The Disasters of 1915 and Russia's Widening War - David Stone 

I think people do know that it was extremely important. I just think they don't know the why of it.

All my historically minded friends know this. And I would have thought it applies everywhere.? E.g. at school in Norway we were taught about "the first and second acts of the tragedy", even though Norway was only an active participant in WW2. Also, a large number of countries, in eastern Europe and the Arab world, were formed after the Great War. I would think every citizen in every one of them sees WW1 as significant.

You know what

I don't think the Russian invasion of Ukraine is a farce!

except for Austro-Hungary perhaps, they were the most pathetic...

J

Or the Ottomans?

@@whitepanties2751 The Ottomans had massive successes first at the Dardanelles and then at Gallipoli and it took even the best equipped British forces to grind them down late in the war. Austria may have a case though.

@@lkrnpk Very true. AH was truly pathetic the entire war but for the Italian Alpine Front. It's hard to lose there though, they had the high ground across the entire front and were well dug in and even better equipped.

what Russia had was a curse of high intelligence without institutions to channel it. a country with dumber people would have been better than Russia. what Russia needs are fewer but better ideas.

True. Germany blamed Austria-Hungary for alienating Italy, and for creating conditions for Italian entry on the Entente side. But two years later Germany made a far greater, dumber blunder. Though American military force alone did not tip the balance to win the war, the mere fact of American entry, which was avoidable and should have been avoided, instantly made the war unwinnable for the Central Powers. The Central Powers were already losing the crucial food war and the sea war. They lost both irretrievably the day America entered. They also instantly lost the manpower war (pop. of United States = 100 M) and particularly the propaganda war or the whole-purpose-of-the-war war in a disastrous way, wars they were not losing before American entry. A mass mobilization war of attrition depends on popular consent to wage, no matter what the form of government. Unlike Russia, America was a socially strong country that was not going to implode in a heap of revolutionary rage. The Entente got new hope, while suddenly the Central Powers could not answer the people's question of how the war was to be won, how the great sacrifice was all to be made worthwhile. "My older sons died for nothing and my school kids subsist on turnips" is a hard war to sell to moms. Italian participation is an interesting question. It was great for the Entente, but Italy clearly didn't get out of the war what it expected and it's not clear what the right move would have been. War with the Entente would have made even less sense. Continued Italian neutrality might have benefited Italy's weak economy, but since the Entente controlled the Mediterranean and its exits and Italy is all coastline, the Entente would have had greater leverage. Finally, while neither Austria-Hungary nor France was Italy's best friend, Italy's historic liberation struggle and nationalist aims were clearly much more hostile to Austria than to France.

Partly true, but more false than right! Italy also supported Serbia, because the British aristrocracy was within the Italian, Serbian and (less so in the) Russian military. Serbia was against the Austrians and the Romanians, which were together with Italy in the active Triple Alliance. However, it was not a breaker of the Alliance, because it was only a singular target on those. Your argument is proven invalid, however. Italy thought about going against allied Austria & Croatia for territory in Croatia with the Serbs around 1903. (6 years prior to the pact with Russia about the Balkans!!) This fact about the British nobelity within a supposed "national military" wasn't understood by the population of the new "democratic" State of Italy, which formerly belonged to Germany/Austrian Empire, who gave the regions strong autonomacy, but also controlled the military from foreign control. (The Italian military ties with Serbia over the nobility repeated to be problematic in WWII against Yugoslavia.) Italy's government made a neutrality pact with France in 1910, when the British formed hidden offensive pacts independent/not part of Entente, what was also kept away from the British public but also from Germany. The Russians, being in a strong alliance with the French, then supported the aggressive Balkan League (against the Italian speaking territory in Croatia over Bosnia). This was end of 1913. That's why Italy was the "idiot", who not only stayed neutral with France, but was pulled out of the Triple Alliance, officially only in 1915 for no national reason. Instead, it got promised further land from Austria (South Tirol and in Croatia) and Britain waged further offensive attack on Germany. It was just clear that Italy got sideplayed after the war, because the only guarantor would have been Germany for these areas, because they were never Italian territory under International Law. They have only settled there, but belonged to parts of the German Reich, even with the Venezians. That gave rise to Fascism, because for obvious reasons Italy got nothing real out of their behavior against their former Allies Germany and Austria, and used all the international credit to atleast get something. It even resulted in problems with the Croats were never were such. The Italian "National Movement" prior to WW1 was pretty much influenced by British interests, restricting any real Italian influence. Conclusion: The Italians could never have been neutral for anybody in the Entente.

Why were they the victims of pogroms? Why do so many people have problems with them? they are not pure victims. There are 2 sides to everything.

Always ask why though? Why were they discriminated against? there are 2 sides to this

No. First of all, the Russian military was based on Western/German military until Communism. In WW2, the Soviets still had Western educated military leaders before Stalin killed them, even though new tactics were developed in contrast to Western military traditions with swarm and tank masses. Modern Neo-Soviet Russia has the Soviet tactics without the swarm, also lacking former inhabitants. In WW1, they had their military based opon mass, too. The Russians defeated Austria-Hungary through own suicide. Russia and Serbia were linked through Socialism, not honest religiousy, because the churchs were infiltrated by communists. Serbia was used by Russia in the past, in the 1990's, because Serbians think Russia saved them from Islam 200 years ago and also around 1910. The Ukraine dissolved the Soviet Union in 1990 and was against Socialism. Therefor it collapsed also in Serbia, but mainly in Russia. With the Balkan wars in the 1990's, Serbia tried to pull the Ukraine also back to Moscow, but Ukraine helped Croatia and the Austrians. Poland was formerly also Austria once, not only Prussia. Catholicism was a big driver against communism, not against true orthodoxy. Orthodoxy was just communist since 100 years, and therefor against Catholicism.

Terrorism??? Really???

Serbia asked for help, Russia saw Serbia as a buffer with Austria and some Serb agricultural products weren't available anywhere else. www.firstworldwar.com/source/serbianappealforhelp.htm

We really do need more info about this.

Russia historically saw itself as the protector of all Slavs everywhere. In part this was in response to blatant bias by the members of German and Austrian elites. The Kaiser once remarked to Franz Josef that, "..Slavs are born to serve. If they think they can govern they must be disabused of this notion..." Thats something or a paraphrase but its close. Now there was also something of a posture on Russia's part but, when Austria Hungary declared war on Serbia, the Russian governing elite believed that turning its back on Serbia would be a serious blow to its prestige as a great power. The Czar was very hesitant interestingly enough but in the end he gave in and declared war. In truth, he had little choice. The Kaiser had already declared war on Russia so there was not much else that poor Nicholas could have done. So it was part national pride, part altruism and a good measure of pragmatic necessity. Did that help at all?

REALLY, State sponsored..

I'm fairly sure that, within the restrictions of the documents available (thanks, Putin), David wouldn't have made such a claim.

Yes. But still the British had no reason to declare war on Germany, they did so for political reasons. Also the Italians tried themselves to duck, but had nothing from it to change sides.

+Emil Nicolaie Perhinschi 8 actually. Austria-Hungary, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, Greece, Romania, Bulgaria, and the Ottomans. Compared to the rest of pre-war Europe, the density of states was quite high.

It's a lot of states, especially given the relatively small size of the region.

9 actually as Hungary was a nation too.

France was heavily investing in Russian industry and railways. They didn’t have a choice on the timing of the war. In fact one of the reasons Berlin was willing to back Vienna and risk war in 1914 was fear that Russia’s rapid growth fueled by French investment would be an insurmountable challenge for Germany within in the foreseeable future. Then, once the war began, France and Britain urgently needed all available capital for their own war industries . In fact in 1914 both Russia and Austria-Hungary were on the brink of becoming first rank developed powers over the next couple of decades, say by 1940. On the eve of war, Austria-Hungary was the fourth biggest producer of machine tools and Russia’s abolition of serfdom had been paid off and was producing a substantial agricultural surplus that could be invested in industrial development. WW1 threw all that away. In fact global trade as a proportion of world GDP did not recover to 1914 levels until the 1970s.

In a word. Yes. Christopher Clark's brilliant Book "Sleepwalkers" looks in depth at the motiviations and actions of the various powers in the lead up to the war. And while he purposefully states that he is not in the blame game and does not think it's accurate to "blame" any one country for the war significantly more than any other. I disagree. In my opinion France is principally to blame for WW1. Their entire international strategy since 1872 had been to avenge the defeat of 1871. There was no way to do that absent war. And allying with Russia was their only sure fire path to gaining the advantage they thought they could get which would justify the risk. They even went so far as to give a name to the strategy for sparking the conflict. Namely the "Balkan inception".

Post Franco Prussian war France was a superpower?

Russia and France were allied not because of any love or for strong military partnerships. First, the Russians hate the French because of Napoleon. This is even reoccuring today around Western orientated Russians. Not only did it question the Zarist hegemony and economy, it also pushed the Polish against the Russians. France used the alliance with Russia for war preparation against Germany and military arms race. They were not interested in a strong Russia, if they wanted to collect Central Europe and again attacking Russia like under Napoleon. The Russians only said yes to it, because Germany didn't backed the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia. The problem was, that Russia didn't knew how to stay important. So they took financial credits in France, mainly to support their east with railroads against the Japanese and support French Indochina.

@@TenOrbital Germany backed Austria because both were strong allies, not because of Russian growth. Also, the French didn't invest in Russia, it was the Germans. The French only were creditors to Russia. Because Russia attacked Austria through Serbia, and then mobilized its troops, Germany moved into Belgium to attack France. France did use the pact with Russia for their own war industry prior to the war, because they wanted to fight Germany. The only correct point was, that Russia increased agricultural surplus. The funfact was: That was due to the German investments, and this "Russian region" was mainly the Ukraine which became independent after the Russian loss on the Eastern front.

Plus, many social agendas that don't have much to do with actually learning anything.

Do you have a link or a name of the PBS special? I'd like to watch it

Ok so how does that allow the rise of facism???? Being that italy first was an ally to Western alliance. The axis partners in Italy and Germany were enemies in ww1. And, 2nd they didn't even suffer near the amount of casualties that the other allies suffered.

Not as high as the holocaust and the starvation of 5 million Ukrainians by Stalin - babies, children, women and men were in both, unarmed and defenceless unlike the 'young men'

The Red Army had some impressive generals...Rokossovsky, Zhukov, Konev, Vatutin etc...

So, why do you feel your analysis is more accurate than the one here?

No one is whitewashing anything. You can perfectly be a good man and a bad ruler. Also serfdom was abolished in 1861, before even the birth of Nicholas II.

​​@@samuelhoran7898He could go easy way of Western democracies and had functional parliament and goverment so he could dedicate more time to his wife and kids.

Nicolas 2 was an incompetent leader, an antisemite, racist (his views of Japanese people) and at his worst a defender of autocracy (bloody Sunday … among other things) but he was someone who deeply cared about and loved his family. That cant be denied. He put up with Rasputin being in his court, just because he believed he could keep his son from bleeding, his wife also wanted Rasputin around because she also believed the same thing, and Nicolas had some other wild ideas about the Russian peasantry Oh wow dude I’m listening to the speaker, say the exact same thing about his love for his family, as an example of him being a good man. Could you not have listened for like two more minutes?

@@bentrinker1937 Being antisemitic in 1900 among european christians was a nonevent. You were far more likely to stick out if you weren't. Our perceptions of antisemitism are colored by WW2 but before WW2 it was common. Probably more common than islamophobia today. You can't really judge people by our standards. There was only a minority who wasn't antisemitic back then. So you can't really judge him for that since odds are your ancestors were the same. Same goes with racism. Unless you want a blanket condemnation of 80% of everyone that was around back then. Antisemitism was not a statistical rarity it was very common. After WW2 most antisemites suddenly forgot their prewar attitudes 'I didn't have any problem with them it was just those nazis yeah only them'. Sure buddy only them not 80% of every european alive back then. So Nicholas cannot be taken to task for something that he was in the majority at the time. You can only take someone to task when he's a clear minority when it comes to an opinion. Which for antisemitism would only be post-45 officially and post-75 unofficially. Actually probably closer to 85. Only when the postwar generation reached middle age.That's the true Europe.

I remember that during his coronation the bread was thrown to masses of hungry people, the country was in deep need of widespread reforms, but he ignored that more or less. No wonder 1917 was such violent event.

They don't have Prussia. All they have is the tiny Kaliningrad / Königsberg region (5,800 sq mi).

At what cost, millions dead as a result of Stalin's criminality and megalomania. Not to mention whatever propaganda present day Russians say without massive western aid with trucks,tanks,planes and incredibly importantly FOOD the Soviets would have fallen. Even with all that aid it was an incredibly Close run thing. If the Japanese had invaded from the east it would have been all over Red Rover for the Soviets.

“For all its faults” is the key point there, these faults were too huge for the material gain. Russia only won ultimately because they had the biggest global empires on their side, huge US support saved them logistically. The brutal industrialisation under Stalin was a rushed effort based off the pre 1914 projection, Russia had a literacy rate of over 80% before ww1 and was projected to be the worlds leading economy by 1940. Tsarist Russia had rapid improvement in industry and standard of living, the communists did not affect this much, in fact they reversed it for a couple decades of civil war, in fighting and sacrificing the workers they were supposed to represent to make material profit.

Yeah, it was super great more pogroms, millions died of starvation‘s in two great famine‘s, a civil war, religious repressions by an aggressively atheist state. How lucky are these people than to be delivered into the great terror 1937-1938 and 2 more wars of expansion followed by the military disaster of 1940-1941

ikeike2, try using the settings icon to slow it down to 75% or 50% of normal speed.

Other than the way, he pronounces Yanushkevich what did you find excruciating or incorrect?

Russia's problem was the disintegration of the regime's connection with the people and purpose of the war, worsened by corruption and material shortages. This wasn't a random event. Only one year of war, and with Japan, which threatened only Russia's remotest imperial ambitions rather than the nation, had been enough to trigger a precursor or a severe stress indicator in 1905. It's a bit of a wonder that Russia lasted about three years against the Central Powers. No land Russia lost to military defeat, or at Brest-Litovsk, even had a Russian population. Even modern Russia is without that land. Regime collapse and the civil war, which reflected Russia's real problems, were worse fates than losing to the Central Powers. Russia was only the first of several to implode. When Bulgaria eventually collapsed in September 1918, the Central Powers lost the war. Ironically, Bulgaria quit the war because it had won the war in terms of what victory meant to Bulgaria, but it could not exit because this was World War 1, not Balkan War 3. With nothing else to gain, Bulgaria had passed the point of suffering and dying for the imperial aims of the other three Central Powers, and Bulgarians weren't willing to do that for long. Austria-Hungary also imploded into fragments between the Bulgarian armistice and the general November armistice, but it was already showing breakdown stress. When your Emperor dies midwar and you only half bother to replace him, and when thousands of your own subjects and ex-POW are in the enemy trenches fighting you, your Empire is toast. The war stressed all participants, it just didn't push them all over the edge. France had a mutiny, which came close. Britain experienced Irish rebellion, closely followed by actual loss of Ireland in a wave of voter rage, fully validating the rebellion. The Central Powers starved and rioted. The most mildly stressed belligerent was the United States and even it significantly changed, with the war driving the end of Progressivism and a hard switch to conservatism and isolation ("normalcy"), not only in November 1920 but in the armistice midterms of 1918.

'Professional' historian, accredited and respected, vs internet nobody with no references. Yup, I know who I am going to listen to.

TBF The only reason russia has a strong navy is because tsar Peter liked boating and ships as a kid. Ya might not like the answers but that is life under nobility and feudal lords.