No GNW (or “Peter goes South”)

I’d call SS “negativist”:
Nattering Nabob of Negativism(c) Spiro Agnew
But they were causing huge problems and could be considered a good ROI. In this case I’m talking about the OTL proponents had been basing their argument on two main considerations:
1. Experience of 1877-78 demonstrated that the reasonably modern Britain-built Ottoman battleships proved to be pretty much useless while the small Russian mine boats were quite effective in creating problems for the Ottomans.
2. Nobody in the right senses expected that Russia is going to win a naval war against Britain because Russian strength was on the land and the naval communications were pretty much irrelevant (at that time). The purpose was to make the whole exercise as painful for the opponent as possible and within this framework the raiders (submarines were not, yet, practical) were good ROI.
Thanks for explanation.
Agreement with Japan was a distinct possibility.
I'm add that's from strategic viewpoint interests of Japan and Russian Empire in Far East are relatively close - borh countries don't want really strong China and borh countries don't like perspective of British or American naval supremacy in Pacific Ocean. That's why anglo-american romance with Japan broke after 1905 and why was russo-japanese rappcohment, crowned by treaty of 1916 , possible.
 
I don't think the US is such a decisive factor in the Pacific. They have little or no Pacific coast. In addition to the fact that the Philippines is Spanish and is more of an independent country.
 
Which way to go? (#2)
273. Which way to go? (#2)

“Nowadays, more than before, extreme speed is required in preparing armies for war, which is used to be called mobilization. More than ever, unity and harmony are needed in the management and disposal of heterogeneous elements of military force.”
Milyutin, “Military Reforms of Alexander II”, 1882
The positive results of the Milutin reforms were visible immediately (and created a halo of the "benevolent genius" of the Russian army). Negative results were revealed only gradually, decades later ...The regulation … introduced chaos of improvisation to the field administration of the troops, legitimized the "detachment system".”
Kersnovsky, “History of the Russian Army”, 1930s
“I’m a dog, I bite everyone, I don't let anyone sleep, and therefore the order is such no one else may have; when you are bosses, I advise you to be dogs too.”
Vannovsky to his subordinates


The naval debates were a child play comparing to those related to the army. The recent military reform was on its initial stages and managed to cause a heated debate even during the reign of AII so now, with Milyutin gone, everybody felt free to express his opinion. Situation was aggravated by the fact that the new Minister of War, Vannovsky was unwilling and most probably incapable to shape the debate.
1672285219631.png

His immediate contribution was to re-convert Mulyutin’s military gymnasiums back to the cadet and junker military schools: in these gymnasiums the students had been taught predominantly by the civilian teachers and the military aspect of the education was minimized and most of the graduates did not go to the military service. Which was in line with Milyutin’s idea of improving the general education in Russia but had little to do with preparing the officer cadres. The military curriculum was restored and the number of schools increased. A total of 16 junker schools were established (11 infantry, 2 cavalry, 2 mixed and 1 Cossack).

Other than that Vannovsky was mostly concentrating on fighting corruption and enforcing professionalism of the officers corps: “Sargent-major, where is my place?” was gone and the junior officers were forced to exercise the real command of their units (in the army of NI with its compact formations, only battalion and rarely company commanders had to act on their own, now it was down to a platoon level).

Outside his area of comfort, he was inclined to see how the debates will be received by AIII and then to act accordingly. Which was one more catch 22 situation because, unlike most of his predecessors, AIII did not imagine himself a military authority and expected a meaningful input from the professionals to make his decisions. And, as was correctly remarked by general Dragomirov, at the times of peace many people felt free to get engaged in all types of the fantasies and great schemas. Of course, he was too modest to explicitly include himself into this group. 😂

As one of the most experienced Russian staff officers (prior to the Austro-Prussian War, Dragomirov was visiting France and Britain and wrote voluminous reports on the instructional and manoeuvre camps of these countries, in 1859, he was attached to the headquartersof the King of Sardinia Victor Emmanuel II during the campaign of Magenta and Solferino, and immediately upon his return to Russia he was sent to the General Staff Academy as professor of tactics) he was made a head of the General Staff Academy. A man of great merits, he also had great shortcomings, which made his influence on the army ultimately negative. Like Tolstoy he denied existence of the military science and emphasizing preeminence of the “spiritual” element he extended his logic to denial of the strategy as a science. All military affairs were reduced to tactics, and tactics - to "winning by the guts".

Dragomirov opposed the spirit to technology, not realizing that technology is not an enemy of the spirit, but his valuable ally and assistant, which allows you to save the forces and blood of the fighter. The Dragomirov school built all its tactical calculations on piles of human meat, flows of human blood - and these views, taught from the department by the Honored Professor, and then by the head of the Academy, had the most detrimental impact on the formation of a whole generation of officers of the General Staff.” [1]

The problem was that he was not some kind of a military imbecile. His teachings about the proper education and good treatment of the soldiers were right to the point making him quite popular among the younger generation of the Russian officers who were much more liberal than the older generation of the veterans of NI’s times. Then again, his good attitude toward the soldiers should not be exaggerated because all that “humane” stuff was serving one main purpose: to teach the “holy cattle” to die bravely on a battlefield. Not that he considered soldiers mentally quite equal human beings. Here is his system of the soldiers’ “mental development”:
  1. Teach little by little one, a lot - two thoughts at a time.
  2. Avoid bookish words.
  3. At the slightest opportunity to resort to example or, even better, to a show.
  4. To take not everything from what has to be transferred, but in order of importance, to apply to soldier's life and service.
Eventually, he was moved from from the Academy to command the Kiev Military District (as an internationally popular figure he could not be just fired or transferred to some insignificant position) and an interesting metamorphosis happened: on the earlier stage of his career as a division commander he was encouraging initiative of his subordinates but when he eventually became commander of the Kiev Military District he started suppressing any such initiative. Putting all his attention to the individual upbringing of a soldier ("holy gray cattle"), Dragomirov completely overlooked the officer, moreover, deliberately ignored and humiliating the officers (his favorite ironically contemptuous "gas-pa-din officer!"). Deliberate belittling, humiliating the officer’s authority, Dragomirov thought to create popularity both among soldiers and in civilian society and in this he was successful but authority of the officers in the troops under his command was seriously shaken.

Anyway, service in the staff of the Kiev district was a trampoline for the future careers of quite a few generals of a questionable quality due to the “name recognition” of their boss.

In OTL he was fighting tooth and nail against the magazine rifles and his significant “contribution” was a delayed introduction of the machine guns in the Russian army. Not to be forgotten, he successfully insisted on the Russian field artillery not having the protective shields because they are “lowering artillerymen spirit” - the results were high losses of the artillery crews during the RJW. And “students” of his school who by 1914 grew up in the ranks, demonstrated all faults of his teaching by the huge losses due to the idiotic tactics.

To be fair, so far his tactical teachings were reasonably within a mainstream defined by the experience of the recent Austro-Prussian War. The danger was long-term sticking to what is going to be obsolete in a near future.
1672284831685.png

As a head of the Academy he was replaced by general Leer, the greatest military-scientific mind of the Russian army. He was a strong defender of the strategy, which Dragomirov tended to neglect, and probably was a founder of the strategic theory in Russia. However, he emphasized the subordination of the theory to practice, seeing the meaning of science in the regulation of creativity. At his insistence, field trips of officers of the General Staff were introduced, which extremely widened their horizons in a practical direction. As a matter of principle, he was warning against sending troops to the theater of war piecemeal because “it is better to have too many troops rather than too few.”

The issues of the general military organization were a complete mess.

With the formation of military districts, and then gubernia and uezd military departments, the practice of drawing up mobilization plans began, which ensured the relatively rapid mobilization and deployment of the army in case of war. Now mobilization could be carried out in 30-40 days, previously it took from 3 to 6 months. It was also positive that in wartime district offices could be turned into army headquarters or allocated personnel for their formation.

On the other hand, Milyutin’s decentralization soon began to have a negative impact. The headquarters of the districts, which often managed 8-10 infantry and 2-4 cavalry divisions, were overloaded with work. The position of brigadier was also not superfluous, as it was thought and in 1871 it was restored. In 1872, the Guards Corps was restored. In 1873, 7 corps (numbered from 7 to 12 and Caucasian) formed, 2 infantry and 1 cavalry division each. The corps were called "army corps" rather than "infantry corps" as before. In total, the army corps had 24 battalions, 18 squadrons and Cossack hundreds and 108 guns. In 1874 9 more corps had been formed (Grenadiers, 1 - 6, 13, 14) and later 2 more (2nd Caucasian and 15).


It was argued that the military districts are a bureaucratic rather than military institution that will be disastrous in the case of a war. Actually, as implemented by Milyutin’s Reform, this was probably a correct conclusion. The military district was an assembly of the divisions and other units with no supporting structure for the corps and army level (Dragomirov liked this). Commander of the district and his staff had to be primary administrative figures because their main concern was to provide well-being of these units at the peacetime. And a good peacetime administrator is not necessarily a good frontline commander capable of making the fast decisions and taking responsibility. If at the time of a war these people are going to be converted into the field commanders, who will keep things running in the districts? The Prussians were lucky to finish the war fast but what if it was not? The obvious remedy would be to upgrade the reform by adding the permanent peace time corps and army level commanding and staff cadres to the military districts.

Then, of course, within the reform there was no provisions for the permanent staffs of the corps and army levels so these officers would have to come from the existing units leaving them short of the qualified officers.

Similar problem was with the idea of building-up the units during mobilization: brigade will become a division, division - a corps. This was good on a paper but these promoted commanders did not have experience of commanding a bigger unit and neither did their staff officers or their subordinates who had to be promoted above their level of expertise. And where are you going to get the junior officers from if almost half of the people with high education had been exempt from the military service at a peacetime and could not be considered the immediately useful cadres even if they mobilized during a war?

Then there was a vocal group arguing that the whole system is just producing a lot of the badly prepared reserve soldiers while at the same time decreasing a size of a high-quality army and killing its spirit. They were basically proposing something like the French model: a relatively small professional army backed up in the case of war a badly prepared “opolchenie” that would not have any organizational structure, competent officers and non-coms, etc.

There was a proposal to create the reserve troops, which will have the command structure (most of the officers and non-coms) and stored weapons, uniforms and equipment but in the peacetime not the full numbers and during mobilization will expand their size to the required numbers. The drawback was that these units will have to be given some time to shape up. The proposal also implied Prussian-style territorial formation of the units located within the military district while Milyutin’s reform was closer to the French method of staffing the units by the people arbitrary assigned from various regions because even in the European Russia the troops had to be disproportionally concentrated closer to the western borders. Taking into an account the huge size of the Russian Empire and still inadequate communications, mobilization based on this system would be a complete nightmare. In a peacetime they would amount to approximately 10% of the army and in wartime - up to 30%. This was seemingly neatly addressing issue of the 2nd echelon but not something beyond it, however, at that time nobody (seemingly anywhere in Europe) was seriously looking beyond that level. [2]

The alternative was system of so-called “hidden cadres”. 140 first-echelon regiments would have an additional 19 officers and 262 lower ranks, of which a second-echelon would be deployed during mobilization. If the framework of the 1st system size of the reserve regiment related to the mobilized reserve as 1 to 4-8, and in the 2nd as 1 to 16. Which significantly worsened the quality of the secondary units and require the longer post-mobilization training but would save money. There was also an additional problem with the high level assignments within this system. [3]

A significant figure was the Chief of the General Staff, General Obruchev, whose name should be associated with all positive developments the military area during this period. Regardless his reputation of being a liberal and close association with Milyutin AIII liked and trusted him. He was responsible for construction of the strategic roads, border fortifications, creation of the new corps units [4], etc. Under his influence system of the reserve troops was adopted.

1672285626976.jpeg

The Engineer troops had been augmented by the railroad, telegraph and, later, aerial battalions and companies. Under his command the General Staff [5] became the “brain center” of the Ministry of War (not surprisingly, with Vannovsky being generally occupied with the subjects he knew and liked trusting Obruchev to deal with the rest). Later Obruchev presented Vannovsky with a project modifying General Staff’s functions. Its essence was to turn the General Staff into a body capable of performing the work of "the highest strategic order regarding the distribution of troops in theaters of war, the formation of armies, drawing up plans for their concentration and initial actions, preparing field management in border districts, organizing the collection of information about the enemy, etc." Obruchev believed that after the reorganization of the General Staff, the latter should take a leading position in the ministry, and his chief, "as the closest employee of the Minister of War on all major issues related to the structure of the armed forces and the defense of the state," should become a deputy Minister of War with the right to report directly to the emperor. However, Vannovsky was reluctant to allow such an elevation of his subordinate and tabled the proposal.

The military district system resulted in the uneven training of troops. In different districts, the troops were trained differently, depending on the views of the commanders of the troops. In the same district, the training system changed with each new commander. If this latter was an artilleryman, he was only interested in his brigades, providing infantry and cavalry commanders to train troops as they like. A sapper was appointed - and the fascination with "grave digging" began: the construction of field fortifications, self-digging without end with complete disregard for everything else in the world. Sapper was replaced by an infantryman - the "fortification" was immediately abolished, and all training was reduced to knocking out an "super-excellent" percentage of hits at shooting ranges. Finally, a representative of the Dragomirov school appeared, proclaimed that "bullet is a fool, bayonet is good!" And the thick chains smartly marching under the drum began to win brilliant and crushing victories over the designated enemy.

The favorite type of fire was shooting with volleys - by platoon and the whole company (however, and command "battalion, fire!" was not uncommon). Volley fire was widely used in Caucasian and Turkestan campaigns and it was effective against the brave but undisciplined opponents and (with Dragomirov’s blessing) it was cultivated as a demonstration unit’s good training and spirit. The accuracy of such a "decorative" fire was, of course, insignificant.

Not that education to the individual accurate fire (a good part of Dragomirov’s credo) was problem free. It was not uncommon for the officers during the practice to inch their way close to the targets of their platoon and, if the results were not good, to “improve” them by shooting at the targets from their revolvers at point blank range.

At the insistence of General Obruchev, large bilateral maneuvers began to be carried out periodically (approximately every two years), in which large masses of troops from different districts took part.

The corps structure was standardized but neither Obruchev nor Vannovsky were immune from the “special detachment” disease, which came from the Caucasus and Turkestan experience. Fighting on these theaters obviously involved deployment of the small ad hoc units which would not be typical for a major European war. However, the experience was there, it was widespread and now it was legitimized in the field instructions allowing cannibalizing the corps by arbitrary taking the officers and small units out of them and making the “special detachments” directly subordinated to the army staff.

One more important thing was abolishing (at least for a while) positions of the inspector-generals of various branches. This position was usually held by the Grand Dukes who tended to consider their branch from a proprietary perspective and to act independently from the Ministry of War, creating a duplicate line of command with a resulting confusion. Some of them, if they had a serious military education, could be quite useful by proposing valid innovations but most were just considered their position as a sinecure.

In 1867, field artillery got rifled breech-loading guns.
1672284563324.png


Berdan rifles (with the metal cartridges) No. 1 (1868) and No. 2 (1870) were adopted by infantry, cavalry and Cossack troops. A wire telegraph appeared in the army. In 1871, the army received a 4.2-line Smith-Wesson revolver. In 1867, a new military judicial charter was approved, and the Main Military Court was formed. The term of service in the army was 15 years - 6 years of active service and 9 years of stay in reserve. After this term, conscripts were enlisted in the State Militia (opolchenie), as well as those released from conscription. Later time the active service was cut to 5 years. There were numerous exemptions based upon family situation, education and ethnicity (population of the former Khanates and Northern Caucasus was exempt, except for those volunteering to the service).

For those who received primary education, the period of active service was reduced to 4 years, who graduated from the city school - to 3 years, the gymnasium - to a year and a half, and those who had higher education - to six months. As a result, Milyutin pursued a good goal - to help public education. However, it turned out that the most intellectually valuable element was the worst used (served only 6 months), which did not affect the army in the best way denying it the most promising candidates to the officer cadres.
1672284393163.jpeg

Eventually, this problem was partially fixed by changing the rules: those with the education above primary had to serve 3 years with “volunteer” status (did not have to leave in the barracks and were free from the non-military duties). After 6 months they were getting a right to pass exam to a military school and if admitted, study here for 1 year and then serve the remaining 1.5 years as the junior officers with a right to retire afterwards or to continue service.
1672285048963.jpeg

The Cossacks had been serving based upon their own rules. Their regiments were included into the cavalry divisions and they became a separate branch of the regular troops.



____________
[1] Kersnovsky
[2] System existed between 1878 and 1910
[3] In case somebody has illusions about general brainpower of NIIs regime, this system was adopted in 1910. Of course, in 1914 many, if not most, of these units had been sent to front immediately after mobilization without any training. “Thus, on August 6, 1914, in East Prussia, units of the 56th Second Echelon Infantry Division were sent directly from the trains into battle. Having come under fire, the infantrymen distraught with fear, throwing their rifles and all equipment on the way, and often even boots, by a disorderly crowd, that had lost all their military appearance, sought to slip to the east, for the Neman, who for some reason seemed to be their salvation.” The main fault was not with the soldiers or officers but with the people who were responsible for an overall organization and screwed up. Even the 56th division after it got some experience in the minor engagement, got a very good fighting reputation.
[4] As in OTL, the corps structure within the military districts organization was restored in the early 1870s.
[5] Strictly speaking, this was “Main Staff” which later incorporated “General Staff”.
 
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Nowadays, more than before, extreme speed is required in preparing armies for war
Indeed
I’m a dog, I bite everyone, I don't let anyone sleep
Woof woof 🐕

And I thought being a doge was a Venice thing
Not that he considered soldiers mentally quite equal human being
Of course, they're better - see Steve Rogers
Do we really need any more examples?
  1. Teach little by little one, a lot - two thoughts at a time.
  2. Avoid bookish words.
  3. At the slightest opportunity to resort to example or, even better, to a show.
  4. To take not everything from what has to be transferred, but in order of importance, to apply to soldier's life and service.
Doesnt that apply to everyone
holy gray cattle"
I read holy grail cattle and was so excited
Like where's the sacred beef
 
Kresnovsky,
Kresnovsy
Typo. Kersnovsky

(Off-top. How ugly looks all slavic words (and especially surnames), when they written in latin alphabet)

Dragomirov completely overlooked the officer, moreover, deliberately ignored and humiliating the officers (his favorite ironically contemptuous "gas-pa-din officer!"). Deliberate belittling, humiliating the officer’s authority, Dragomirov thought to create popularity both among soldiers and in civilian society and in this he was successful but authority of the officers in the troops under his command was seriously shaken.
I knew about his zealous loyalty to "winning by guts" , but this is a new level of stupidity. How, on Earth, can be strong army without firm authority and respect (and self-respect) of officer corps?
Of course, in 1914 many, if not most, of these units had been sent to front immediately after mobilization without any trainin
Facepalm.
 
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Typo. Kersnovsky
Thanks.
(Off-top. How ugly looks all slavic words (and especially surnames), when they written in latin alphabet)
I gave up on «вольноопределяющийся» and made it “volunteer” 😂
I knew about his zealous loyalty to "winning by guts" , but this is a new level of stupidity. How, on Earth, can be strong army without firm authority and respect (and self-respect) of officer corps?
Kersnovsky commented that in 1905 he (already in retirement) started giving the officers recommendations how to maintain order in the troops (cool head and sharp sword) and concluded with exactly what you said.

IMO, this was a typical case of going from one extreme (treating soldiers as a dirt) to another (the logical continuation of which was 1917 with a resulting disintegration of the Russian Army), both of which had been wrong.
Facepalm.
The same mistake was made in 1904 on a lesser scale. BTW, Kuropatkin was one of the “chicks of Dragomirov’s nest” (to plagiarize the classics 😉 ): a very good chief of staff and really liked commander of a military district but not very good Minister of War and terrible army commander.
 
Interesting military reforms, hope they bares results
Everybody knows how “well” they worked in RJW and WWI so I’ll have to undo certain things and preferably keep Russia at peace. 😂

OTOH, ITTL Russia is much more industrialized and had less idiotic government so some problems will go away automatically.
 
OTOH, ITTL Russia is much more industrialized and had less idiotic government so some problems will go away automatically.
Logistics and moral make a lot of difference and artillery is the King of the Battlesfield up to and including WW1 & 2 at least. With it and the machinegun the war will go a lot better. But the rest, well...
 
@alexmilman I find quote about Pobedonostsev's views:
"...[Teslya]: And what the empire needs is a situation where each estate will reproduce itself as an independent, self-contained cycle, this is the very vision of the freezing of the country. What, in principle, is rushes before Pobedonostsev's thought is the "concreting" of all social elevators, ideally. To stop any movement <...> And Pobedonostsev's project, by and large, is a project of withdrawal from history, return to a natural state <...> if you really radicalize it, then compare it with the Khmer Rouge
{Repnikov - author of book]: Well, that's too radical!
[Teslya]: ....The Khmer Rouge is, of course, too much, but if we wish, I don't even remember, one of the historians has it, that we can call Konstantin Petrovich, for all the strangeness, a Russian Taoist. Because if I recall the image, in my opinion, from Chuang Tzu, I'm afraid to make a mistake, from where, what is an ideal life: when songs are heard on the other side of the river, there is clearly some kind of village, but no one cares about it, no one goes to find out what is happening there"(c) from Repnikov's book about conservative models of Russian State in late XIX - early XX century

Kersnovsky commented that in 1905 he (already in retirement) started giving the officers recommendations how to maintain order in the troops (cool head and sharp sword) and concluded with exactly what you said.

"Too little, too late". Typical russian trait - caught themselves ("spokvatyvatsya" -that is. firstly make mistake in calculations or act stupidly and then feverishly fix it) Also, what prevented him from coming to obvious conclusions earlier, God damn!

BTW, Kuropatkin was one of the “chicks of Dragomirov’s nest” (to plagiarize the classics 😉 ): a very good chief of staff and really liked commander of a military district but not very good Minister of War and terrible army commander.
Like spiritual father, like spiritual son.

Also off-top. Recently I reflect about idolizing Suvorov (brilliant tactician and capable strategist, but not best general of all times) in Russian military circles of XIX century and later in Russian society as whole. And I think the cause is that Suvorov's style embodies what is lacking in the usual Russian style of warfare - namely, impetuosity and speed. Russian wars in most cases were solved not by brilliant single field battles or campaigns, but by a long series of wars (three centuries of struggle with the Great Steppe, two centuries of struggle with the Poles, twelve Russo-Turkish wars), where victory was achieved due to greater fortitude and willingness to continue fighting despite all costs. Using terminology of boxing, Suvorov was "swarmer" , but russian military and Russian State (in all shapes) are "slugger" - who dreams about transforming into "swarmer".
 
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Russia really should annex Heilongjiang. Not for the money per se, but to make the Far East a functional economic unit. It never really got off the ground OTL, partially because it was a thin strip with relatively limited population and also because USSR managed to be hostile to everyone in the area. Heilongjiang has far more farmland than all the Russian Far East. 8.5 million hectares versus 3 million. Some of that is a much larger farming population, but most of it is that it is an agricultural breadbasket (~8% of China's farmland despite ~2.5% of its population). Rich black soils. It is also fairly lightly populated at this point in history. The population within the modern borders of Heilongjiang+
Hulunbuir was close to 2 million in 1900. In 1850, no more than a couple hundred thousand. That is easily swamped by Russian immigration. With a more developed Russia with an earlier end to serfdom, it can flood the zone in Central Asia, Siberia, etc even more than it did. Plus of course shut the floodgates the Qing opened. Earlier is better though of course given those floodgates.

Basically Russian power projection in the region improves a lot if it can actually turn the Far East into an economic and industrial unit rather than it being a dependency of European Russia, since so much had to be transported by the Trans-Siberian Railroad. Probably 1930s or 40s before this really comes into its own. Realistically a lot more important than the Caucuses in the long run. My mental timeline would be gain 1895 or so, basically as the price for not rolling back Japanese gains assuming a roughly OTL progression there. Start flooding Heilongjiang with settlers, by 1914, maybe 1.5 million Russian, 1.5 million Chinese (some natural growth offset by Russia finding plenty of excuses for 'deporting' Chinese, I suspect a lot of them didn't have their paperwork quite in order for their land occupancy or personal presence) with a couple hundred thousand Koreans, flood it with millions more in the 1920s and 30s and by then it is considered an integral part of core Russia like Outer Manchuria.
 
@alexmilman I find quote about Pobedonostsev's views:
"...[Teslya]: And what the empire needs is a situation where each estate will reproduce itself as an independent, self-contained cycle, this is the very vision of the freezing of the country. What, in principle, is rushes before Pobedonostsev's thought is the "concreting" of all social elevators, ideally. To stop any movement <...> And Pobedonostsev's project, by and large, is a project of withdrawal from history, return to a natural state <...> if you really radicalize it, then compare it with the Khmer Rouge
{Repnikov - author of book]: Well, that's too radical!
[Teslya]: ....The Khmer Rouge is, of course, too much, but if we wish, I don't even remember, one of the historians has it, that we can call Konstantin Petrovich, for all the strangeness, a Russian Taoist. Because if I recall the image, in my opinion, from Chuang Tzu, I'm afraid to make a mistake, from where, what is an ideal life: when songs are heard on the other side of the river, there is clearly some kind of village, but no one cares about it, no one goes to find out what is happening there"(c) from Repnikov's book about conservative models of Russian State in late XIX - early XX century
I agree, based upon what little I do know about Pobedonostsev’s views, that he was bent on maintaining the status quo. Not sure if he seriously wanted to roll things back to what? The mythological times of Vladimir the Red Sun? The same goes for the self-contained estates because one of the main ideological points of the “reactionaries” was to keep the nobility in charge while cutting down any attempts of self-rule by other classes.

But, anyway, even maintaining the status quo required active involvement of a government and this was how the counter-reforms had been done: state control over zemstvos and city dumas was increasing.

"Too little, too late". Typical russian trait - caught themselves ("spokvatyvatsya" -that is. firstly make mistake in calculations or act stupidly and then feverishly fix it) Also, what prevented him from coming to obvious conclusions earlier, God damn!

AFAIK, Milyutin was approving all his activities so the whole thing looks like a vintage Russian liberalism. Well, some other international varieties of it include sticking to the stupidity made no matter what. 😜
Like spiritual father, like spiritual son.

Also off-top. Recently I reflect about idolizing Suvorov (brilliant tactician and capable strateg, but not best general of all times) in Russian military circles of XIX century and later in Russian society as whole. And I think the cause is that Suvorov's style embodies what is lacking in the usual Russian style of warfare - namely, impetuosity and speed. Russian wars in most cases were solved not by brilliant single field battles or campaigns,
Actually, very few pre-Napoleonic European wars had been won by the single battles or campaigns. Look at GA (even in the PLC) or the best marshals of LXIV. Or to the WoSS and the 7YW.



but by a long series of wars (three centuries of struggle with the Great Steppe, two centuries of struggle with the Poles, twelve Russo-Turkish wars), where victory was achieved due to greater fortitude and willingness to continue fighting despite all costs.
The Austrian-Ottoman wars also lasted for quite a while and as far as the Steppe and Poles are involved, the PLC kept paying tribute to the Crimea in the late XVIII and keep in mind that as far as the Tatars are involved, “Russia” did not exist in a meaningful form until the XVI century and had to build the state and military force simultaneously (and not too successfully). It was a weak and poor state all the way to the second part of the XVIII after which it was simply poor.

Using terminology of boxing, Suvorov was "swarmer" , but russian military and Russian State (in all shapes) are "slugger" - who dreams about transforming into "swarmer".
Well, Suvorov, IIRC, did not win a single war because the only one in which he was commander-in-chief ended up with a retreat across the Alps. Of course, this was not his fault and it can be argued that he won a war in Italy, etc. In the Ottoman wars he was a subordinate commander and the same goes for the Kościuszko Uprising. Of course, he was the most energetic out of the Russian generals and probably the most talented one but his school, just as later D’s school, produced the generals ready to attack witlessly disregarding the losses. Suvorov eventually demonstrated that he was also a very good strategist but the followers were just energetic…
 
Russia really should annex Heilongjiang. Not for the money per se, but to make the Far East a functional economic unit.
You may add: providing a greater strategic depth.



It never really got off the ground OTL, partially because it was a thin strip with relatively limited population and also because USSR managed to be hostile to everyone in the area.
Leaving the USSR aside, Russia had over 100,000 troops there and could not establish effective control over the area.

Heilongjiang has far more farmland than all the Russian Far East. 8.5 million hectares versus 3 million.
Russia needed industrial workers, not peasants.

Some of that is a much larger farming population, but most of it is that it is an agricultural breadbasket (~8% of China's farmland despite ~2.5% of its population). Rich black soils. It is also fairly lightly populated at this point in history. The population within the modern borders of Heilongjiang+
Hulunbuir was close to 2 million in 1900. In 1850, no more than a couple hundred thousand. That is easily swamped by Russian immigration. With a more developed Russia with an earlier end to serfdom, it can flood the zone in Central Asia, Siberia, etc even more than it did. Plus of course shut the floodgates the Qing opened. Earlier is better though of course given those floodgates.
All that is correct but there was a problem: the Russian peasants were quite reluctant to move even to the Siberia and the move to the Far East became technically possible only after construction of the TransSib after which the movement still was less then expected. It was bad enough that the first line was going through China because this prevented development on the Russian side of the Amur.
IIRC, the big Chinese move into the region started after construction of the East China RR, so how are you going to prevent them to get into the area into which the Russian did not come, yet.

Basically Russian power projection in the region improves a lot if it can actually turn the Far East into an economic and industrial unit rather than it being a dependency of European Russia,
Russian resources were quite limited and development of European Russia and Siberia were of a much higher importance than Far East because there was very little in the terms of the Russian international trade on the Pacific and no serious chances to change this situation. At least not without a major conflict with Britain and the US.

since so much had to be transported by the Trans-Siberian Railroad.

True. But creation of a major industrial region from the scratch in a remote region with no clear geopolitical perspectives would be a costly entertainment. Russia run out of funds with a relatively minor adventure of Dalnji-PA, did not have enough money to both build Witte’s dream port and fortify PA at the same time, and you are talking the whole huge agro-industrial area with all supporting infrastructure.

I’m not even talking about the population or expenses for fortifying the border.
Probably 1930s or 40s before this really comes into its own. Realistically a lot more important than the Caucuses in the long run.
This is not too difficult because the only valuable thing on the Caucasus was oil.

My mental timeline would be gain 1895 or so, basically as the price for not rolling back Japanese gains assuming a roughly OTL progression there.

Japan would not be a problem. Was not even after the RJW.
Start flooding Heilongjiang with settlers, by 1914, maybe 1.5 million Russian,
They were not going in the expected numbers even to Eastern Siberia.

1.5 million Chinese
There will be much more because the border is wide open and you’ll run out of ammunition trying to kill millions Chinese. You are kidding about ‘deporting’.

 
Generally while Russian immigration won't kick in for quite some time i believe Russia should be quite capable at managing 1.5 million Chinese. As for industrialization of the area, it can be a long term process as no one will be able to contend Russia there in the long run anyway. Ultimately consolidating far east can only benefit Russia in long run opposed to keeping current status quo.

Plus I'm firm believer that while Russian market is unsatiated as of now it won't be so forever and Russia should search other market's (even in the far east).

Not to mention this looks like a fine eastern map:
46804750931_a0750b5980_c.jpg
 
Generally while Russian immigration won't kick in for quite some time i believe Russia should be quite capable at managing 1.5 million Chinese. As for industrialization of the area, it can be a long term process as no one will be able to contend Russia there in the long run anyway. Ultimately consolidating far east can only benefit Russia in long run opposed to keeping current status quo.
How would it benefit alt-Russian Empire if Dzungaria-Kashgar territory with all natural resources (and generally loyal population) are part of it and their development requires big amounts of money and work force (it is not too likely that in mid-/late-XIX a predominantly nomadic local population is going to voluntarily turn themselves into the industrial workers while they have Cossack status)?

Actually the whole region of the Eastern Siberia-Far East is on the initial stages of its development and requires huge investments. AFAIK, AIII wanted TransSib going on the Russian side of the Amur just for this purpose and was against the adventures into which Witte got Russia involved after his death.

Status quo is stable because it is defined by the natural borders and loyal population but the part of Manchuria we are talking about (Heilongjiang) is reasonably open on the South and East and it is practically impossible to control its border.

I quite agree about absence of the competition: the Japanese did not have any plans regarding this territory until much later and even then only after the Russian Empire ceased to exist and there was a power vacuum. But this is not the reason for annexing the territory unless you really need it. IMO, would not be in style of AIII and in a direct contradiction with his explicitly stated policies.

Plus I'm firm believer that while Russian market is unsatiated as of now it won't be so forever and Russia should search other market's (even in the far east).
Even more reason not to annex Heilongjiang: as a part of China it can be looted and exploited at will but as a part of Russia it is under protection of the Russian laws. Ditto for being paid in gold and silver for the goods sold there if the region is a part of Russia.

Anyway, I already mentioned more than once that China trade was mostly disappointing for Russia and adventure in Korea ended up as a losing enterprise before the RJW.

Not to mention this looks like a fine eastern map:
Seems to be product of the Soviet times but it is just fine. Now, putting aside the map maker’s fantasies like grabbing a part of the British India all the way to the ocean (taking into an account general weakness of the Russian merchant marine and even greater absence of the Russian navy this seems a rather pointless exercise), would you care to explain which of these “objects of the aggressive desires” caused anything but trouble? As markets they were pretty much useless due to the low purchasing potential and as anything else they kept causing unnecessary international problems.

Industrially-developed Russia could have more promising markets without any annexations because it would have valuable stuff to sell.

 
Seems to be product of the Soviet times but it is just fine.

Indeed, but it makes a nice power fantasy. But yea in long run it's probably better not to annex the territories that Russia will have trouble holding on to in long run and could only cause tensions along the way .

One way, or another Russia doesn't have territorial conflicts with China and if it wants something it probably can get it via concessions, or mutually beneficial trade deals without needing to directly control the area.

Plus at this point eastern border is mostly settled and in need of development itself (not speaking about Alaska).
So yea i agree that Russia more than enough lands, plus it mostly achieved all it's desired objectives and is in phase of consolidation and development.

No need to make same mistakes Nick was making with his forgein adventures.
 
Indeed, but it makes a nice power fantasy. But yea in long run it's probably better not to annex the territories that Russia will have trouble holding on to in long run and could only cause tensions along the way .

One way, or another Russia doesn't have territorial conflicts with China and if it wants something it probably can get it via concessions, or mutually beneficial trade deals without needing to directly control the area.
Yes. The problem in OTL was that China was not a very good trade partner to anybody.



Plus at this point eastern border is mostly settled and in need of development itself (not speaking about Alaska).
So yea i agree that Russia more than enough lands, plus it mostly achieved all it's desired objectives and is in phase of consolidation and development.

No need to make same mistakes Nick was making with his forgein adventures.
Exactly.

Of course, the problem you mentioned, a need for the exports, will remain for Russia and the OTL markets, except for the European need for grain (with the US and Argentine being strong competitors) and increasing export of the kerosine, were not too promising in this regard. ITTL the Japanese market can increase substantially in some areas but it is still limited. Which leaves Ottoman Empire with Egypt, Persia and what else? Probably Hungary and Poland, which is not too much.

How likely is for Russian Empire to grow into, for example, a shipbuilding giant? Weapons exporter, as the SU, but to whom?

I’m still trying to figure this out and the ideas are welcomed.
 
Of course, the problem you mentioned, a need for the exports, will remain for Russia and the OTL markets, except for the European need for grain (with the US and Argentine being strong competitors) and increasing export of the kerosine, were not too promising in this regard. ITTL the Japanese market can increase substantially in some areas but it is still limited. Which leaves Ottoman Empire with Egypt, Persia and what else? Probably Hungary and Poland, which is not too much.

How likely is for Russian Empire to grow into, for example, a shipbuilding giant? Weapons exporter, as the SU, but to whom?

I’m still trying to figure this out and the ideas are welcomed.
Latin America might be a good choice, they can supply some tropical goods into Russia as well as the fact those countries have a habit of buying old and used as well as brand new warships either for war or just for show, considering the major lack of industry in most of the countries, russia could make good cash by selling it's products.
 
How likely is for Russian Empire to grow into, for example, a shipbuilding giant? Weapons exporter, as the SU, but to whom?
Honestly I'd see Russia grow into:
  1. An agricultural goods exporter. (Which isn't different then OTL, however, I have plans here based on the next item)
  2. Industrial end & semi goods exporter
    1. Mainly known for Tractors, Ploughs, etc (like OTL USA)
    2. And Trains, Trucks, tracks, containers (OTL USA)
    3. Planes, but also Zeppelins (mainly in combination with Containers, they can ship much more efficiently to end points in hard to reach places - OTL USA, Germany)
    4. Transformers (for electricity), machine tools, etc (OTL USA, Germany)
    5. At some point: Home goods like washing machines, fridges etc etc (OTL Germany)
    6. Cars (France, USA)
  3. Natural goods exporter (like OTL, but again like the agricultural goods, higher in the chain and based on mechanisation)
    1. Refined oils
    2. Diamonds
    3. Coal
    4. Etc
  4. Steel frames, for large scale pre-fab building construction
  5. At some point I'd love to get to electronics industry. The Soviet Union and later highlighted that capability is missing.
That's why I still like a Far East alternative for peasants. Increased industrialisation will do a lot of things
  1. Increase social disruption
    1. More and more Farmers becoming obsolete, having to turn into laborers and from there on into the industrial worker
    2. Individual Farms will massively increase in size: tractors etc need scale to be efficient
    3. OTL peasants around this age, especially in Russia and States like it, are not beacons of innovation, hence even more turmoil
  2. Increase political awareness
  3. Create a necessity for large volume of people to move, needing housing, utilities, hospitals, schools etc
In my opinion the reason why peasants were reluctant to move OTL is because
  • Nobody wants to be moved by outside pressure
  • There was not a lot of incentive from inside the community
  • The alternatives were not significantly better, or even on par
  • Where European Russia had transport capacity and established sellers, OTL Asian / Far East Russia has neither.
So if we industrialise & mechanise earlier, plus play the long game in Asia, I could see some peasants prefer the Far East over factories. Whether that would be enough is another question. I think it's very much possible to be very sustainable to move the border 100km per migration train. But it's your timeline
 
I need opinions on both North and South America of the 1860s - early 1870s. Questions to those better familiar with the subject

NA:
1. How much the changed American-Mexican border of this TL would impact each side?
2. Would it be realistic for Britain (and other negatively impacted European cotton consumers) to break the naval blockade of Confederacy’s ports (with a resulting ability to supply it with the weapons)?
3. How would a much smaller Irish immigration would impact the North?
4. With ##2 and 3, as the worst case scenario:
4.a What’s the best realistic outcome for the Confederacy?
4.b How much longer the war could go on and, the most important, what would be the economic impact on North and South? By “impact” I mean both domestic and geopolitical.

SA:
Is it possible at all within ITTL framework of the “Spanish Commonwealth” to avoid military conflicts between SA countries. Specifically:
1. 1864 — 1866 The Chincha Islands War between Spain and Peru and Chile
2. 1879 — 1884 Bolivia and Peru fight Chile in the War of the Pacific
3. 1864 - 1870 The Great Paragyayan War (Paraguay vs. Brazil, Argentine and Uruguay)

It seems that the ##1, 2 were mostly about the rights of shoveling the bird’s s—t and then nitrates and probably some deals could be made (judging by wiki, there were some agreements which then were broken).


Thanks.
 
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