History UsefulNotes / RussiansWithRifles

Outside of Europe, the army played a significant role in Russia's imperial expansion in Central Asia. This was the time of TheGreatGame and the place where painter Vasily Vereshchagin got inspiration for many of his works.

On the other hand, a combined detachment (5800 infantry, 5000 cavalry, 32 guns) led by General I.V. Gurko advanced south at the general's own initiative throughout July. In Bulgaria, the Balkan mountain range split the country horizontally on a north-south axis. There were four major passes through these mountains and any force that managed to cross them would be free to march straight to Constantinople. Gurko seized the major town of Turnovo on the north side with the intention of seizing a passage through the Balkan mountains. He then crossed the mountains through Hainkioi Pass in order to prepare for an attack to seize the bigger Shipka Pass (which was later abandoned by the Turks). Gurko wanted to continue his advance south, but the arrival of reinforcements under Suleiman Pasha made his plan unfeasible. But his cavalry managed to disrupt Turkish rail and telegraph lines. To some observers, Gurko's actions demonstrated how cavalry retained their usefulness on a late 19th century battlefield.

As we've said before, the Russians were also fighting to eliminate Turkish strongpoints in northern Bulgaria. After Russian forces seized the riverside town of Nikopol (4 July) the next objective was Plevna. The Russians and Turks arrived in Plevna on the same day, but the Turks were faster and dug in to await the Russians. The Russians (later assisted by the Romanian Army) launched three attacks (first and second on July, third in August), but they all failed to dislodge the Turks. In combat that looked like something out of Port Arthur and World War I, massed infantry assaults were thrown against Turkish trenches and redoubts, and all of them were driven back. While it is tempting to use Plevna as a case that all combat in the late 19th century was trench warfare, it must be noted that Russian tactics relied too much on the bayonet and fire support was absent.

After the third attack failed the Russians decided to besiege Plevna and to seal off the town by capturing three strongpoints (Dolni Dabnik, Gorni Dabnik, Telish) along the road to Sofia. The combat to seal the road resembled Plevna--bayonet assaults were launched with scant artillery support. Russian bayonet assaults were actually successful in taking Gorni Dabnik (albeit with heavy casualties) but they did not work at Telish. The Russians then concentrated ten artillery batteries on Telish and fired 3,000 rounds to force the Turks in the town to surrender. When the two towns fell the Turkish commander at Dolni Dabnik decided to abandon the town and join the forces at Plevna. By the end of November, the Turks at Plevna began to run low on supplies; the Turkish commander launched a breakout attack but Russian counterattacks forced him back into the town. After that the Turks decided to surrender.

All this eventually led to the White armies' demise; Kornilov died in battle, Kolchak was arrested and shot, other White leaders eventually fled Russia and founded White Emigre military unions that existed for a long time after the revolution; many tens of thousands of Whites ended up working as mercenaries [[NoMoreEmperors for various factions of China's Warlord Era]], such as the Shandong-province Warlord Zhang Zongchang of the 'Three Don't Knows'[[note]]It was said that he didn't know how many concubines/mistresses he had, how much money he had, or how many men he had in his armies[[/note]] - he hired enough of them (c.5000) to form a cavalry regiment and an armoured-train corps.

The first major international military victory that made Russia a great power was against Napoleon. Field Marshal Kutuzov (portrait on the page picture) used what some military historians call "strategical aikido": he lured Napoleon's army deep into Russia, waited for the supply lines to stretch thin, and counterattacked when winter was closing in. Europe's greatest army was reduced to freezing, hungry crowds of deserters fleeing Russia as fast as they could. [[hottip:*:It wasn't the last time they made use of that strategy. There is a witticism that goes round in military/historical circles, naming Russia's best military asset as "General Winter".]]

As we said, though, that's not how it happened at all. While it was true that the Japanese took their modernization very seriously, the fact was that the war was an ''enormous'' gamble. By the war's end, 84% of the total paid-up (cash) capital held in Japan's banks had been given to the government as war-loans, and the Japanese government was entirely reliant upon foreign loans to fund the war[[hottip:*: to the tune of 80% of the war's up-front costs being funded through Anglo-American loans]], despite having doubled taxation without printing money. The result was exponentially increasing prices, which had risen by some 10-30% on pre-war levels even for basic goods like rice. Russia had lost battle after battle, but the strategic situation was looking rosy as Japan was just months - if not ''weeks'' - away from at least a morale collapse, with all Japan's strategic reserves depleted and the country teetering on the verge of a price-increase spiral. Russia didn't know all this, however, so the peace-loving Tsar Nicholas II sued for peace on the grounds that too many people had died already and it wasn't worth the effort for Russia to continue (and win) the war. The long series of tactical setbacks and defeats looked very bad, however, and many people took it as a sign that Nicholas II was incompetent and should step down. Which he was, of course, but many other parties also took the opportunity to kick the government while it was down and there were numerous strikes as peasant campaigned for the abolition of the village-commune system and workers at government firms went on strike to get higher wages.

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies. Regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses, the other 2/3 coming from the government creating money to pay/loan to itself[[hottip:*: i.e. the budget was always, ''always'' written off as if it was balanced, even though throughout the war it ran at a massive deficit. The 'theoretical' money used to pay all those expenses didn't just 'go away' after the budget was presented, it became actual money as it trickled down the various accountancy chains until it made its way into the economy as a whole - and some of which ends up as wages paid into bank accounts and physically handed to people as cash.]] and printing money with which to pay its personnel. The inflation was made worse by the fact that before the war, the Russian government had insisted on a ridiculously low proportion of cash-in-the-economy-as-a-whole to precious-metals-in-Russian-banks-held-as-reserves ratio: 1:1. That is to say, the value of all the Russian money in the entire 1913 Russian economy was exactly equal to that of all the precious metals in Russia's banks.[[hottip:*: This kind of tight-fisted-ness was just stupid, given that it would be physically impossible for anyone or anything, not even the Russian government itself, to panic and exchange ''all the money in the entire economy'' for ''all the gold and silver in the entire economy'' (save that held by private individuals). By comparison, the contemporary USA had a ratio of more than 2:1.]]

Though it was indirectly Nicolas's fault, for not standing up to the army's individual generals and bullying them out of ''arguing with the General Staff, and repeatedly winning'', he quite definitely got the blame for the problems with his out-of-control Generals were causing for the Russian war effort. The shell-shortage was a complete fiction - numerous Russian fortresses were captured with great numbers of the kind of heavy artillery pieces that the army as a whole apparently lacked, and combat''-months'' of ammunition hoarded away inside them[[hottip:*: Russia's artillery Generals, with the exception of a reformist clique under Sukhomlinov, seemed to all believe that fortresses and fortress artillery should be the cornerstone of Russia's war effort... even though in this age of mobile and highly destructive warfare, each and every one of the fortresses they championed and ''filled'' with (heavy) artillery and ammunition could be destroyed in a day]]. While it was true that the army was a little short of ammunition, this was nothing like the problem the army portrayed it is as being. All armies always operate with a limited supply of ammunition; what was ''really'' affecting the Russian army's ability to fight the war was not material shortages or morale problems but a ''godawful'' eighteenth/nineteenth-century command structure that prevented the war-effort from being coordinated in any meaningful kind of way at any level.

All this eventually led to the White armies' demise; Kornilov died in battle, Kolchak was arrested and shot, other White leaders eventually fled Russia and founded White Emigre military unions that existed for a long time after the revolution; many tens of thousands of Whites ended up working as mercenaries [[NoMoreEmperors for various factions of China's Warlord Era]], such as the Shandong-province Warlord Zhang Zongchang of the 'Three Don't Knows'[[hottip:*: It was said that he didn't know how many concubines/mistresses he had, how much money he had, or how many men he had in his armies]] - he hired enough of them (c.5000) to form a cavalry regiment and an armoured-train corps.

The main man behind the Russian Army's post-Crimea reform was Dmitriy Milyutin. As Alexander II's Minister of War, he and other reformers believed that the Russian Army could only be effective through a revolutionary reform. Under Milyutin's leadership the War Ministry was restructured to increase its efficiency. Milyutin established Russia's first general staff institutions and implemented universal military service--13 years after the serfs were regarded as freemen. Russia's ground forces themselves were restructured to make them more compatible with the War Ministry's cadre and reserve systems. Cavalry establishments were increased and a special fortress troop section was created so that regular infantry units were free from manning fortresses.

The Russo-Japanese War was forced upon Russia when Japan attacked, seemingly out of the blue but really for reasons of geopolitical security. Russia's minister of police, [[GermanRussians von Plehve]], stated that "Russia needs a small victorious war to stave off the threat of revolution". This was the time when ImperialRussia seemed to truly become a VestigialEmpire, losing international reputation, getting mired in civil unrest and not knowing what to do with their own future, and the [[RomanovsAndRevolutions revolution]] lurked somewhere very close. So, as many people today see the matter, ImperialRussia tried to choose the weakest possible enemy to fight, and chose Japan: it was just a feudal Asian state that only recently got out of MedievalStasis, [[SchmuckBait what could possibly go wrong]]?

* ''[[AwesomeButImpractical The Tsar Tank]]'' was a WWI Russian design for a super-tank that resembled a giant tricycle with enormous wheels. Didn't go past prototype stage, but hey, it looked cool.

Milyutin also oversaw the army's rearmament. Initially, muzzle-loading rifles replaced the old smoothbore muskets used since Peter the Great's time. When the AustroPrussianWar showed that breech-loading rifles were superior, the Russians chose to adopt new rifles and turn their existing rifles into breech-loaders. The weapons adopted (Austrian Krenk, American Berdans 1 and 2) would be Russia's main rifles until the 1890s. The Russians also adopted a Smith and Wesson revolver as their main pistol. For artillery, rifled breech-loading field guns were adopted in 1867, which were made of bronze and used the German Krupp breech system.

The Turkish Army by the beginning of the war was a mess; while in theory 400,000 men could be called to arms, the Ottoman military lacked the organization and institutions to equip and mobilize such an army into war. Though the Turks did manage to get some excellent weapons like the Peabody-Martini rifle and Krupp field guns.

On the other hand, a combined detachment (5800 infantry, 5000 cavalry, 32 guns) led by General I.V. Gurko advanced south at the general's own initiative throughout July. In Bulgaria, the Balkan mountain range split the country horizontally on a north-south axis. There were four major passes through these mountains and any force that managed to cross them would be free to march straight to Constantinople. Gurko seized the major town of Turnovo on the north side with the intention of seizing a passage through the Balkan mountains. He then crossed the mountains through Hainkioi Pass in order to prepare for an attack to seize the bigger Shipka Pass (which was later abandoned by the Turks). Gurko wanted to continue his advance south, but the arrival of reinforcements under Suleiman Pasha made his plan unfeasible. But his cavalry managed to disrupt Turkish rail and telegraph lines. To some observers, Gurko's actions demonstrated how cavalry would effectively fight on a late 19th century battlefield.

* ''M1870 Russian Berdan'' - a single-shot bolt-action rifle, one of the first standardized infantry weapons of the Russian Army (before that, they used a mishmash of various muskets and muzzle-loading rifles). Later many Berdans were converted into shotguns, and the word "berdanka" entered Russian in the sense of "old rusty shotgun of a night guard".
* ''Smith & Wesson Russian'' was the Russian version of the Smith & Wesson Model 3 revolver.

* ''Nagant'' revolver was the main reason why the government decided to pander to him. The Smith & Wesson reolver was beginning to grow obsolete (it used black powder), Nagant offered his revolutionary design for a quite reasonable price. Quite slow and difficult to reload (it didn't have a break-out cylinder and has thus to be reloaded one-by-one), this revolver, however, used a special cartridge that eliminated the gas breakout from the cylinder front, and was thus very powerful for its time. Still a lot of them in storage.

* The ''Model 1900 "Putilov"'' was a 76.2mm field gun used during the Boxer Rebellion and the Russo-Japanese War. It looked like a typical 19th century field gun, but the Putilov incorporated a series of rubber recoil rings in the carriage trail that absorbed the gun's recoil and then expanded again to return the barrel into firing position, making it a semi-quick-firing gun. It was already obsolete as the French 1897 75mm field gun (using a modern hydro-pneumatic recoil system) was introduced three years before.
* The ''1877 Baranovsky 2.5-inch gun'' was an experimental quick-firing field gun that employed a spring-based recoil mechanism and metal cartridge cases for its ammunition. Its creator died when he mishandled a fuse during gun testing, but the Baranovsky gun was employed in the Russo-Turkish War and in certain mountain artillery batteries in the 1880s.

The nineteenth century was the time of rapid technological development, but Russia failed to catch up to the other Great Powers and entered the middle of the century with pretty much the same army that fought Napoleon. Because of that, when the next major conflict started, Russians began to lose. That conflict was the Crimean War (against Turkey, France, Britain, and the tiny Kingdom of Sardinia), of Thin Red Line and Charge of the Light Brigade fame.
Well, initially this looked like everything was beginning well -- Russia took on its traditional whipping boy, Turkey, looking for a quick little skirmish and freeing Turkey's Slavic subjects. But the Turks managed to enlist the help from the other European powers not wanting the increase in Russia's influence. Losses in the war demonstrated that progress is essential for an army to stay war-worthy. The military reforms of Alexander II were motivated by Russian inferiority demonstrated in this war.

'''Some More Victories: Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878'''

After Alexander II's military reforms were mostly complete, Russia started reasserting its power in Europe. A series of Slavic uprisings on the Balkans, cruelly quelled by Turks, provided a casus belli for the biggest Slavic country to intervene.
Turks, by that time, also had an underequipped army, and, despite any military supplies by the British, they failed to reped Russian intervention. A new series of Russian victories resulted in Romania and Bulgaria regaining independence and Serbia increasing its territory.

* The ''Model 1900 "Putilov"'' was a 76.2mm field gun used during the Boxer Rebellion and the Russo-Japanese War. It looked like a typical 19th century field gun, but the Putilov incorporated a series of rubber recoil rings in the carriage trail that absorbed the gun's recoil and then expanded again to return the barrel into firing position, making it a semi-quick-firing gun. It was already obsolete as the French 1897 75mm field gun (using a modern hydro-pneumatic recoil system) was introduced three years before.

* The Model 1900 "Putilov" was a 76.2mm field gun used during the Boxer Rebellion and the Russo-Japanese War. It looked like a typical 19th century field gun, but the Putilov incorporated a series of rubber recoil rings in the carriage trail that absorbed the gun's recoil and then expanded again to return the barrel into firing position, making it a semi-quick-firing gun. It was already obsolete as the French 1897 75mm field gun (using a modern hydro-pneumatic recoil system) was introduced three years before.

The RussoJapaneseWar was forced upon Russia when Japan attacked, seemingly out of the blue but really for reasons of geopolitical security. Russia's minister of police, [[GermanRussians von Plehve]], stated that "Russia needs a small victorious war to stave off the threat of revolution". This was the time when ImperialRussia seemed to truly become a VestigialEmpire, losing international reputation, getting mired in civil unrest and not knowing what to do with their own future, and the [[RomanovsAndRevolutions revolution]] lurked somewhere very close. So, as many people today see the matter, ImperialRussia tried to choose the weakest possible enemy to fight, and chose Japan: it was just a feudal Asian state that only recently got out of MedievalStasis, [[SchmuckBait what could possibly go wrong]]?

* ''[[AwesomeButImpractical The Tsar Tank]]'' was a WWI Russian design for a super-tank that resembled a giant tricycle with enormous wheels. Didn't go past prototype stage, but hey, it looked cool.

* ''M1870 Russian Berdan'' - a single-shot bolt-action rifle, one of the first standardized infantry weapons of the Russian army (before that, they used a mishmash of various muskets and muzzleloading rifles). Later many Berdans were converted into shotguns, and the word "berdanka" entered Russian in the sense of "old rusty shotgun of a night guard".
* ''Smith&Wesson Russian'' was a revolver [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin made by Smith&Wesson for the Russian army]].
* ''Mosin-Nagant'' was the five-shot bolt-action rifle that replaced the Berdan and became famous in both the [[RedOctober Russian Civil War]] and [[WorldWarTwo the Great Patriotic War]]. Now sold to private citizens as a hunting weapon. About the only things that connects it to the famous Belgian weaponsmith is basically a lawsuit, as the only detail that captain Mosin borrowed from Nagant's competing design was present only in the prototype, was completely redesigned in the trials and refinement stage and wasn't even all that important to begin with -- it simply prevented some possible malfunctions. But the Tsar's government decided to placate a famous foreigner and paid him the same amount as to Mosin. Nagant then felt that it was a proof of his copyright and ran with it, advertising himself as one of the rifle's co-designers — which is why the rifle is called as such in the West.
* ''Nagant'' revolver was the main reason why the government decided to pander to him. As S&W revolver was beginning to grow obsolete, Nagant offered his revolutionary design for a quite reasonable price. Quite slow and difficult to reload (it didn't have a break-out cylinder and has thus to be reloaded one-by-one), this revolver, however, used a special cartridge that eliminated the gas breakout from the cylinder front, and was thus very powerful for its time. Still a lot of them in storage.

some still persist to this day.

All this eventually led to the White armies' demise; Kornilov died in battle, Kolchak was arrested and shot, other White leaders eventually fled Russia and founded White Emigre military unions that existed for a long time after the revolution; some still persist to this day.

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies. Regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses, the other 2/3 coming from the government creating money to pay/loan to itself[[hottip:*: i.e. the budget was always, ''always'' written off as if it was balanced, even though throughout the war it ran at a massive deficit. The 'theoretical' money used to pay all those expenses didn't just 'go away' after the budget was presented, it became actual money as it trickled down the various accountancy chains until it made its way into the economy as a whole - and some of which ends up as wages paid into bank accounts and physically handed to people as cash.]] and printing money with which to pay its personnel. The inflation was made worse by the fact that before the war, the Russian government had insisted on a ridiculously low proportion of cash-in-the-economy-as-a-whole to precious-metals-in-Russian-banks-held-as-reserves ratio: 1:1. That is to say, the value of all the Russian money in the entire 1913 Russian economy was exactly equal to that of all the precious metals in Russia's banks.[[hottip:*: This kind of tight-fisted-ness was just stupid, given that it would be physically impossible for anyone or anything, not even the Russian government itself, to panic and exchange ''all the money in the entire economy for all the gold and silver in the entire economy''. By comparison, the contemporary USA had a ratio of more than 2:1.]]

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies. Regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses, the other 2/3 coming from the government creating money to pay/loan to itself[[hottip:*: i.e. the budget was always, ''always'' written off as if it was balanced, even though throughout the war it ran at a massive deficit. The 'theoretical' money used to pay all those expenses didn't just 'go away' after the budget was presented, it became actual money as it trickled down the various accountancy chains until it made its way into the economy as a whole - and some of which ends up as wages paid into bank accounts and physically handed to people as cash.]] and printing money with which to pay its personnel. The inflation was made worse by the fact that before the war, the Russian government had insisted on a ridiculously low proportion of cash-in-the-economy-as-a-whole to precious-metals-in-Russian-banks-held-as-reserves ratio: 1:1. That is to say, there value of all the Russian money in the 1913 Russian economy was exactly that of all the precious metals in Russia's banks.[[hottip:*: By comparison, the contemporary USA had a ratio of more than 2:1.]]

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies. Regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses, the other 2/3 coming from the government creating money to pay/loan to itself[[hottip:*: i.e. the budget was always, ''always'' written off as if it was balanced, even though throughout the war it ran at a massive deficit. The 'theoretical' money used to pay all those expenses didn't just 'go away' after the budget was presented, it became actual money as it trickled down the various accountancy chains until it made its way into the economy as a whole in the form of bank accounts. A tiny portion of this money was then given physical form as it was withdrawn from them in the form of actual in-hand cash.]] and printing money with which to pay its personnel. The inflation was made worse by the fact that before the war, the Russian government had insisted on a ridiculously low proportion of cash-in-the-economy-as-a-whole to precious-metals-in-Russian-banks-held-as-reserves ratio: 1:1. That is to say, there value of all the Russian money in the 1913 Russian economy was exactly that of all the precious metals in Russia's banks.[[hottip:*: By comparison, the contemporary USA had a ratio of more than 2:1.]]

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies. Regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses, the other 2/3 coming from the government creating money to pay/loan to itself[[hottip:*: i.e. the budget was always, ''always'' written off as if it was balanced, even though throughout the war it ran at a massive deficit. The 'theoretical' money used to pay all those expenses didn't just 'go away' after the budget was presented, it became actual money as it trickled down the various accountancy chains until it made its way into the economy as a whole in the form of bank accounts. A tiny portion of this money was then given physical form as it was withdrawn from them in the form of actual in-hand cash.]] and printing money with which to pay its personnel. The inflation was made worse by the fact that before the war, the Russian government had insisted on a ridiculously high proportion of cash-in-the-economy-as-a-whole to precious-metals-in-Russian-banks-held-as-reserves ratio: 1:1. That is to say, there value of all the Russian money in the 1913 Russian economy was exactly that of all the precious metals in Russia's banks.[[hottip:*: By comparison, the contemporary USA had a ratio of more than 2:1.]]

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies. Regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses, the other 2/3 coming from the government creating money to pay/loan to itself[[hottip:*: i.e. the budget was always, ''always'' written off as if it was balanced, even though throughout the war it ran at a massive deficit. The 'theoretical' money used to pay all those expenses didn't just 'go away' after the budget was presented, it became actual money as it trickled down the various accountancy chains until it made its way into the economy as a whole in the form of bank accounts. A tiny portion of this money was then given physical form as it was withdrawn from them in the form of actual in-hand cash.]] and printing money with which to pay its personnel. The inflation was made worse by the fact that before the war, the Russian government had insisted on a ridiculously high proportion of cash-in-the-economy-as-a-whole to gold-in-Russian-banks-held-as-reserves ratio: 1:1. That is to say, there value of all the Russian money in the 1913 Russian economy was exactly that of all the precious metals in Russia's banks.[[hottip:*: By comparison, the contemporary USA had a ratio of more than 2:1.]]

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies. Regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses, the other 2/3 coming from the government minting theoretical money to pay itself[[hottip:*: i.e. the budget was always, ''always'' written off as if it was balanced, even though it was running a huge deficit. The 'theoretical' money didn't just 'go away' afterward, it remained and trickled down the various accountancy chains until it made its way into the economy as a whole in the form of private back accounts and was given physical form as it was withdrawn from them in the form of actual in-hand cash]] and printing money with which to pay its personnel.

Concerning the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, opinions differ. Communists think he was a bloody tyrant. Monarchists think he was a saint. But two things can be stated about him as hard facts: he was weak-willed and indecisive, and most of the Russian government's problems at this time stemmed from the government not having the loyalty of any one demographic, but the enmity of many if not all of them. Russian involvement in WorldWarOne was almost inevitable, unfortunately, and although the regime seemed to whether the first two years of war well enough the economic situation became critical in the winter of 1916; instead of taxing the population harder or using the war as an excuse to institute land-reform, Nicholas had instead 'abolished' the state liquor monopoly (which provided 1/4 of all 1913 government revenue) - to 'ensure' that the grain thus used would be used for bread instead - and tried to fund the war through inflationary policies - regular income (after the abolition of the liquor monopoly) was only enough to cover some 1/3 of expenses.

Thus, to avoid looking bad, the Russian government set out to solve a problem that didn't actually exist. Up until 1915-16, Russia's state-owned armouries produced all the weapons and ammunition for the army's needs, with some of both being ordered from abroad as the government did not trust Russian businesses one bit. Then, under pressure to 'solve' the 'shell shortage', Russia's government was forced to award numerous lucrative armaments-production contracts to domestic producers. Russia's corporations collectively trampled all over each other to leap, or attempt to leap, on the armaments-contract gravy train. What resulted was a ''dramatic'' shortage of consumer goods as all sorts of industries stopped producing mundane goods and produced the more-profitable military supplies. This doubled the reluctance of farmers to sell their grain, as the country was quickly running out of things they wanted to buy with their money. The end result of all this was that agricultural output dropped as a result of hoarding (for when consumer goods became available) and the labour shortages caused by mass-migration to the cities to get work in the war-industries... and thus urban famine in a formerly food-exporting country which still had a healthy food-surplus.

Though it was indirectly Nicolas's fault, for not standing up to the army's individual generals and bullying them out of ''arguing with the General Staff, and repeatedly winning'', he quite definitely got the blame for the problems with his out-of-control Generals were causing for the Russian war effort. The shell-shortage was a complete fiction - numerous Russian fortresses were captured with great numbers of the kind of heavy artillery pieces that the army as a whole apparently lacked, and combat''-months'' of ammunition hoarded away inside them[[hottip:*: Russia's artillery Generals, with the exception of a reformist clique under Sukhomlinov, seemed to all believe that fortresses and fortress artillery should be the cornerstone of Russia's war effort... even though in this age of mobile and highly destructive warfare, each and every one of the fortresses they championed and ''filled'' with (heavy) artillery and ammunition could be destroyed in a day]]. While it was true that the army was a little short of ammunition, this was nothing like the problem the army portrayed it is as being. All armies always operate with a limited supply of ammunition; what was ''really'' affecting the Russian army's ability to fight the war was not material shortages or morale problems but a ''godawful'' nineteenth-century command structure that prevented the war-effort from being coordinated in any meaningful kind of way at any level.

Though it was indirectly Nicolas's fault, for not standing up to the army's individual generals and bullying them out of ''arguing with the General Staff, and repeatedly winning'', he quite definitely got the blame for the problems with his out-of-control Generals were causing for the Russian war effort. The shell-shortage was a complete fiction - numerous Russian fortresses were captured with great numbers of the kind of heavy artillery pieces that the army as a whole apparently lacked, and combat''-months'' of ammunition hoarded away inside them[[hottip:*: Russia's artillery Generals, with the exception of a reformist clique under Sukhomlinov, seemed to all believe that fortresses and fortress artillery should be the cornerstone of Russia's war effort... even though in this age of mobile and highly destructive warfare, each and every one of the fortresses they championed and ''filled'' with (heavy) artillery and ammunition could be destroyed in a day]]. While it was true that the army was a little short of ammunition, this was nothing like the problem the army portrayed it is as being. All armies always have a limited amount of ammunition; what was ''really'' affecting the Russian army's ability to fight the war was not material shortages but a ''godawful'' command structure that prevented the war-effort from being coordinated in any meaningful kind of way.

Though it was indirectly Nicolas's fault, for not standing up to the army's individual generals and bullying them out of ''arguing with the General Staff, and repeatedly wining'', he quite definitely got the blame for the problems with his out-of-control Generals were causing for the Russian war effort. The shell-shortage was a complete fiction - numerous Russian fortresses were captured with great numbers of the kind of heavy artillery pieces that the army as a whole apparently lacked, and combat''-months'' of ammunition hoarded away inside them[[hottip:*: Russia's artillery Generals, with the exception of a reformist clique under Sukhomlinov, seemed to all believe that fortresses and fortress artillery should be the cornerstone of Russia's war effort... even though in this age of mobile and highly destructive warfare, each and every one of the fortresses they championed and ''filled'' with (heavy) artillery and ammunition could be destroyed in a day]]. While it was true that the army was a little short of ammunition, this was nothing like the problem the army portrayed it is as being. All armies always have a limited amount of ammunition; what was ''really'' affecting the Russian army's ability to fight the war was not material shortages but a ''godawful'' command structure that prevented the war-effort from being coordinated in any meaningful kind of way.

Though it was indirectly Nicolas's fault, for not standing up to the army's individual and bullying them out of ''arguing with the General Staff, and repeatedly wining'', he quite definitely got the blame for the problems with his out-of-control Generals were causing for the Russian war effort. The shell-shortage was a complete fiction - numerous Russian fortresses were captured with great numbers of the kind of heavy artillery pieces that the army as a whole apparently lacked, and combat''-months'' of ammunition hoarded away inside them[[hottip:*: Russia's artillery Generals, with the exception of a reformist clique under Sukhomlinov, seemed to all believe that fortresses and fortress artillery should be the cornerstone of Russia's war effort... even though in this age of mobile and highly destructive warfare, each and every one of the fortresses they championed and ''filled'' with (heavy) artillery and ammunition could be destroyed in a day]]. While it was true that the army was a little short of ammunition, this was nothing like the problem the army portrayed it is as being. All armies always have a limited amount of ammunition; what was ''really'' affecting the Russian army's ability to fight the war was not material shortages but a ''godawful'' command structure that prevented the war-effort from being coordinated in any meaningful kind of way.