Encyclopedia of Russian History

Kerensky survived the crisis to become premier, while Lavr Kornilov, who advocated harsh measures to restore order, replaced Brusilov. The Bolshevik leaders were now imprisoned, underground, or in exile in Finland, but their antiwar message won further soldier-converts on all fronts. The Germans tested their own Brusilov-like tactics by capturing Riga during September 1-6, but otherwise remained passive as the revolutionary virus did its work. Riga’s fall revealed Russia’s inability to fight even defensively and helped provoke the much-debated Kornilov Affair. When Stavka ordered units to disperse the Petrograd Soviet, Kerensky (whatever his initial intentions) branded Kornilov a traitor and used the left to foil this Bonapartist adventure.

Bolshevik influence now made the officers’ position impossible. Desertion was massive, and units on all fronts dissolved. After Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky took power on November 7, the army became so disorganized that a party of Baltic sailors easily seized Stavka and murdered General Nikolai Dukhonin, the last real commander-in-chief. The army no longer existed as an effective fighting force and, with peace talks underway at Brest-Litovsk, the so-called demobilization congress of December sanctioned the harsh reality. In February 1918 the army’s remnants mounted only token resistance when the Austro-Germans attacked and, despite desperate attempts to create a Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army, forced the Soviet government to accept the diktat (dictated or imposed peace) of Brest-Litovsk on March 3.

CONCLUSION

Western accounts of Russia’s war are dominated by the Tannenberg defeat of 1914, the Great Retreat of 1915, and the debacle of 1917. Yet the Imperial Army’s record compares favorably with those of its allies and its German opponent, and surpassed those of Italy, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey. Despite many real problems, the same is true of efforts to organize the war economy. But the regime’s failures were exaggerated, and its successes often obscured, by a domestic political struggle that undercut the war effort and helped bring the final collapse. See also: BREST-LITOVSK PEACE; JULY DAYS OF 1917; KERENSKY, ALEXANDER FYODOROVICH, KORNILOV AFFAIR; NICHOLAS II; STAVKA; TANNENBERG, BATTLE OF; YUDENICH, NIKOLAI NIKOLAYEVICH

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Allen, W. E. D., and Muratoff, Paul. (1953). Caucasian Battlefields: A History of the Wars on the Turco-Cau-casian Border, 1828-1921. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Brusilov, Aleksei A. (1930). A Soldier’s Note-Book, 1914-1918. London: Macmillan. Florinsky, Michael T. (1931). The End of the Russian Empire. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Gatrell, Peter. (1986). The Tsarist Economy, 1850-1917. London: Batsford. Golder, Frank A. [1927] (1964). Documents of Russian History, 1914-1917. New York: Appleton-Century; reprint, Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith. Golovin, Nicholas N. (1931). The Russian Army in the World War. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Heenan, Louise Erwin. (1987). Russian Democracy’s Fatal Blunder: The Summer Offensive of 1917. New York. Praeger. Jones, David R. (1988). “Imperial Russia’s Forces at War.” In Military Effectiveness, 3 vols., ed. A. R. Millet and W. Murray. London: Allen and Unwin. Jones, David R. (2002). “The Imperial Army in World War I, 1914-1917.” In The Military History of Tsarist Russia, ed. F.W. Hagan and R. Higham. New York: Palgrave. Katkov, George. (1967). Russia 1917: The February Revolution. London: Longmans. Kerensky, Alexander F. (1967). Russia and History’s Turning Point. New York: Duell, Sloane and Pearce. Knox, Alfred W. F. (1921). With the Russian Army, 1914-1917, 2 vols. London: Hutchinson. Lincoln, Bruce W. (1986). Passage Through Armageddon: The Russians in War and Revolution, 1914-1918. New York: Simon and Schuster. Pares, Bernard. (1939). The Fall of the Russian Monarchy. New York: Knopf. Showalter, Dennis E. (1991). Tannenberg: Clash of Empires. Hamden, CT: Archon.

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Siegelbaum, Lewis H. (1983). The Politics of Industrial Mobilization in Russia, 1914-17: A Study of the War Industries Committees. London: Macmillan. Stone, Norman. (1975). The Eastern Front, 1914-1917. New York: Scribner’s Sons. Wildman, Allan K. (1980, 1987). The End of the Russian Imperial Army, 2 vols. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

DAVID R. JONES

WORLD WAR II