The First World War was the most important cause of the Russian Revolution Essay Example

lost 1 700 000 dead. Many of the dead were professional soldiers on whom the Tsar had been able to rely for support against rebels and the army had become one of peasant and worker conscripts. As a result, when the masses rebelled in February 1917, the army sympathized with them and the Tsar could no longer suppress the revolution as he had been able to in 1905.WWI starkly exposed the limitations of the Tsarist government.

In a desperate effort to find a successful team of ministers, Nicholas appointed 5 chief ministers, 7 ministers of the interior, 4 war ministers, 4 foreign ministers and appointed himself the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, all between 1914 and 1916. He ignored the demands of the Duma for the appointment of talented men from among its own ranks. The war dragged on and news of defeats were more common than those of victories, causing the masses to turn to apathy, while the frustrations of the intelligentsia, middle classes and constitutional democrats (KDs) produced despair.The war also demonstrated the incompetence of the Tsar, made evident when his absences on military affairs left the Tsarina Alexandra in charge of government, while she began to place much trust in Rasputin who was became the uncrowned king of Russia for a time, merely because he was able to exercise some healing power over her son Alexei.

His place at court discredited both the monarchy and the Church, and was very much a grievance which Russians nursed against the Romanovs.However, other events and factors besides the war led to a loss of prestige. Governments are largely reliant on prestige and in the case

of Russia; the Tsarist regime had basically lost its prestige mainly due to defeats in the Russo-Japanese war as well as the Bloody Sunday incident. When Russia went to war with Japan in 1904, there were many humiliating defeats as the war added to the unrest within Russia. Things worsened on Bloody Sunday in January 1905 when Father Gapon led a vast crowd of about 200 000 to the Winter Palace. It was a peaceful demonstration to deliver a petition to the Tsar for reforms but officials and palace guards panicked, and opened fire killing a vast number of innocent people.

Apart from the effects of WWI itself, another important factor would be the lack of reforms. Nicholas issued the October Manifesto, promising to summon a parliament together with other reforms including the ending of peasant's redemption payments. The Tsar in his folly dismissed Witte the day before the first meeting of the Duma in May 1906, replacing him with Goremykin who opposed anything progressive. 4 days before The First Duma met the Tsar proclaimed his right to rule as an autocrat.

The First Duma also lasted a mere 73 days in 1906, the second survived for 3 months in the next year while the third lasted from 1907 to 1912 and the fourth from 1912 to 1917. Nicholas also preferred to fit the Duma into his own autocratic system, thus the Duma's power was limited.Furthermore the peasants were hungry for land. The Russian farming economy was out-of-date. The majority of peasants lived in the country and were under the control of the nobles. By 1900, 4 out of 5 citizens were peasants living under the

harsh oppression from the upper classes and the Tsarist regime.

The social situation in Russia was that of a small class of noble landowners controlling vast numbers of indentured peasants. Although 40 million peasants were freed from serfdom in 1861, almost half of these were on royal estates and were not freed until 1866. They were allowed to buy land from the landlords with money advanced by the government but were deep in debt for the purchase money had to be repaid over 49 years. Each year the mirs divided up the land in the communes and distributed it to each family according to its needs in the year but as each year went by, the population grew and the plots grew smaller. Between 1861 and 1900 the average size of plots halved, causing the peasants difficulty in supporting their families.The million or so personal servants received no land and they either continued to work for wages or drifted to the towns in search of work in industry.

The vast demand for factory production of war supplies and workers caused many more labor riots and strikes. In addition, because more factory workers were needed, peasants moved out of the country and into the cities, which soon became overpopulated, and living conditions rapidly grew worse. Furthermore, as more food was needed for the soldiers, the food supply behind the front grew scarce. By 1917, famine threatened many of the larger cities. This further motivated the Revolution.Hence, while WWI was a crucial cause of the 1917 revolution, other causes include events that led to the loss of prestige.

WWI simply accelerated the process of the Russian Revolution

that was to ultimately take place in 1917. Furthermore, since the approach to this question is based on the pessimist school of thought, it would be fair to consider that regardless of such events, the Russian Revolution that led to the eventual fall of Tsarism would happen anyway, since the Marxist view is that the autocracy will eventually be replaced by the aristocracy, the bourgeosis and eventually, the proletariat.