WI: Czar Nicholas II keeps Russia out of WW1

I agree with Saran, apart from on the Ottoman factor. (Why, if Britain immediately wanted to go against the Ottomans, was Churchill so comparatively generous to them? Those warships were the Ottoman equivalent of the Belgium issue-a bit of PR. Churchill promised to return them after the war, and even pay compensation if they got damaged. Britain had a massive naval threat facing it, after all. The Ottoman leadership, with aggressive aims of its own, refused.) And that the Kaiser had, years before, previously considered an attack on France via Belgium; Britain warned him that they would intervene if they did so.

Grey was fixed on the idea of a continental alliance of Britain, France and Russia against Germany, and had tried hard since the First Moroccan Crisis to cement it. His perspective was (entirely justifiably in 1905) that Germany, combining its great industrial and increasing military (especially naval) strength with a severelly weakened Russia and an expansionist imperial policy, was upsetting the balance of power. He therefore took steps to oppose Germany. By 1914, this had came to a crisis point. Attempted detentes since 1912-in colonial and naval matters- had all failed, partly due to Britain, partly due to German insistance that Britain, if Ger restricted its fleet, kept out of a continental war. Germany was unnerved at its "encirclement", and Russia's recovering strength, and Grey still feared the consequences of an aggressive Germany. A couple of bullets later in Sarajevo, and the rest is history. And...

*Realises he wasn't on a thread about Britain, but Russia. No, really, that was my thought process. There's another one out there, and the way the thread was going confused me. Still, too long a post to waste. Have been revising recently.*

Right. What happens is an AH intervention in Serbia, with Germany looking on approvingly, and Russia wondering what had gone on in the Tsar's head-the Slavs needed protecting! (So yet another group is added to a long list of anti Tsarists-but not as long as the one there would be in OTL. The people only really started to turn against Nicky when the war-driven famine and casualties came. There may be future uprisings, but without the massive casualties amongst the old, loyal army, they could be crushed more effectively.) What happens next is a tense period in Europe. It is far from impossible that WWI could break out later, the way things were going. There was quite enough tension in Europe for everyone.
 
Honestly that reads like the stuff you see about America on conspiracy boards!
Not really. Unlike some pro-German historians/conspiracy theorists (e.g. Terence Zuber or Niall Ferguson) I don't think that the Entente powers engineered the whole war as a way to destroy Germany. Fundamentally, the war happened because the international system of the time was 'stacked' against Germany and Austria-Hungary, and they resorted to military aggression to try to change that. And it was 'stacked' that way in large part because the British, French, and Russians had ceased to treat Austria-Hungary as an independent actor (let alone a Great Power) worthy of being treated equally on the world stage. I don't see how that's a conspiracy theory; it's just the way things worked, like how the "Congress system" of 1814-48 was basically a joint Anglo-Russian hegemony over Europe tempered by an understanding of sovereignty and the rule of law.

Saying that the British thought they could dissipate their internal problems by a foreign war is hardly a conspiracy theory; Churchill himself admitted it in his history The World Crisis. Plenty of similar gavottes have been tried in the past: Seward's plan to forestall the secession of the American South by going to war with Spain over its invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1861, for instance, or the Ottoman Empire's declaration of war on Russia in 1787, to shore up the Sultan's control by arresting a decline in his power by violence. Indeed, that very motive, foreign war to forestall civil war, is ascribed to both Austria-Hungary and Russia in 1914 by various historians. And for decades, the construct of Primat der Innenpolitik, foreign policy dictated by domestic policy, dominated the understanding of Germany's decision to go to war in 1914 as well. Why would the British be any different here?

As for the whole Ottoman thing, well, it kinda sucks, but it's true. There's literally no other way to view British actions in the late summer and early fall of 1914. Now, a real conspiracy theory would've made mention of the fact that all of the Entente powers denied Ottoman requests for an alliance in early 1914. Surely, then, that was because they planned to dismember the Turks in the near future, even before the war broke out! I don't think that's true, because the British and French (at least) had excellent other reasons for not allying with the Ottomans.
Derek Pullem said:
Home Rule had passed. Asquith had to introduce an Act to PREVENT it from becoming law.

With even a few months delay of entry into the war (or the war itself) Britain would have been in a war in Ireland with two hostile armed groups and in no real position to think about any intervention in a European conflict unless there was a clear and present danger to the nation. I don't think even violation of Belgium neutrality would be enough in these circumstances - the Germans would have to be sieging Paris!
I pretty much agree with all of this. In late July and early August 1914 the British were in the highly fortunate position, vis-a-vis Home Rule, of being able to see clearly where the current crisis would go (open warfare in Ireland and probably in parts of Great Britain as well), yet far enough from the brink that they could successfully turn around and unify the country (more or less) around a foreign war. Arguably the shooting war had already started at Bachelors Walk. Any fool could see what was coming.
 
Saying that the British thought they could dissipate their internal problems by a foreign war is hardly a conspiracy theory; Churchill himself admitted it in his history The World Crisis. Plenty of similar gavottes have been tried in the past: Seward's plan to forestall the secession of the American South by going to war with Spain over its invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1861, for instance, or the Ottoman Empire's declaration of war on Russia in 1787, to shore up the Sultan's control by arresting a decline in his power by violence. Indeed, that very motive, foreign war to forestall civil war, is ascribed to both Austria-Hungary and Russia in 1914 by various historians.
When the Russians tried it against Japan, they got defeated. There is no way that they would have tried again against Germany of all countries.

The comment about Seward and a war with Spain is a new one to me. Would make an interesting PoD with the Union fighting both the CSA and Spain.
 
I'm assuming you're doing this to prevent the Bolsheviks coming to power. An easy POD is that Lenin's brother succeeds in his attempt to assassinate the Czar, which was only discovered the night before OTL. OTL, his sister was arrested as well as his brother even though she had nothing to do with it. We can assume that she would likely be put in prison if her brother succeeds, and instead of going into internal exile, Lenin and his mother flee the country. This will be before Lenin becomes a Marxist and without Lenin, there is no real Bolshevik group as it existed OTL. I'd suspect the mensheviks would likely be larger than OTL and more influential and therefore, if there was a February Revolution, there wouldn't be a successful November one. Such spirit would likely be crushed in the July Days and Kerensky would continue in power.
 
When the Russians tried it against Japan, they got defeated. There is no way that they would have tried again against Germany of all countries.
But they did try it against Germany. In the Council of Ministers, there were several key voices, but the most relevant to this question were those of Pyotr Durnovo, the minister of the interior back in 1905, and Aleksandr Krivoshein, the minister of agriculture.

In February 1914, Durnovo claimed that war would lead to revolution, in no uncertain terms: Russia would be forced to deal with immense social strains in adapting to modern industrialized warfare, and the only result of these could be revolution. The tsar brought these arguments up again in late July when the war arguments started up, although it is not clear whether he believed them or whether he was simply fleshing out his other ministers' positions. Durnovo brought up strike numbers, which are frequently quoted in any discussion of Primat der Innenpolitik as it applies to Russia: 3,534 strikes from January 1914 to July 1914, of which two-thirds were classified as 'political' strikes.

Yet the tsar got an alternative view from the current interior minister, Nikolai Maklakov, who brought up the official outlook from the police. Urban strikes were, claimed Maklakov, not representative of the view of the Russian people as a whole. In 1905, both urban and rural Russia had been in ferment; in 1914, urban Russians were restless, but the countryside was extremely quiet. Furthermore, Maklakov argued, war would rally the nation around the flag, and mobilization would preempt industrial disturbances.

In addition, Durnovo was not popular in Russian ministerial circles for his diplomatic views. As an artifact of the pre-Manchurian War era, he thought that Russia's future was in the East, and proposed an Asia-centric foreign policy. To Durnovo, Britain was Russia's chief enemy, and Germany a useful ally. Regardless of the validity of his arguments about Russia's internal situation, the council of ministers could hardly endorse Durnovo because his foreign policy views were so radically out of step with the rest of the government.

The killing blow, in the late July meetings, was delivered by the aforementioned Krivoshein. He brought up the memory of 1909: a humiliation which, he claimed, fatally weakened the tsar's position at home. Krivoshein argued that Russia needed an assertive foreign policy to stave off the demands of Slavophiles at home. To him, the only real excuse for Russia's diplomatic somnolence over the previous nine years was the weakness of the armed forces. Here he was backed up by the army and navy chiefs, Sukhomlinov and Grigorovich, both of whom declared that their service arms were ready and could support an assertive foreign policy and, most expected, a war in the west.

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I think that a description of the Manchurian War as an assertive war to stave off revolution at home is a bit of a fairy tale. Russia's decision to fight was a direct consequence of the previous twenty-odd years of Asiatic foreign policy, and was made with scant attention to the domestic situation either way. (That said, despite the way the war started - a Japanese surprise attack on Port Arthur - the Russians were somewhat complicit in the way it happened. Negotiations over the division of Korea had already broken down, and war had already seemed less a question of 'if' but 'when'.)
 
I think that a description of the Manchurian War as an assertive war to stave off revolution at home is a bit of a fairy tale. Russia's decision to fight was a direct consequence of the previous twenty-odd years of Asiatic foreign policy, and was made with scant attention to the domestic situation either way. (That said, despite the way the war started - a Japanese surprise attack on Port Arthur - the Russians were somewhat complicit in the way it happened. Negotiations over the division of Korea had already broken down, and war had already seemed less a question of 'if' but 'when'.)
"What this country needs is a short, victorious war to stem the tide of revolution."
V K Plehve Russian Minister of the Interior 1903

Krivoshein argued that Russia needed an assertive foreign policy to stave off the demands of Slavophiles at home. To him, the only real excuse for Russia's diplomatic somnolence over the previous nine years was the weakness of the armed forces. Here he was backed up by the army and navy chiefs, Sukhomlinov and Grigorovich, both of whom declared that their service arms were ready and could support an assertive foreign policy and, most expected, a war in the west.
An assertive foreign policy is not the same as starting a war. The former can include building an alliance with other powers in order to make another country back down, visits to foreign ports by warships and investing in the infrastructure of other countries.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Hello, Russia has always been a place that has intrigued me but I still have a lot to learn about its history. One thing that has pecked my interest in this lately was a comment I heard on a documentary about world revolutions made by a historian who said that if Czar Nicholas II had never let Russia into the fighting during WW1 then the communist revolution may never have had occurred there. In fact they said that Lenin had even left the country before then because his hopes where so dim for the revolution to start there.

So in this thread I'd like to discuss some of the PODs that could keep Russia out of WW1 and what long term effects that would have on local and world events.

Here is the documentary
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpK84illOPA&feature=related

Even as late as 1915, Russia taking up Germany peace feelers would have probably prevented communism. There is also a good argument that the provisional government making peace in early 1917 prevents communism. At one point, Germany offered to keep Lithuania and Poland, no reparations, end the war now. It was a good offer for Russia, all things considered.

Russia not getting involved in the Serbia deal, means no Pan-Slavism at least for the Southern Slavs. So Russia likely gives a sphere of influence to A-H in Yugoslavia, and helps them keep the peace. Things that come to mind that are different:

1) Three emperor league or something like it exists in 1914.
2) A-H much more likely to be the triple monarchy or some system where Yugoslavs have more say. Russia will want something to show its people the Southern Slavs are well treated.
3) Ottoman empire may be in bad shape, if Russia has a free had that way. I can also see the French, British, Ottoman Alliance
4) The Tsar likely realizes how difficult Russia is to govern, so Russia may not be expansionistic. The USA got to a certain size, and decided to stop growing, Russia may make the same choice. Imagine the headache that making the Philippines and Panama a permanent part of the USA could cause combined with maybe trying to annex half of the remainder of Mexico in the late 1800's.
5) If Russia does not do #4, then where does it expand. Conquering large parts of China is possible as is building railroads towards India. Or maybe the Ottoman empire is the target.
6) Take away WW1 and WW2, and likely no Israel today. Russia is still the Jewish homeland.

No Russian involvement means that the Serbs will likely get mauled by Austria-Hungary and everyone looks around and realizes what a powder keg Europe is. Chances are there could be a continuation of the Interparliamentary Union that might become a weak LEague of NAtions equivalent but beyond that I am not sure. So many people being cut down means that the world would be more populated, which might play hell with the Spanish Influenza in 1918. I also think that technology would be reduced while tanks and some military technology would be delayed, though Germany might realize her stockpiles are appalling and focus on synthetics for a while. OVerall it still sets up for an equally bloody conflict later one though the alliances, and thus the victors, may shift.

Serbia is crippled. Bulgaria is larger. A-H and Germany are seen as master of the Balkans, and the area might be "reasonable" peaceful for decades. WW1 stopped the massive outflow of Europeans to the rest of the world. The USA, Brazil and the rest of Latin America are bigger and whiter. Given decades more of white population flow to Africa, there might be a few more White nations in Africa. A low population nation like Kamerun might actually be majority German. With enough whites, maybe Apartheid does not end. Sixteen % is too low to rule a country, but if it got to more than 35% white, it is a lot more doable. I can also see these white African nations expelling "non-native" black populations in some cases. With a steady stream of a few hundred thousand extra whites moving into South Africa each year, there would be a temptation to remove the blacks from the better land to make rooms for the Whites. Or to send the Indians back to India. Colonialism and colonies might even survive til today.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
Anyway, on the subject of Russia: it would not be consistent with Russian policy from 1909 onward to not have threatened war with Austria-Hungary over Serbia. Supposing that they did not, though, the Austrians would fight and win against Serbia, albeit probably taking too many casualties and exposing the Habsburg military to have been grossly unprepared for the fighting. Since the Habsburg government had no actual plan in the event of victory, I can only assume that the result of the war, whether it involved any annexations of Serbian territory or not (probably Bulgaria would end up taking some Serbian territory, not Austria, and the Obrenovićes to end up in charge of a rump Austrian puppet-Serbia), would spark a fairly serious Austro-Hungarian political crisis in advance of the upcoming one over the Ausgleich renegotiations of 1917. It'd get ugly. Austria would certainly not have solved any of its problems.

If Russia is clearly neutral, then the A-H probably transfers a lot of forces from the Russian border to the Serbian campaign. There may be an initial setback, but the second attack with a lot more forces than OTL probably breaks the Serbian Army, and it is a fairly quick war. A-H army will be improved because the Serbian war will show a lot of flaws.

Bulgaria ends up with most of Serbia.

The Serbian war does solve one problem, the Serbia issue. The 1917 crisis is going to happen anyway, and the war may accelerate the date of the crisis. A-H had many problems to solve, but he Hungarian problem is not the same as the Slav problem. Related, but not the same.
 
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