How much potential did Russia have before WWI?

In the 20th century Russia became a Superpower and one of the two strongest countries in the world in the first half of the 20th century. This was in spite of losing 12 million people between WWI and the Civil War, 20+ million killed by Stalin/Lenin, 25+ million killed in WWII, and being run by Communist for a long time. They also had their country ravaged by two world wars and a civil war.

With either no WWI or a shorter war that didn't damage Russia as much, provided the Tsarist regimes are forced to slowly head towards a more democratic system, and provided Russia has more stability, just how powerful could they become?

It seems like without losing 50+ million people between 1914 and 1945 and avoiding the complete devastation of the Civil War, they could have been much stronger than the Soviet Super Power of the 20th century.
 
So you think it was more in spite of those disasters, and less because, that Russia became the other superpower?
 
One way to guess this would be to track industrial growth from around 1890 & try to project that growth into the 1920s & 1930s absent the Great War. Comparisons with growth in other nations that industrialized a few decades earlier might be useful here.
 
So you think it was more in spite of those disasters, and less because, that Russia became the other superpower?

Absolutely. The Tsarist Russian economy was the fastest growing in Europe before WWI. By the end of the Civil War factory and mining production in Russia had fallen to 20% of it's prewar levels, Iron production had fallen 98%,
and both their cultivated land and cattle stock fell by over a third. Russia not only spent an entire decade without progressing, they destroyed years worth of prewar economic growth. If Russia hadn't fought those wars they could have continued growing at an alarming rate instead of destroying themselves.

They were no longer in the global market and lost most of their access to global foreign investment post civil war. The world war and civil war also meant losing Finland, the Baltic Republics, and Poland, and Bessarabia.

You could say that the World Wars helped them become a Super Power in that the rest of Europe's Empires were destroyed, but they could have collapsed or weakened without Russia losing 50 million people and turning Red.
 
Hindsight's 20/20. Tsarist Russia might have been politically creaky but economically exploding, mostly due to foreign investment until WWI pushed it over the cliff.

IMO Kerensky or some other government embracing a more gradual industrialization and growing the internal economy away from feudally-owned plantations and mining being the main earners to exporting finished goods in a system of international trade with decent alliances and ties to most major nations would've been a much less tragic nightmare for the Russians and other peoples.
It ain't easy.
It would've taken decades to get the process rolling and
since Russia skipped light industrialization and commercial banking, not to mention all the fun economic and political things Western Europe developed and ran with from 1600-1915 that Russia only got piecemeal, Stalin's heavy industrial utopia was a disaster.

The problem was that the folks wanting revolution most were Western-educated or very heavily tied to Western institutions, understood the technologies and political theories and wanted to Xerox all that to Russia without addressing the social and economic underpinnings of Western progress.
Russia wasn't alone in a checkered campaign of trying to reform itself during the 1800's- the Ottomans next door tried many of the same strategies of adopting Western technologies but not allowing society to change accordingly.

The Russian peasant or industrial worker fresh off the farm was so pissed about being disposable labor at the negligible mercy of landlords, moneylenders, and tsarist recruiting sergeants that they wanted to smash the system, redistribute land and didn't think too hard about what followed.

When the Bolsheviks came out with the slogan "Bread and Peace", it was compelling argument after nearly fifteen years of Tsarist failure and casualties from the Russo-Japanese War on.

LSS, you needed to avoid the Russian populace completely losing faith in liberal politics or reforms to get and things moving in the right direction.
My POD would be the KaDets (Constitutional Democrats) actually pulling a Meiji-level social transformation in 1905.

I've mentioned before how foreign investment was powering a lot of Russian development-- railroads and mines and power companies and so forth, that might have gotten an official OK from corrupt officials lining their pockets but weren't something understood or particularly supported by the local populace.

In essence, I see Russians doing what Taiwanese, Koreans, and Japanese did which was adopt the technologies and management principles, make the social reforms, and Westernize over three generations. The results of same would make you blush in prosperity, technical progress, and overall.
 

Coulsdon Eagle

Monthly Donor
I've always heard about Russias big economic growth pre-WWI, but could someone link me to an article on it?

Zuber's The Real German War Plan: 1904-14" sources the German 1912 intelligence summary for Russia noting theat Russian industry was booming and tax revenues were flowing in. There was a 1bn mark positive trade balance and the state budget increased by 285m marks but was still in balance, even allowing for 110m marks of state debt being redeemed ahead of schedule.

He states that there was a Russian budget surplus in 1913 that "allowed unforeseen expenditures to the tune of 800m marks to be covered" without resorting to loans or increasing taxes. The budget estimate for 1914 was 660m marks greater than 1913. This is according to the German 1913 intelligence summary for Russia.
 

Kongzilla

Banned
You know what could make an interesting TL, a world where there isn't any World Wars. Just a massive hundred year cold war. Russia can replace America since they're isolationist. While Britain, France and Russia have the upper hand at the start Britain and France weaken like OTL. Both sides supporting rebellions in the others. So Finnish and Polish resitance to the Russians and what not. Could be pretty cool.
 
You know what could make an interesting TL, a world where there isn't any World Wars. Just a massive hundred year cold war. Russia can replace America since they're isolationist. While Britain, France and Russia have the upper hand at the start Britain and France weaken like OTL. Both sides supporting rebellions in the others. So Finnish and Polish resitance to the Russians and what not. Could be pretty cool.
If there are no World Wars France and Russia may still stay allied and Britain more or less friendly to them, depends what Germany and Austro-Hungary will do and how much Russian will interfere in areas of British interest (Afganistan, Iran). France investment were huge in Russia before war.

But let say France abandon their investment in Russia and together with Britain they will support Polish resistance against Russians. Resistance will sooner or later spill over the border to Germany and Austro-Hungary. (See Kurdish resistance and movements in Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Syria OTL). So you will get economically strong Russia allied to Germany and Austro-Hungary. Afterwards, Germans may feel even stronger with Russian backing and supplies secured and France will be in big trouble.
 

Kongzilla

Banned
I was thinking more along the lines of Germans and Austro-hungarians supporting polish resistance. And I think that Germany was pretty stable. Nothing majorly upsetting to the populace in 1914, except maybe if the Kaiser refuses to liberalize. Leading to some discontent but that will only last until Wilhelm croaks and someone smarter takes up the thrown.
 
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