In Search of POD for A Radically Different 1905 Russian Revolution

I was inspired to write this thread by a number of different things, including the "A Force More Powerful" companion book to the PBS series of the same name, John Green's Crash Course video on Nonviolence and Peace Movements particularly his ending conclusion speech, and Erica Chenoweth's "Why Civil Resistance Works." There's always debate about history and the merits of violent vs. nonviolent revolution, but taking these works together, they suggest an interesting historical possibility. The Russian Revolution of 1917 was undeniably a major historical event and shaped the world just as much on its own as World War I. But the 1905 Revolution did force some fairly significant concessions from the nobility, even a rather limited parliament and constitution is no small concession for any absolutist monarchy to make, so it was having an effect before it got crushed. Taking Erica Chenoweth's assertion that nonviolent resistance is more likely to provoke security force defections than violent resistance, since her evidence suggests soldiers are less likely to fire on nonviolent uprisings than armed ones. This is especially interesting given that the 1905 Revolutionaries seemed to be relying on that strategy of hoping that the army troops guarding Moscow would immediately defect once the uprising there started.

So here's an interesting WI? What if the 1905 Revolution had stayed nonviolent, but had continued a civil resistance campaign until they'd actually managed to overthrow the Tsardom? And afterwords this had inspired just as many anti-authoritarian/national independence movements as the OTL Russian Revolution did and let things snowball from there. I'm not a huge expert on the final days of the Russian Empire, and much of what I do know I'm rusty on, so I'm definitely willing to look at ideas and sources of information people have for a POD that might create that "nonviolent 1905 Russian revolution that does get the security forces to defect once they march on Moscow, the monarchy collapses, and this revolution goes on to inspire others, some successful, others not so much, but it starts a trend towards fewer violent and more nonviolent revolutions."

I think the POD would have to be sometime after 1875 to avoid too many butterflies making things especially complicated. I want the timeline to run up until about 2005, because I find that the longer the timeline goes on, the harder it is to keep everything totally plausible, conceive of every scenario, and avoid the temptation to dive into completely silly things just because it's cool *Glares at Harry Turtledove.* (I mean the Lizards were notorious ASBs to begin with, but Homeward Bound was a major middle finger to hard sci-fi that, Lizard Aliens aside, Worldwar had been up until then.) I already feel a 130 year maximum will probably involve me falling to the occasional temptations to make the timeline softer than it could/should be for the sake of "but this would be so cool!" because keeping track of all the butterflies would be difficult. Besides, any POD before 1875 probably has a major risk of outright butterflying away the Russo-Japanese war and Japanese victory in said war, ergo butterflying away the 1905 Revolution to begin with (even if this probably just kicks the can for the Czardom's demise down the road to 1917 like in OTL, or else not much farther than that.)

So it's kinda a borderline pre-1900s/post-1900s type thread since the POD is gonna straddle the era, maybe even break the borderline if someone can find a plausible change that would create a nonviolent 1905 Revolution in the first 5 years of the 20th century. And most of the timeline would run in the 20th Century. So if the mods want to move this or for me to delete and repost it in post-1900s because of its unique situation, I'll understand and comply.

I'm not totally lazy and have done some preliminary research so far though. The key to getting the Radically Successful!1905 Revolution seems to involve making a strong commitment to nonviolent resistance a major part of the revolutionaries ideology. This seems to me to involve one of three options: Firstly, change the attitudes of the Revolutionary leaders like Trotsky, Lenin, and Chernov away from the Marxist dialectic necessitating violent revolution to create the workers' state and believing that civil resistance tactics could achieve the same ends. This seems very unlikely but if anyone offers a reason why it could happen, I'll gladly take a closer look to see if the scenario holds water.

The second option, and what seems most interesting to me so far even if it has some barriers to plausibility to me right now, is instead of a Marxist-spearheaded revolution, the 1905 Revolution is a Toltsoyan-spearheaded revolution. The Toltsoyans would definitely be committed to civil resistance, they were a big influence on Gandhi after all, and had no great love for the Czardom, but the big thing is getting them to 1) become just a bit more mainstream than they were OTL and 2) take more direct action to overthrow the Czardom rather than just contentedly establishing their communes and leaving the monarchy be. There's also the issues of being totally opposed to any kind of police, military, courts, and sex. So Toltsoyan!Russia would have to have a more moderate strain of the ideology develop if it wanted to last more than, at best, 30 years before totally collapsing. Which we might do, but it still seems to undermine the idea of creating a world where civil revolutionary movements are more prominent because civil resistance's supposed major success story in this timeline would be even less of a success story than the Soviet Union was (at least if we go by chronological longevity rather than refraining from committing mass murder, which sadly seems the standard for a lot of people.)

An interesting third possibility is that some of the less bloodthirsty leaders of the 1905 Revolution, or figures similarly sympathetic to the revolutionaries ideals, like Chernov or Kropotkin, discovered Toltsoy (either his writings or meeting him in person), and become influenced by his nonviolent philosophies. Said quasi-Toltsoyan becomes an advocate of civil resistance and gains enough influence in the leadup to the 1905 Revolution to take it in that direction so that the garrison in Moscow defects rather than crushes the uprising when it happens.

Like I said though, I'm not an expert on the last 50 years of the Russian Empire. If anyone would like to recommend historical sources that would be helpful in getting me up to speed on this era (and the Russo-Japanese war that sparked this revolution) I'd gladly appreciate the offer. It doesn't matter if it's books, webpages, or threads in this very forum, I'll appreciate any information. If I feel the completed timeline I write is worthy of a legit publisher, I'll also be sure to thank anyone who gives me resources to make the timeline as good as it can be in the dedication page(s.) I'll also be glad to discuss ideas for both the Successful!1905 Revolution and the resulting butterflies as the timeline develops. Thanks for reading this TL;DR madness, I hope ya'll find this idea interesting, and eagerly await feedback.
 
It seems pretty hard for revolutionaries to stay non violent after being gunned down on Bloody Sunday.

I think a more interesting change would be if the Dogger Bank Incident involved German rather than British vessels.
 
The problem with having a drastic change in the revolutionaries’ plans is that there was no unified plan or even a political leadership to speak of.

The bolsheviks and the rest of them were caught unawares by the insurrection.

I just don’t see the mass of Russian workers peasants and soldiers who know they face a bullet or a Siberian prison deciding en masse to be peaceful.
 
I asked a question about what would happen if Tsar Alexander II had been killed in 1880 once and got no response. However, if that bomb in the Winter Palace is done correctly, maybe flammables being spread in the room between the explosion and the people or whatever, you could have a very interesting leadership over the next few years, with a Tsar ruling who is perhaps a small child needing a regent. Tghe idea of violence would have been seen as worse to many because this wasn't just an assassination (which had happened to other Tsars) but a slaughter of a whole bunch of people.

The ruler who emerges should be someone who is not so reactionary that he ruthlessly provokes people to violence, of course.

I think you also could use a Gandhi-type who preaches non-violence, but an impressionable lad born in the 1860s who sees this might choose, instead of being a normal cleric or whatever who just stays in the shadows, to truly get out and lead and preach against such things. I'm not saying India's Gandhi would work in Russia, but however such a person would work within the system.
 
The 1888 train wreck kills Tsarevich Nicholas. After Tsar Alexander dies in 1894 from nephritis, and Tsarevich George in 1899 from tuberculosis, Tsarevich Michael becomes Tsar. His image won't be tainted by Alexandra or Rasputin, and he'd be more likely than the other Romanovs to listen to demands for democratic reform.

(Unless Alexander's brother Vladimir has him taken out).
 
It seems pretty hard for revolutionaries to stay non violent after being gunned down on Bloody Sunday.

Actually, people gunned down on Bloody Sunday were not revolutionaries by any stretch of imagination: they were loyal monarchists who came to present Nicholas with a respectful petition. :teary:
 
I asked a question about what would happen if Tsar Alexander II had been killed in 1880 once and got no response. However, if that bomb in the Winter Palace is done correctly, maybe flammables being spread in the room between the explosion and the people or whatever, you could have a very interesting leadership over the next few years, with a Tsar ruling who is perhaps a small child needing a regent.

Well, mental capacities of Alexander III had been subject of the endless jokes among his contemporaries but I have a problem imagining situation where he, at the age of 35, is officially announced to be "a small child needing a regent". :winkytongue:

I think you also could use a Gandhi-type who preaches non-violence, but an impressionable lad born in the 1860s who sees this might choose, instead of being a normal cleric or whatever who just stays in the shadows, to truly get out and lead and preach against such things. I'm not saying India's Gandhi would work in Russia, but however such a person would work within the system.

You don't need to invent a "lad" born in 1860s preaching Gandhi-type ideas: Russia already had its own "genius" who was born in 1847, started preaching non-violence (and vegetarian) crap much earlier, became well-known and popular even outside Russia and actually was one of Gandhi's sources of inspiration. Did you hear about Lev Tolstoy? :winkytongue:
 
The 1888 train wreck kills Tsarevich Nicholas. After Tsar Alexander dies in 1894 from nephritis, and Tsarevich George in 1899 from tuberculosis, Tsarevich Michael becomes Tsar. His image won't be tainted by Alexandra or Rasputin, and he'd be more likely than the other Romanovs to listen to demands for democratic reform.

It is anybody's guess if Michael would be able to avoid the Manchurian adventure and managed the resulting war noticeably better than Nicky. Issue of the "democratic reforms" is a very vague and, as far as the available experience was going, the immediately seen results of these reforms were terrorism (all the way to the regicide), permanently unhappy "educated classes", dysfunctional judicial system and many other unpleasant things. We know too little about Michael, besides the fact that he did not want to be a Tzar (which quite well can be a result of a mental laziness) and that he was not prepared for the role any better than his brother. So how do we know who would be influencing him?

Now, as far as the "demands" part was involved, there were no meaningful opposition figures capable of formulating any comprehensive program of the acceptable reforms, just the (presumably) well-intentioned liberals with the very vague ideas and "the educated class" with even vaguer ideas and well-set opinion that whatever government is going to do is not enough, that government (including the local administration) is bad and that a "decent person" should not be cooperating with the administration no matter what. So, to whom Michael would have to listen?
 
Well, in my suggestion it was one of Alexander the third children who would need a regent but still... :)

Ask for the other, Tolstoy? Wow, I had no idea, that's like one of those Paul Harvey rest of the story revelations to me. Very interesting.


Well, mental capacities of Alexander III had been subject of the endless jokes among his contemporaries but I have a problem imagining situation where he, at the age of 35, is officially announced to be "a small child needing a regent". :winkytongue:

You don't need to invent a "lad" born in 1860s preaching Gandhi-type ideas: Russia already had its own "genius" who was born in 1847, started preaching non-violence (and vegetarian) crap much earlier, became well-known and popular even outside Russia and actually was one of Gandhi's sources of inspiration. Did you hear about Lev Tolstoy? :winkytongue:
 
Well, in my suggestion it was one of Alexander the third children who would need a regent but still... :)

Well, you explicitly mentioned 1880 and Alexander II (who would be killed year earlier than in OTL). If he is killed, he is replaced by Alexander III. Bot sure if the future Alexander III was even in the palace at the time of that explosion.

Ask for the other, Tolstoy? Wow, I had no idea, that's like one of those Paul Harvey rest of the story revelations to me. Very interesting.

You really did not know? Wow!
 
The 1888 train wreck kills Tsarevich Nicholas. After Tsar Alexander dies in 1894 from nephritis, and Tsarevich George in 1899 from tuberculosis, Tsarevich Michael becomes Tsar. His image won't be tainted by Alexandra or Rasputin, and he'd be more likely than the other Romanovs to listen to demands for democratic reform.

I was thinking of that disaster killing the entire family on that train, leading to Grand Duke Vladimir taking up the throne as a result.
 
I was thinking of that disaster killing the entire family on that train, leading to Grand Duke Vladimir taking up the throne as a result.

If only I could write. Would be a cool SI story in which the SI tries to stop the train crash, fails and makes it worse, followed by having to temper and guide Vladimir. Because Vladimir looks from what I can find a perfect charismatic front guy. He only needs to stay away from the military, leaving such to Brusilov or the like.
 
Gandhi had something called Tolstoy Farm in SA, and I believe he mentions Tolstoy in his biography too.

Of course, it goes almost without saying that Tolstoy had a huge negative effect upon the Russian society by adding one more factor to the existing collective confusion (BTW, in the issues related to the peasants he was quite retrograde arguing against the Stolypin reforms and the notion of the Russian farmer class). Basically, he created one more anti-government social group which, admittedly, was not violent but hardly productive in any shape or form. x'D
 
If only I could write. Would be a cool SI story in which the SI tries to stop the train crash, fails and makes it worse, followed by having to temper and guide Vladimir. Because Vladimir looks from what I can find a perfect charismatic front guy.

Yeah, sure. Except that it was he (Military Governor of St Petersburg) who screwed the Bloody Sunday (of course, not personally but Grand Duke Sergei did not organize Khodynka personally, either).


He only needs to stay away from the military, leaving such to Brusilov or the like.

Before WWI Brusilov was relatively low on Army's totem pole. Just one of the corps commanders.
 
The American education system is quite lax in foreign matters.

Yes, I know. This summer I found that Henry VIII and his wives are one of the grey areas so lapse on Tolstoy is quite understandable. But don't feel too bad: while ago I found that the Brits (even some of their professional writers) are associating Chekhov (not from Star Treck) with the boring plays while he was a famous humorist. ;)
 
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