In an attempt to increase their wages, industrial workers went on strike. The Tsar’s indecisiveness, the reality of him continuing the war against Germany although there were many thousands of casualties and the rest of Russia was starving due to the bad transportation systems, and the fact that he had broken his promises from the October Manifesto after the
War Communism was radical and involved the militarisation of Labour which was disliked by the people and made people focus purely on the needs of the war. This contrasts greatly with the First World War (WW1) because the Tsar didn’t militarise Labour completely and so the demand for supplies in WW1 couldn’t be met by the factories. Starvation was nothing new in Russia and during WW1 the supplies couldn’t reach the troops on the front line and so many soldiers had little to eat. With War Communism the majority of the food would be taken from a household to feed an army and the result was that Russians starved, this time the household starved and there was little incentive to grow more. War Communism was introduced as the focus of Lenin was on the military and getting supplies to the soldiers of Russia quickly.
The development of Russian government was influenced more by war than any other factor. Throughout the period of 1855 to 1964, war played a major role in the development of Russia’s government and acted as a catalyst for change. Despite all the wars leading to a certain degree of political change, it certainly was also linked to social-economic change. Arguably, war is seen as the most important cause for revolutions and change in Government, as The First World War proved with its importance in the fall of the Tsarist autocracy and the failure of the Provisional Government. Major ideological change was also seen after the Russo-Japanese war with the change of Nicholas II’s method of ruling and was important in the change of structure of government and tools, causing leaders to impose new reforms and enforce their legitimacy.
How far do you agree that the first world war was mainly responsible for the February revolution of 1917? To fully understand to what extent the first world was was responsible for the February revolution of 1917 we must look further than the war itself. Other factors such as the actions of the Tsar Nicholas alongside the social and economic strains the was placed upon the country can also be identified as important. The war played a large part in influencing the revolution. When war was declared in 1914, much of the Russian population rallied behind the Tsar and the monarchy in a wave of patriotism.
During the period 1905 – 1917 in Russia, numerous political and social alterations occurred. These ultimately led to the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II on March 2nd 1917 along with the falling of the Romanov Dynasty whom has ruled Russia for 3 centuries. Chain events of poor political actions from the 1904 – 1917 combined to influence the decisions of the Russian society. As these changes occurred, the people of Russia began to question the Tsar as the ruler, which led to lose of support from workers, peasants and the military. Despite the key cause of the February revolution was sparked by Russia’s involvement in World War I, it wasn’t the only factor in the regime.
Russia’s role in World War I quickly led Russia’s people to the strong dislike of their Provisional Government and further into economic downfall which continued to upset the citizens of Russia. The Bolsheviks, a left-wing political party that were socialists, began to grow in popularity among the peasants and industrial workers whose pay was very low and in most cases among the industrial workers; their working conditions were very poor and unsafe. The Bolsheviks then instigated a revolution, resulting in Bolshevik power of Russia. Bolshevik power led to further unhappiness. The months before and during the Bolshevik revolution, as well as the signing of the peace treaty at Brest-Litovsk cause turmoil among the socialists and brought Russia into civil war.
This was terribly inconsiderate of the military as the other 82% of the nation was left to starve as the military was the government’s top priority. This led to extreme cases of hunger across Russia which soon became famine. Food shortages were at their worst in the towns and cities, Petrograd suffered particularly badly due to the remoteness from the food-producing regions. Secondly, transportation was a key pre- existing war condition; it was the disruption of the transport system rather than the decline in food production that was the major cause Russia’s wartime shortages. The attempt to transport millions of troops and masses of supplies to the war fronts created unbearable pressure on the Russian transport system, and it bucked under the pressure.
Czar Nicholas II saw the possibility of diverting Russian discontent with a “successful war”, and so in February, 1904, Nicholas decided to go to war with Japan. The war was a disaster for the Czar – the Russian army was ill-equipped, poorly armed, and unskilfully trained; the transportation system throughout Russia collapsed and bread prices soared, thus destroying the confidence in the government. Basically, government corruption and inefficiency was exposed during the war and as the war continued, discontent among the people increased dramatically and they lost faith in their
Not only was it the population of the Russian empire that turned against the Tsars, but the Army too. They were many revolts in the countryside; of which were suppressed by the army. This caused problems as the army was mainly structured of peasants. This meant mutinies were to come into play – 200 from October to December. In addition to this, troops within the far-East wanted deployment as they disagreed with the rules after the Manifesto.
To what extent did the Russo Japanese War cause the 1905 Revolution The 1905 Revolution was a series of strikes which took place all over Russia. Unlike the 1917 Revolutions this was spontaneous and took place as a result of considerable resentment about the social, economic and political situation in Russia. The Russo Japanese war was one of the main factors that caused the Revolution, however there were other significant events, such as the Bloody Sunday and long term causes that could be argued to be the outbreak of the Revolution. The Russo-Japanese War lasted from 1904 to 1905, and arose from both Japan and Russia wanting to expand and dominate in Korea and Manchuria. Allthoug the Russians saw themselves as far superior in military power and Japan was a nation that was considered inferior and was not one of the Great Powers, they suffered a humiliating defeat.