure, training, and overall command, making it go from a disorganised band of what was little more than street thugs made up of criminals, disgruntled soldiers, ex-Black Hundreds, and disaffected former Social Revolutionaries into a small and highly trained, but rapidly growing, private army for the PNOR.
 
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brooklyn99

Banned
So, how would any of you imagine the PONR to be like, militarily speaking? What commanders would be serving the regime? One would imagine Vlasov being one of them, but his military career only started when he enlisted with the Red army in 1919 during the civil war, being a student in agro-science beforehand, and would likely continue to be so. Also, would the author wish to include some of the more obscure white emigres to partake with the PONR? Unknown yet interesting folks whose wikipedia pages would only be in Russian, prehaps?
 
Name: Alexei Ruslanovich Konstantinov (also goes by Ruslan)
Gender: Male
Age: April 20, 1895
Birthplace: Zlatoust
Occupation: Metalworker (1910-1914) Soldier (1914-1917) Metalworker (1917-) Political Activist (1917-)

Political Views:
Alexei was raised as a Russian Nationalist, and so when the Great War started in earnest, he enlisted in the Army the first day he heard about the war. Since he was old enough, and was physically fit, he was promoted to Senior Unteroffizier, (sergeant equivalent) after a few weeks on the front. He always found it ironic that the Russian army, which used propaganda squads that almost never fought themselves, used German-named ranks and sometimes insignias. Partaking in the German front, where there never seemed to be a victory, he grew a general hatred for Germans, Austrians, and even Western Europeans in general, which he saw as not assisting Russia enough. He didn't necessarily despise Jews, but he didn't think highly of them, instead preferring to treat them individually with the respect that he thought they deserved. He is a staunch industrial progressive, as such he believes a sort of Ultranationalist technocracy is the best way to move Russia forward. He does not believe in the ultimate racial superiority of Russians, but instead just believes them to be the People with the Iron Will, one of the few races on earth that will do whatever it takes to make the world a better place.

Background: The second of five children, Alexei's father was a blacksmith and metalworker in Zlatoust. He owned a small business and made enough money to have a modest home, big enough to avoid the claustrophobia of seven people in a room. They did fairly well, and Alexei and his brother Vladimir were chosen as the successors of the family business. The brothers worked for their father, who enrolled them in school, and hired them at his shop. They learned their trade, and were never shown favoritism over other workers, and grew used to the shop. Alexei married at seventeen, to a Natalia Kabanov, another Blacksmith's child. He left for the Army at nineteen, and when he came back, he lived with Natalia for a month, before moving to Moscow to support the little known PNOR, which he only heard about from a conversation he overheard on a train ride back home. His family are Tsarists at heart, and did not support his affiliation with the PNOR, but they still care for him, as a family should, and Alexei cares for them as well.
 
So here is my own character, i hope that it would be accepted by the author.

Name: Yuriy Zakharov

Gender: Male

Born: 01.05.1895

Birthplace: Moscow

Occupation: 1914 – 1917 Soldier


1917 – 1919 Manual Worker

Political views:


Embittered by the post-war Russian situation, Yuriy has completely changed his worldview. Before the war, he could have been considered a cosmopolitan. However, everything changed when Yuriy was enlisted in the army. Fatal situation on the front, Russia's defeat against Germany, ubiquitous corruption and the incompetence of its commanders completely changed Yuriy. Yuriy began to blame the Tsar, the aristocracy and the entire ruling class for the increasingly worse situation in the country. His views seemed to be confirmed as correct when Russia was completely defeated by Germany and forced to sign the Treaty of Lublin. After the war, his views began to be even more extreme and radical. According to him, it was not only the tsar and the aristocracy who was to blame, but almost everyone who was not affected by the post-war crisis. This group included the rich, Jews, clergy and bureaucrats. The theory has developed in Yuriy's mind that Russia and the Russians fell victim to an international conspiracy aimed to destroy his homeland and his compatriots. Yuriy has also completely rejected Christianity. In his opinion, Christianity was an instrument of the Jews and clergy to enslave and exploit the Russians and Russia. He also believed that the answer to this must be a return to the religion of his ancestors, i.e. Slavic paganism. Yuriy's great dream was to completely rebuild Russia and Russian society so that Russia could be reborn like a phoenix from ashes. The aim of this country would be complete domination of Asia and Europe and avenging defeat in the Great War. Russia's aim should be a unificationof all Slavic people against the Jewish-German threat. In his theory, Yuriy has emphasised the place and role of the Russian people. According to this theory, it was the Russians who were the real l chosen people predestined to rule Eurasia for the next thousand years.

Background:


Yuriy was born in Moscow in 1895. His father worked in a factory and his mother was a seamstress. As a child he did not cause much trouble and could always count on the support of his parents and siblings. After graduating from school Yuriy wanted to become a student, but his family was not sufficiently wealthy to send Yuriy to study. In 1914 Yuriy was called up to the Russian army. During this time Yuriy served as a dispatch runner. He spent the last months of the war in hospital because he was seriously injured in his left leg. After the end of the war and demobilisation, Yuriy returned to his family home in Moscow. Unfortunately, after returning home, Yuriy could not find a permanent job and was forced to take on various jobs as a gardener or doorman, which led him to bitterness and desperation. Over time, Yuriy fell into alcoholism and spent all his money on alcohol. He also spent more and more time in beer halls. The breakthrough moment in his life was the day when he heard for the first time an exciting speech of the man known as Mikhail Tukhachevsky. This speech made such an impression on Yuriy that he considered this man to be someone he would follow in the fire. Under the influence of a speech by Tukhachevsky and his own beliefs Yuriy decided to join the PNOR.According to Yuriy, his life started to make sense again and his life's aim was to serve the party, the leader and the Russian people.
Name: Vladimir Pavlov
Gender: Male
Age: 27 (b. March 6, 1892)
Birthplace: St. Petersburg
Occupation:
Student (1910-1914)
Soldier (1914-1916)
Junior Officer (1916-1917)
Professor (1918-1919)
Political views: Believes in the idea of Russia as a "Eurasian" nation, incorporating the best of Europe and Asia and shaped by the geography of the Eurasian steppes, arguing that Russian people (and by implication, the other Slavic peoples of Eastern Europe) have more in common with the peoples of the Eurasian Steppes in the Turks, Mongols, and native Siberians than with the Europeans. He has a theory of European history as well where he argues that there are three natural "civilizations" in Europe, the Romantic Civilization (a category which, to him, also includes the Greeks), the Celto-Germanic Civilization, and the Eurasian Civilization and that Celto-Germanic Civilization is a greater threat to the Romantic and Eurasian Civilizations than the Romantic and Eurasian civilizations are to each other, therefore, the Romantic and Eurasian civilizations must band together to defeat the Celto-Germanics.

As such, he believes that Russia needs to eliminate "Celto-Germanic" influence, believing that a "fifth column" of "Celto-Germanics" sabotaged the Russian war effort and that Russia needs to "renew" itself under the Vozhd. Despite this, he, in accordance with his belief in Russia as a Eurasian nation, is open to integrating Russia's various Turkic minorities into the Russian state. In addition, he sees in Tukhachevsky a "philosopher-king" who would "renew" Russia and set about creating a "Eurasian" nation.
Background:
Vladimir Pavlov was born to a prominent aristocratic family on March 6, 1892 and initially wanted to become a professor of history and while he is still such a professor, focusing on studies of the interactions between Russians and the various peoples of the steppes, the experiences he had as a soldier and later as a junior officer would change him forever as he fought against the Germans during the war heroically and developed a close rapport with a Tatar soldier who was his best friend in the trenches until he died just before the war ended. The war would radicalize him against the Germans and when he returned to his studies, he would come into contact with one Nikolai Trubetskoy, who he shared many ideas regarding Russia as a "Eurasian" nation with him. However, Pavlov, having served in the trenches, would develop a more radical take on the Eurasianist ideas of his friend and eventually join Mikhail Tukhachevsky after hearing a speech of his.
Name: Natalia Pavlova (nee Orlova)
Gender: Female
Age: 25 (b. September 25, 1894)
Birthplace: St. Petersburg
Occupation:
Nurse (1914-1917)
Author (1918-Present)
Political views: Like her husband, a devout follower of Eurasianism and the idea that Russia is a "Eurasian" nation with more similarities with the Turkic peoples and the Mongols than the West in terms of culture and background. As such, she believes that Russia must become the leader of the Eurasian peoples and lead the Eurasian civilization to victory against the "Celto-Germanics."
Background: Natalia Pavlova, much like her husband, was born to a wealthy aristocratic family and would initially live a life of relative comfort and luxury until the Great War, where she would volunteer as a nurse and would meet the love of her life, Vladimir Pavlov, while he was being tended to his wounds during the war. As the relationship between them blossomed with the two writing to each other after Vladimir had recovered, the two shared many ideas and would share a devotion to the ideology of Eurasianism. However, while her husband became a professor, Natalia would become an author, initially writing poetry about the relationship of the Russian people to its geographical settings but is currently writing a historical novel on the life of Alexander Nevsky, emphasizing both his struggles against the Teutonic Knights and his close alliance with the Mongols.
I could see Stalin becoming something of Bormann in TTL, it was a how he gained power OTL afterall. Will he continue to finance PNOR the same way he financed Bolsheviks?

Name: Grigory Shorin
Gender: Male
Age: born October 14th 1892
Birthplace: Mishutino (village between Yaroslav and Vologda
Occupation: peasant, soldier (1913-1917), lumpenproletariat
Political views: Grigory never held any strong political views, except the need for agrarian reform, but he was swept up by the mass movement of disgruntled soldiers in 1917, however he grew disillusioned by the revolutionary government, whom he considered no lesser bunglers than the tzarist predecessers. Feeling used, he was soured on the politics in general, until he started running errands for PNOR.
Background: Born as eight of fourteen children in poor peasant family, Grigory's outlook in life was poor. Doing farm work on land that would be never his, he was expected to look for his chances in life elswhere, after he served his conscription duty. Learning to read and write in the army, he turned into voracious reader, but his clumsy handwriting would be his source of embarasment for his entire life. The war exposed to him the deadly the incompetence of the Tzarist army, which he barely survived, rising to the rank of feldwebel, as attrition took the toll on the regiment. The fact that army still used German ranks, three years into war was not lost on him. The loss of war, demobilization and general anarchy in Russia made him bitter and cynical. He survived these years doing whatever odd job he could find and petty crime, dreaming of somehow earning enough for a piece of land of his own, but unlike so many of his down on the luck compatriots, he preferred reading (especially history books) to drowning his sorrows in alcohol. Library card was cheaper than vodka bottle afterall.
Then one day he got paid to take part in breaking up a PNOR meeting in Petrograd, but looking at drunk ruffians he was supposed to join and their alerted and sober counterparts, he decided that he wanted no part of yet another painful defeat. Soon enough he was part of the PNOR protection group, finding again comradeship he missed since his demobilization.
Here’s my crack at it.


Kislitzin.jpg

Name: Vladimir Alexandrovich Kislitsin.

Gender: Male.

Age: 36 (January 9, 1883).

Birthplace: Bila Tserkva, Kiev Oblast, Russian Empire.

Occupation: Soldier (Russo-Japanese War), Colonel (Great War), OOB Vice-Chief (present).

Political views: Right-wing, former Tsarist-turned pro-PNOR. Having served in with distinction in both the Russo-Japanese War and the Great War, Kislitsin is a very patriotic man and the fall of the Romanov Dynasty combined with the Kerensky government’s disastrous Brusliov Offensive along with the humiliating surrender and peace treaty with the Central Powers drove the young colonel mad. Though the tsar is gone, Kislitsin hates the ruling governments of the so-called “Russian Republic” and see them along with the republic as weak and corrupt thus making the Russian nation weak and corrupt. However, Kislitsin sees the PNOR and its leader Mikhail Tukachevsky has a way for Russia to regain its greatness and destroy its enemies – be they internal or external.

Background: As a son of Admiral Alexander Kislitsin, Vladimir was educated at the Odessa Military Institution in 1900 and the Sandomir Officer Training School. He was assigned to the Special Frontier Corps on the Western border of the Russian Empire and served in the Russo-Japanese War.

During the course of World War I he was an officer of the 11th Dragoon Regiment, gaining the rank of colonel in 1916. Kislitsin was awarded the Order of St. George of the Fourth Degree (1915), the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Imperial House of Romanov) of the 3rd and 2nd classes, the St. George honor weapon, and the Order of St. Anna, the 4th and 1st classes. He was repeatedly wounded, many times in the head. The ex-colonel now has joined the PNOR as a loyal party member and is part of its security force and paramilitary arm, the Otryady Obespecheniya Bezopasnosti (OOB), and has quickly rose through its ranks it become OOB chief Boris Savinkov’s right hand man – though he is doubtful of his superior’s convictions to the party.

Regardless of his feelings towards Savinkov, Kislitsin has done a great service for the PNOR’s paramilitary wing – using his experience as a battle hardened veteran of both the Russo-Japanese War and the Great War to give the OOB more military-like structure, training, and overall command, making it go from a disorganised band of initially street thugs made up of criminals, disgruntled soldiers, ex-Black Hundreds, and disaffected former Social Revolutionaries into a small and highly trained, but rapidly growing, private army for the PNOR.
Name: Alexei Ruslanovich Konstantinov (also goes by Ruslan)
Gender: Male
Age: April 20, 1895
Birthplace: Zlatoust
Occupation: Metalworker (1910-1914) Soldier (1914-1917) Metalworker (1917-) Political Activist (1917-)

Political Views:
Alexei was raised as a Russian Nationalist, and so when the Great War started in earnest, he enlisted in the Army the first day he heard about the war. Since he was old enough, and was physically fit, he was promoted to Senior Unteroffizier, (sergeant equivalent) after a few weeks on the front. He always found it ironic that the Russian army, which used propaganda squads that almost never fought themselves, used German-named ranks and sometimes insignias. Partaking in the German front, where there never seemed to be a victory, he grew a general hatred for Germans, Austrians, and even Western Europeans in general, which he saw as not assisting Russia enough. He didn't necessarily despise Jews, but he didn't think highly of them, instead preferring to treat them individually with the respect that he thought they deserved. He is a staunch industrial progressive, as such he believes a sort of Ultranationalist technocracy is the best way to move Russia forward. He does not believe in the ultimate racial superiority of Russians, but instead just believes them to be the People with the Iron Will, one of the few races on earth that will do whatever it takes to make the world a better place.

Background: The second of five children, Alexei's father was a blacksmith and metalworker in Zlatoust. He owned a small business and made enough money to have a modest home, big enough to avoid the claustrophobia of seven people in a room. They did fairly well, and Alexei and his brother Vladimir were chosen as the successors of the family business. The brothers worked for their father, who enrolled them in school, and hired them at his shop. They learned their trade, and were never shown favoritism over other workers, and grew used to the shop. Alexei married at seventeen, to a Natalia Kabanov, another Blacksmith's child. He left for the Army at nineteen, and when he came back, he lived with Natalia for a month, before moving to Moscow to support the little known PNOR, which he only heard about from a conversation he overheard on a train ride back home. His family are Tsarists at heart, and did not support his affiliation with the PNOR, but they still care for him, as a family should, and Alexei cares for them as well.

It’s so exciting to see how many people are engaged in the character creation of this story. Each with their own unique background and in the end getting together into a single movement to change the history of the world. Thank you folks, I really appreciate that.

As for Stalin, the matter of raising money in the PNOR is quite different from the Bolshevik way, and while he would have his own schemes, they will have to be toned down because of the next member to join the Inner Circle of the Vozhd.
 
I was thinking, if France fell in 1916 (worse Verdun, no American credit?) then the tanks didn't get much use in WWI, so armored warfare concept will be even more theoretical in the 20's and 30's than it was OTL.
 
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I was thinking, if France fell in 1916 (worse Verdun, no American credit?) then the tanks didn't get much use in WWI, so armored warfare concept will be even more theoretical in the 20's and 30's than it was OTL.

Maybe this time the more fluid combat on the Eastern front of World War One is the driving force behind tanks, making moreso them tank-tank instead of tank-infantry from the beginning.
 
RISE OF THE VOZHD: THE YEARS OF DELUSION
RISE OF THE VOZHD
THE YEARS OF DELUSION

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Yuri never knew that hell was cold until he reached Vorkuta, all the tales told by the priests since his childhood depicted hell as a red world full of fire and sulphur where the Devil and his demons tormented his soul for eternity. But now he saw that as a blissful improvement of his current situation in a much worse kind of hell, the Vorkuta Katorga, a system created by the Tsars of old that was abolished by the Republican government prior to the Vozhd. Vorkuta was where men went to die, or at least work until they wished to, a cold place, he didn’t even know the temperature it was supposed to be now, where he was forced into mining coal with a pickaxe under the watch of trigger-happy guards who just looked for an excuse to shoot. He had already lost two of his foot fingers to frostbite and his left toe to a pickaxe accident, he was given a bandage and nothing more, not even a day off or even a new pickaxe. He recalled when one poor bastard broke his pickaxe, the wood had been rotting since the last time there was a rain, he was stripped of his thin coat, walking with just a linen shirt that left him completely exposed to the cold, he didn’t wake up on the next morning and his body was left to root.

He remembered the day he was taken, it was the last date in his mind, 23rd of May 1931, the agents of the OOB, a group of folks he thought were just a bunch of thugs and troublemakers dressing up like real soldiers, caught him while he walked back home late at night, putting a sack on his head and throwing him inside of a truck with other poor souls. During the trip no word was said, he only recalled a single incident where they stopped to bring in one guy and one of the prisoners tried to make a run for it, only ending up tripping on the floor and getting a bullet to the chest, he bleed out in the way to Vorkuta and his body was thrown away in a frozen river.

Once he arrived, he was shoved out of the truck, the sack finally removed and he would see the scenario he would get so used to: There was nothing but grey, the sky was grey, the clouds were grey, the trees were either covered in snow or dead, not even the snow was white, it was just a sad grey with some ponds of freezing water. He was put on a line surrounded by guards, if they were wearing masks or not he didn’t notice, what difference would it make if their expression didn’t change anyways ? He walked for half an hour in the freezing wind, each blow was like a thousand needles cutting through his skin, he started losing the feeling of his fingers, one poor man, probably no younger than 60, could not handle the cold any second longer, his legs failed him and he fell down to his right side, still barely breathing, the prisoners were ordered to ignore as he was dragged into the woods and the echo of a gunshot was heard, scaring off the birds. He would then finally arrive at his final destination where a sign was held above the gate saying “Все долги подлежат оплате”, “All debts are payable”.

He recalled that part, apparently the Vozhd and his goons thought that people like him had some kind of “debt” that had to be paid to the Russian people and the Motherland itself. He would enter the tent where other prisoners were walking through where a bureaucratic guard, who somehow looked even colder than the outside, with the most uninterested voice that a man could muster, was seated behind steel bars, signing up on some papers. It was his turn. “Name ?” “Yuri Alexandrovich Karloff.” After a few seconds ruffling through papers, the bureaucrat would find his name. “You are from... Kazan, son of Vasily Karloff and Olga Karloff ?” “Yes.” “You will remain in section 16, row 25, go down this way to receive your uniform.”

The Uniform was not designed to be comfortable, in fact he had to constantly scratch his neck in the first days until he just got used to it. Each prisoner had a number, his’ was 44597, and once he arrived at his new home, he would see a tight space made up two 3-deck beds, a sink, a toilet, a few windows for fresh air and single lamplight dangling on the ceiling. That was his new home, and he seemed to be the first one there so he picked his bed and laid back on it, it was surprisingly more comfortable than he thought, but to compensate his pillow was a literal piece of log. Soon the door opened, seemed to be his first roommate, he had a joyful face as he saw someone getting inside, but that suddenly turned into a mix of surprise and hatred. It was a man whose face looked like a square, his hair cut to make it even more like so. “So, you are my roommate ?” The man said, but he could only spit venom on him as he looked at his face. He got up to his feet and walked towards the man who took a step back, pressed against the wall. The next words he said almost as low as a whisper, with nothing but pure anger and hatred, for him to be in that situation.

“This is all your fault, Kerensky.”


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Alexander Kerensky, Minister-President of Russia, was the de facto leader of the Republic, Chernov might’ve been a figurehead, a public face for the government, but every member of the Duma knew who was in charge. The years between 1918 and the takeover of the PNOR were some of the harshest Russia had ever suffered since the time of troubles, millions of unemployed flooded the streets, the Great War had destroyed the growth that the Russian economy experienced in the past years, and now poverty skyrocketed. The social unrest seemed to have reduced after the Treaty of Lublin but the “honeymoon” only lasted until the constitution was approved and went under fire for either being too radical or not radical enough, and the government couldn’t do anything to stop the rise of radicalism, it’s own laws were so resolute on protecting freedom of speech that they couldn’t arrest Vladimir Lenin even if he continued to advocate a Soviet takeover. The Soviets started gradually losing their power and radicalization as the government structures solidified, yet they still retained a powerful influence that threatened the government if turned against it.

As the Kerensky government began, his first mandate would last until 1920 and he spent those two years trying his best to fulfill the titanic effort to restore the nation into a path of prosperity, justice, and equity. But it was hard to find someone to invest in Russia, not just the world was still at war in the Middle East and Africa, but who would wish to create a farm that could be taken over by a group of rebellious peasants ? Who would be investing in an industry in Petrograd if it would be held hostage by the Soviets ? Kerensky saw that the economical recovery would only come with the political stabilization, although the latter greatly depended on the former. He feared that if he used emergency powers from the Duma he could end up overthrown himself, but with the majority of the security forces by his side, Kerensky felt confident enough to launch a crackdown on the Russian countryside, fighting his own supporters of the Left-SR movement and peasant leagues.

The June days of 1918 are considered by some as the end of the Russian Revolution, when the forces of reaction, ironically used by a Social Revolutionary, cracked down on his own movement causing a schism in the SRs that would pave a way for Tukhachevsky’s takeover. The army under General Lavr Kornilov, a known anti-communist and sympathizer of the Tsar, cracked down on rural movements from anarchist communes to Left-SRs that up to that moment were members of Kerensky’s government. Thousands of arrests were made while hundreds of communes that resisted were destroyed by the military, in Southeastern Ukraine there was a full scale military campaign against a coalition of anarchist communes led by the Anarchist Nestor Makhno. This period of reaction ended up drifting the Kerensky government away from the radical left and split the Social Revolutionary Party in two, the Left-SRs would join the Mensheviks and other left forces in Kerensky’s coalition to leave the government, losing him his majority in the Duma. Modern historians and economists consider that such repression by Kerensky was needed in order to restore order in the Russian countryside, but that the political effects crippled the Kerensky government and provoked a wave of popular delusion in the revolution that would be instrumental in bringing the rise of the PNOR.

Tsar Nicholas II had spent the last year and half in a hitatus, in house arrest with his family in Tobolsk, living on the governor’s house over a hundred miles from any major settlement. To say that opinions about him were controversial was a complete understatement, the public hatred of him was considerably diminished since the Revolution as the new government lost it’s popularity but he still remained as the most divisive figure in Russia. The reactionary and conservative movements, including the Kadets that once opposed him in the Duma, now viewed him with a mix of nostalgia and pity, while the Social Revolutionaries and Progressivists continued to speak the name of the Tsar in anger. But to continue to hold him in house arrest was becoming an increasingly precarious position, especially with the new laws and the right to Habeas Corpus that the law provided. In January 1919, at the anniversary of the Revolution, a representative of the Duma of the Kadets raised the issue that the Tsar was being held for over two years without a fair trial and he should finally be put in court to settle the affair once and for all. It was a surprisingly agreed proposal by the Duma, no one, not even the Tsar, should be kept imprisoned without a fair trial, for the left it was a chance to finally expose the full extent of his crimes and legitimize his status as prisoner, to the right it would be a chance to restore his image and maybe even release him.

Nicholas went to court on the 1st of April 1919 and it became the most famous trial in history since Louis XVI, for the first time a Russian Tsar would be judged by its people, with a group of 11 judges picked to supervise the proceedings. There was a great question of a jury should be used and who would be picked, a jury of 15 randomly picked civilians would be chosen. For 3 months both the defense and prosecution teams would collect evidence from the Tsarist archives to be used in Court, and finally on the day, the Tsar would arrive, dressed up in his old military uniform with a greying beard and hair. His crimes were read before him: The unlawful imprisonment of thousands of political enemies, the pogroms launched against the Jewish citizens of Russia, the mass repression of public gatherings, the murder of thousands of protesters during the 1905 revolution, the attempts to suppress the New Year Revolution by ordering the troops to open fire at the protesters, among others. He plead not guilty.

Soon it would start a 3-months long judicial conflict, the defense team’s main tactics were to claim that none of these were crimes, and the suppression of the protests wasn’t ordered by him. The Bloody Sunday of 1905 was used by the prosecution while the defense claimed the Tsar didn’t order the soldiers to fire and wasn’t even in the city. The Prosecution team showed itself comically incompetent, constantly citing the Tsar breaking up laws that didn’t even exist at the time. Dozens of witnesses were called including generals and former imperial ministers, the public opinion started swigging in the Jury, when the Pogroms were called, one of the viewers reportedly said “Who cares about some fucking Jews ? His crime is not killing them all !” The man in question was Vladimir Kislitsin, a former soldier who would later that year become one of the major figures inside the PNOR.

In the end, the Jury would spend two weeks to reach a decision, but they ended up reaching no consensus “Beyond reasonable doubt” of the Tsar’s guilt, automatically absolving him from his crimes. The gambit of the Kadets paid off and the Tsar ended up released, causing a general outrage on the Republican government and even more delusion of populist and left-wing sectors of society on not just the government but the justice system itself. After being released the Tsar was greeted by his followers, but he decided to retire with his family, moving to Alexander’s palace near Petrograd. Still, the government would keep him under strong watch, although legally free, he would still feel like a prisoner.

The trial of Nicholas II ended during a period when Kerensky’s government was reaching its end, although he held a strong base of supporters in the Duma, the lack of a majority made governance difficult, and the only reason he was able to survive a no-confidence vote was the division between the right and the hard left of the Duma. After the June Days, Kerensky hoped to attract foreign investors to the countryside, and with the Great War finally slowing down he hoped that it would allow a greater freedom of commerce. American and Japanese industrials were among the first to come, while even German Junkers started finding the potential in the vast Russian territory, although their investment was seen with heavy suspicion. The British were still prevented from accessing Russia due to the ongoing naval war and the blockades in the Baltics and Bosporus to British ships and citizens. But soon it seemed like the economy was beginning to recover by the end of 1918, with social unrest slowing down and a certain political security restored.

But in 1919, the war was over, and the recession began. The demobilization of a 4-year long war economy provoked a wave of unemployment, the harsh war reparations imposed by the victorious Germans upon the French had made it practically impossible for the French Republic to pay its war debts to Britain and America, and as response the British banks that loaned to the French government could not pay back the American loans. Soon the French government was forced to default in 1919 with the economies of the former Entente nations and America crashing down. Investments in Russia would be pulled back, the banks tightening the belts, all while the Germans had their own unemployment crisis to deal with, with the Reichstag approving an increase in tariffs in order to pull back investors to the Reich. The Russian economy, already fragile, went downhill, unemployment soared to over 27% in May compared to the 15% in March. With several business closing doors, the wages of workers were slashed by the surviving factories resulting in a call for a General Strike to be made by the Petrograd Soviet on the 17th of August.

The General Strike was a death kneel for the Kerensky government, while he sympathized with the workers, he saw that some of the demands made by the Soviets had political objectives. Lenin used the General Strike to spread his message, calling for a Revolution and finding echo of his message in Petrograd. A revolution seemed close to arriving and Lenin was already making preparations to launch an attack in the Duma during a session in October. But like before, destiny likes to play a game of changing in Russia.

On the 24th of September 1919, while making a Public speech in Sverdlov Square, would end up being shot by an unknown assailant in the middle of the crowd. The Bolshevik leader would be rushed to a Hospital but the doctors couldn’t stop the hemorrhage and he died later that day, the shooter was discovered to be a former businessman that was left penniless after the call for General Strike ended up bankrupting his factory. The death of Lenin, similar to Purishkevich’s in 1917, ended up being a major crippling blow to the party, the Bolsheviks would end up losing their momentum for revolution and would never reach so close to a takeover again, although they would continue to exist as a strong force in the Soviets, which would serve as a major scapegoat for Tukhachevsky.


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Kerensky’s government was forced to give in to most of the strikers’ demands, but his government already was buried 6 feet under. By the end of the year, when making a speech of the New Year Revolution, Kerensky was booed by the crowd, with his guards quickly shoving him in his car as the crowd started throwing rotten fruits, eggs, and even bottles of Vodka on him. With several death threats, Kerensky would come forward to the Duma in January announcing he would be stepping down from his position, calling for a General Duma election and handing his resignation letter to President Chernov, who would assume power temporarily until the Duma choose a new Minister-President. The elections of 1920 would begin and some began to hope for a new beginning, while Kerensky went back to his Dacha, it wasn’t the last time his country would call to him, for the worst years of the Republic weren’t over yet.

And for the first time in 1920, a new party would appear as an option: The Party of Russian National Renewal, the PNOR.
 
Are you liking this format of showing parts of Russia under the Vozhd before beginning a proper chapter ? Would you be interested in playing some classical music with each chapter that is related to the theme ? The Vozhd has a passion for Violins after all.
 
Are you liking this format of showing parts of Russia under the Vozhd before beginning a proper chapter ? Would you be interested in playing some classical music with each chapter that is related to the theme ? The Vozhd has a passion for Violins after all. Also glad to see Kislitsin mentioned in the update.
I like the formatting style very much. Music would be a nice touch.

If you do decide to use music might I suggest this piece for any more stories of the Katorga system?

 
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Depending on how many OTL figures you use, there's quite a wide variety of people to use in this strange Slavic Fascist Russia you have created. No doubt, especially when you need to verify your clock.
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Who is this guy ? And what is “Midnight” ?
Sergey Taboritsky from TNO a HOI4 mod
Midnight is when he realizes that Alexi is dead and the idea of the Russian nation is destroyed with his death.

What Legion said above. Sergey Taboritsky was also a collaborator with Nazi Germany, heading the Bureau for the Russian Refugees in Germany and worked for the Gestapo. He was also a Russian nationalist and monarchist.

He TNO he's far more... extreme in his views due to circumstances. But, I could see him staying in Russia seeing as how it falls a fascist/nationalist regime rather than a communist one. The main reason why he emigrated from Russia to Germany.
 
What Legion said above. Sergey Taboritsky was also a collaborator with Nazi Germany, heading the Bureau for the Russian Refugees in Germany and worked for the Gestapo. He was also a Russian nationalist and monarchist.

He TNO he's far more... extreme in his views due to circumstances. But, I could see him staying in Russia seeing as how it falls a fascist/nationalist regime rather than a communist one. The main reason why he emigrated from Russia to Germany.
Well, he seems to be an... interesting figure. Although it would be hard for him to rise if he is still half-Jewish, Ilyin is only able to do so here due to a personal friendship and protection of the Vozhd, and being German is still a little better than being Jewish in the PNOR, unless he manages to hide it, then some use can be found for him.
 
Well, he seems to be an... interesting figure. Although it would be hard for him to rise if he is still half-Jewish, Ilyin is only able to do so here due to a personal friendship and protection of the Vozhd, and being German is still a little better than being Jewish in the PNOR, unless he manages to hide it, then some use can be found for him.
Well I have a catalogue of Russian nationalists and or fascists that could work along side the Vozhd.
 
Well, he seems to be an... interesting figure. Although it would be hard for him to rise if he is still half-Jewish, Ilyin is only able to do so here due to a personal friendship and protection of the Vozhd, and being German is still a little better than being Jewish in the PNOR, unless he manages to hide it, then some use can be found for him.

The Problem that Taboritsky runs into (head first at full speed, I might add) is not only his ethnicity, but his views regarding the monarchy, a Fascist state is either virulently anti or fanatically pro monarchy. His quest for Alexei in TNO actually destroys Russia forever, since he believes that Alexei will save Russia. Since he never does, Taboritsky will never succeed.

Now, without a reason, just begging, please don't put him in the story as a major character in the PNOR
 
Also for Taboritsky, here is information on him from TNO:
 
Name: Pavel Timofeyevich Gorgulov (OTL's Paul Gorguloff)
Gender: Male
Age: June 29, 1895
Birthplace: Labinsk, Kuban Oblast
Occupation:
Soldier (1914-1917)
Medical Student (1917-1919)
Political views: A devout Russian nationalist who believes that Russia is a "Scythian" nation who will inevitable triumph over the Western civilization and believes in the power of the "national peasantry" as the basis of a powerful Russia. While not necessarily aligned with the radical Eurasianist elements of the PNOR, his beliefs do overlap in some ways with the beliefs of the radical Eurasianists, namely in how both believe that Russia is a nation forged out of the steppes.
Background: Pavel Gorgulov was born in the Kuban region to a family of Cossacks who were also wealthy farmers who inculcated Russian nationalism, love of rural life, and anti-Semitism to the young Pavel Gorgulov. Despite this, Gorgulov would initially desire to become a doctor and while he is still studying to be one, his experiences in the war, including a head wound he sustained, has resulted in him being a changed man. Whereas he was once a devout monarchist, he is now a supporter of a nationalist right-wing "republic" as a result of his disillusionment with the Tsar and he has been organizing his fellow students after listening to Tukhachevsky speak.
 
Name: Pavel Timofeyevich Gorgulov (OTL's Paul Gorguloff)
Gender: Male
Age: June 29, 1895
Birthplace: Labinsk, Kuban Oblast
Occupation:
Soldier (1914-1917)
Medical Student (1917-1919)
Political views: A devout Russian nationalist who believes that Russia is a "Scythian" nation who will inevitable triumph over the Western civilization and believes in the power of the "national peasantry" as the basis of a powerful Russia. While not necessarily aligned with the radical Eurasianist elements of the PNOR, his beliefs do overlap in some ways with the beliefs of the radical Eurasianists, namely in how both believe that Russia is a nation forged out of the steppes.
Background: Pavel Gorgulov was born in the Kuban region to a family of Cossacks who were also wealthy farmers who inculcated Russian nationalism, love of rural life, and anti-Semitism to the young Pavel Gorgulov. Despite this, Gorgulov would initially desire to become a doctor and while he is still studying to be one, his experiences in the war, including a head wound he sustained, has resulted in him being a changed man. Whereas he was once a devout monarchist, he is now a supporter of a nationalist right-wing "republic" as a result of his disillusionment with the Tsar and he has been organizing his fellow students after listening to Tukhachevsky speak.


@Whiteshore I see that you are very interested in Gorguloff, but don’t just go and make an alternate bio for someone that already existed irl before the PoD. I understand people making Pre-PoD bios because they are meant to be people that might’ve existed irl but were not relevant. Only change IRL personalities AFTER the PoD.
 
@Whiteshore I see that you are very interested in Gorguloff, but don’t just go and make an alternate bio for someone that already existed irl before the PoD. I understand people making Pre-PoD bios because they are meant to be people that might’ve existed irl but were not relevant. Only change IRL personalities AFTER the PoD.
Fair enough. Going to make an OC soon anyways.
 
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