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Daniel Nazarov
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Russia in the First World War |
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History Project |
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Daniel Nazarov |
INTRODUCTION
In 1914, the Russian Empire, in defense of Serbia, declared war in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which led to the German Empire declaring war on Russia, even though just a week before this event, the Tsar and the Kaiser, who were relatives, were exchanging friendly telegrams concerning the Austro-Hungarian aggression against Serbia. It seemed that the last thins that the two nations wanted was war, but it was obvious that both were prepared, as the Kaiser stated, ‘…I am obliged to mobilize my armies…’
Even though there were some Russian defeats, which included disgraceful battles for the Russian army, like Tannenberg, the Russian army did really well in the beginning stages if the beginning of the war in invading East Prussia, as well as holding the first German attack on Warsaw, as well as organizing a genius plan known as the Brusilov offensive.
Most, if not all of the text books state that the Russian army was large but ill-equipped and poorly trained. But some sources do not agree. For example, in letters by Russian soldiers to their families, the soldiers mostly complain about the Tsar and the politicians, not lack of ammunition or rifles, yet there are letters where they complain about lack of food and drink. Richtofen.com, which summarizes events on the Eastern front, claims that the Russian army in 1914 was trained very well and was well-equipped. On the other hand, it says that the Russian army had problems with supply routes, which meant that they couldn’t supply their soldiers in time.
Richtofen.com then says that the Russian soldier was better equipped than the Austro-Hungarian soldier, and equipped just as well as the German soldier. It also says that Russian 76.2mm guns were robust enough to be used in WW2, and even to stay in reserve in the 1980’s.
This, according to the same source, meant that the Russian generals decided to abandon the typical Russian strategy of ‘tactical retreat’ with almighty counter-attacks and partisan regiments, like what was done in the Patriotic war of 1812. This tactic was to be known as ‘Scorching Earth’ by the German occupants in WW2. The GHQ decided to attack straight away after any declaration of war, so that the Russians could take control of the enemies’ supplies, and not use its own. The result, as seen on any source, was very high in human lives.
To explain why people think that the Russians were ill-equipped and trained, in my opinion, is simple. After the war, the Bolshevik government took over, and massive propaganda operations were conducted throughout the whole country; Russian defeats in the war were over-exaggerated and children were taught that Russia only suffered defeats in WW1. This continued until the fall of the USSR. This could possible mean that the Bolsheviks re-wrote archives or destroyed pro-imperial letters and documents, meaning that historians would get the opinion that the communists wanted of Imperial Russia-a weak and poor, falling country. Yet as we can see, this was not completely true.
This map shows pre-war positions of the German, Russian and Austro-Hungarian Empires on the East.
THE BEGINNING OF THE WAR IN THE EAST (1914)
After the declaration of war against Germany, Russia invaded East Prussia, with the goal of taking Konigsberg (Kaliningrad), the capital of Prussia. This looked fairly simple, as the Russian heavily outnumbered the Germans, is everything went well, the Russians could surround the Germans and Konigsberg was relatively close to the border with Russia. The first army of General Rennenkampf swept through the relatively small German defenses, and was nearing Konigsberg. The second army of Samsonov also advanced from the south, but with less success. The Germans were desperate and it was only thanks to the genius of Hindenburg and Ludendorff that the Russian armies failed to meet and capture Konigsberg, and eventually, East Prussia. The Germans surrounded the Russian second army quietly and destroyed it at the battle of Tannenberg, where general Samsonov committed suicide after the defeat. According to the ‘WW1 in color’ series, Rennenkampf knew that the Germans were surrounding Samsonov, and he had a great opportunity to attack, but he disliked Samsonov, and saw competition in him, so he did nothing. The egoistic decision of Rennenkampf not only destroyed the Russian second army, but, in a way, destroyed the Russian Empire…
A week later, the army of Rennenkampf would be swiped back to Russia, and Russia would never be able to invade Germany (in the war) again.
But on the other hand, Austro-Hungary was having problems of its own; three-quarters of the Austro-Hungarian army were Slavic, meaning that most of the often either refused to fight against their Russian brethren, or simply fought worse than they should in hope of being captured by the Russians. When the Austrians tried to take Warsaw, their poorly-equipped 39 divisions were heavily outnumbered by the prepared Russian 4 armies. The Russians counter-attacked, and not only kicked out the Austro-Hungarians from Poland, but also managed to take the province of Galicia.
This map here shows the situation in 1914. As you can see, the two Russian attacks on East Prussia gave no results, even though the first army was near Konigsberg. The Austrian campaign in Galicia was more successful.
Russian Tanks in 1914-1915
Even though some textbooks say that the Russians did not have tanks in WW1, the reality is that they had tanks even before the British, it is just that the tanks were never used in a major scale and were rarely used or seen. There were, in fact two tanks, both very ridiculously different, and a motorized vehicles:
This tiny tank (which in fact doesn’t have a name) is very funny-looking indeed. As you can see from the first photo, the caterpillar tracks are protected and one can add the tower onto the tank. It seems well camouflaged, and it could easily be mistaken for a small hill. This tank was developed in Lithuania in 1915.
This is not exactly a tank, but it was one of the very first armored trucks in history. It had 2 canons on each side. The circled texts, in Latin alphabet would be ‘SOKOL’ meaning ‘Falcon’. It is my opinion, that therefore, the truck must have been called the ‘Sokol’
And finally, the Tsar tank, which was also known as the ‘Bat’, because it reminded someone of a bat. The tank was developed in 1914 and was used in the same year and the following year. The blue circled part shows were one of the turrets was. There would be an identical turret on the other side. The Red circled bit shows where the tower and main canons were. There was a slightly smaller tower where there green circle is. The two front wheels were 9 meters high, but the rear wheel was around 2 meters high. The bigger wheels easily crossed trenches and mud, but the rear wheel had problems; this led to the abandoning of this tank. This was used with high success in the beginning of the war, the engines were very strong, it looked big, had a lot of canons and looked invincible. This tank was not as rear as the first one, but was also very rare. I was lucky enough to find another photo of it:
As one can see from this picture, the Tsar-Tank was gigantic. The smaller wheel is nearly as big as a Christmas tree.
OTHER CONFLICTS CONCERNING RUSSIA IN 1914
In December 1914, the Ottoman Empire invaded Russian Armenia in the Caucasus region with a force of 100,000 troops. The Ottomans were not as well equipped as the Russians and Enver Pasha, the Ottoman commander devised a plan of a quick and mobile war, a bit like the Schleiffen plan. This was a bit too much to expect from the Ottoman army. ‘World War 1 in color’ shows a scene where the Ottomans are moving through the Russian winter on camels. The Caucasus region is very mountainous and is a ‘gift from God’ for defenders. Russia has one a lot of wars against the Ottoman Empire in the past, and the Ottomans should have been more wary. Depending on different sources, the amount of Ottoman survivors varies from 4,000 to 14,000 but even with the second option, the Ottomans have lost 86% of their troops. This is because of the weather; many of the Ottomans froze to death, just like Napoleon’s army in 1812 and because of the decisive battle of Sarikamis, where Enver Pasha lost approximately 85% of his soldiers, which means that the Ottomans definitely lost more than 86,000 as some sources proposed. The theory of 6,000 survivors is much more likely, as we know that around 85,000 died in one battle alone, Ottomans froze during the retreat, and of course, other battles. The campaign ended in a disaster and the Russians eventually attacking and taking crucial ports on the Black Sea in Turkish Armenia, which were given back after the Treaty of Brest.
THE SITUATION IN 1915 ON THE EASTERN FRONT
As one can see, the Central Power’s attack on the East was a major success. The Germans were even nearing the now Belorussian capital, Minsk (circled)
Around 220 miles
Austria-Hungary realized that it was not capable of destroying Russia alone, and it asked Germany for a shred offensive. After a long period of thinking, the Germans agreed and the attack took place on May the 1st. This resulted in the capture of 200 miles in two weeks, the fall of Warsaw in September, and the eventual fall of the Polish, Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian provinces. The major fortresses of Novo-Georgiesk and Brest-Litovsk were taken, seriously damaging Russian morale. The Central Power’s success is to be fully thanked on the Germans, as it was them who mostly took all the territory. In the campaign of 1915 alone, the Russian lost 2 million men, half of them were POWs. The Austro-Hungarians and the Germans lost 1,000,000 men. On the other side of Europe, the situation was stalemate while on the Eastern front, two major events happened: the Ottomans failed to open a second front to help the German and Austrian forces, and the Russians lost all the territory that they took in 1914, as well as losing the Baltic states and Poland.
Daniel Nazarov Y10