the great war and the february revolution, 1914-1917
DESCRIPTION
The Great War and the February Revolution, 1914-1917. Initial patriotic support. Duma deputies Major cities middle-class Workers stopped striking Peasants – resignation and misunderstanding Large-scale anti-German propaganda (popular): e.g. Petrograd - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
The Great War and the February Revolution, 1914-1917
Initial patriotic support• Duma deputies• Major cities• middle-class• Workers stopped striking• Peasants – resignation
and misunderstanding• Large-scale anti-German
propaganda (popular): e.g. Petrograd
• Initial military gains: East Prussia and Galicia
But soon ended, not a short war
• April-September 1915: Great Retreat from:– Galicia– Prussia– Russian Poland– Lithuania– Latvia
• Why?– Germans better armed– Russian generals
incompetent• Radicalized soldiers
Great Retreat’s effectsHuge losses (G.F. Krivosheev) : • Killed in action 1,200,000• missing in action 439,369• died of wounds 240,000• gassed 11,000• died from disease 155,000• POW deaths 190,000• deaths due to accidents and
other causes 19,000• Total war dead 2,254,369• Wounded 3,749,000• POW 3,342,900
A Whole Empire Walking (Peter Gatrell)
• Massive refugees problem
• Military command incompetent
• Six million fled front zone• One million forcibly
expelled Jews, Germans and other foreigners
• Jewish pogroms• ‘scorched earth’• Increased ethnic tensions
Peasants’ lives transformed• Most soldiers were
peasants– 50% of working-age men
mobilized• Livestock massively
requisitioned• Many impoverished• Soldatki• Stolypin land reform
protests• Bazaar riots against price
controls
War’s economic impact• Prohibition stopped
vodka revenues• Cut off markets• Cut off foreign
investment• Impoverished
government printed tons of money
• Inflation• War effort greatly
impeded food supply
Greater public participation• All-Russian Union of
Zemstvos and Municipal Councils (ZemGor)– Aid to refugees, injured
soldiers• Military-Industrial
Committees– Involved middle-class, but
workers often boycotted.• Led to greater public self-
confidence• Progressive Bloc in Duma
-- increasingly critical
Workers’ war situation• Many mobilized• Increasingly valuable to
military production• But real wages fell; by 1917
a quarter of pre-war levels• Food supply and other
necessities increasingly expensive and scarce
• Illegal to strike• But by summer 1915 strikes
began to increase– 1915: 1000 strikes– 1916: 1600 strikes,
increasingly political and assertive demands.
Then, Nicholas went to front• Aug 1915: Progressive Bloc
demanded a “Government of public confidence”
• Nicholas refused, ignored the Duma, went to the front.
• Left Alexandra and Rasputin in charge• The “German Woman” and the
“Mad Monk”• Ministerial ‘leapfrog’
• Left no one else to blame for military failures
• Greatly undermined legitimacy of Romanovs
Nicholas at the front
Alexandra and Rasputin
1 November 1916: “Stupidity or Treason?”
• Pavel Miliukov• State Duma• Attacked Sturmer, Rasputin,
and “the court party grouped around the young tsarina.”
• Nicholas replaced Sturmer with Trepov.
• MVD Protopopov remained.• Trepov tried to work with
Duma.• Tried to remove Protopopov.• Trepov dismissed.• Liberal opposition united
against tsarist government
Rasputin murdered, 16/29 December 1916
• Prince Felix Yusupov• Grand Duke Dmitri
Pavlovich• Vladimir Purishkevich• Did not solve the
problem.
February (1917) Revolution
• February 23 (March 8), 1917: International Women’s Day
• Women joined by locked out Putilov workers
• Police over-reacted.• 25 February: General
strike of 240,000 workers
• Key: (27 Feb.) Volynsky regiment mutinied.
Revolutionary Petrograd
February Revolution, final acts• 27 Feb: Temporary
Committee of State Duma (Chair: Rodzianko)
• 1 March: Petrograd Soviet issued Order No. 1
• March 2 (15), 1917: Tsar Nicholas II abdicates at Pskov.
• March 3 (16): Grand Duke Mikhail declines the throne.
End of the Romanov Dynasty, 1613-1917
Provisional Government