The Russian Army before World War 1
Introduction
The Russian army has had a long history with many successes
such as those in the Russo-Swedish war and in particular over Napoleon. However
in 1906 its fortunes had reached something of a nadir. Humiliated by defeat
against Japan in the Russo-Japanese war, even its staunchest supporters
recognised that change needed to come; particularly given the European
situation where Tsarist Russia was aligned with Republican France against the
German and Austro-Hungarian Empires. This post details the issues it faced and
how prepared it was for World War 1.
Politics
Political reforms were taking place. The revolution of 1905
convinced the Tsar and his ministers that change was necessary and as a result,
a Duma was created, freedom of speech and assembly was granted and even
restrictions against the Jews were lifted.
Economics
The industrial advances of the 1800’s and early 1900’s had
had a significant impact on war making. Artillery could fire faster and at much
longer ranges. Infantry fire power had rapidly increased and the influence of
cavalry was much diminished. In the Russo-Japanese war, Russian officers
recognised that small groups of Japanese infantry had defeated charging
Cossacks but rather than accepting this as a result of the increase in infantry
fire power, they argued that the Cossacks had been cowardly and henceforth were
made to rely on the sabre. The supply situation was so chaotic that even three
years after the war soldiers still did not have their iron rations. Such events
convinced even the staunchest generals against change that it was now
necessary.
Political reform also coincided with rapid economic growth.
Years of railway construction and foreign investment had an impact as well as
an extra 2,500 million roubles of government spending. Russia reduced her dependence on foreign
investment from a half in 1904-1905 to an eighth in 1914. A clear sign of this
growth is seen from the fact that government revenue nearly doubled in the last
15 years before WW1 to 3,500 million roubles.
Army Structure
There was a clear division in the officer class. Unlike many
Western European countries, the army was a refuge for social mobility. Russia
did not have a large middle class and so needed ambitious peasants to fill
lower ranked officer positions. Attempts had been made to confine officer posts
to the nobility in the past but these attempts had usually broken down due to a
lack of numbers.
This led to officers who sought to change the system, by
applying the lessons of the Russo-Japanese war. However, there were strong
centres of reaction; notably the artillery and the cavalry, notably represented
by the Grand Dukes Mikhailovitch and Nicholas. For example by 1906 it was clear
than an 8 gun battery was too large and that due to advances in rate of fire, a
6 gun battery could do the same job. Whilst the artillerists agreed this was
so, albeit reluctantly, they were not eager to act. In part this was because an
8 gun battery was commanded by a senior officer whereas a 6 gun battery would
be commanded by a captain. With promotions and pensions at stake, the
artillerists obstructed the matter so that by 1914, the batteries were still 8
gun affairs, which contributed to the infamous shell shortage.
Whilst the economic boom provided the army with a wealth of
material, it still had to adapt to warfare in the 20th century. It
had to change a social and administrative heritage of backwardness. Warfare had
changed. Armies were larger. It was no longer enough to drill soldiers on a
parade ground. They needed more complex skills. Officers needed trigonometry
more than courage and a body of highly educated officers was needed to study
war in its higher aspects; namely a general staff. Even so, Russian soldiers
were taught two manoeuvres; forward and back. It was feared that anything for
more complicated would cause confusion, particularly under fire.
The disasters of 1905 led to the creation of a general staff
but it was small and its functions were not well defined. It had a torrid time
trying to make any impact on an army with a large bureaucratic structure where
administrators who could work the system had the most success.
These wrangles discredited the General Staff in the eyes of
the Duma as after 3 years there was little progress. As such, this fuelled
demands for a navy. Naval leaders appeared to have an air of competence that
was lacking in army men. A navy was expensive however, at 40 million roubles a
dreadnought. Army leaders combined to head off such demands but could not
decide what to do with the money thus saved. Grand Duke Sergey, of the
artillery, wanted more guns and Grand Duke Nicholas desired more cavalry.
It was said during the war that Russia lost battles in part
because of a lack of heavy artillery. The truth of the matter is that Russia
had plenty of heavy guns, but the vast majority were situated in the
fortresses. Furthermore, they declared that high trajectory artillery was a
‘coward’s weapon’ and that infantry should not expect artillery to lob shells
behind fortifications when they could charge them. The General Staff sent a
representative to high level artillery meetings but they deliberately made
discussions highly technical until the representative disappeared.
Sukhomlinov
To try to resume progress, the Tsar appointed Sukhomlinov as
Chief of the General Staff. He has had something of a bad press, being regarded
corrupt and incompetent. The government arrested him in 1915 for corruption, as
did the Provisional Government though ironically the Bolsheviks released him.
However the case against him is not strong. He made several
enemies amongst the upper class officers by promoting lower class officers,
pruning the privileges of the Guard Corps and by taking over some of the tasks
of the Inspectors General. It was said by artillerists that he really wanted 6
gun batteries in order to make posts for his lower class clients. His
assistant, Danilov, was regarded as an ‘agrarian revolutionary’. To continue
his reforms, he needed better control of the promotions machinery. Higher
promotions were a matter for the higher attestations committee and as such,
outside his remit. Promotions lower down were a matter for the war ministry
which he was able to seize via intrigue.
However in wartime, power moved from the administrators to
the commanders in the field and military districts but both sides would try to
cancel each other out through promotions. It was often such that a commander
would hardly speak to his chief of staff but would have excellent relations
with his quartermaster general. In I army, its commander Rennenkampf was an
aristocratic cavalry man who refused to speak to his chief of staff Mileant but
had good relations with his quarter-master-general Bayov. Both sides would seek
to discredit opposing appointments but officers, if dismissed, would be caught
in each other’s safety net. Divisional commanders, dismissed for inefficiency,
could end up commanding corps. This did not help the army improve the quality
of its officers. It was said that the army had the power to dismiss but not to
appoint.
Sukhominlov’s reforms were aided by Russia’s economic
recovery and between 1909 and 1913, some 3,000 million roubles were found for
the army. By 1913-1914, the Russian army was receiving more money than the
German army though it is likely the German army got a lot more for its money
than the Russian army. The Germans noted with alarm in 1914 that the Russian
recovery from the disasters of the Russo-Japanese war was almost complete.
It was said that Sukhomlinov was corrupt but the reality was
that there was a good deal of confusion how the money should be spent. Often
the infrastructure was not in place for a particular project. For example,
money given by the Duma for ship building was in part spent on ice breakers,
dredgers and light houses. It is said that he fell victim to development
economics rather than corruption.
There were many obstacles to reform which hindered the
Russian army. Sukhomlinov proposed the creation of reserve divisions, formed by
detaching a group of officers and men from each corps and using reservists.
Germany had such a system in which an army corps could form a reserve division.
This was a good system if one did not want the expense of maintaining many
divisions in peacetime but many Russian generals regarded these divisions as
useless and artillerists tried to ensure that guns were not ‘wasted’ on them.
Fortresses
He also suggested that the Russian fortresses should be
raised. In the late nineteenth century, fortresses were built in western Russia
and Poland to offset the difference between the Russian and German
mobilisations. However, by 1910, the fortresses were obsolete and were often
made of brick. Heavy artillery and even field guns could destroy them. His
opponents were aghast and demanded that they should be built up, rather than
broken up. World war one showed the futility of this as all fortresses fell in
a matter of days, with few exceptions such as Pryzmysl which was really
defended by mud and Verdun which was defended from trenches. His opponents were
eventually successful and by 1912 the programme of razing had to be abandoned.
This meant that even more heavy artillery was placed in fortresses rather than
for use by the field army. In 1915 when the fortresses were supposed to save
Russia, they collapsed in a matter of days and the Germans captured hundred of
guns and millions of shells whilst the Russian army, lacking mobile heavy
artillery, could only retreat.
Planning for War
The saving of the fortresses had an impact of Russia’s plans
for war. Russian fortresses were thought essential as the Germans could
mobilise far quicker than the Russians, who planned to situate most of their
troops well inside Russia. Poland was to be abandoned as it jutted out into
Central Power territory. However, this lack of action was deemed inadmissible
by 1909 as the Bosnian crisis had shown there was strong hostility between
Russia and Germany.
In 1910, Sukhomlinov and Danilov rewrote this plan. They
felt the Russian army needed to take to the offensive as early as possible to
save the French from defeat. Attacking from Poland was risky to counter attack
from East Prussia or Galicia so one of these bastions needed to be taken out.
Austria-Hungary would not influence the first period of the war so East Prussia
was chosen as the target. East Prussia could be attacked from the South and the
East but the two were separated by a line of lakes. Danilov allotted four of
Russia’s seven armies to an East Prussian offensive, leaving three for
Austria-Hungary.
There was a huge outcry as commanders in the military
districts and Sukhomlinov’s enemies opposed it. Some felt it would be better to
take out Austria-Hungary first as she was the weakest opponent. Also, some
argued that the Southern army could be taken in the rear by Austria-Hungary as
early as the 20th day of mobilisation. Such ideas were pure fantasy
(although sometimes replicated by the Austro-Hungarian General Staff) as by
this day, they were a considerable distance behind their own borders.
Nevertheless, the opponents succeeded in changing the plan. Two of the four
armies allotted to East Prussia were now moved south to attack Austria-Hungary.
This was dangerous because the two missing armies were intended to provide
flank protection (from the fortresses of Konigsberg and Thorn) for the two
attacking armies. Their absence meant that coordination between the two armies
needed to be very strong to prevent the Germans from attacking each one
separately.
Thus by 1912 the Russian army was split between the two
operations; against East Prussia and Austria-Hungary. Russian weakness was not
shown by Danilov’s plan, but rather the upsetting of it as it highlighted the
lack of unity in the army.
Conclusion
In conclusion it has been shown that Russia was not
economically backward as vast amounts of money were made available to the army
before the war. It suffered from administrative mismanagement and a lack of
understanding as to what the next war would be like. It also suffered from an
ideological split between the aristocratic side of which Grand Duke Nicholas
was a member and between the Sukhomlinovsky who were for reform. This had an
impact of the equipment the army was provided, such as a lack of mobile heavy
artillery, and through its war plans as the two operations were separate and
neither had enough strength to ensure success. This substantially contributed
to the Russian wartime defeat.
References
Much of this work is taken from Norman Stone’s ‘The Eastern
Front 1914-1917’.
(ES)
