Yes, but why would Maria survive ITTL just because Alexander II survived? No sense to me.
The Russian Century - a TL
- Thread starter Onkel Willie
- Start date
Just random butterflies. Such things happen.
If then Maria hadn't something such issue which was going to kill her anyway no matter what.
No, you are missing the point: they have to convert as many peasants as possible into the industrial workers. Russia needed to get heavily industrialized ASAP and the only source of the industrial labor were peasants and Russia had a much greater percentage of them than any other major country, which was its weakness.
+1, and converting is not as easy as it seems. You can't "just" move peasants into the factories, nor can you "just" automate the peasants with farm tooling. Both need training & literacy, as well as time. And even if that goes smoothly, you need housing, sanitation, healthcare, public transportation, factories to put them in etc etc. It's a huge undertaking. Adding more territory (even though I love Manchuria to be added, it has even more resources and can be a reason for a balanced Russia between East and West, it's just not worth it. More peasants, of a completely different culture is only valuable to deny them to the Japanese.
Not necessarily the literacy: there were many industrial professions which did not need it, but there must be a reason for the peasants to change their life style dramatically and, short of the OTL communists’ exercises, this was going to be a long and painful process. Plus, of course, there must be enough capital invested into the industry to create a big demand fir the work force.
Most of these issues had been addressed to one degree or another before WWI. Public transportation was not a noticeable problem: the workers usually lived close to the industrial plants.
If there is no OTL irresponsible policies regarding the Far East then Japan is not a problem and perhaps even an ally.
Oh I agree, but many factories wouldn't work without those workers that actually could read and write. From what I've been reading there were never enough of those. I do remember a member here telling that Tzarist Russia made great strides around the 1900-ed already and the role of Communist Russia is exaggerated and they were profiting more from the groundwork laid before, but I don't recall it was you or someone else, nor their sources.
Interesting, I distinctly remember there was a lack of housing in most European cities, sanitation was low. Did Russia do any better?
Still, that's a very big prize to leave in their hands. I rather have it be an Russian protectorate.
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That’s true: the Tsarist education reform was planning to achieve a complete literacy by the early 1920s and before wwi more than a half of the male kids had been literate. The Bolsheviks started with claiming the phony lower numbers by 1917 (who had an opportunity to make a comprehensive study at that time?) and then reported rather questionable results. Besides, there is a difference between “literate” (as being formally capable of reading some text) and “functionally literate” as being able to read and understand something more complicated (as applicable to the industrial labor).
AFAIK, in Russia the industrial plants tended to be built closer to the outskirts of the cities, which allowed creation of the whole settlements of the individual and multi-appartment houses (there was an old TL about Stolypin with some photos of those). Of course, there were also the barrack-style accommodations but, in general, an industrial worker was getting enough money to rent an apartment or to take a credit for buying a house.
Of course, Russia had much fewer industrial workers than more developed countries so the housing crisis simply was not there.
If the Japanese are not infringing upon the trade along the Eastern China RR, there is no problem. And in OTL after the RJW both sides came to a working arrangement which kept the 3rd party (the US) out of the picture.
And a lot more open land to build more housing, I assume. Between the abundant land and Russia's large oil and natural gas reserves, I wouldn't be surprised if Russia's urban planning ITTL goes down a similar direction to the urban sprawl of the Anglosphere (sans the UK, which is a lot more like the rest of Europe in that regard).
The problems with annexing Manchuria are overstated. The population was 8 million in 1900 so if Russia moves in and prevents further waves of Han migration then the population is very manageable without genocide or forced expulsion.
People arguing that Siberia can be settled slowly are overlooking the fact that in the US California was settled before the states in the Mid West. Similarly Manchuria would give Russia a good Pacific frontier warm water ports and a highly productive agricultural area and would in turn aid in the development of Siberia. That area can grow rice so probably rice which provides higher calories per acre would enter the eastern Russian diet.
Manchuria can firm a second heartland for Russia. By 2020 the original 8 million cam grow to 30-40 million people but the incoming Russian, and other ethnicities of the empire may meant that Manchuria may have 100 million people with Siberia having 70million and Kamchatka and the other eastern territories may have more people too. The Russian Empire without the Civil War, Communist industrialisation and the demographic catastrophe of the Second World War may reach 500 million by 2020.
People arguing that Siberia can be settled slowly are overlooking the fact that in the US California was settled before the states in the Mid West. Similarly Manchuria would give Russia a good Pacific frontier warm water ports and a highly productive agricultural area and would in turn aid in the development of Siberia. That area can grow rice so probably rice which provides higher calories per acre would enter the eastern Russian diet.
Manchuria can firm a second heartland for Russia. By 2020 the original 8 million cam grow to 30-40 million people but the incoming Russian, and other ethnicities of the empire may meant that Manchuria may have 100 million people with Siberia having 70million and Kamchatka and the other eastern territories may have more people too. The Russian Empire without the Civil War, Communist industrialisation and the demographic catastrophe of the Second World War may reach 500 million by 2020.
Look at https://www.charmingrussia.ru/2017/02/blog-post.html even if you can't read the text, there is plenty of a visual material to get an idea about the "plant settlements": the whole suburban areas with the hospitals, schools, kindergartens, etc. Of course, this was not 100% the case but looks as a trend. And the photos of the workers and their families are also telling (you may make a guess, which of them show a factory owner and which the workers
).This is all a pure theory, In a reality the Russian Empire had huge problems with the native population of the areas which it officially annexed: they were marginally controllable at best with the border not controllable at all and a massive crime both inside and across the border. Taking into an account that a big part of the territory was "uncivilized", establishing an effective control of a border would be a pure fantasy.
In case you missed it, the Russian Empire had been quite different from the US in more than one respect so the parallels are simply irrelevant. Anyway, Russian Far East, if you are intent on CA analogy, was not populated either. And warm water ports are plain nonsense: read so-called Durnovo Memorandum on that issue. Russia had plenty of the good agricultural land in the Western Siberia but migration there was quite slow even with the government's sponsorship.
Yeah, and the Russians are going to learn to use the chopsticks in no time ....
The most important part about this and similar fantasies is that they are (in pretty much ASB case of their implementation) pushing Russia in an absolutely wrong path of development, increasing number of peasants (of which Russia already had a much higher percentage than any developed country in the world) instead of building up its industry. Vulnerability of the peasant-heavy Russian Empire had been convincingly demonstrated during the RJW and WWI: low productivity agriculture plus underdeveloped industry was a recipe for disaster.
Would you like to elaborate on the so called "massive crime" and what "uncivilized" people you are talking about? The tribes of northern Siberia where nearly no Russians lived and government did not exist were uncontrollable, sure but where proper infrastructure existed not at all. Khiva and Bukhara are prime examples of their ability to control. The borders there with Afghanistan and Persia which shared ethnicities across the borders were controlled well and so what miraculous problems would arise in the Manchurian sector so as to make the border control a fantasy. Why would Han migrate there when they know they are unwelcome and would be kicked out. Even with OTL low population the Russians prevented the Han from crossing the Amur why would they fall here.
There are several reasons for this analogy to hold true. The conquest of Siberia by Russian pioneers was very similar to the westward expansion of the US but it did not manage to have the population boom of the frontier societies because of the lack of direct state support and the strict control on the use of land like reserved for game hunting and furs. It wasn't until 1880s that the rules were relaxed somewhat(it was feared earlier that a large Siberian population would form an alternate powerbase and become connected with Siberian culture and as a result may come under the influence of Russian enemies) and serfdom abolished which actually allowed for people to migrate there and migration increased(although did not reach a large figure yet) significantly after serfdom was abolished.
How is warm water port irrelevant Mr. Genius? Before Port Arthur they did not really have a proper warm water port in the east from which they could base their operations from. And how exactly would trans Baikal Siberia develop without ports? They are the one that bring investment and thus incentivises people to move.
You last line is plainly false. Since 1906 government support for migration began,coupled with the completion of the Trans Siberian Railway, the number of people moving to Siberia increased dramatically.
I am not sure how Durnovo Memorandum is relevant. Please elaborate.
Rice already formed a secondary part of the Russian diet and particularly in the diet of the nobility and with the inclusion of major rice growing regions within the Empire that is going to increase. The people generally follow the nobility and it is quite likely that they would inherit the taste for rice from them. The impact wouldn't be the same across the Empire but more concentrated in the east and slowly spreading to the west. As for chopsticks the settlers in Manchuria are likely to know its use as most of the people around them(the Han/Manchu majority would remain until 1940s or 50s even in face of sustained settlement) would be using them it would be kind of like how Mexican cuisine entered the US diet and more prominently.Yeah, and the Russians are going to learn to use the chopsticks in no time ....
The industry was growing as fast as it could given the limitations of capital, skilled labour and education faced Russia, absorbing a lot of the excess peasantry but there were even more left who could be shifted to Manchuria which had ample farmland available and where they could thrive. The limitations faced by the industry could not be overcome in a short time when the population would continue to rise.
Only alternative is to force industrialisation down the throats of the people like Stalin did during reindustrialisation during his time.
The disaster suffered in the RJW and WW1 were for reasons far more impactful than peasantry. If Russia fought on a and didn't send the second fleet they would have won after the Japanese economy which was on the verge of collapse finally collapses. And there are too many ways by which things could have gone wrong for the central powers.
The low productivity agriculture was practised by the nobles and the mood in the European pay of the empire which was obviously the vast majority of the agriculture but Siberian farms were the most productive in the Empire, had the highest technological input on the land and sent massive amounts of grain to European Russia. With better farmland available low productivity isn't going to be an issue with individual farms and the reforms mentioned ITTL the productivity is going to be high and it would be beneficial for the stability of the empire.
In a normal industrialisation it is the farms which grow productive and invest into the industries and which in turn leads to better farming and more industrialisation till industry reaches a higher level where it can grow independently of the agricultural sector. Russia had definitely not reached that point ITTL it is mentioned that the agricultural machinery is imported from the USA.
The western countries industrialized in that manner only and the same is true for Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. India, Pakistan, Egypt,Iraq and several other third world countries tried to jump ahead in industrialisation before agriculture got developed and failed in their industrialisation attempt.
I’m talking about “uncivilized” (in quotes) territory, not people. A big part of the area were mountains and taiga and as for the crime, didn’t you hear about the honghuzi?
I’m talking about the parts of Manchuria that Russia got by the treaties with China, not the Northern Siberia.
First of all, not exactly and second absolutely irrelevant to the specifics of the area I’m talking about.
The question is purely rhetorical because they were migrating in both directions.
They did not fully and, in case you missed it, the Amur is a rather big river which you need to cross. Southern border of Manchuria is just a line on the map. Do you understand the physical difference?
You clearly did mot get it. Unlike the case with the US, there was never really mass migration to the East even into the good areas reasonsbly close to the European Russia: the cultures were different and your “similarities” are totally ignoring this.
Mr. Ignirant, I already recommend you to read Durnovo Memorandum to get some idea on the subject.
To start with, PA was a terrible port and I explained more than once why. Second, there were no meaningful “operations” they could conduct from it or any other port on the Pacific. Third, PA was exclusively naval base, aka, no merchant marine in it and a commercial “warm water port” about existence of which you are seemingly unaware, proved to be a complete commercial failure by the reason well explained by Durnovo.
There were and still are Russian ports on the Far East, none of them is a warm water port and none of them of a serious importance prior to wwi. How would it develop? As it was in OTL: its important connection was to the rest of the empire, not to the Pacific.
Baby, it increased dramatically comparing to close to zero level but even settlement in the Western Siberia backed up by Stolypin Reform was well behind the anticipated level. Completion of the TransSib prior to the RJW meant completion of the East China RR: there was no RR on the right bank of Amur and ECRR was a commercial enterprise for the trade with China.
Please read it and hopefully you’ll understand.
Second part of it was potato.
There was no need for more farmland, all resources had to be channeled to industrialization and I did not say that it would happen overnight or being a nice process.
Nope. Industrialization was already happening in a high rate but a lot of available resources had been misspent.
Which “nobles”? By 1914 almost 90% of the agricultural land belonged to the small holders and the only places with the high productivity and modern technology were few big land holdings. Nobility ceased to be the major land owning class by the end of the XIX. The exception was Siberia, the only area where Russia had true farmers: most of the peasants refused to turn into them and remained in the communal model. Did not want to migrate either. Learn Russian history before arguing.
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So a bunch of Bandits is all that is needed to discourage people from going to Manchuria and for Russia to attempt. When did Russians have trouble ruling Outer Manchuria?
Yeah sure if something goes against your argument it automatically becomes irrelevant.
Oh yes a river how do people cross it? For several millennia now people haven't learnt to cross rivers despite how ridiculously easy it is to do so. And people surely don't know how to enforce a line on a map.
Why would someone use a port that has no hinterland? A port attracts people, people create a hinterland which needs a port and that cycle continues. The original Trans Siberian was built through Manchuria rather than through the more treacherous terrain in the left bank.
I am fully aware that the migration increased dramatically compared to none earlier. So do you expect it to go from nearly zero to tens of millions in just a few decades and emancipation to be like a magic box that changes the mindset of the people immediately. Similarly the serfdom prevented the migration of people into siberia even close to the European Russia
In a long term the success of the farmers would inspire more and more people to migrate coupled with the industrial potential of Manchuria what I am suggesting is quite feasible. Victory in the RJW would almost certainly mean that Korea turn into a Russian protectorate, increasing the investment opportunities of the Russian in the Far East and opening up even the Korean ports for Russian trade and further incentivizing migration.
Is this the memorandum? If yes it talks nothing of the Russian Far East and only gives a remarkable prediction of the Great War and talks of some shortcomings of the Russian agriculture. Is that all that you are referring to?
Prioritizing Industrial Growth doesn't mean agriculture should be neglected. Agricultural growth is as important when you have a fast growing population. of the 18% people who decided not to settle in Siberia doesn't mean no one wanted. Although fertile it was difficult to clear land and get actual Siberia and it was easier in the Manchurian Plains and Primorsky Krai so if people are settled there the chances are far higher that they settle down over there.
As for resources getting misspent is inevitable in the capitalist system resources are wasted and there are limits in the age before computers there is a limit to the wastage you can bring about. Or else the government would have to search out and bring in all the management ideas that emerge across the world and force them down the throats of the Russian businessmen.
The large estates had comparatively higher yields compared to the small landowners and not high yield as per the global standards of the time which were achieved in Siberia. I still don't understand why in your opinion Russia could not absorb one more region? if Kazakhstan did not go through he 20s and the 30s as we know it then we would have a population similar to the Manchuria if it were a part of the empire from the early 1900s. It wasn't an organized large scale effort to settle Manchuria by the Hans unlike how many places got colonized and aggressively settled and it was well within the ability of the Russians to defend.
Chapter IV: The Russo-Japanese War, 1904-1905.
It's been a while since the last update, so here goes! An RJW in which Russia doesn't wind up completely humiliated.
Tensions in the Orient between Russia and Japan had slowly been mounting for years. After the Meiji Restoration in 1868, Japan endeavoured to assimilate Western ideas, technologies and ways of warfare and transform itself into a modern and industrialized state (though not a Westernized one) becoming imperialist in its own right and seeking overseas expansion. Inoue Kaoru, the Foreign Minister, gave a speech in 1887 saying “What we must do is to transform our empire and our people, make the empire like the countries of Europe and our people like the peoples of Europe,” going on to say that the Chinese and Koreans had essentially forfeited their right to be independent by not modernizing. There was also major popular support for an ultranationalist line, including the annexation of Korea to relieve the heavy taxes imposed on the Japanese people to finance the country’s modernization. The Meiji oligarchy supported this, but didn’t feel ready yet to confront China and backed off after a coup in 1884 by a pro-Japanese reformist faction led to Chinese diplomatic protests.
A decade later, Japan’s reluctance to confront China had evaporated and the former scored a decisive victory in the Sino-Japanese War in only eight months’ time. A peasant rebellion led by the Tonghak religious movement led to a request by the Korean government for the Qing Dynasty to send in troops to stabilize the country. The Empire of Japan responded by sending their own force to Korea to crush the Tonghak and installed a puppet government in Seoul. China objected and war ensued. Hostilities proved brief, with Japanese ground troops routing Chinese forces on the Liaodong Peninsula and nearly destroying the Chinese Beiyang Fleet in the Battle of the Yalu River. Japan and China signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki, which ceded the Liaodong Peninsula and the island of Taiwan to Japan.
After the peace treaty, Russia, Germany, and France compelled Japan to withdraw from the Liaodong Peninsula. The leaders of Japan did not feel that they possessed the strength to resist the combined might of Russia, Germany and France, and so gave in to the ultimatum. At the same time, the Japanese did not abandon their attempts to force Korea into the their sphere of influence.
Meanwhile, Russia encroached on China, particularly in Manchuria (which happened to be a region that Japan also considered an area of interest). In 1897, a Russian fleet appeared off Port Arthur and in 1898 a convention was signed in which China agreed to lease it to Russia, an agreement that could be extended by “mutual agreement.” The Russians clearly expected such an extension, for they lost no time in occupying the territory and in fortifying Port Arthur, their sole warm-water port on the Pacific coast and of great strategic value. A year later, to consolidate their position, the Russians began to build a new railway from Harbin through Mukden to Port Arthur, the South Manchurian Railroad. The development of the railway became a contributory factor to the Boxer Rebellion. The Russians also began to make inroads into Korea. By 1898 they had acquired mining and forestry concessions near the Yalu and Tumen rivers, causing the Japanese much anxiety.
The Boxer Rebellion further cemented Russia’s influence over Manchuria. After the Sino-Japanese War, many in China feared foreign imperialism and came to resent foreign-backed Christian missionaries. In 1898, China experienced floods and draughts and the Boxers blamed these catastrophes on foreigners and Christians, prompting them to destroy foreign property and attack and kill missionaries as well as Chinese Christians. The events came to a head in June 1900 when Boxer combatants, convinced they were invulnerable to foreign weapons, converged on Beijing and laid siege to the Legation Quarters. Foolishly, Dowager Empress Cixi declared war in support of the movement only to result in China’s defeat at the hand of the Eight-Nation Alliance consisting of Britain, Russia, Japan, France, Germany, the United States, Austria-Hungary and Italy (Dutch, Belgian and Spanish forces participated outside of the framework of the alliance).
One of the results of the crushing of the Boxer Rebellion was a permanent Russian presence in Manchuria. Russia had already sent 177.000 soldiers to Manchuria, nominally to protect its railways under construction. The troops of the Qing Empire and the participants of the Boxer Rebellion could do nothing against such a massive army and were ejected from Manchuria. After the Boxer Rebellion, 100.000 Russian soldiers were stationed in Manchuria. The Russian troops settled in and despite assurances they would vacate the area after the crisis, by 1903 the Russians had not established a timetable for withdrawal and had strengthened their position in Manchuria instead.
Japan’s leadership was divided over the issue of going to war, but initially followed the line of statesman Ito Hirobumi that their country was too weak to challenge Russia militarily and should negotiate. In short their proposal amounted to reciprocal recognition of Russia and Japan of each other’s spheres of influence over Manchuria and Korea respectively. Russia responded by counterproposals, gradually scaling back their demands and claims vis-à-vis Korea bit by bit and making serious compromises. However, in the ensuing negotiations it became clear that Russia had no interest in solving the Manchurian and Korean issues and, instead, was buying time to build up militarily.
This issue had an international dimension to it. While one would expect Russia’s nominal Entente partner France to be supporter, in fact it was Germany that relentlessly encouraged Russia to go to war: a recurring theme of German Emperor Wilhelm II’s letters to his cousin Nicholas was that “Holy Russia” had been “chosen” by God to save the “entire white race” from the “Yellow Peril”, and that Russia was “entitled” to annex all of Korea, Manchuria, and northern China up to Beijing. Wilhelm II hoped to establish an alliance with Russia and deal a severe blow to Britain, which hoped to curtail Russian influence and had an alliance with Tokyo to that end. St. Petersburg believed its military weakness in the Far East wouldn’t matter because they miscalculated that Germany would support them in war. Tsar Nicholas II himself said there would be no war if he “did not wish it”, which didn’t imply a rejection of aggression but rather disbelief that a nation of people he dismissed as “Yellow monkeys” would strike first, typical for the arrogant white supremacist racism of the era. The Russo-Japanese talks stalled and amounted to nothing.
On February 8th 1904, Japan attacked the Russian Far East Fleet at Port Arthur while its declaration of war was received three hours later by the Russian government. Tsar Nicholas II was incredulous at this attack, having been assured by his advisors Japan wouldn’t fight. It did, however, provide him a great opportunity to galvanize Russian patriotism if he spun it right. He did just that by addressing the Duma with a speech laden with subtle and less subtle nationalist and religious overtones designed to create a rally around the flag effect. In his address to the Duma, publicized in newspapers and as pamphlets across the country, he accused Japan of a dastardly unprovoked attack. Russia would overcome this premeditated strike and with the righteous might God on its side the Russian people would win through.
Meanwhile actuality caught up to the wave of popular support for the government’s jingoism. Bad news from Port Arthur reached St. Petersburg that the heaviest battleships in the east, the Tsesarevich and Retzivan, as well as the 6.800 tonne cruiser Pallada had been seriously damaged by an enemy torpedo boat destroyer during the initial attack on February 8th. Russian commander Vice Admiral sent out fleet elements to aggressively defend Port Arthur and seek out engagements. None of these engagements proved decisive and a stalemate ensued: the Russian fleet stayed bottled up in Port Arthur under the cover of its coastal guns and sea mines while Japanese Admiral Togo Heihachiro attempted to draw the Russians out and destroy a significant portion of their fleet in detail.
After the Battle of Port Arthur in February, naval actions continued. On April 13th 1904 the Russian destroyer Strasny returning from patrol, tried to re-enter the mouth of the Port Arthur but was intercepted by Japanese destroyers. An engagement began between the opposing destroyers, and when observed by Makarov he immediately sent the cruiser Bayan to assist Strasny, while he led three battleships, four cruisers, and a group of destroyers into the Yellow Sea to seek battle with the surrounding enemy warships led by Japanese Admiral Heihachiro Togo. While rushing out of the harbour, Makarov had his minesweepers check for mines and indeed they found some Japanese sea mines waiting for them. Meanwhile, the Japanese warships withdrew with Makarov in pursuit and as he caught up to the Japanese fleet, the thick fog that blanketed the sea lifted to reveal their trap: Admiral Togo was waiting with his capital ship and five additional battleships, plus six additional first-class cruisers bringing up the rear. Makarov quickly turned his force around and fled back to the safety of Port Arthur’s harbour.
Makarov considered that the Japanese would slowly continue to whittle away at his forces this way and planned a breakout attempt, waiting only for favourable weather. On April 19th his fleet rushed out of Port Arthur at the crack of dawn, the Russian ships appearing as barely discernible phantoms in the mist. The Japanese ships on the other hand were backlit by the rise of the sun in the east and their easily distinguishable shapes were easy targets for Russian naval gunners.
In what has since become known as the Second Battle of Port Arthur Makarov and his fleet escaped. Out of a fleet of seven battleships, one armoured cruiser, five protected cruisers, two minelayers, twelve torpedo boats and five gunboats the better part escaped: only protected cruiser Pallada, one torpedo boat and three gunboats (sunk by enemy fire) as well as the heavily damaged battleship Retzivan (scuttled to prevent her from falling into enemy hands) were lost. Out of six battleships, nine armoured cruisers, fifteen destroyers and twenty torpedo boats, the Japanese lost battleship Mikasa, protected cruiser Yoshino, two destroyers and four torpedo boats.
Makarov steamed around Korea and through the Tsushima Strait, arriving at Vladivostok on April 22nd. There his fleet united with ships belonging to the present ships of the Siberian Military Flotilla: four protected cruisers and ten torpedo boats. Russian naval strength in the Far East still totalled six battleships, one armoured cruiser, eight protected cruisers, twenty-one torpedo boats and two gunboats. The forces of Admiral Togo, injured during the sinking of the Mikasa, numbered five battleships, eight armoured/protected cruisers, thirteen destroyers and sixteen torpedo boats. The Imperial Japanese Navy wasn’t out for the count as a rough numerical parity remained, but the battle had been a clear tactical victory for the Russians.
Meanwhile, the war unfolded on land too. The Imperial Japanese Army laid siege to Port Arthur, but along with the fleet much of the garrison had evacuated too and the remaining defenders commanded by Major General Anatoly Stessel surrendered two weeks later on May 3rd. He believed the point of defending Port Arthur was to protect the fleet, rendering further resistance and loss of life pointless, particularly as the Russian defenders suffered disproportionate casualties during every Japanese attack. Elsewhere in Manchuria, the Russians fought delaying actions and suffered defeats as the Japanese stormed their positions on the Yalu River and Nanshan in May.
During the Battle of Liaoyang in August 1904, fourteen divisions totalling 158.000 men supported by 609 artillery pieces under General Aleksey Kuropatkin faced eight divisions with 120.000 men and 170 artillery pieces. Fought between August 25th and September 5th, and intelligence proved decisive: whereas Kuropatkin erroneously believed the enemy outnumbered him, Field Marshal Oyama Iwao precisely knew Russian strength and deployments thanks to cooperation with the local Chinese population. Kuropatkin ordered a withdrawal to the outermost defensive line and then to the second defensive line, which he also abandoned quickly and after an unsuccessful counterattack he ultimately withdrew to Mukden.
Kuropatkin’s claim of victory by avoiding encirclement and inflicting great casualties (Japanese casualties were indeed greater than Russian ones) were met with ridicule. He was fired and his subordinate General Nikolai Zarubaev, who’d proven competent, replaced him. Zarubaev’s plan was to block the Japanese advance at the Shaho River south of Mukden by turning the Japanese right flank and counterattacking towards Liaoyang with Stackelberg’s Eastern Detachment. Simultaneously, Bilderling’s Western Division was to move south and to cut off Kuroki's 1st Army. The terrain was flat all the way to Liaoyang for the Russian right flank and centre, and hilly for the left flank. In the Second Battle of Liaoyang in October 1904, 210.000 Russians faced 170.000 Japanese: the former suffered 4.000 killed in action, 16.000 wounded in action and 600 missing or taken prisoner; the latter suffered 5.100 killed inaction and 31.000 wounded and 4.500 missing or taken prisoner. The battle was strategically inconclusive, although the Russians did retake Liaoyang. This was the last battle in 1904.
Hostilities picked up again in January 1905, with the Battle of Sandepu southwest of Mukden proving inconclusive, failing to improve the situation of Russia’s flanks and setting the stage for the Third Battle of Liaoyang. The Second Battle of Liaoyang four months prior had produced a salient, which Oyama intended to cut off with his offensive that took place between February 20th and March 12th. Again forces on both sides had increased, though with Russia still having numerical superiority: Russian forces totalling 340.000 men with 1.200 artillery guns and 100 machine guns faced 270.000 Japanese with 1.000 guns and 200 machine guns. The salient containing the Third Manchurian Army was temporarily cut off and surrounded. With clever tactics, audacity, a willingness to suffer casualties and feeding the enemy false intelligence by correctly assuming the Chinese population favoured Japan, Zarubaev was able to break the encirclement of the Third Manchurian Army.
The subsequent Russian spring counteroffensive in May 1905, known today as the Battle of Anshan, compelled Oyama to withdraw to the Liaodong Peninsula as the arrival of seven fresh divisions increased Russian numbers to ~ 450.000 men while he now had 160.000 men. However, he used the geography of the peninsula to create a defence in depth with multiple elaborate trench systems reinforced with land mines, barbed wire, machine guns, mortars, artillery, small forts made from dirt walls and sandbags, casemates and pillboxes. A bloody stalemate ensued in which entrenched defenders proved they could inflict far greater casualties on a numerically superior attacker, a modern Thermopylae. On both sides, the cry for peace became increasingly louder.
Chapter IV: The Russo-Japanese War, 1904-1905.
Tensions in the Orient between Russia and Japan had slowly been mounting for years. After the Meiji Restoration in 1868, Japan endeavoured to assimilate Western ideas, technologies and ways of warfare and transform itself into a modern and industrialized state (though not a Westernized one) becoming imperialist in its own right and seeking overseas expansion. Inoue Kaoru, the Foreign Minister, gave a speech in 1887 saying “What we must do is to transform our empire and our people, make the empire like the countries of Europe and our people like the peoples of Europe,” going on to say that the Chinese and Koreans had essentially forfeited their right to be independent by not modernizing. There was also major popular support for an ultranationalist line, including the annexation of Korea to relieve the heavy taxes imposed on the Japanese people to finance the country’s modernization. The Meiji oligarchy supported this, but didn’t feel ready yet to confront China and backed off after a coup in 1884 by a pro-Japanese reformist faction led to Chinese diplomatic protests.
A decade later, Japan’s reluctance to confront China had evaporated and the former scored a decisive victory in the Sino-Japanese War in only eight months’ time. A peasant rebellion led by the Tonghak religious movement led to a request by the Korean government for the Qing Dynasty to send in troops to stabilize the country. The Empire of Japan responded by sending their own force to Korea to crush the Tonghak and installed a puppet government in Seoul. China objected and war ensued. Hostilities proved brief, with Japanese ground troops routing Chinese forces on the Liaodong Peninsula and nearly destroying the Chinese Beiyang Fleet in the Battle of the Yalu River. Japan and China signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki, which ceded the Liaodong Peninsula and the island of Taiwan to Japan.
After the peace treaty, Russia, Germany, and France compelled Japan to withdraw from the Liaodong Peninsula. The leaders of Japan did not feel that they possessed the strength to resist the combined might of Russia, Germany and France, and so gave in to the ultimatum. At the same time, the Japanese did not abandon their attempts to force Korea into the their sphere of influence.
Meanwhile, Russia encroached on China, particularly in Manchuria (which happened to be a region that Japan also considered an area of interest). In 1897, a Russian fleet appeared off Port Arthur and in 1898 a convention was signed in which China agreed to lease it to Russia, an agreement that could be extended by “mutual agreement.” The Russians clearly expected such an extension, for they lost no time in occupying the territory and in fortifying Port Arthur, their sole warm-water port on the Pacific coast and of great strategic value. A year later, to consolidate their position, the Russians began to build a new railway from Harbin through Mukden to Port Arthur, the South Manchurian Railroad. The development of the railway became a contributory factor to the Boxer Rebellion. The Russians also began to make inroads into Korea. By 1898 they had acquired mining and forestry concessions near the Yalu and Tumen rivers, causing the Japanese much anxiety.
The Boxer Rebellion further cemented Russia’s influence over Manchuria. After the Sino-Japanese War, many in China feared foreign imperialism and came to resent foreign-backed Christian missionaries. In 1898, China experienced floods and draughts and the Boxers blamed these catastrophes on foreigners and Christians, prompting them to destroy foreign property and attack and kill missionaries as well as Chinese Christians. The events came to a head in June 1900 when Boxer combatants, convinced they were invulnerable to foreign weapons, converged on Beijing and laid siege to the Legation Quarters. Foolishly, Dowager Empress Cixi declared war in support of the movement only to result in China’s defeat at the hand of the Eight-Nation Alliance consisting of Britain, Russia, Japan, France, Germany, the United States, Austria-Hungary and Italy (Dutch, Belgian and Spanish forces participated outside of the framework of the alliance).
One of the results of the crushing of the Boxer Rebellion was a permanent Russian presence in Manchuria. Russia had already sent 177.000 soldiers to Manchuria, nominally to protect its railways under construction. The troops of the Qing Empire and the participants of the Boxer Rebellion could do nothing against such a massive army and were ejected from Manchuria. After the Boxer Rebellion, 100.000 Russian soldiers were stationed in Manchuria. The Russian troops settled in and despite assurances they would vacate the area after the crisis, by 1903 the Russians had not established a timetable for withdrawal and had strengthened their position in Manchuria instead.
Japan’s leadership was divided over the issue of going to war, but initially followed the line of statesman Ito Hirobumi that their country was too weak to challenge Russia militarily and should negotiate. In short their proposal amounted to reciprocal recognition of Russia and Japan of each other’s spheres of influence over Manchuria and Korea respectively. Russia responded by counterproposals, gradually scaling back their demands and claims vis-à-vis Korea bit by bit and making serious compromises. However, in the ensuing negotiations it became clear that Russia had no interest in solving the Manchurian and Korean issues and, instead, was buying time to build up militarily.
This issue had an international dimension to it. While one would expect Russia’s nominal Entente partner France to be supporter, in fact it was Germany that relentlessly encouraged Russia to go to war: a recurring theme of German Emperor Wilhelm II’s letters to his cousin Nicholas was that “Holy Russia” had been “chosen” by God to save the “entire white race” from the “Yellow Peril”, and that Russia was “entitled” to annex all of Korea, Manchuria, and northern China up to Beijing. Wilhelm II hoped to establish an alliance with Russia and deal a severe blow to Britain, which hoped to curtail Russian influence and had an alliance with Tokyo to that end. St. Petersburg believed its military weakness in the Far East wouldn’t matter because they miscalculated that Germany would support them in war. Tsar Nicholas II himself said there would be no war if he “did not wish it”, which didn’t imply a rejection of aggression but rather disbelief that a nation of people he dismissed as “Yellow monkeys” would strike first, typical for the arrogant white supremacist racism of the era. The Russo-Japanese talks stalled and amounted to nothing.
On February 8th 1904, Japan attacked the Russian Far East Fleet at Port Arthur while its declaration of war was received three hours later by the Russian government. Tsar Nicholas II was incredulous at this attack, having been assured by his advisors Japan wouldn’t fight. It did, however, provide him a great opportunity to galvanize Russian patriotism if he spun it right. He did just that by addressing the Duma with a speech laden with subtle and less subtle nationalist and religious overtones designed to create a rally around the flag effect. In his address to the Duma, publicized in newspapers and as pamphlets across the country, he accused Japan of a dastardly unprovoked attack. Russia would overcome this premeditated strike and with the righteous might God on its side the Russian people would win through.
Meanwhile actuality caught up to the wave of popular support for the government’s jingoism. Bad news from Port Arthur reached St. Petersburg that the heaviest battleships in the east, the Tsesarevich and Retzivan, as well as the 6.800 tonne cruiser Pallada had been seriously damaged by an enemy torpedo boat destroyer during the initial attack on February 8th. Russian commander Vice Admiral sent out fleet elements to aggressively defend Port Arthur and seek out engagements. None of these engagements proved decisive and a stalemate ensued: the Russian fleet stayed bottled up in Port Arthur under the cover of its coastal guns and sea mines while Japanese Admiral Togo Heihachiro attempted to draw the Russians out and destroy a significant portion of their fleet in detail.
After the Battle of Port Arthur in February, naval actions continued. On April 13th 1904 the Russian destroyer Strasny returning from patrol, tried to re-enter the mouth of the Port Arthur but was intercepted by Japanese destroyers. An engagement began between the opposing destroyers, and when observed by Makarov he immediately sent the cruiser Bayan to assist Strasny, while he led three battleships, four cruisers, and a group of destroyers into the Yellow Sea to seek battle with the surrounding enemy warships led by Japanese Admiral Heihachiro Togo. While rushing out of the harbour, Makarov had his minesweepers check for mines and indeed they found some Japanese sea mines waiting for them. Meanwhile, the Japanese warships withdrew with Makarov in pursuit and as he caught up to the Japanese fleet, the thick fog that blanketed the sea lifted to reveal their trap: Admiral Togo was waiting with his capital ship and five additional battleships, plus six additional first-class cruisers bringing up the rear. Makarov quickly turned his force around and fled back to the safety of Port Arthur’s harbour.
Makarov considered that the Japanese would slowly continue to whittle away at his forces this way and planned a breakout attempt, waiting only for favourable weather. On April 19th his fleet rushed out of Port Arthur at the crack of dawn, the Russian ships appearing as barely discernible phantoms in the mist. The Japanese ships on the other hand were backlit by the rise of the sun in the east and their easily distinguishable shapes were easy targets for Russian naval gunners.
In what has since become known as the Second Battle of Port Arthur Makarov and his fleet escaped. Out of a fleet of seven battleships, one armoured cruiser, five protected cruisers, two minelayers, twelve torpedo boats and five gunboats the better part escaped: only protected cruiser Pallada, one torpedo boat and three gunboats (sunk by enemy fire) as well as the heavily damaged battleship Retzivan (scuttled to prevent her from falling into enemy hands) were lost. Out of six battleships, nine armoured cruisers, fifteen destroyers and twenty torpedo boats, the Japanese lost battleship Mikasa, protected cruiser Yoshino, two destroyers and four torpedo boats.
Makarov steamed around Korea and through the Tsushima Strait, arriving at Vladivostok on April 22nd. There his fleet united with ships belonging to the present ships of the Siberian Military Flotilla: four protected cruisers and ten torpedo boats. Russian naval strength in the Far East still totalled six battleships, one armoured cruiser, eight protected cruisers, twenty-one torpedo boats and two gunboats. The forces of Admiral Togo, injured during the sinking of the Mikasa, numbered five battleships, eight armoured/protected cruisers, thirteen destroyers and sixteen torpedo boats. The Imperial Japanese Navy wasn’t out for the count as a rough numerical parity remained, but the battle had been a clear tactical victory for the Russians.
Meanwhile, the war unfolded on land too. The Imperial Japanese Army laid siege to Port Arthur, but along with the fleet much of the garrison had evacuated too and the remaining defenders commanded by Major General Anatoly Stessel surrendered two weeks later on May 3rd. He believed the point of defending Port Arthur was to protect the fleet, rendering further resistance and loss of life pointless, particularly as the Russian defenders suffered disproportionate casualties during every Japanese attack. Elsewhere in Manchuria, the Russians fought delaying actions and suffered defeats as the Japanese stormed their positions on the Yalu River and Nanshan in May.
During the Battle of Liaoyang in August 1904, fourteen divisions totalling 158.000 men supported by 609 artillery pieces under General Aleksey Kuropatkin faced eight divisions with 120.000 men and 170 artillery pieces. Fought between August 25th and September 5th, and intelligence proved decisive: whereas Kuropatkin erroneously believed the enemy outnumbered him, Field Marshal Oyama Iwao precisely knew Russian strength and deployments thanks to cooperation with the local Chinese population. Kuropatkin ordered a withdrawal to the outermost defensive line and then to the second defensive line, which he also abandoned quickly and after an unsuccessful counterattack he ultimately withdrew to Mukden.
Kuropatkin’s claim of victory by avoiding encirclement and inflicting great casualties (Japanese casualties were indeed greater than Russian ones) were met with ridicule. He was fired and his subordinate General Nikolai Zarubaev, who’d proven competent, replaced him. Zarubaev’s plan was to block the Japanese advance at the Shaho River south of Mukden by turning the Japanese right flank and counterattacking towards Liaoyang with Stackelberg’s Eastern Detachment. Simultaneously, Bilderling’s Western Division was to move south and to cut off Kuroki's 1st Army. The terrain was flat all the way to Liaoyang for the Russian right flank and centre, and hilly for the left flank. In the Second Battle of Liaoyang in October 1904, 210.000 Russians faced 170.000 Japanese: the former suffered 4.000 killed in action, 16.000 wounded in action and 600 missing or taken prisoner; the latter suffered 5.100 killed inaction and 31.000 wounded and 4.500 missing or taken prisoner. The battle was strategically inconclusive, although the Russians did retake Liaoyang. This was the last battle in 1904.
Hostilities picked up again in January 1905, with the Battle of Sandepu southwest of Mukden proving inconclusive, failing to improve the situation of Russia’s flanks and setting the stage for the Third Battle of Liaoyang. The Second Battle of Liaoyang four months prior had produced a salient, which Oyama intended to cut off with his offensive that took place between February 20th and March 12th. Again forces on both sides had increased, though with Russia still having numerical superiority: Russian forces totalling 340.000 men with 1.200 artillery guns and 100 machine guns faced 270.000 Japanese with 1.000 guns and 200 machine guns. The salient containing the Third Manchurian Army was temporarily cut off and surrounded. With clever tactics, audacity, a willingness to suffer casualties and feeding the enemy false intelligence by correctly assuming the Chinese population favoured Japan, Zarubaev was able to break the encirclement of the Third Manchurian Army.
The subsequent Russian spring counteroffensive in May 1905, known today as the Battle of Anshan, compelled Oyama to withdraw to the Liaodong Peninsula as the arrival of seven fresh divisions increased Russian numbers to ~ 450.000 men while he now had 160.000 men. However, he used the geography of the peninsula to create a defence in depth with multiple elaborate trench systems reinforced with land mines, barbed wire, machine guns, mortars, artillery, small forts made from dirt walls and sandbags, casemates and pillboxes. A bloody stalemate ensued in which entrenched defenders proved they could inflict far greater casualties on a numerically superior attacker, a modern Thermopylae. On both sides, the cry for peace became increasingly louder.
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Chapter V: Peace in the Orient & Steps to War, 1905-1914.
And the story continues...
By May 1905, fourteen months into the war, public support for the war was drying up in Russia and Japan alike. Neither side was any closer to a decisive victory than the other. Both were moving more troops to the front to replace those coming back home in body bags to fight what increasingly looked like a long, protracted, fruitless endeavour. Popular protests erupted in Japan and Russia alike with the public demanding a swift end to the costly war: casualties were terrible for negligible gains on the Manchurian front and neither side was prepared for these fatality rates; the economies of both countries were heavily burdened by the demands of a wartime economy; the haemorrhaging of money and scarcity of food and fuel drove up prices, directly affecting the civilian population. In both countries the wave of nationalistic popular support had waned and increasingly got replaced with discontent and sometimes outright hostility towards the government.
On Sunday June 18th 1905, strikes erupted at the Putilov Ironworks in St. Petersburg against working conditions and these devolved into protests concerning fairer wages, a reduction of the working week from 48 to 40 hours, an end to the war and universal suffrage. The crowd was joined by middle class shop owners, office clerks, teachers, policemen and so on and they intended to present the Tsar with a petition. On Nevsky Prospekt a unit of elite Preobrazhensky’s Guards stood in between the Winter Palace and the crowd of peaceful protestors. A stand-off ensued.
Nicholas had already been told the crowd was peaceful, carrying religious icons and singing patriotic hymns and songs (“God Save the Tsar” in particular). Therefore he’d already given the order not to fire unless he, and he alone, personally ordered otherwise. He told high-ranking members of the court critical of this decision “I’d rather be known as Nicholas the Weak than Nicholas the Bloody.” While pondering what to do he was mindful that mounting tensions between the troops and the protesting crowd could still ignite if an incident occurred. One wrong move, and a nervous soldier might decide to pull the trigger and cause a bloodbath that everyone would blame the Tsar for.
He decided to invite a small delegation of union leaders and representatives from the middle class, including two city councilmen, headed by Father Georgy Gapon. Gapon was a Russian Orthodox priest who took an interest in the working and lower classes and had proven himself a charismatic speaker and capable organizer. The priest handed the Tsar the petition and the delegation explained the hardships the lower classes were suffering because of the war. Nicholas responded that the demands they laid out were understandable and sensible, but tactically replied that legislative power was primarily the prerogative of the Duma. He nonetheless promised he would do what he could to alleviate the suffering and Gapon returned with this message, after which the crowd of protestors dissolved. The story was spread through newspapers across the country and it helped improve the popularity of the monarchy, which had begun suffering the longer a clearcut victory did not manifest.
Tentative, informal peace negotiations began between Russia and Japan, which gained a more official character and sped up after US President Theodore Roosevelt offered to mediate. Japan readily agreed to the talks because its economy was on the verge of collapse. The end result was the Treaty of Portland, signed at the venue selected by Roosevelt: with the negotiations commencing in August, he chose the town of Portland in the state of Maine to avoid the sweltering Washington summer.
Though Roosevelt was more sympathetic to the Russians, he remained neutral and in the end the reality of the military situation determined the peace treaty: though both sides were war weary, Russia now had a more favourable military position as it had further built up its troop strength in Manchuria to half a million should negotiations fail and hostilities continue. The Treaty of Portland determined that Manchuria would be in the Russian and Korea in the Japanese sphere of influence respectively and also that Tokyo would pay twenty million roubles in war indemnities for its first strike against Port Arthur. Other than the reparations, Russia had gained nothing that Japan hadn’t already offered in negotiations concerning spheres of influence two years prior. Decades later a historian declared: “The Russo-Japanese War was pointless and caused by Russian arrogance. They got exactly what they would’ve gotten if they’d just engaged in diplomacy, sparing more than 100.000 lives.”
The war, however, didn’t prove to be completely useless to Russia as it revealed the flaws in its armed forces as well as detecting a clear difference in performance between the two branches (the army and the navy). The Pacific Fleet had performed competently under Makarov by breaking out of Port Arthur and winning a clear tactical victory over the Imperial Japanese Navy. In Vladivostok, Makarov’s force had remained as a “fleet in being” for the duration of the war, tying down considerable Japanese naval assets. Some would’ve preferred a more aggressive approach (i.e. a decisive battle) but the final evaluation declared that the fleet had done its job properly.
The Imperial Russian Army’s performance was considered mediocre. Many of the innovations brought by the Industrial Revolution, such as rapid-firing artillery and machine guns, as well as more accurate rifles, were first tested on a mass scale then. Military operations showed that modern warfare had undergone a considerable change since the Franco-Prussian War over thirty years prior. Most army commanders had previously envisioned using modern weapon systems to dominate the battlefield on an operational and tactical level but, as events played out, the technological advances forever altered the conditions of war too: today it’s considered the first “total war”. The Tsar, an amateur engineer himself, ordered a greater emphasis on artillery and machine guns.
Another problem, however, was incompetence. Many high-ranking officers owed their positions thanks to their titles and/or their aristocratic descent rather than merit and competence, and General Aleksey Kuropatkin became the symbol for this. He initially got the death penalty for his series of failures, but Tsar Nicholas II granted him clemency and his sentence was commuted to time served and a dishonourable discharge. This was merely the most publicized change in a wave of discharges, resignations and promotions. Aristocratic scions solely seeking prestige were reassigned to make room for professional officers who’d performed admirably in combat. The most promising ones were sent to study abroad at Berlin’s Prussian Staff College, the École Militaire in Paris, and West Point in the United States.
Meanwhile, Austria-Hungary took advantage of Russia’s moment of weakness in the wake of the Russo-Japanese War, resulting in the Bosnian Crisis. The 1878 Treaty of Berlin had granted Austria-Hungary the right to occupy Bosnia-Herzegovina, though it formally remained under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire. Its final status wasn’t settled until the 1881 Three Emperors’ League treaty between Germany, Austria-Hungary and Russia in which Russia agreed to Austria-Hungary’s annexation. By 1897 Russia under Tsar Nicholas II changed its position again, but Vienna didn’t intend to give up on this. After a 1903 coup put a new pro-Russian dynasty in power in Belgrade, relations between Austria-Hungary and Serbia gradually deteriorated, the former could do little as long as the latter was still under Russian protection.
An opportunity to annex Bosnia-Herzegovina presented itself when Russia emerged weakened from the Russo-Japanese War. By 1907, Austro-Hungarian Foreign Minister Alois Aehrental began formulating a plan to solidify Austria-Hungary’s position towards Serbia through annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina. His opportunity came in the form of a letter from Russian Foreign Minister Alexander Izvolsky – proposing Austrian annexation of the provinces as part of a deal to secure better access to the Turkish Straits for Russian naval vessels – and a subsequent meeting at Buchlau castle in Moravia, Austria-Hungary. Izvolsky made too grievous errors: firstly, he misjudged that Britain would support Russia in its demands for opening the Turkish Straits; secondly, he grossly underestimated how much this would fan the flames of Russian nationalism. He presented himself as being duped by Aehrental, but was most likely lying to save face and to keep his position (which didn’t work as the Tsar replaced him with Sergey Sazonov).
On October 6th, the day after Bulgaria declared its independence from the Ottoman Empire, Emperor Franz Joseph announced to the people of this Ottoman territory (that had been occupied by Austria for thirty years) his determination to recognize and grant them an autonomous and constitutional regime, under his authority as their annexing sovereign. Vienna presented this to the world as a fait accompli.
The Tsar was infuriated, but was aware he shouldn’t go to war again so soon: the war against Japan had caused serious societal tensions that were still lingering and that could destabilize Russia if they were ignited again, something he might not be able to stop again. Secondly, the Imperial Russian Army was in the midst of reforms to incorporate the lessons learned from the Russo-Japanese War. He nonetheless ordered a partial mobilization to which Germany and Austria-Hungary responded by issuing mobilization orders of their own, which induced a war scare in Europe.
The threat of a general European war erupting in the Balkans alarmed Great Britain and. This was not so much because it could draw them in, as it could opt for neutrality: other than Japan Britain had no great power allies. However, the British estimated that it was likely that the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy) would defeat the Dual Entente (Russia and France), which they considered detrimental to their continental interests. Britain offered to mediate and Charles, 9th Duke of Marlborough, offered the Palace of Blenheim to Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey as a suitable venue for him to host the negotiations. Besides Grey the talks were also attended by the respective foreign ministers of Russia, France, Austria-Hungary, Germany and Serbia: Sergey Sazonov, Stéphen Pichon, Alois Aehrental, Wilhelm Freiherr von Schön and Milovan Milovanović. The conference led to the Blenheim Agreement: this compromise detailed that Austria-Hungary would keep Bosnia-Herzegovina, but would recognise Serbia’s annexation of the Sanjak of Novi Pazar in return (the Sublime Porte wasn’t even asked and was forced to accept this fait accompli).
Tensions in the Balkans remained high and ultimately erupted in 1912. The Italo-Turkish War had revealed just how weak the Ottoman Empire was: Italy won and annexed Libya as well as the Dodecanese Islands. Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and Montenegro formed the Balkan League. After Montenegro declared war on October 8th 1912, the others followed. Montenegro launched its main thrust toward Shkodra; the Serbs moved on Skopje and Monastir before turning to Albania and reaching the Adriatic; Bulgaria attacked eastern Thrace, threatening Constantinople; and Greece’s main attack was into Thessaly. With the war over in May 1913, the second Balkans War erupted over the spoils of war: Bulgaria, dissatisfied with not being allowed to keep Macedonia, attacked its former allies. Romania and the Ottoman Empire intervened, resulting in Bulgaria’s defeat.
The Second Balkans War was a catastrophic blow to Russia’s Balkan policies, which had focused on warm water ports for centuries. It marred the tercentenary of Romanov rule. The Balkans League, established as an alliance against Austria-Hungary, was now gone. Secondly, Russia had taken a pro-Serbian position in Serbia’s disagreements with Bulgaria over land partitioning, creating a permanent break-up between the two countries that caused Bulgaria to gravitate towards the Central Powers. This left Russia with no choice but to unconditionally support Serbia in order to avoid losing their only remaining ally in this crucial region. The Balkans remained rife with tensions and this would lead to the coming war.
Chapter V: Peace in the Orient & Steps to War, 1905-1914.
By May 1905, fourteen months into the war, public support for the war was drying up in Russia and Japan alike. Neither side was any closer to a decisive victory than the other. Both were moving more troops to the front to replace those coming back home in body bags to fight what increasingly looked like a long, protracted, fruitless endeavour. Popular protests erupted in Japan and Russia alike with the public demanding a swift end to the costly war: casualties were terrible for negligible gains on the Manchurian front and neither side was prepared for these fatality rates; the economies of both countries were heavily burdened by the demands of a wartime economy; the haemorrhaging of money and scarcity of food and fuel drove up prices, directly affecting the civilian population. In both countries the wave of nationalistic popular support had waned and increasingly got replaced with discontent and sometimes outright hostility towards the government.
On Sunday June 18th 1905, strikes erupted at the Putilov Ironworks in St. Petersburg against working conditions and these devolved into protests concerning fairer wages, a reduction of the working week from 48 to 40 hours, an end to the war and universal suffrage. The crowd was joined by middle class shop owners, office clerks, teachers, policemen and so on and they intended to present the Tsar with a petition. On Nevsky Prospekt a unit of elite Preobrazhensky’s Guards stood in between the Winter Palace and the crowd of peaceful protestors. A stand-off ensued.
Nicholas had already been told the crowd was peaceful, carrying religious icons and singing patriotic hymns and songs (“God Save the Tsar” in particular). Therefore he’d already given the order not to fire unless he, and he alone, personally ordered otherwise. He told high-ranking members of the court critical of this decision “I’d rather be known as Nicholas the Weak than Nicholas the Bloody.” While pondering what to do he was mindful that mounting tensions between the troops and the protesting crowd could still ignite if an incident occurred. One wrong move, and a nervous soldier might decide to pull the trigger and cause a bloodbath that everyone would blame the Tsar for.
He decided to invite a small delegation of union leaders and representatives from the middle class, including two city councilmen, headed by Father Georgy Gapon. Gapon was a Russian Orthodox priest who took an interest in the working and lower classes and had proven himself a charismatic speaker and capable organizer. The priest handed the Tsar the petition and the delegation explained the hardships the lower classes were suffering because of the war. Nicholas responded that the demands they laid out were understandable and sensible, but tactically replied that legislative power was primarily the prerogative of the Duma. He nonetheless promised he would do what he could to alleviate the suffering and Gapon returned with this message, after which the crowd of protestors dissolved. The story was spread through newspapers across the country and it helped improve the popularity of the monarchy, which had begun suffering the longer a clearcut victory did not manifest.
Tentative, informal peace negotiations began between Russia and Japan, which gained a more official character and sped up after US President Theodore Roosevelt offered to mediate. Japan readily agreed to the talks because its economy was on the verge of collapse. The end result was the Treaty of Portland, signed at the venue selected by Roosevelt: with the negotiations commencing in August, he chose the town of Portland in the state of Maine to avoid the sweltering Washington summer.
Though Roosevelt was more sympathetic to the Russians, he remained neutral and in the end the reality of the military situation determined the peace treaty: though both sides were war weary, Russia now had a more favourable military position as it had further built up its troop strength in Manchuria to half a million should negotiations fail and hostilities continue. The Treaty of Portland determined that Manchuria would be in the Russian and Korea in the Japanese sphere of influence respectively and also that Tokyo would pay twenty million roubles in war indemnities for its first strike against Port Arthur. Other than the reparations, Russia had gained nothing that Japan hadn’t already offered in negotiations concerning spheres of influence two years prior. Decades later a historian declared: “The Russo-Japanese War was pointless and caused by Russian arrogance. They got exactly what they would’ve gotten if they’d just engaged in diplomacy, sparing more than 100.000 lives.”
The war, however, didn’t prove to be completely useless to Russia as it revealed the flaws in its armed forces as well as detecting a clear difference in performance between the two branches (the army and the navy). The Pacific Fleet had performed competently under Makarov by breaking out of Port Arthur and winning a clear tactical victory over the Imperial Japanese Navy. In Vladivostok, Makarov’s force had remained as a “fleet in being” for the duration of the war, tying down considerable Japanese naval assets. Some would’ve preferred a more aggressive approach (i.e. a decisive battle) but the final evaluation declared that the fleet had done its job properly.
The Imperial Russian Army’s performance was considered mediocre. Many of the innovations brought by the Industrial Revolution, such as rapid-firing artillery and machine guns, as well as more accurate rifles, were first tested on a mass scale then. Military operations showed that modern warfare had undergone a considerable change since the Franco-Prussian War over thirty years prior. Most army commanders had previously envisioned using modern weapon systems to dominate the battlefield on an operational and tactical level but, as events played out, the technological advances forever altered the conditions of war too: today it’s considered the first “total war”. The Tsar, an amateur engineer himself, ordered a greater emphasis on artillery and machine guns.
Another problem, however, was incompetence. Many high-ranking officers owed their positions thanks to their titles and/or their aristocratic descent rather than merit and competence, and General Aleksey Kuropatkin became the symbol for this. He initially got the death penalty for his series of failures, but Tsar Nicholas II granted him clemency and his sentence was commuted to time served and a dishonourable discharge. This was merely the most publicized change in a wave of discharges, resignations and promotions. Aristocratic scions solely seeking prestige were reassigned to make room for professional officers who’d performed admirably in combat. The most promising ones were sent to study abroad at Berlin’s Prussian Staff College, the École Militaire in Paris, and West Point in the United States.
Meanwhile, Austria-Hungary took advantage of Russia’s moment of weakness in the wake of the Russo-Japanese War, resulting in the Bosnian Crisis. The 1878 Treaty of Berlin had granted Austria-Hungary the right to occupy Bosnia-Herzegovina, though it formally remained under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire. Its final status wasn’t settled until the 1881 Three Emperors’ League treaty between Germany, Austria-Hungary and Russia in which Russia agreed to Austria-Hungary’s annexation. By 1897 Russia under Tsar Nicholas II changed its position again, but Vienna didn’t intend to give up on this. After a 1903 coup put a new pro-Russian dynasty in power in Belgrade, relations between Austria-Hungary and Serbia gradually deteriorated, the former could do little as long as the latter was still under Russian protection.
An opportunity to annex Bosnia-Herzegovina presented itself when Russia emerged weakened from the Russo-Japanese War. By 1907, Austro-Hungarian Foreign Minister Alois Aehrental began formulating a plan to solidify Austria-Hungary’s position towards Serbia through annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina. His opportunity came in the form of a letter from Russian Foreign Minister Alexander Izvolsky – proposing Austrian annexation of the provinces as part of a deal to secure better access to the Turkish Straits for Russian naval vessels – and a subsequent meeting at Buchlau castle in Moravia, Austria-Hungary. Izvolsky made too grievous errors: firstly, he misjudged that Britain would support Russia in its demands for opening the Turkish Straits; secondly, he grossly underestimated how much this would fan the flames of Russian nationalism. He presented himself as being duped by Aehrental, but was most likely lying to save face and to keep his position (which didn’t work as the Tsar replaced him with Sergey Sazonov).
On October 6th, the day after Bulgaria declared its independence from the Ottoman Empire, Emperor Franz Joseph announced to the people of this Ottoman territory (that had been occupied by Austria for thirty years) his determination to recognize and grant them an autonomous and constitutional regime, under his authority as their annexing sovereign. Vienna presented this to the world as a fait accompli.
The Tsar was infuriated, but was aware he shouldn’t go to war again so soon: the war against Japan had caused serious societal tensions that were still lingering and that could destabilize Russia if they were ignited again, something he might not be able to stop again. Secondly, the Imperial Russian Army was in the midst of reforms to incorporate the lessons learned from the Russo-Japanese War. He nonetheless ordered a partial mobilization to which Germany and Austria-Hungary responded by issuing mobilization orders of their own, which induced a war scare in Europe.
The threat of a general European war erupting in the Balkans alarmed Great Britain and. This was not so much because it could draw them in, as it could opt for neutrality: other than Japan Britain had no great power allies. However, the British estimated that it was likely that the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy) would defeat the Dual Entente (Russia and France), which they considered detrimental to their continental interests. Britain offered to mediate and Charles, 9th Duke of Marlborough, offered the Palace of Blenheim to Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey as a suitable venue for him to host the negotiations. Besides Grey the talks were also attended by the respective foreign ministers of Russia, France, Austria-Hungary, Germany and Serbia: Sergey Sazonov, Stéphen Pichon, Alois Aehrental, Wilhelm Freiherr von Schön and Milovan Milovanović. The conference led to the Blenheim Agreement: this compromise detailed that Austria-Hungary would keep Bosnia-Herzegovina, but would recognise Serbia’s annexation of the Sanjak of Novi Pazar in return (the Sublime Porte wasn’t even asked and was forced to accept this fait accompli).
Tensions in the Balkans remained high and ultimately erupted in 1912. The Italo-Turkish War had revealed just how weak the Ottoman Empire was: Italy won and annexed Libya as well as the Dodecanese Islands. Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and Montenegro formed the Balkan League. After Montenegro declared war on October 8th 1912, the others followed. Montenegro launched its main thrust toward Shkodra; the Serbs moved on Skopje and Monastir before turning to Albania and reaching the Adriatic; Bulgaria attacked eastern Thrace, threatening Constantinople; and Greece’s main attack was into Thessaly. With the war over in May 1913, the second Balkans War erupted over the spoils of war: Bulgaria, dissatisfied with not being allowed to keep Macedonia, attacked its former allies. Romania and the Ottoman Empire intervened, resulting in Bulgaria’s defeat.
The Second Balkans War was a catastrophic blow to Russia’s Balkan policies, which had focused on warm water ports for centuries. It marred the tercentenary of Romanov rule. The Balkans League, established as an alliance against Austria-Hungary, was now gone. Secondly, Russia had taken a pro-Serbian position in Serbia’s disagreements with Bulgaria over land partitioning, creating a permanent break-up between the two countries that caused Bulgaria to gravitate towards the Central Powers. This left Russia with no choice but to unconditionally support Serbia in order to avoid losing their only remaining ally in this crucial region. The Balkans remained rife with tensions and this would lead to the coming war.
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Kinda expected russia to stomp over japan with how they are better industrialized and it seems war because of Serbia would still happen,
Serbia could very much still be the tail wagging the dog, but for the former: it's not the industry that is a constraining factor, its logistics. The railways to the east are limited in what they can transport, men, equipment and supplies all fight for priority. That's why I expect @Onkel Willie to devote not just time to reform and the international relations but also on internal things that upgrade Russias capabilities to wage wars: Trucks, Tractors and Trains for instance. But also things that allow greater stockpiling of food like canning.