Okhrana Doesn't Miscalculate

Here is a thread starter for you. What would have happened if the Okhrana (or Okhranka) did not miscalculate in the sending exiles to Western Europe instead of to Siberia. At the end, it propably did the regime in. Here are some CIA files to help you decide: https://www.cia.gov/library/center-...ns-of-the-russian-imperial-police/5474-1.html

Also, as a booby prize, there are the side issues of Father George Gapon with the Okhrana (a false march not coordinated with the secret police and the authorities shooting at them, kicking off the 1905 rebellion apparently). Or the strange march of the Okhrana Paris Branch documents into Herbert Hoover's short, stubby arms (sort of, more accurately into the Hoover Institution). And sealed from 1925 to 1957, which makes me wonder if Raiders of the Lost Ark ending came from this incident.

Enjoy!
 
Author/Compiler's Note: This is a first in a planned series of thematic collections of articles that appeared previously in classified editions of the Intelligence Community journal Studies in Intelligence, which is published at CIA. As part of its "openness" policy, CIA has declassified more than 1,200 articles from the first 40 years of Studies.

The Okhrana's initial assumption--that exile in Europe rather than Siberia or some other remote place would act as a safety valve for such groups--proved erroneous. Russian emigrants did not assimilate quickly or easily, and some discovered that relatively greater freedom in the West gave them broad opportunities to engage in antiregime activities.

The last imperial ambassador to France, Basil Maklakov, closed his mission in Paris and sealed its secret files, but he reopened them when the official inquiry began. After the short-lived Provisional Government fell to Lenin and the Bolsheviks in November 1917, Maklakov resealed the files and waited for further instructions.
France refused to resume relations with the radical new government in Moscow. It withheld recognition until 1924, when the USSR was formed. Maklakov, meanwhile, was not idle. Taking advantage of the confusion in Moscow, he placed the Okhrana files in sixteen 500-pound packing crates, which were then bound with wire and sealed.

The files, however, remained intact and were awaiting shipment to the Unites States. The ambassador convinced Christian Herter, then associated with Herbert Hoover's American Relief Administration and later Secretary of State

Maklakov's contract with the Hoover Institution and his longevity--he died in Switzerland in 1957 at age 86--kept the archive under wraps for more than three decades. The Institution opened the packing crates at a gathering of reporters and photographers on 28 October 1957. (5) It took the privately supported Institution five more years to find funds and assemble a staff to organize and catalogue the files.
 
It's an interesting question but I'm not sure how much it would affect the eventual overthrow of Nicholas II. The key actors after all weren't exiles but a mixture of Duma politicians and the mob. However, an examination of the role of Father Gapon could yield some interesting finds.
 
It's an interesting question but I'm not sure how much it would affect the eventual overthrow of Nicholas II. The key actors after all weren't exiles but a mixture of Duma politicians and the mob. However, an examination of the role of Father Gapon could yield some interesting finds.

The Okhrana also was capable of devastating blunders. The most notorious example was "Bloody Sunday" of 22 January 1905. When Father George Gapon, an Okhrana agent who had organized a police-sponsored workers' group, led a demonstration of peasants and workers to the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg, the Gendarmerie, without the tsar's authorization or advance knowledge, charged the crowd, killing or wounding at least 100 persons. This was a seminal event in the eventual demise of the Romanov dynasty and Russian autocracy; it set in motion the first revolution of 1905 and ultimately led to the events of 1917. (20)


-- And the leader of the mob was a paid state Czarist agent, not exactly under cover but instead making money on the side. History is full of 'what ifs'.
 
The CIA has changed the URL. If it changes again, you might try CIA/Okhrana google.
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-...ns-of-the-russian-imperial-police/5474-1.html

I can only hope that the reason this and other posts (not all of them threads started by myself, so real anomolies except a determined cherry picking search) is in this post real interest long after being originally posted. My google of username/alternatehistory is very different than some dozens tried for other posters in random samples, indicating a determined attempt to discredit by some one who does not know or care about the issues on hand. If so, the likely intended audience would be AH readership, as we often google in shortcut to searching on AH. Only one other person posted to the thread, indicating little general interest.

For the record, this thread is/was not obscure. If the Russian secret police did not enact this policy of using Western Europe as a dumping ground for revolutionaries, 1917 or 1918 revolutions would be at the very least greatly altered. It is quite possible Russia could have even become a reasonably stable constitutional monarchy, though considerable turmoil was likely before that hashed out. And very oddly enough, we have a very complete registration of the Imperial Russian records, recieving them circa 1927 sent to Stanford and kept unexamined for 30 years.
 
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