The Russian Empire entered World War 1 and came out with heavy losses, setting the stage for the Russian October Revolution to break out, ending the tsar’s rule for hundreds of years.
World War I is considered the ultimate disaster for the Russian empire, leading to the inevitable collapse in October 1917.
The family of the last tsar of Russia, Nikolai II.
The Russians entered the war as a counter to the rise of the German empire, but the enormous casualties at that time created deep conflicts within Russia.
According to Russian newspaper RBTH, 1.7 million soldiers killed, 4.9 million wounded is just the beginning. Because after withdrawing from World War I, Russia fell into a spiral of civil war between the supporters of Tsar Nikolai II and the Bolsheviks.
Starting World War I with a fiery spirit, the Russians were soon poured cold water by the Germans at the Battle of Tannenberg in 1914.
On August 1, 1914, the German Empire declared war on the Russian Empire. According to Count Alfred von Schliffen’s plan, the Germans intended to end the war early by defeating France in four to six weeks, and then move on to the Eastern front to fight Russia.
Tannenberg was the battle that destroyed the Russian 2nd Army.
The Russians knew this, so they took the initiative to launch an attack first in the territories bordering East Prussia and Russia. Taking place from August 26 to 30, 1914, the Battle of Tannenberg helped Germany escape the siege of Russia on the Eastern Front. The Germans identified Russia as a potential threat, so the German emperor decided to send the 8th Army (equivalent to 100,000-150,000 men) to defend in East Prussia.
Early in the morning of August 26, Russia attacked East Prussia with the strength of the 1st and 2nd armies, which had an overwhelming advantage over the German 8th Army. Due to weak command and lack of combat coordination, the Russian army was quickly counter-attacked and repelled by the enemy.
Assessing this defeat, historians say that General Alexander Samsonov was unable to link up and get the necessary support from the 1st Army commanded by General Paul Rennenkampf. As a result, Samsonov’s 2nd Army alone engaged the armies of German Generals Erich Ludendorff and Paul von Hindenburg.
As a result, the two wings of the Russian 2nd Army were broken one by one. The entire 2nd Army was completely annihilated. Of the 200,000 soldiers of the 2nd Army, only 10,000 managed to escape.
General Alexander Samsonov committed suicide after allowing the 2nd Army to be destroyed.
On the evening of August 30, instead of announcing defeat to Tsar Nikolai II, General Samsonov walked alone into the forest and committed suicide. Samsonov’s body was found only a year later and returned to Russia.
The Germans suffered only 20,000 casualties but got 500 cannons. After the decisive battle at Tannenberg, the Russian empire fell into a passive position, only to be forced to withdraw from Poland and Ukraine, before a large-scale German offensive in 1915.
Particularly in the campaign to withdraw from Poland, the Russian army lost up to 500,000 people, strongly damaging the will of soldiers to fight.
By 1917, the Russian economy could not bear the weight of the war, the population was miserable, unemployment, widespread famine.
The successive defeats caused great dissatisfaction among the Russian people and army. The soldiers who were overburdened by the war hated the aristocratic officers and no longer had the same patriotism as when the war first broke out.
The order to mobilize 10 million people to join the army caused a serious decline in Russian agricultural production. From 1916-1917, food production fell by 20%.
Crop failure and famine occurred everywhere. Industrial production also stagnated, leading to a high unemployment rate. Russia’s financial system is in crisis.
From August 1914 to March 1917, the Russian tsar spent 29.6 billion rubles on the war, three times higher than the total revenue of the state treasury. In order to pay for the war, Tsar Nicholas II constantly imposed new taxes and issued debt bonds among the people. The debt figure rose to Rs 36.6 billion in 1917.
Leader VILenin, the successful leader of the Russian October Revolution.
In 1917, the Russian revolution broke out. The tsar abdicated in March 1917, the Russian army disbanded. Lenin, as leader of the Bolshevik Party, seized power during the Russian October Revolution.
Faced with an enemy situation inside and outside, Lenin signed the Brest-litovs peace treaty with the German empire, giving Germany Poland, West Belarus, Ukraine and the Baltic countries, and paid 6 billion gold marks to Germany.
The concession to Germany was part of Lenin’s plan, that the German Empire would soon lose in World War I. The signed peace treaty would thus become null and void, and Russia would no longer need to pay reparations. This statement is partly correct when Germany was defeated after only 8 months.
Soviet Russia then moved to recapture eastern Ukraine and Belarus. In the end, Russia lost 842,000 square kilometers (15.4 percent) of its territory, which was home to 31.5 million people (23.3% of the pre-war population).
The collapse of the Russian empire led to the formation of new countries, including Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and for the first time, Finland gained independence in history.
Today, the geopolitical situation in Eastern Europe remains tense, stemming from the defeats of the Russian Empire in World War I, Russian newspaper RBTH concludes.