WW1 From Russia's Perspective | Animated History

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As a result, when the Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated by a Bosnian Serb in June of 1914, the Russians were quick to act. Though Austria-Hungary couldn't find evidence that the Serbian state had sponsored the assassination, it issued an ultimatum. The Russians, who had declared themselves protectors of Christians in the Balkans for centuries now, were afraid of Austro-Hungarian domination in the region. This, alongside pan-Slavic sentiment, convinced the Russians to back Serbia, even if they had no formal treaty obligation. France, who had an alliance with Russia, also reassured their support if war sparked. Tensions boiled over, and Austria-Hungary declared war on July 28th. Russia came to Serbia's defense, and days after, alliances had been drawn in Germany, France, and Britain. What had begun as a Balkan crisis had evolved into a worldwide conflict, with the Central Powers on one side, and the Triple Entente on the other. 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Poor transportation infrastructure hindered effective mobilization and troop movements. The Russian army was ill-prepared for modern warfare, relying on outdated strategies and equipment. The rigid hierarchical structure and lack of proper training and leadership further hampered the military's performance. Nonetheless, Russia launched offensives into East Prussia and Austria-Hungary. Initially, the Russians were successful, with the First and Second Armies advancing into East Prussia and even achieving victory at the Battle of Gumbinnen on August 20th. Although the Russians wanted to threaten Konigsberg, the Russian Second Army would be annihilated at the Battle of Tannenberg, with the Germans capturing over 100,000 prisoners in the conflict's aftermath. The Russian army would be defeated once again at the Battle of Messorian Lakes, being kicked out of East Prussia for good. After their successes in East Prussia, the Germans aimed to take Warsaw and fought the Russians at the Battle of the Vistula River, but were repelled, building on this defensive success, the Russians attacked Silesia, aiming to take the city of Breslau, but were repulsed and retreated to Lodz, which would fall by the end of November. The first four months of the war had taken its toll, not only on the morale of the Russians, but also on materiel, as they were already low on guns and ammunition. Against the Austro-Hungarians, Russia started with defeats, first with the Battle of Krasnik, and later Komarov. However, at Gnila Lipa, they drove away the Austro-Hungarians and captured Lemberg. The Russian push into Galicia was quite successful, taking much land and capturing tens of thousands of Austro-Hungarian prisoners. Many of them were Austro-Hungarian Slavs, Czechs, Slovaks, Croats, and Bosnians, and Russia portrayed itself as a liberator of subjugated people. Soon after, the Russians laid siege to the fortress of Piemyshev, which they captured along with more than 100,000 prisoners in March of 1915. Russia's third adversary, the Ottoman Empire, would join the war in October of 1914 after bombarding Russian Black Sea ports. The initial Russian Casus Belli had been defending their fellow Slavs, but as the dead mounted, this wasn't an especially sellable cause to the Russian public. The involvement of the Ottoman Empire, which historically had been akin to an archrival to the Russians, made the war more logical to public perception. Furthermore, Russian officials managed to extract a commitment from Britain and France that Russia would take Constantinople at the end of the war. Formerly the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire, which Russia claimed to be the successor of, the city would also give Russia access to the Mediterranean. The fighting between the Ottomans and Russians would mostly take place in the Caucasus, a region rife with ethnic and religious tensions. Both sides would exploit these tensions, with the Russians vaguely promising independence for the Armenians in exchange for assistance against the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman Sultan would also use his religious position to leverage support for the war, proclaiming a jihad against the Entente. In December, the Ottomans crossed into Russian Georgia and captured Ardahan, murdering many Christians. In response, when the Russians retook it in early 1915, they retaliated, killing many in the Muslim community. Later, the Russians, alongside their Armenian allies, would achieve a massive victory at Sarikamish in January of 1915. In response, the Ottoman violence against the Armenians began to spiral out of control, eventually leading to the Armenian Genocide. In April of 1915, the Germans and Austro-Hungarians launched the Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive, achieving a major breakthrough, reversing the Russian gains in Galicia and capturing over 140,000 men. By June, both Pemeshu and Lemberg were in the hands of the Central Powers again. The Germans would continue to build on their success, seizing Warsaw, Brest-Litovsk, and Vilnius. The Russians had suffered heavily as a result of these offensives. In July, Assistant Minister of War, General Mikhail Belyaev pleaded with the French Ambassador for help and revealed that in some infantry regiments, one man in three had no rifle. The poor fellows wait patiently under the hail of shrapnel for their comrades to fall, so they can collect their weapons. Faced with insurmountable pressure, the Russians began the Great Retreat, in which they relinquished over 100,000 square kilometers to the Central Powers. While the withdrawal did shorten their frontlines and allow for a much-needed respite, it was a huge blow to morale. Disillusioned with the constant military struggles, Tsar Nicholas decided to make himself the supreme commander of the Russian forces, tying his regime to success in the war. While a large part of Russia's involvement in the war had been due to its role as the preeminent Slavic power, the Russian Empire was incredibly diverse. Large minorities of Poles, Ukrainians, Germans, Baltic, and Central Asian people lived within the Russian borders. While the Russians retreated, the Germans continued to advance, capturing the fortresses at Kovno and Novogeorgesk. That being said, the Germans would be routed at the fortress of Osovyesk, in an action that would later be immortalized as the Attack of the Dead Men. After their initial bombardment and assault was repelled by the Russians, the Germans would surround the fortress for months. On August 6th, the Germans decided to use poison gas to root the maskless Russians out. The gas proved deadly, leading to extremely heavy casualties on the Russian side. As the Germans advanced to take the Russian positions, in what they expected to be an unimpeded assault, the surviving Russians, bloody with chemical burns wrapped up in rags and spitting out blood, counterattacked in a bayonet charge. Shocked by the sight of what appeared to be dead men charging against them, the Germans retreated. The newspaper would later call this counterattack the Attack of the Dead Men. Nonetheless, this heroic action would be in vain, as the Russians would later abandon the fortress to the Germans. As the war continued, its impact on Russia's society and economy was profound and destabilizing. The cost of financing the war effort strained the economy, leading to inflation, scarcity of goods, and food shortages. The hardships faced by the Russian people during the war fueled discontent and social unrest. Strikes, protests, and bread riots became more prevalent as the war dragged on, further weakening the government's ability to maintain control. The harsh living conditions and lack of faith in the ruling class created an environment ripe for revolutionary sentiments. Among the most notorious figures in the Russian court at the time was Grigory Rasputin, a mystic holy man who had befriended the royal family and acted as a faith healer for Tsar Nicholas' only son, Alexei, who suffered from hemophilia. Many in the court saw him as little more than a religious charlatan that discredited the Tsar. As Russian military defeats mounted on, both the royal family and Rasputin continued to become increasingly unpopular, and eventually Rasputin was assassinated by a group of conservative Russian noblemen who opposed his influence over the imperial family. Nonetheless, Rasputin's association with the royal family left its mark, discrediting the government in the eyes of many. In March 1916, the Russians initiated the disastrous Lake Norwich Offensive in the Vilnius area, during which the Germans suffered only one-fifth as many casualties as the Russians. Many of the Russian casualties would come at the hand of the cold, with thousands of soldiers succumbing to hypothermia due to dreadful supply conditions. The offensive had taken place at the request of France, who had hoped it would force the Germans to transfer more units to the east and relieve some pressure from the Battle of Verdun. The Germans and Austro-Hungarians fell into complacency after repelling the Russian attacks, with the Austro-Hungarian leadership transferring units from both the Balkan and Russian Front to the Italian one. Many of the experienced divisions on the Eastern Front were withdrawn and sent to the Alps, and replaced by formations largely composed of new, inexperienced recruits. This reshuffling presented an opportunity to the Russians. At a war council held with senior commanders and the Tsar in April of 1916, General Alexei Brusilov presented a plan to the Russian High Command, proposing a massive offensive against the Austro-Hungarian forces in Galicia. Brusilov's plan aimed to take some of the pressure off the French and British armies in France, and the Italian army along the Isonzo. His plan had a mixed reception, with some commanders favoring a more defensive strategy, but the Tsar would nonetheless approve the plan, although he did deny Brusilov's request for supporting offensives. On June 4th, 1916, the Russians opened the offensive with heavy artillery fire. Brusilov's troops made quick work of the Austro-Hungarians. Within four days of the offensive, the Austro-Hungarian 4th Army had its strength fall from 117,800 men to just 35,000, a fall of nearly 70%. Brusilov used smaller, specialized units to attack weak points in the Austro-Hungarian trench lines, and blow open holes for the rest of the army to advance into. These tactics were a remarkable departure from the human wave tactics that had dominated the strategy of all major armies until that point in the First World War. Soon, the Germans began sending reinforcements to prevent the Austro-Hungarians from collapsing, and the Russian advance was slowed, but not stopped. While the Russians still outnumbered their Germanic opponents, their advance became more and more costly, until they were ultimately stopped in the outskirts of the Galician town of Kovul. Attacks continued until the autumn rains turned the roads to mud, but other than adding to the already terrible casualty list, nothing substantial was achieved. The damage the Brusilov offensive inflicted meant that the Austro-Hungarian army increasingly had to rely on the support of the Germans. It also achieved its original goal, disrupting Germany's attack on Verdun and having them transfer forces to the east. The early success of the offensive also convinced Romania to join the war on the side of the Entente, but they would soon be defeated and occupied by the Central Powers. The units commanded by Brusilov directly performed very well, but the overall campaign was tremendously costly for the Imperial Army, with more than half a million men becoming casualties. Continuing the war was an especially costly affair for the Russian Empire. As a result, Tsar Nicholas declared a draft of Central Asian men which was unprecedented. The Muslim Central Asians had not heeded the Ottoman call for jihad, but the draft, alongside the rampant corruption of the Russian regime, was too much to bear. Soon, the Kazakhs and Kyrgyz were up in arms, and thousands of Russian troops were dispatched to put them down. The suppression of the revolt was brutal and led to over 100,000 deaths due to violence, disease, and the famine that followed. Hundreds of thousands of Central Asians fled into China, and the Russian Empire never managed to fully restore order to the region. The mounting discontent and frustration with the government's handling of the war culminated in a revolution in February 1917. The February Revolution led to the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II and the establishment of a provincial government led by liberal politicians who aimed to continue the war effort and implement democratic reforms. However, the provisional government shared power with the Petrograd Soviet, a body representing workers and soldiers. This arrangement led to a state of dual power and political instability, as the two bodies had conflicting interests and goals. While the provisional government's decision to continue the war was unpopular, it was the catastrophic Kerensky Offensive in July 1917 that destroyed any morale left in the Russian army, along with the image of the provisional government. The army by now was plagued with desertion and disobedience, with many soldiers looting, ignoring officers' orders, or even outright attacking them. Amid the chaos and disillusionment, the Bolshevik Party, led by Vladimir Lenin, capitalized on popular discontent and actively promoted slogans of peace, land, and bread. The Bolsheviks aimed to end Russia's involvement in the war, redistribute land to the peasants, and provide food to the starving population. The October Revolution of 1917, spearheaded by the Bolsheviks, overthrew the provisional government and established a communist one. Keeping to their word, the Bolsheviks would end Russia's participation in the war, negotiating with Germany, and signing the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, ending the fighting on December 16, 1917. The price for peace was a heavy one. Not only did Russia have to concede vast swathes of land to the Central Powers, but they also lost millions of men in combat and decimated their economy. Unfortunately, peace with the Central Powers did not mean an end to Russian suffering, as soon after, the country would devolve into civil war. Russia's participation in the First World War had profound consequences that transformed the country's political and social landscape. The war exposed Russia's weaknesses, exacerbated internal divisions, and led to the downfall of the imperial regime, ultimately paving the way for the rise of communism. The Russian experience during the war serves as a stark reminder of the human cost and complexity of global conflicts, leaving an enduring impact on the nation's history. The tragic transformation of Russia during the First World War and the subsequent Russian Revolution left an indelible mark on the 20th century, and significantly shaped the course of the world's political and social developments.