WI: George V doesn’t turn his back on his Romanoff cousins and grants them asylum in Britain?

They'd probably live in obscurity in Britain under heavy guard possibly dodging Stalin's assassins for the rest of their (or Stalin's) natural lives.

They'd serve no political roles later and like the Kaiser they'd probably just remain in exile, complaining about how things had deteriorated in their home country with other like-minded emigres, vaingloriously ignorant of the fact that their own brutal leadership had landed them (and by extension their people) in their current miserable predicament.

The Czar, like the rest of those old European autocrats at the time, were pretty awful rulers who were woefully out of touch with the needs of their country. After abdication, Nicholas barely understood and underestimated the radicalism that had gripped his country. Their constant dance of abuse and neglect made them highly unpopular and when given the choice between a new Czar or a new system in 1917, the Russian people chose the latter and abolished the Monarchy.

Even if they escape or are smuggled out, they are unlikely to have much impact, they'd just remain a curious and eternally baffled relic of a by-gone era.
 
BTW, one indication of how unpopular monarchism was in Russia in 1917: in the elections for the Constituent Assembly, the only place where monarchists made a significant showing was in the Kiev electoral district, long a Black Hundreds stronghold. Yet even there they got only 3.24% (though 20.5% in the city of Kiev). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiev_electoral_district_(Russian_Constituent_Assembly_election,_1917)
Were there any national-liberal parties in the running?
 
Were there any national-liberal parties in the running?

If by "national" you mean Russian-national-liberal, the Kadets qualify. (Virtually all the Ukrainian parties were socialist. Oliver Radkey in his Russia Goes to the Polls: The Election to the all-Russian Constituent Assembly, 1917, p. 160, gives only 17,000 votes in all Ukraine for "Ukrainian nonsocialist" groups.)
 
If by "national" you mean Russian-national-liberal, the Kadets qualify. (Virtually all the Ukrainian parties were socialist. Oliver Radkey in his Russia Goes to the Polls: The Election to the all-Russian Constituent Assembly, 1917, p. 160, gives only 17,000 votes in all Ukraine for "Ukrainian nonsocialist" groups.)
Were the Kadets republicans?
 
Were the Kadets republicans?
Depends on the time frame. They were parliamentarianists throughout the late Tsarist period, hence their name "Constitutional Democrats", and they were chiefly involved in the process of transferring power from the Tsarist regime onto a Duma-backed Provisional Government in the February Revolution.

Throughout the dual power time of 1917, the Kadets moved more and more to the right, or if you want: the political spectrum moved to the left, leaving them on almost on the right edge. They became THE bourgeois party, THE opposition to worker-and-soldier-soviet power. Minutiae of constitutional nature, while continually discussed, became secondary to the pressing issues of the Kadets, which were to support a continuing war effort, to oppose the implosion of Russia into countless national republics, to oppose worker takeovers of factories and peasant takeovers of land, to push for a government which would "restore order" in the face of the above-mentioned goings-on and combat the Bolshevik danger, and the like.

By the time of the CA elections, though, i.e. after the Bolshevik October Revolution, the Kadets were oppressed opposition, and they had opposed holding CA elections under such circumstances. When the CA was elected, though, they were a smallish faction on the right edge, and while utterly uncomfortable with the Socialist Revolutionary majority in the CA, they nevertheless tended to see this institution as the lesser evil when compared to Bolshevik dictatorship through the People's Commissariat. Very soon, the CA would be sent home by the Bolshies, and what was left of the Kadets supported various White movements of resistance against the Bolsheviks. Their struggle was one of survival, and the question of whether Russia, if it should ever be freed of the Bolsheviks, should be some sort of constitutional tsardom or a parliamentary republic was absolutely secondary then (although the question continued to be discussed of course).
 
Were the Kadets republicans?

In 1917, definitely. (From 1906 to 1917 they had been willing to accept constitutional monarchy, but even then the left wing of the party was republican at heart.) Eventually, in exile, some people in the right wing of the Kadets did become monarchists.
 
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Deleted member 94680

I would have imagined that Nicholas would enjoy Balmoral. He could pass the days hunting and fishing. However he would be catching an earful everyday from his wife complaining about their cousin’s hospitality.

And there lies the problem. Nicholas was (family wise) incredibly conscious of what his wife and children wanted. He wouldn’t leave Russia without them and wanted only to go somewhere where they could live as a family in peace.

It didn’t help that Alexandra was a we-rule-by-divine-right nutjob that was roundly disliked by all and convinced a monarchical counter-revolution was just round the corner.
 
Depends on the time frame. They were parliamentarianists throughout the late Tsarist period, hence their name "Constitutional Democrats", and they were chiefly involved in the process of transferring power from the Tsarist regime onto a Duma-backed Provisional Government in the February Revolution.

Throughout the dual power time of 1917, the Kadets moved more and more to the right, or if you want: the political spectrum moved to the left, leaving them on almost on the right edge. They became THE bourgeois party, THE opposition to worker-and-soldier-soviet power. Minutiae of constitutional nature, while continually discussed, became secondary to the pressing issues of the Kadets, which were to support a continuing war effort, to oppose the implosion of Russia into countless national republics, to oppose worker takeovers of factories and peasant takeovers of land, to push for a government which would "restore order" in the face of the above-mentioned goings-on and combat the Bolshevik danger, and the like.

By the time of the CA elections, though, i.e. after the Bolshevik October Revolution, the Kadets were oppressed opposition, and they had opposed holding CA elections under such circumstances. When the CA was elected, though, they were a smallish faction on the right edge, and while utterly uncomfortable with the Socialist Revolutionary majority in the CA, they nevertheless tended to see this institution as the lesser evil when compared to Bolshevik dictatorship through the People's Commissariat. Very soon, the CA would be sent home by the Bolshies, and what was left of the Kadets supported various White movements of resistance against the Bolsheviks. Their struggle was one of survival, and the question of whether Russia, if it should ever be freed of the Bolsheviks, should be some sort of constitutional tsardom or a parliamentary republic was absolutely secondary then (although the question continued to be discussed of course).

And thus I cannot see much utility in salvaging the Romanovs, monarchy is not returning to Russia. Even with a White victory I think we have a strong anti-Monarchy dictatorship in the guise of a republic with no sympathy or desire to share power, even symbolic. Once the fire started the monarchy was going to be gone. The Romanovs can at best become like the Hohenzollerns or Hapsburgs but likely even less sympathetic. It takes until the end of the Soviet Union to give them any romantic notion of place. For me the exercise is a historic parallel, the Tsar befalls a fate in a CP "win" not unlike he Kaiser, abdicate and exile, potentially an influence if the butterflies blow things other ways but more fictional relevance for narrative purposes than anything else. If the Whites succeed and the Bolsheviks cannot gain power then we have an heir to bring back perhaps in future. In my own drafting I thought to have Wilhelm honor his pre-war friendship despite the political poison that is Nicholas to ensure Germany and Russia do not become too friendly. I think Wilhelm has the power and even the desire, if Nicholas will run, Germany would do what George V did not, damn the consequences.
 
"So maybe a cloak and dagger (black ops) escapade could be arranged. A few dead bodies in a burnt out farm house, identified as the Romanoffs, whilst the real family whisked away to some far off corner of the empire."

How do you know this didn't happen?
 
"So maybe a cloak and dagger (black ops) escapade could be arranged. A few dead bodies in a burnt out farm house, identified as the Romanoffs, whilst the real family whisked away to some far off corner of the empire."

How do you know this didn't happen?

Because it makes no sense and flies in the face of all evidence.
 
While all of which is perfectly true. His Majesty’s Royal Marines and out units did get involved in combat against the ‘reds’ in the Russian civil war.

On the orders of the British government, not the monarch himself.

(And can we please stop using "Romanoff"? The proper Romanization is <Romanov>.)

So maybe a cloak and dagger (black ops) escapade could be arranged. A few dead bodies in a burnt out farm house, identified as the Romanoffs, whilst the real family whisked away to some far off corner of the empire.

Not going to happen - as bad as the Admiralty or War Office was, no one would be that stupid as to stick their head out for rescuing what many British thought was a brutal tyrant.
 
I wonder how long Nicholas and Alexandria would have lived in exile. Of the three cousins ruling Germany, England and Russia Nicholas was the youngest.
Whilhelm II born 1859
George V born 1865
Nicholas II born 1868
The former Kaiser lived to be 82 so there is the chance that Nicholas could have lived to see Elizabeth II become Queen (Nicholas would have been 85 in 1953).
Alexandria was a hypochondriac but sickly. She might have gave up the will to live and died early. If Alexi died young I think that would have been the end of her. Maybe she would have rallied if the Grand Duchesses gave birth to healthy grandchildren.
I wonder if The Romanovs would have been invited to the coronations of Edward VIII and George VI.
If either Nicholas, Alexandria or both are alive in 1940 and living in Denmark would they stay or evacuate to England?
 
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I give you Winston Churchill.

Who at the time was already becoming quite isolated from the rest of the Government. The point still stands - no way is any British person going to stick their head out for a brutal tyrant whom the Government feared could stoke unrest at the time they least needed it if they were brought to the UK.
 
I'm reminded of an ATL I saw elsewhere online years ago where as a sort of compromise between political considerations and family loyalty the Tsar and his wife weren't granted asylum in Britain but their children were. IIRC the adult Romanovs met much the same fate as in OTL and their son didn't outlive them by much as when he heard that his parents were dead he went running off in a fit of grief, fell down somewhere and sustained the sort of injury wouldn't have been much of an issue for a healthy boy his age but which for a haemophiliac back then would be fatal. Which left only the girls.

I have no idea as to the plausibility of the above, I just remembered it and thought I would mention it.
 
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