Abstract
A few days after Nazi Germany had launched its invasion of the Soviet Union, the BBC’s Overseas Transmission broadcast a talk by Sir Bernard Pares entitled ‘Democracy Marches’. Pares spoke of an earlier invasion of Russia, one which he had witnessed.
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Notes
In a recent study of the ‘soliders’ revolt’ in 1917, Allan Wildman has concluded that ‘one can say with reasonable confidence that the peasant-soliders entered the world war with the conviction that it was an alien enterprise, the patriotic outpourings of cultured society notwithstanding’ — Allan K. Wildman, The End of the Russian Imperial Army: The Old Army and the Soldiers’ Revolt (March-April, 1917) (Princeton, N.J., 1980) p. 374.
For a superb account of working conditions among Donets miners during the war, see Iu.I. Kir’ianov, Rabochie Iuga Rossii, 1914-fevral’ 1917 g. (Moscow, 1917) esp. pp. 35–7, 54–106.
According to factory inspectors’ reports, there were only 70 strikes in Russia in the latter half of 1914. See I.I. Mints, ‘Revoliutsionnaia bor’ba proletariata Rossii v 1914–1916 godakh’, Voprosy istorii, no. 11 (1959) p. 59.
For the general strike in Baku see A.N. Guliev, Bakinskii proletariat v gody novogo revoliutsionnogo pod"ema (Baku, 1963) pp. 164ff.
and the brief summary in Ronald G. Suny, The Baku Commune 1917–1918: Class and Nationality in the Russian Revolution (Princeton, N.J., 1972) pp. 52–8;
and in Petersburg, E.E. Kruze, ‘Rabochie Peterburga v gody novogo revoliutsionnogo pod"eme’ in Istoriia rabochikh Leningrada, 2 vols (Leningrad, 1972) vol. I, pp. 449–60.
Frantsuzskii ekonomist ob ekonomicheskoe i finansovoe polozhenie Rossii, PT no. 21 (165), 1 Nov. 1914, p. 406. For original French see R.G. Levy, ‘La situation économique et financière de la Russie’, Revue des deux Mondes no. 24, 1 Nov. 1914, pp. 30–50.
See especially I.S. Bliokh, Budushchaia voina v tekhnicheskom, ekonomicheskom, i politicheskom otnosheniiakh 5 vols (St Petersburg, 1898) vol. IV, p. 6. The author was a Polish-Jewish banker and a self-avowed pacifist.
A.A. Manikovskii, Boevoe snabzhenie russkoi armii v mirovuiu voinu 2nd edn, 2 vols (Moscow, 1930–2) vol. I, p. 124.
N. Golovine, The Russian Army in the World War (New Haven, Conn., 1931) p. 130;
D.A. Kovalenko, Oboronnaia promyshlennost’ sovetskoi Rossii v 1918–1920 gg. (Moscow, 1970) p. 25.
General B. Gourko, War and Revolution in Russia, 1914–1917 (New York, 1919) p. 125.
Golovine, The Russian Army p. 32; E.Z. Barsukov, Podgotovka Rossii k voine v artilleriiskom otnoshenii (Moscow and Leningrad, 1926) p. 114.
Tarnovskii, Formirovanie p. 16. P. Karatygin, Obshchie osnovye mobilizatsii promyshlennosti (Moscow, 1925) p. 22; Golovine, The Russian Army p. 146.
See M. Mitel’man, B. Glebov and A. U1’ianskii, Istoriia Putilovskogo zavoda, 1801–1917, 2nd edn (Moscow and Leningrad, 1941) pp. 133–4.
A.N. Kuropatkin, The Russian Army and the Japanese War, trans. A.B. Lindsay (New York, 1909) p. 308.
R. Girault, ‘Finances internationales et relations internationales (. propos des usines Poutiloff)’, Revue d’historie moderne et contemporaine, vol. XIII (1966) p. 220.
See V.I. Bovykin, ‘Banki i voennaia promyshlennost’ Rossii nakanune pervoi mirovoi voiny’, IZ, vol. LXIV (1959) pp. 82–135;
Ia. I. Livshin, Monopolii v ekonomike Rossii (Moscow, 1961) pp. 65–70.
On the Vickers proposal which finally came to fruition in 1916 in the form of a factory at Tsaritsyn, see E.R. Goldstein, ‘Vickers Limited and the Tsarist Regime’, Slavonic and East European Review, vol. LVIII (1980) pp. 564–70, and Sidorov, Ekonomicheskoe polozhenie, pp. 122–3, 132–3.
This is convincingly argued in K.F. Shatsillo, ‘O disproportsii v razvitii vooruzhennykh sil Rossii nakanune pervoi mirovoi voiny (1906–1914 gg.)’, IZ, vol. LXXXIII (1969) pp. 123–36.
V.A. Sukhomlinov, Vospominaniia (Berlin, 1924) p. 336.
A.A. Polivanov, Is dnevnikov i vospominanii po dolzhnosti voennogo ministra i ego pomoshchnika ed. A.M. Zaionchkovskii (Moscow, 1924) p. 148. According to Bruce Lockhart, the British consul in Moscow, Polivanov alleged that the Grand Duke managed to obtain a commission on all orders placed with the Putilov Works for his mistress, the notorious ballerina, Kshesinskaia. See Public Record Office (London), Foreign Office Papers, Series 371, vol. 2745, N92149: ‘Lockhart enclosed in Ohindley (for Ambassador) to Grey’, 12 Apr. 1916. Sukhomlinov makes the same accusation in Vospominaniia, p. 262.
For a defence of the GAU’s policies in the pre-war era, see A. Bart, ‘Na fronte artilleriiskogo snabzheniia’, Byloe, vol. V(XXXIII) (1925) pp. 188–219.
Ibid., pp. 253–6; for an elaborate counterfactual statement see David Lloyd George, War Memoirs 6 vols (London, 1933–8) vol. I, pp. 458–77.
Testimony of General Smyslovskii quoted in Manikovskii, Boevoe snabzhenie, vol. II, pp. 34–5. The Supreme Commission was appointed by the Council of Ministers in August 1915, largely in response to the crescendo of criticism over supply policies under Sukhomlinov. It was chaired by General N.P. Petrov and contained members of both legislative chambers. See Sidorov, ‘Bor’ba s krizisom vooruzheniia russkoi armii v 1915–1916 gg.’, Istoricheskii zhurnal, no. 10–11 (1944) p. 46.
T.D. Krupina, ‘Politicheskii krizis 1915 g. i sozdanie Osobogo soveshchaniia po oborone’, IZ, vol. LXXXIII (1969) p. 60.
This was in cooperation with the Commission on the Preparation of Explosives, established in February 1915. For details of the commission’s work see V.N. Ipat’ev, Zhizn’ odnogo khimika, vospominaniia, 2 vols (New York, 1945) vol. I, p. 440ff.
E.Z. Barsukov, ‘Grazhdanskaia promyshlennost’ v boevom snabzhenii armii’, Voina i revoliutsiia, no. 10 (1928) pp. 16–17.
A.P. Pogrebinskii, ‘Sindikat “Prodamet” v gody pervoi mirovoi voiny 1914–1917’, Voprosy istorii no. 10 (1958) p. 28. Golovine, in The Russian Army, p. 152 makes a similar charge with respect to metalworks enterprises. This probably refers to an investigation of the Kolomna Machine Works carried out by a group appointed by the Special Council of Defence’s Supervisory Commission. The investigators characterized Vankov’s order for 40,000 shells as ‘harmful…to the production of other no less essential items’ (see ’Doklad komissii dlia obsledovaniia deiatel’nosti Kolomenskogo, Sormovogo, i Kulebakskogo zavodov’, TsGVIA, f. 369, op. 4, d. 20, 1. 189). Manikovskii, Boevoe snabzhenie, vol. II, p. 49, holds the Special Council and the War Minister responsible for such ’one-sided development’.
M.V. Rodzianko, ‘Krushenie imperii’, Arkhiv rusekoi revoliutsii (hereafter ARR), vol. XVII (Berlin, 1926) p. 89.
B. Pares, The Fall of the Russian Monarchy (New York, 1961) p. 230. Cf. also his Day by Day with the Russian Army (London, 1915) pp. 201–34.
Quoted in You. Danilov, La Russie dans la guerre mondiale, 1914–1917 (Paris, 1927) p. 416.
The eleven were A.A. Davidov, K.P. Fedorov, N.D. Lesenko, A.P. Meller, A.P. Meshcherskii, M.S. Plotnikov, N.E. Ponafidin, A.I. Putilov, Ia.I. Utin, A.I. Vyshnegradskii and S.F. Zlokazov. None of them took part in the War-Industries Committees. For their ties with industry and finance cf. I.F. Gindin and L.E. Shepelev, ‘Bankovskie monopolii v Rossii’, IZ, vol. LXVI (1960) pp. 58–9, 62–3, 68–75;
and V.I. Bovykin and K.F. Shatsillo, ‘Lichnye unii v tiazheloi promyshlennosti nakanune pervoi mirovoi voiny’, Vestnik Moskovskogo universiteta, seriia ix, no. 1 (1962) Tables 1–9. The banks and the relevant officials are: Russian-Asian Bank–Putilov (chair.); Petrograd International Commercial Bank–Vyshnegradskii (dir.); Petrograd Private Commercial Bank–Davidov (chair.); Petrograd Savings and Loan Bank–Utin (chair.).
In terms of their fixed assets as of Jan. 1914 the banks ranked 1, 2, 8, 9respectively (see I.F. Gindin, Russkie kommercheskie banki (Moscow, 1948) p. 381).
Osobyi zhurnal Soveta ministrov’ (29 May 1915), TsGIA, f. 1276, op. 11, d. 888, 1. 272 obv. Sukhomlinov’s affirmation is to be contrasted with the extremely pessimistic remarks which Putilov made to the French ambassador several days earlier. See Maurice Paleologue, An Ambassador’s Memoirs, 3 vols (London, 1923–5) vol. I, p. 349.
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© 1983 Lewis H. Siegelbaum
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Siegelbaum, L.H. (1983). Russian Industrialists and the Initial Mobilization, 1914–15. In: The Politics of Industrial Mobilization in Russia, 1914–17. St Antony’s/Macmillan Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17316-7_2
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