Snow Day #1: 1/13/12

Wow, you guys must have really being praying to those snow gods last night. Hope you guys enjoy your 4 day weekend. Sadly, I'm going to take about 40 minutes of our time to make up for our lost class time today. On a side note; Merriman is now posted on my web site along with the powerpoints for Hunter.


Today, I want you to watch the following clip from the Tsars of Russia and then start a dialog about what has happened to Russia since the time of Peter the Great? Where did they go wrong? Why was their stay at the military top so short lived? Your conversation must contribute to the whole of the dialog and you must contribute a minimum of 3 times. See you guys on Tuesday.

Watch Sections 15,16, 17 and 18.

Video Link

Russia did not maintain their rank as one of the most powerful militaries for long because of their failure to industrialize. After Peter the Great, they didn't improve at the same rate as the rest of Europe. By the time of the Crimean Wars and Alexander III's war on Japan, Russia was much less advanced militarily. France and England had been some of the first countries to industrialize, and had an advantage over the pre-industrial Russian army during the Crimean War. The Japanese also proved to be much more advanced than the Russians, defeating their navy, which had been one of the most powerful since Peter the Great.

Starting with Alexander I Russia began to fall behind the other developing countries. Politics were not allowed and any hope for rebellion for the Russian people was destroyed by the secret police. Alexander and his brother Nickolas were against reform and didn't realize how much they needed it until getting defeated in the Crimean war which was a complete embarrassment. Their military was underdeveloped compared to the countries they faced this was an eye opener to the strict czars on reform.

Another reason Russia was unable to become a more liberal, advanced country was the radical revelutionaries. When they killed the tsar who was going to create a more representative government, they ruined their chance for reform. Their own terrorism destroyed their cause, and the next tsar was even more conservative.

Yes, Ashten's right about them not realizing they needed reform until after the Crimean war... but they also noticed the need for reform after Nicholas II's unnecessary war with Japan. All that did was waste their time and money which could've been put to a better use, such as reforming Russia. I feel like the czars saw their people as weak, thinking that they couldn't do anything about change, because nothing had been done previously, and that's why the Russian people were always ignored. It's like the Czar's were so arrogant that they just didn't care; all that mattered in life was their own well-being.

I think their big mistake was to kill their only hope of revolution. I think that he was trying his best to make his people happy. He didn't realize the effect that would result from freeing the serfs. If the Russian terrorists would've waited a while, I think Nicholas would've proved to be a tsar that was for the people.

I can't imagine how embarrassed the Russians were after being defeated by te Japanese. The Japanese were a bunch of nobodies!! If Peter the Great were still in power, they wouldn't have lost. If they would've defeated Japan, the Russian people probably wouldve felt more secure with their tsar. They probably wouldn't have panicked about their future.

I'm sure Bloody Sunday demolished any hope of a relationaship between the tsar and the people. The people didnt trust the tsar to look out for their interests. They felt like they had been betrayed as they watched their loved ones being shot by the tsar's guards. If this is how the guards would react to the people coming in peace, imagine how they wouldve responded to a riot. This just proves how arrogant and sheltered the Russian tsars actually were.

I don't think it's right to call the Russian Tsars sheltered, because they weren't. After all, Tsar Nicholas I was the one that fought against revolutions all across the continent, beginning with Austria, which was the doorstep to Russia. He knew that if revolution would've succeeded in the Habsburg Empire then revolution would spread to the minds of Russians and they would want it as well, hence to why he helped the Austrians, because he didn't want his thrown being threatened. They just didn't want revolution because then their name as the higher power would be like, disgraced in a way I think, but something like that. They want to be more powerful than their people; but yes, I do think they were arrogant, I agree with that claim.

To add on to my previous comment, since nobody is commenting back, I can answer why their stay at the military top was so short lived! It was so short lived because of the Russian's arrogance, as previously discussed. The Russian military thought that they could defeat anyone because of all the revolutions that they had stopped in Western Europe. The Russians were unaware of the strength of the allies of the Turks, and since Russia had no one to help them since they were the "best", they were easily crushed by the industrialized weapons of France and Britain. It was a selfish thing to do, fighting the Turks; Nicholas I felt like he HAD to expand his land as a reward for all the countries that he "saved" in the west, when in reality he was just worsening the situation. Three Tsars later I believe, when Nicholas II was in power, he was unprepared; he went to war with the Japanese, oblivious to reforms, and only concerned about his title and his own well-being. He was easily crushed by the Japanese with their aggressive tactics and far greater weaponry. They had better weapons than the Russians; they did away with 2/3 of Russian ships that came up to the shores of Japan. There's two explanations as to why their stay at the military top was so short lived.. sorry for the length lol.

I think Russia went wrong in that they never had a set government and that allowed for way too many political reformers. If they had had a set government, they might have been able to have been one of the leading powers in Europe.

Nicholas I had become way to greedy and arrogant and thought that his army was invincible, even though his weaponry was outdated. The Russians weren’t just outgunned in the weapons category but they were beat in almost every possible way. I think the Russians also had a false sense of how good they actually were. Yeah they beat Napoleon but all they did was retreat the whole time, and then slowly pick off the French one by one as the fench retreated.

I don’t really understand why Nicholas II decided that he wanted to expand because Russia is a HUGE country. And when he did try he was absolutely murdered. This all boils down to the fact that, even though Russia was industrializing really quickly, they were just too far behind technologically. He basically sent the troops to Japan to their deaths because there is no way they could have won.

I think the reason why Russia’s military wasn’t powerful for a long time was because they didn’t industrialize with the rest of Europe. If they had made changes, sooner the country would have been caught up with everyone else and they wouldn’t have been behind in technology. Also, if they had industrialized with the rest of Europe they might have been able to win the Crimean War or defeat the Japanese because they would have had more up to date weapons, ships, etc and would have never gotten so low militarily.

This probably isn't the brightest question but I am confused on why the pesants became poorer after they were freed by Alexander. Do you really even get paid being a serf I thought you were just owned.

I think the Russian's defeat in the Crimean and Japanese wars may even have prevented further reform because of the people's reaction to it. Whatever small reforms were being made by the tsar were compromised by the rebels who were angry with the government because of their military failures.

Also to answer the question about the serfs, I think they were so poor because they were free but had no land. They land that they had worked on as serfs still belonged to the landlord, so they would now have to pay for new land without the protection and support of their old lord.

To answer Ashten's question about the serifs becoming even more poorer and to add on to Katie's answer... The serifs had money, but very little money almost nothing. The land owners sold their land at very high prices, so when serifs bought the land they would be in debt for life. So, them being in debt they wouldn't have the money to buy farming necessaries. And with no farming and no income, this decreased Russia's economy a whole lot.

Where Russia went wrong in the late 1800 was that they forced the industrialization on their people. This made the poor even poorer and this would lower the morale of the people. You can't force on something like this, the government has to proceed with the industrialization little by little. Let the people get use to all the changes. And since the poor got poorer, they would have no money to provide for themselves and their family, so more people would die.

Has anybody else noticed that whenever the Russian people try to change the government and gather as a whole at a central power or location, that the Russian royal loyalists would open fire on their own people? This has happened twice between 1800 and 1904. In December 1825, the Decembrist Revolt was when Czar Nicholas I opened fire on the 700 rebels for wanting a Constitutional rule, this killed hundreds of people and Nicholas I preserved the Romanov dynasty. However, in January 9 1905, Bloody Sunday, was a day where the working class, priests, and students (Numbered in the thousands) marched on the Winter Palace to ask the Czar for Representative government, freedom of speech, worker rights, and peace with Japan. The people were not revolutionists but just people who wanted change and help from Czar Nicolas II. However, Nicolas II was out of town, so the loyalists opened fire on the petitioners, killing in the thousands. The outcome was rebellions with the Russian people. This demolished factories and farms across Russia.

I think that czars of Russia are just so concerned with keeping power they will do whatever they must do to preserve it. Because someones pride in Russia is more important than a life and I think the Russian people were just beginning to get sick of the absolute rule just like multiple citizens of other countries under absolute rule. But the thing is most other countries had already gone through that phase of revolution and reconstruction of their government and since Russia had been stuck in this time of when they were still the most powerful country in europe and multiple czars had restricted new reform they were just now experiencing it.

One thing I didn’t understand was why many of the elite people were forming rebellious groups and trying to kill the czar. I think it would make more sense for people like the serfs to rebel because they were stuck in serfdom all those years and even after serfdom was emancipated, they still didn’t have a great life or anything. It seems like the serfs had more of a reason to rebel than the elite. Why were the elite wanting to kill the czar so bad?

I also think that one of Russia’s weaknesses was the fact that they never had change. Peter the Great helped catch Russia up with everyone else in Europe but after him no one really tried to keep that going and so they fell behind. Up until the Decembrist Revolt they were not many revolts or revolutions. Because of that there was never any actual political change so the czars kept doing the same thing for years. If the people had revolted more their ideas and the changes they wanted to see could have possibly taken place and maybe the czars could have been overthrown but that didn’t happen.

Like Katie said in the beginning, I think that Russia fell off because of their lack of Industrialization. When the rest of Europe, excluding the Ottoman Empire, industrialized on a massive scale, Russia hardly did anything. Other countries were able to make steel, iron, and several other things to help improve their armies and military technology. Russia failed to even get close to building as many railroads as England, Germany, and France did. These other countries could move things faster and more effectively than Russia.

One reason the elites were so upset with the Czars was that they had 0 power compared to the elites of England or France. They had not freedom of speech or press, they had no political power, they were "humiliated by Russia's backwardness". They were also upset at the lack of change in politics and industrialization. They could see that they were falling behind as other populations boomed and democracy/other types of government replaced monarchs. Czar Nicholas allowed no talk of change. The last thing was when Czar Alexander freed the serfs. The elites were upset because now they had no free labor. Their agriculture production slowed and the elites didn't make as much money as they did before. The bottom line, people wanted change, but each person wanted their own change in a different way.

One thing that i found interesting was how similar Czar Alexander II and Peter the Great were. Both of them came to power in a time when Russia was so far behind the rest of the world in just about every area. Both men made changes to the Russian way of life, economy, military, and political issues, but Russia was still behind.
Also, like Holly said, there were people literally hunting the Czars. They blew up carriages, they blew up dining rooms, and they terrorized their leader. The people were wanting to kill the czar when he was leaning toward giving more elites power. But the other half of people weren't satisfied. The revolutionaries only thought they could have reform by killing the czar and therefore liberate the people. As the video tells, after Alexander, the new czar killed all of the people involved in killing him, and when the new Czar came in, he cut all ties with the idea of sharing power. This would repeat in different ways over and over and over again. So they basically stopped themselves from staying on top.