Is this Russia’s Smartest Idea in History? 

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Fun fact: Tomsk was by far the biggest city in the west Siberia. But their elders refused to get this railroad near the city. Now Novosibirsk, at the time a small town to the south, is 3 times bigger than Tomsk.

So it means that the British Empire had a monarchy, and the Russian Empire had an autocracy. Okay, alright. The double standards in any european or american rhetoric towards Russia are no longer surprising😂

My grandfather was one of the workers on this Trans-Siberian Railroad. That is where he learnt his trade as an engineer of Railroads and bridges. He moved to South Africa and ended up building many thousands of kilometers of railways and many bridges which are functional to this day.

Not trying to poo on your title too much, I understand headline sensationalism with you tube. But Siberia was already mostly integrated into the Russian empire by the time of the railroads construction. The vast Siberian river system was vital to trade and logistics. And the massive fur trade along with mineral exploitation made Siberia essential to Russia's economy long before oil and gas. What the railroad enabled was quicker travel but more importantly travel in all seasons. With winter being the obvious bottleneck.

Another genius idea of the Russian railroad is that they made the gauge larger than those in Europe. This became very important in 1941. The German trains wouldn't fit on the Russian tracks. The gauge difference significantly slowed down the Germans supply chain and troop movements as the war moved East.

Fun Fact about Russia: It was Russia who saved The Union during the American Civil War as they sent their Navy to San Francisco and New York when England and France were just about to enter the war on the side of the Confederates since London created the Confederates. France was already in Mexico making a spear head movement to resupply the Confederates and to open up a Pacific Theatre and to create a port in California. England already amassed 11,000 troops and growing stationed at their Northern Confederacies border now called Canada ready to open a Northern Theatre to divert Union troops away from their Southern Confederacy then to attack The Unions naval blockade. The Union would have been completely destroyed and annexed by those two great powers leaving the Confederates to exist as either a puppet state of London or to be fully brought back into the fold of the British Empire. London was already courting (threatening/bribing) other countries to get involved like Spain while Russia was in talks with Prussia to ally with incase London was to intervene. Seeing all of this Tsar Alexander II wrote a letter to Queen Victoria saying “If you enter in this war it will be a casus belli for all out war with the Russian Empire”. The stage was set for the 1st World War and Russia stopped it. There is also a memorial in San Francisco for the hundreds of Russian sailors who came off their Asiatic fleet ships that died while helping the city put out a fire that threatened to lay waste to it during the War.

People in Siberia do not consider themselves subjects of the Chinese Emperor))) what kind of nonsense is this??

Nice video. It's "Rasputitza" (Распутица), not "Rasputista" though... 😉

Actually, not China ruled Siberia, but some siberian tribes like Mongols and Mandchu ruled China.

Strange presentation of the material, China after 2 opium wars with Britain did not scare anyone. Russia, with diplomatic authority, extended its borders with the Aigun Treaty of 1858 and the Beijing Treaty of 1860. In 1858, as a result of the Treaty of Aigun, the Amur region went to Russia, and in 1860, as a result of the Treaty of Beijing, Primorye went to Russia. Manchuria, after China's military defeat from Japan (1894-1895), practically became a protectorate of Russia, and therefore a Russian railway and fortresses were built there. Trans-Siberian Railway Built in 1891-1916, it was an economic project and not a military one.

Every video I watch on the building of the Siberian Railroad BLOWS ME AWAY even more!!! The logistics to build this railway today would make it the most difficult project to complete, so I can't even wrap my head around how they built it back then. No disrespect to the other transcontinental railway projects, but when you look at the length/land/environment/sparseness ect. ect., this project makes those projects look like walks in the park! And I know they weren't (so no disrespect) but i'm sure the American cross continenetal railway was the easiest to build by a large margin, and while Canadas cross continental railway may have been more difficult to build than the American trans-continental railway, I feel like the Trans-Siberian railway by magnitude, was harder to build than the Canadian railways compared to the American one, by many times....

Why does everyone hate Russia it’s in a war because Russia is trying to defend itself against nato and also Russia tried to join nato about 20 years ago and nato refused because nato wouldn’t have a purpose if Russia was in nato

"the snow in the Arctic would melt and turn these rivers into raging torrents" except that all the major rivers of Siberia flow _into_ the Arctic Ocean

"США Луизиану купила" - "Россия аннексировала земли в Японском море". Ооооокей :) Американский вариант и формулировка истории такой забавный!

God Bless Mother Russia..

Trans Siberian railway was one step in complexity up from railways across North America. It is longer, in worse climatic conditions and with more natural obstacles.

Russia should never have sold Alaska.

The railroad built between Moscow and my hometown Vladivostok takes over 9k km long, or 5.7k miles. And yes, despite current global circumstances, Vladivostok is still lucky regarding to its location. We're still trading with Japan, Korea, China and many other Asian countries but of course, all ships are sailing under the gray flag instead of Russian. 🤷

Bullshit about people allegedly considering themselves subjects of the Chinese Emperor. 😂

Not "rasputista" but "rasputitsa" Распутица in Russian. If you put in Google translate, you will hear the pronouncation for it.

Your map of Russian Empire lacks a lot of Caucasus

the obsession with Russia among westerns is overwhelming. i wonder what's the reason

I do not agree with the conclusion about the new cities, even taking the example of Tomsk and Novosibirsk. Due to geography (rivers and such) the road was built past the local regional center, the city of Tomsk. Since this place is located at the intersection of key traffic flows, a small settlement on the Trans-Siberian railroad - Novo-Nikolaevsk with a population of 8 thousand people in 1897, began to grow rapidly. Now it is the third largest city in Russia - Novosibirsk, with a population of 1.63 million people and the population of the Novosibirsk region of 2.8 million people. Tomsk in its turn - a city with a population of 52 thousand in 1897 - has grown only to 550 thousand nowadays.

The construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway was only the first step. The next step was the construction of the Baikalo-Amur railway, which run north of the first one.

It's beyond me, I loved being in Russia, the ppl were great

Puts into perspective just how lucky the U.S. is. Almost as much natural resources as Russia, but in a more compact territory with far better climate and river systems which make logistics comparatively easy.

Several youtubers spreading the behind the scenes Western propaganda (and dream) of Russia divided from Siberia. Coincidence? I am hallucinating?

15:54 "its a strategic weakness to have it run through foreign territory", like.. no wayy

A bit surprised at the fact Russia use prisoners for the rail road construction and actually paid them.

As an american we love our russian brothers and sisters.

Greetings to all from beautiful Siberia! Krasnoyarsk :)

Russia has a very interesting history and Siberia is a very intriguing space, to say the least. Good video.

In 1970 ussr built BAM - the baikal - amur railway, also a challenging and interesting construction.

Alexander III did not "unexpectedly pass away"--he was assassinated by by Jewish revolutionaries.

Siberia is not that big. It ends at Lake Baikal. Anything east of that is the Far east.

Интересно, как Китай мог атаковать во время "распутица". Кто то насмотрелся китайских фильмов в жанре "уся" и думает, что китайцы могут летать? 5:59 слово логика автору ролика незнакомо. Александр Третий неожиданно скончался.. в результате теракта 9:30. Китайские рабочие получали только 60% от того, что получали другие рабочие. 11:35 скромно умолчал, что при строительстве дорог в Америке китайские рабочие получали 30% от зарплаты "белого" человека. Сход составов с рельс 13:30 в одной стране в 2022 г. произошло 471 сход железнодорожного состава. Это прогресс товарищи, показатели чуть лучше, чем в Российской империи, начала 20 века. 18:00 в 1945 через БАМ за 20 дней перебросили более 400 000 солдат с западного фронта, что привело к победе в Манчжурской операции или по вашему "Августовская буря" и капитуляции Японии.

I drove couple times via Habarovsk Bridge. It's still same Bridge. True miracle!

Excellent doco! Thanks. I hope the best for you. If you do more railroad stuff then I ask you to look at New Zealand railways. I cycled there recently I felt it would be a totally overlooked area if history that deserves bringing to light. Beautiful nation, beautiful people.

you can easily Trevel now by TrusSibirian express from Moscow to Vladivostok ! it takes only 7 days and a lot of fun!

As conservative citizens with a tyrannical out of control government in the USA, we should seek the help and assistance of Vladimir Putin to help us start over afresh. As Socrates said, "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."

Excellent video, a true history lesson presented flawlessly. Many thanks from Brazil.🙏

Russia always bad and poor? Lol, you clowns

"The Americans had just purchased Louisiana and now they were building a transcontinental railroad". To an American there is a bit of "yada yada" between those two premises.

Thanks for the video! But I have to disagree about the part where you say it didnt spawn any large urban centers: its largely because of it that Siberia has 3 cities with more than a million people (Omsk, Novosibirsk and Krasnoyarsk) and 5 cities with more than 500 thousand people. Sustaining urban centers like these would be impossible without a railroad

9:10 In a metallurgical country where there are tons of metal deposits, hundreds of villages and towns have the word "metal" in their names. Do they order metal products in other countries and bring them across tens of thousands of kilometers to Siberia? I don't think it's true. Maybe rivets or some other smaller items, you can still believe it. But can you imagine if it's a big, long, heavy railroad track to a metallurgical country? It's more like a fairy tale. At the same time the Statue of Liberty in the USA and the Eiffel Tower in Paris were built of Russian metal, which is a well-known fact. If they had so much metal that they even exported it to the Russian Empire, why did they use our metal for their own purposes? Maybe it was the low quality of metal in the U.S. and the well-established production and high quality of metal in the Russian Empire?

As a Canadian my next vacation is in russia to make sure my tax dollars goes to helping them take ukraine so the war can end and my tax dollars will stay at home intead of fake democracy ukraine 😂

Canada was largely independent of British rule when the Canadian Pacific transcontinental railway was built.

5:25 It is hard to get through 'raspútitsa' even verbally.

2 minutes and 15 seconds in and I have already heard "purchased louisiana" while saying "conquered siberia" you're very biased lol

It’s not ‘Rasputista”. It’s “Rasputitsa” as in “Распутица”. You pronounce letter “Ц” as “TS”. So, there, you can also learn something today 😅

Rasp'utiTSa.

A common quiz question for UK Navy ships' crew during 1960's: "Name the main stations along Trans Siberian Railway". Ordinary sailors could rattle them off in no time.

Who annexed Hawaii? It wasn't Russia.

02:23 There was no such a phrase or word Ukraine neither country in that time so please stop spreading Western propaganda and Pro- Ukraine narrative.

Very good video. Very well produced and executed. Interesting and entertaining. Thanks!

Author forgot to mention that after Revolution, when czar was killed Russian Empire were changed into USSR, where everyone was building communism and it’s not correct to compare % of the wage, when there is no private property. For example, workers get paid 40% less, but there were no taxes, free healthcare and education, etc

It is "rasputitsa", not "rasputista"

Russia is Unstoppable

I believe, Hindsight, that your recount of the Russo-Japanese war would have benefitted from explaining how the British financed the Japanese fleet. Japan simply lacked the technology and the finances to build it. In fact, half their fleet was British. Not an implementation detail; this was specific British policy to contain Russia, of which Japan was little more than a vector.

Russia is a Christian nation with conservative values that the Russians live out. What's not to admire and respect......

High quality content.

I really enjoy your excellent, high quality videos that present the facts, historical or otherwise; all free of any political bias or hidden agenda. So much to learn from your videos. Keep u the great work.

And what happened to the indigenous population of the american continent?

Суть истории в интерпретации Запада: всё, что делал Запад - хорошо, всё, что делала Россия - плохо.

Excellent and informative video on a very interesting part of the world. Thank you

Стоило все же подробнее описать масштабные работы, проведенные при советском союзе, а именно строительство Б.А.М. - Байкало-Амурской магистрали и т.д. А также упомянуть тот титанический фронт работ, который проводится прямо сейчас - расширение этой магистрали, что приведет к значительному росту пропускной способности (уже привело, т.к. часть участков готовы). Еще отдельный интерес - автомобильная трасса, идущая "параллельно", которая стала единой совсем недавно, раньше были участки с совершенно ужасной дорогой.

What is amazing, the same strategic considerations are valid even today. At Soviet era Russia build Baikalo-Amur railway in parallel to Transsiberian railway, and right now Russia invest a lot in further expansion and improvement of these railroads.

The transcontinental railroad of USA was originally built dodgy as they wanted to build it as fast as possible to gain free government land. Later on the fixed it up.

While Westerners define Siberia as the entire stretch from the Urals to the Pacific as the presenter of this video did, contemporary Russians and, I believe the Soviets before them, refer to the western portion as being Siberia with the eastern portion being called the Russian Far East with the Far East actually being larger than the portion they call Siberia.

Rasputitsa actually, but close enough

Such an interesting video! Thank you. Commented. Liked. Subscribed. 🙂

*SLAVA ROSSIYA FROM CANADA* !!! 🇷🇺#Z🇷🇺🙏🇨🇦🍻

In 1938 the book was published, the work of the German philosopher Walter Shubart «Europe and the Soul of the East», dedicated to the origins of the confrontation of civilizations of Europe as the West and Russia as the East. The book broke stereotypes of Western worldview. Russia has proved to all mankind the inconsistency of the godless culture ... and, suffering for all, is purified itself from the alien that has suffocated it for centuries... Now begins the second act of drama. The road for the awakened forces of the East...». The European is drawn to specialization. The Russian - to holistic contemplation. The European is a dismembering analyst. The Russian is an all-reconciling synthetic. He does not seek to know more, but to understand the connection of things, to grasp the essence. The Russian is as capable as anyone - to merge poetry, science and religion; and in this - the future is behind him, and himself - the man of the future». Walter Shubart proclaims the salvation of Europe by Russia and the “birth of Western-Eastern world culture». Shubart’s book is a fascinating essay about the national characters of the world’s leading peoples. Although the main thing for the author is the forthcoming transformation of mankind and the saving mission of the «healing Russian soul”. The Englishman looks at the world as his own enterprise, the Frenchman - as a salon, the German - as a barracks. The Russian looks at the surrounding world as the Divine Temple. The Englishman craves prey, the Frenchman for glory, the German for power, the Russian for sacrifice. An Englishman wants to profit from his neighbor, a Frenchman wants to impress his neighbor, a German wants to command his neighbor, and a Russian wants nothing from him. He does not want to turn his neighbor into his means. This is the brotherhood of the Russian heart and the Russian idea. And this is the Gospel of the future. Russian all-man is the bearer of new solidarism. Promethean man is already doomed to death. The epoch of the Ioannovsky man - a man of love and freedom. Such is the future of the Russian people. The West is driven by disbelief, fear and self-love; the Russian soul is driven by faith, peace and brotherhood. That is why the future belongs to Russia... Characterizing the cultural and historical type of European and Russian man, V. Shubart uses the terms «promethean» and «gothic». The European has a «Promethean» moral constitution, which is based on the view of the world as an object, which should conquer, subdue, rebuild. Hence the eternal aggression of the West against the East, the desire of the West to «civilize» the East.

I just found your channel. Great stuff, subscribed.

Thank you. Very clear and not using too much fancy word which make non English speaker understand easily

I couldn’t imagine doing a train journey where it’s uncertain if you’ll even make it to your destination without being in a train wreck.

For unknown reason, I saw just the map all "video" long but it was still interesting. 3 great transcontinental achievements to bypass British naval hegemony : USA, BBB and Imperial Russian + little but extensive Freycinet Plan in France to match German railways. The century of steel (railways, dreadnoughts, canons). How is the planet still not exhausted ? 😊

Cool video. My only addition is that the borders of Siberia differ on the source and time period. Nowadays I believe you would differentiate between Siberia and The Far East. Similar with the Great Game. This was the British perspective after the Napoleonic Wars. During Napoleons time, Czar Paul I indeed tried to invade India with France, but he always did the opposite of what was in Russia's interest as defined by Catherine the Great anyway. The next plan to invade India was handed in during the Crimean War, but to divert English forces, so the Russians could finish off the Ottomans. I believe the main objective for the Russians, not the Czar however, at that time was still to "liberate" Constantinople. So basically the British got spooked by Paul I. and Russian Navy spending into believing the Russians want India and therefore started The Great Game, while the Russians were oblivious to this geopolitical game. Correct me, if I made a mistake.

Look into the use of the Trans-Siberian Railway by the Czech Legion during WWI, if you have not done so already. Many thanks for posting this video. The achievement was almost beyond belief, despite many setbacks.

darling it's Rasputitsa, not Rasputista

Season of bad/muddy roads called rasputiTSa! Not rasputista😂

Не распутиста, а распутица not rasputiSTa, but rasputiCa or rasputiTSa) Thank you for the video, hello from Russia! I am russian muslim from Ingushetia which is on south of Russia

They shouldn't sell Alaska,same thing with Louisiana bot from France... And yet here we are... I bet 95% American don't know that the border with Russia about 80 klicks or around 40miles.,

As a russian I don't know the word "распутиста"

Thanks for the awesome content and all the great videos!!

Советская неэффективность иногда поражает. Бам и транссиб были построены примерно за одинаковое время. Только транссиб в 2 раза длиннее, и на нём было задействовано в двое меньше рабочих. И строили транссиб кирками и лопатами, а бам 70 лет спустя экскаваторами и кранами. БАМлаг организован в 1932 году приказом ОГПУ № 1020/с от 10.11.1932 и в оперативном управлении подчинялся непосредственно ГУЛАГ НКВД. Целью создания была реализация секретного постановления СНК СССР № 1650/340с от 27.10.1932 «О строительстве Байкало-Амурской магистрали» (БАМ).

Thanks. I was the first and only tourist on the train Moscow - Beijing feb 1979 (next week 3 tourists)

3:20 Bro, almost all the rivers in the Siberia are fed by melting glaciers in the mountains on the south. The Arctic has nothing to do with that.

18:00 You make it sound so glorious, but it was also used to exile Ukrainians to gulags.

This video is very interesting and informative. Thank you!

Great video bro love to content keep it up

Can't help but think of how vulnerable all those bridges would be in time of war with any country from the east (or with a superior Air Force). Makes a ton of sense why the Soviets stayed out of the war with Japan until the very end. Japan could have easily destroyed their ability to get material to the factories to fight the Germans.

Your Siberia map is wrong. I know I am from Serbia 😊 Americans: 🤨🤔🤷‍♂️ Edit: Your R is hilarious 😂

Big Russia ! 💪🏻🇷🇺❤️

And the funny thing is that America didn’t want to buy it. I didn't want to at all. And the Russian Empire then resorted to bribing American officials and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on it. And then the Americans found gold in Alaska

The real reason of Japan attack: Japan did not attack Port Arthur without reason. Japan had made great efforts to acquire Port Arthur earlier from China, but Russia, through international pressure, took it away. As a result, Japan later attacked Port Arthur later.

Siberia is still largery undeveloped. 🤦Mister are you will at least one time in Siberia? Bc if you will you never say such ridiculous thing. Siberia amazing place with beautiful cities and many Universities. What undeveloped in Siberia? Our forests?

Russia really needed an alliance with Germany from the early 1900. The development Russia could have had and the riches Germany could have acquired ... The downfall of both of these nations is that they allowed the British to convince them to fight each other ... when they are natural allies against the sea powers.

Today this railway is under great renovation and upgrades to became real connection between East and West