Patel- Both a collapse from within and an overthrow from without

The February Revolution of the Russian Civil War was a result of equal factors of both a collapse from within, and an overthrow from without. The facts support both reasonings. When Russia lost the Russo-Japanese War, this shocked the Russian people. The admitted defeat of Russia was devastating to Russian pride and nationalism. This called for justification of their Russian pride, and was shown by the deep involvement with WWI. The defeated Russia desired to elevate their status level to being a supreme country again, so they led a full-fledged offensive attack against the oppressive Austria and Germany (1). The loss of the Russo-Japanese war was the origin of the instability in Russia, because of how it motivated Russia’s offensive actions. During this time in Russia, when Tsar Nicholas II was under power, major factors contributed to the instability of the Russian government. Many of these were results of the failures of the Tsar, which brings about factors that involved the Tsar, and factors that were not under the Tsar’s control. An example of this is when the Tsar took complete control of the Russian armies on the Eastern Front (1). When the Tsar took control, he did not provide the soldiers with what they needed to fight in the war such as, equipment and nourishment (1). This was one of Tsar Nicholas’s failures as a leader. This inadequate army did not agree to fight within these conditions, which then raised the issues that were outside the Tsar’s control such as mutiny within the armies, the demoralization of the armies, and the desertion of soldiers within the armies (1). Therefore, we see how the Tsar’s failures led to actions beyond the Tsar’s control. The soldiers were fighting for their country and felt that they should be given the decency of physical support, and because the Tsar did not provide for them, the Russian armies did not believe in him as a leader. The reason for the inadequate equipment and the dearth of food supply was that Russia was in a depression-like state because of the raised prices of food and the steady incomes that did not change, which meant that Russia did not have enough food to provide for everyone (soldiers and Russians) (1). The number of soldiers fighting for Russia was the largest out of all participating countries in WWI, which also meant that it was inevitable that there would be a scarce supply of equipment and food.

The Tsar was responsible for the country, and he could not stand watching the army fall apart within his rule, therefore he took control of the entire Eastern Front (1). In another perspective this was because the Tsar felt that it was his duty to show Russia how much he was willing to do for the country. Despite his disadvantages of fighting as a soldier, he represented a firm devotion to the country. Even if taking control of the army was a failure of the Tsar, the Tsar is seen as a respectable leader.

Another failure of the Tsar is his negligence to the Duma, a group representing the voice of the people (2). This was because his primary motive for allowing its establishment was only selfish because it granted him the position of Tsar by his support of the values of the Duma. The Tsar never actually wanted the advice of the group, but only the position of total power. When the Tsar never established any of his promises the people of Russia were dubious of his leadership and the result was the rise of opposition groups such as strikers and protesters (2). The nationalistic pride once felt by these protestors was shot down when the supposed “short, glorious war” became a four-year failure. This building of grievances led to another failure of Tsar, Bloody Sunday (2). When strikers and protestors violated the streets,(because protests were banned by the Tsar) the Tsar ordered his troops to shoot them down, which led to mass chaos and many lives lost therefore, “Bloody Sunday” (2). This was another example of when the Tsar’s failure led to an action outside of his control.

Overall, the failures of the Tsar led to the grievous effects that were outside of the Tsar’s control. The combined impact of both the overthrow form without and the collapse form within is what led Russia to be ripe for the February Revolution or the downfall of the Tsarist rule within Russia.