Russian stolen victory
The ideas of revanchism are very fashionable now. They say that everything in Tsarist Russia was excellent - there was no famine, there was a high birth rate and an increase in production, etc. And if you add that in Russia in 1917, a bunch of villains stole the victory, then you can earn big political dividends.
Why doesn’t elementary logic occur to anyone? In 1904–1905, Russian generals and officers miserably lost the war to the Japanese, in 1914–1917 they retreated monthly and lost the war to the Germans, in 1918–1920 they completely lost the war to their own people, despite the thousands of guns, tanks and Entente airplanes. Finally, once in exile, tens of thousands of officers climbed the world in ever-greater fights - in Finland, Albania, Spain, South America, China, etc. Yes, thousands of them showed courage and were awarded. But who was given command not just a division, but at least a regiment? Or were the Bolshevik villains interfering there too?
But in stories Western Europe, almost a quarter of the famous commanders were immigrants. And in Russia, about half of field marshals were emigrants, we recall at least Minikh, Barclay de Tolly and others.
NO WEAPONS, NO BREAD, BUT ON GOLD TRADE
What was the morale of the soldiers? They just had nothing to fight for! The king and even more so the queen are ethnic Germans. For 20 in recent years, they have spent a total of at least two years in Germany with relatives. The brother of the Empress, General Ernst of Hesse, is one of the leaders of the German General Staff.
Russian people are responsive to the pain of others, and the propaganda of helping the Slav brothers in the first weeks of the war was a success. But in October 1915, Bulgaria declared war on Russia, more precisely, the Rasputin clique.
The Russian soldiers understood perfectly well that Wilhelm II did not intend to seize Ryazan and Vologda, and the fate of suburbs such as Finland or Poland cared little for workers and peasants. But what about the peasants, if the king himself and his ministers did not know what to do with Poland and Galicia, even if the war ended successfully.
German airplanes threw flyers with caricatures onto Russian trenches — the Kaiser measures an enormous 800-kilogram projectile with a centimeter, while Nicholas II measures a member of Rasputin in the same posture. The whole army knew about the adventures of the "old man." And if the Germans used 42-centimeter mortars only on the most important sectors of the front, then almost all of our soldiers saw the craters from the 21-centimeter.
The wounded, who returned to the ranks, the Zemgusars and nurses told the soldiers how the gentlemen walked to the fullest in restaurants in Moscow and Petrograd.
In all the books of the heads of the State Agrarian University Manikovsky and Barsukov, the famous gunsmith Fedorov, it was recognized that at the cost of high-explosive shells and shrapnel of the same caliber, produced by private and public factories, differed one and a half or two times.
The average profit of private industrial enterprises in 1915 year increased by 1913% in comparison with 88 year, and in 1916 year - by 197%, that is, almost three times.
However, industrial production, including defense plants, began to fall in 1916. For the first 7 months of 1916, the carriage of goods by rail amounted to 48,1% of the required.
In 1915 – 1916 years, the issue of food has sharply escalated. Before 1914, Russia was the second largest grain exporter after the USA, and Germany was the world's main importer of food. But until November 1918, the German “Michel” regularly fed the army and the country, often giving up 90% of the agricultural output. A Russian man did not want. Already in 1915, due to the inflation of the ruble and the narrowing of the flow of goods from the city, the peasants began to hide the grain “until better times.” Indeed, what’s the point of giving grain at strictly fixed prices for “wooden” rubles (during the First World War, the ruble lost its gold content), for which there was practically nothing to buy? Meanwhile, if the grain is skillfully stored, its economic value is preserved for 6 years, and technological - 10 – 20 and more years, that is, for 6 years most of the sown grain will germinate, and it can be eaten in 20 years .
Finally, the grain can be put on moonshine or feed for livestock and poultry. On the other hand, without bread, neither the army, nor industry, nor the population of large cities can exist. As a result of how local historians point out that “about a billion poods of grain stocks could not be transferred to consumption areas,” Rittih’s Minister of Agriculture, 1916, “decided to take an extreme measure in the autumn of the year: he announced a forced bread distribution.” However, by 1917, only 4 million poods were practically developed. For comparison, the Bolsheviks under the surplus were collected in the year 160 – 180 million pounds.
Mikhail Pokrovsky in the collection of articles “The Imperialist War”, published in 1934, cited the following data: “In the winter season, Moscow needs 475 thousand pounds of firewood, 100 thousand pounds of coal, 100 thousand pounds of oil residues and 15 thousand pounds of oil every day peat Meanwhile, in January, before the start of frosts, the average 430 thousand tons of firewood, 60 thousand tons of coal and 75 thousand tons of oil were brought to Moscow every day, so the amount of 220 thousand tons of oil was less than the amount of firewood; From January 17, the arrival of firewood in Moscow fell to 300 – 400 wagons per day, that is, to half the norm set by the district committee, while oil and hard coal did not arrive at all. The fuel reserves for winter in the factories and plants in Moscow were procured for about a month's 2-month requirement, but as a result of the short supply that began in November, these reserves were reduced to nothing. Due to the lack of fuel, many enterprises, even those working for defense, have already stopped or will soon stop. The houses with central heating have fuel in the amount of just 50%, and the wood storages are empty ... the gas lighting of the streets has completely stopped. "
But what is indicated in the multi-volume “History of the Civil War in the USSR”, published in 1930-ies: “Two years after the start of the war, coal mining in the Donbass was difficult to maintain at the pre-war level, despite the increase in workers from 168 thousand in 1913 to 235 thousand in 1916 year. Before the war, the monthly production per worker in the Donbass was 12,2 tons, in 1915 / 16, 11,3, and in winter, 1916, 9,26, in tons. ”
Since the beginning of the war, Russian military agents (as they used to be called military attaches), generals and admirals rushed to buy around the world weapon. Of the purchased equipment, about 70% of artillery systems were outdated and were good only for museums, but only England and Japan Russia paid 505,3 tons of gold for this trash, that is, about 646 million rubles. In total, gold was exported to 1051 million gold rubles. After the February Revolution, the Provisional Government also contributed to the export of gold: literally on the eve of the October Revolution, it sent a shipment of gold to Sweden to buy weapons worth 4,85 million gold rubles, that is, about 3,8 tons of metal.
DISPUTE ABOUT WINNERS
Could Russia have won the war in such a state? Let's fantasize and remove the freemasons, liberals and bolsheviks from the political scene. So what would happen to Russia in 1917 – 1918? Instead of a Masonic coup in 1917 or 1918, there would have been a terrible Russian revolt (which we will talk about later).
Oh, this is the author's assumptions! So let's look at the data on the armament of Russia, Germany and France at the end of 1917-th - the beginning of 1918 year:
- the divisional guns of the French were 10 thousand, the Germans had 15 thousand, and Russia had a total of 7265 units;
- shells of large and special power corps, respectively - 7,5 thousand, 10 thousand and 2560 units;
- tanks - 4 thousand from France, around 100 from Germany and none from Russia;
- trucks - about 80 thousand from the French, 55 thousand - from the Germans, 7 thousand - from the Russians;
- combat aircraft - 7 thousand from France, 14 thousand from Germany and just a thousand from Russia.
Considerable importance in the 1914 – 1918 positional warfare was played by heavy artillery. Here is a brief introduction on the presence of Russian heavy artillery on the front of 15 June 1917.
Long-Range Cannons: Cane 152-mm Systems - 31, Schneider 152-mm Systems - 24 X-VUMkers 120-mm Systems, 67. Attack Attacks 203-mm howitzers of the Vickers system - 24, 280-mm mortars of the Schneider system - 16, 305-mm howitzers mod. 1915, Obukhovsky Plant - 12. The Russian army possessed two 254-mm rail installations, but they were out of order, and after 1917, the guns on both transporters were replaced with 203-mm ship guns.
Now compare these data with the artillery of the French large artillery and special power of the main artillery reserve: 10 regiments 155-mm cannons C. main artillery reserve of three divisions of three batteries and one platoon of vehicles (total 360 guns) and 5 regiments 105-mm guns the main artillery reserve of three battalions of three batteries and one automotive ammunition platoon (180 guns).
Heavy tractor artillery was in a period of reorganization (the shelves from the 6 two-battery divisions were reduced to the shelves from the 4 three-battery divisions). This artillery included: 10 cannon regiments (480 guns), 10 howitzer regiments (480 guns), and 10 mouth tracked tractors. Each regiment had two platoons of ammunition transport.
The structure of heavy artillery of high power included 8 regiments of different composition:
- one working regiment and a park for the construction of a normal gauge railway (CVN) of 34 batteries;
- One regiment of 240-mm guns (75 guns);
- one regiment of mortars and howitzers (88 guns);
- One regiment of heavy railway artillery with circular shelling guns (42 guns);
- Four regiments of heavy railway artillery with guns firing from arc branches (506 guns).
In total, 711 guns were part of heavy artillery.
The naval artillery (ship and coastal installations occupied on the land front. - A.Sh.) consisted of four divisions of mobile 16-cm guns for 4 two-gun batteries in each, two separate batteries and one division for river monitors (1 – 24-cm and 2 - 19-cm guns). Total 39 guns.
By February 1917, the front line ran from Riga along the Northern Dvina to Dvinsk (now Daugavpils), then 80 km west of Minsk and then to Kamenetz Podolsky. The rhetorical question: how could the Russian army in this state of artillery, aviation and vehicles reach Berlin? Recall that in 1944–1945 the Red Army, having superiority two, three or more times over the Germans in personnel, artillery, tanks, aircraft, having thousands of M-13, M-30 multiple-launch rocket launchers, etc., lost several million dead before reaching Berlin.
KICKBACK BUT BUT NOT
Having left the Crimea, the Russian fleet for many years was locked up in Bizerte. 1921 Photo of the Year
It is curious that the overwhelming majority of the German population believed in the theory of “stolen victory” and “stab in the back of the army” in 1920 – 1930's. I note that the Germans just had grounds for such theories. Judge for yourself.
In the summer of 1918, American units arrive on the Western Front, and the Allies are launching an offensive. In September, the Entente troops in the Western European theater had 211 infantry and 10 cavalry divisions against 190 German infantry divisions. By the end of August, the number of US troops in France was about 1,5 million people, and by the beginning of November it exceeded 2 million people.
At the cost of enormous losses, the Allied forces in three months were able to advance on a front about 275 km wide to a depth from 50 to 80 km. By 1 November 1918, the front line began on the North Sea coast, a few kilometers west of Antwerp, then went through Mons, Sedan and further to the Swiss border, that is, the war until the last day was exclusively in the Belgian and French territories.
During the Allied offensive in July – November 1918, the Germans lost thousands of people killed, wounded and captured, the French 785,7 thousand people, the British 531 thousand people, and the Americans lost 414 thousand people. Thus, the losses of the Allies exceeded the losses of the Germans in 148 times. So in order to reach Berlin, the Allies would lose all their land forces, including the Americans.
In 1915 – 1916, the Germans did not have tanks, but then the German command prepared a big tank pogrom at the end of 1918 and the beginning of 1919. In 1918, the German industry manufactured 800 tanks, but most of them did not reach the front. Anti-tank guns and large-caliber machine guns began to enter the army, and they easily penetrated the armor of British and French tanks. Mass production of 37-mm anti-tank guns was launched.
During the First World War, not a single German dreadnought died (the newest type battleship). In November, 1918 of the year was inferior to England in England by 1,7 by the number of dreadnoughts and battle cruisers, but German battleships were superior to allied artillery, fire control systems, ships unsinkable, etc. All this is well demonstrated in the famous Yutland battle of 31 May - 1 June 1916 of the year. Let me remind you that the fight had a draw, but the losses of the British were significantly superior to the Germans.
In 1917, the Germans built 87 submarines, and excluded from the lists (due to losses, for technical reasons, due to navigation accidents, etc.) 72 submarines. In 1918, 86 boats were built, and excluded from 81 listings. The 141 boat was in service. At the time of the signing of the surrender was built 64 boats.
Why did the German command ask the allies for a truce, and in fact agreed to surrender? Germany ruined a stab in the back. The essence of the incident was expressed by Vladimir Mayakovsky in one phrase: “... and if I knew then Hohenzollern that this was a bomb in their empire”. Yes, indeed, the German government transferred quite large sums to the revolutionary parties of Russia, including the Bolsheviks. However, the October Revolution led to the gradual demoralization of the German army.
LOST CHANCE
So, the Russian Empire had no chance of winning the war in 1917 – 1918. I repeat once again, without the Masonic revolution in February 1917 of the year in Russia, a general spontaneous rebellion would break out in 6 – 12 months. However, I will console our “leavened patriots” with the fact that Russia could twice become the winner in the Great War - at the beginning and at the end.
In the first version, Nicholas II was only required to follow the strategy of his great-grandfather, grandfather and father. Nicholas I and both Alexander built three lines of the best fortresses in the world on the western border of Russia. “The best in the world” is not my assessment, but Friedrich Engels, a good specialist in military strategy and a great Russophobe.
However, by decree from Paris, Nicholas II and his generals were preparing for a field war - a march to Berlin. 20 years on the teachings of the Russian army raced horse lava in the composition of several cavalry divisions, dense orders attacked infantry corps. Russian generals took seriously the French "misinformation" - the theory of the triunity. Like, the war can be won with the help of only field guns, only one caliber - 76 mm, and only one projectile - shrapnel. Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, who was in charge of Russian artillery, in 1911, in general, abolished heavy (siege) artillery and promised the king to recreate it after 1917. The prince planned to re-equip the fortress artillery from 1867 and 1877 systems to modern ones by ... 1930!
Western fortresses were abandoned. During the reign of Nicholas II, not a single modern large and medium-caliber guns were made for land fortresses. Moreover, the old 1838, 1867 and 1877 model implements were removed from the forts and placed in the center of the citadel in open positions.
In 1894 – 1914, Russia was able to re-equip the western fortresses with modern implements installed in concrete casemates and armored towers. And in the intervals between the fortresses to build solid fortified areas. I note that the lines of the URs on the western border (the Stalin line and the Molotov line) were created only under Soviet rule. Moreover, in the Soviet era, no new technologies were used, compared to the beginning of the twentieth century, unless, of course, we consider chemical protection. Yes, and a significant part of the guns in the URs was royal time.
And this is not my fantasy. Already from the beginning of the 19th century, 80, many Russian generals and officers raised the issue of building fortifications on the western border. Viktor Yakovlev in his work “The History of Fortresses”, published in 2000, indicates that in 1887, “there was an old question that had arisen as early as 1873 about creating a Warsaw fortified area, which Warsaw had to enter as a stronghold; two other strongholds should be the Forge Novogeorgievsk, expanded by that time, and the small Zegrzh fortress, which was again proposed for construction (instead of Serock, which was meant in 1873,). ” And in 1892, the war minister, General Kuropatkin, proposed the creation of a large fortified area in the Privislensk region, the rear of which would extend to Brest. According to the highest approved order to create a fortified area in 1902, the allocation of 4,2 million rubles was provided. (It’s curious where this money went.) Needless to say, the construction of fortified areas was not started until August 1914 ...
The most interesting thing is that the guns for fortresses and fortified areas in 1906 – 1914 were immersion! It is here that the reader will be indignant, they say, the author has long and tediously argued that there were no tools for the fortresses, but now he says that they were before ... Everything is correct. In the land fortresses they were not enough, but there were many thousands of guns in the coastal fortresses, on ships and warehouses of the Navy Department. And the guns that were absolutely not needed there.
So, by July 1, 1914 of the year in Kronstadt consisted of absolutely useless for fighting Kaiser dreadnoughts, cruisers, and even destroyers: 11-inch guns arr. 1877 of the year - 41, 11-inch guns arr. 1867 of the year - 54, 9-inch guns arr. 1877 of the year - 8, 9-inch guns arr. 1867 of the year - 18, 6-inch guns in 190 pounds - 38, 3-inch guns arr. 1900 of the year - 82, 11-inch mortars arr. 1877 of the year - 18, 9-inch mortars arr. 1877 of the year - 32.
I note that the German admirals did not even plan a breakthrough into the Gulf of Finland either before 1914 – 1914. And our wise generals began to take out the old guns from Kronstadt only after the start of the war.
In Vladivostok, by December there were 1907 guns: 11-inch arr. 1867 of the year - 10, 10 / 45-inch - 10, 9-inch arr. 1867 of the year - 15, 6 / 45-inch - 40, 6-inch in 190 pounds - 37, 6-inch in 120 pounds - 96, 42-linear obr. 1877 of the year - 46; mortars: 11-inch arr. 1877 of the year - 8, 9-inch arr. 1877 of the year - 20, 9-inch arr. 1867 of the year - 16, 6-inch serfs - 20, 6-inch field - 18. Beyond the state: 8-inch light mortars - 8, 120-mm Vickers guns - 16.
Japan’s attack on Russia after the 1907 of the year, that is, after the conclusion of an alliance with England, was excluded, and there was no particular need for these weapons in Vladivostok. It was possible to leave two dozen 10-inch and 6 / 45-inch guns, and take the rest to the West. By the way, this was done, but only in 1915 – 1916. Everything was cleaned out of Vladivostok, but only after all the western Russian fortresses fell.
Finally, in 1906 – 1914, several Russian coastal fortresses — Libau, Kerch, Batum, Ochakov — were abolished and disarmed. In December alone, by December 1907 there were guns: 11-inch - 19, 10-inch - 10, 9-inch arr. 1867 of the year - 14, 6 / 45-inch - 30, 6-inch in 190 pounds - 24, 6-inch in 120 pounds - 34, 42-linear obr. 1877 of the year - 11; mortars: 11-inch - 20, 9-inch - 30, 8-inch arr. 1867 of the year - 24, 6-inch serfs - 22, 6-inch field - 18. Add to this the arsenals of Kerch, Batum and Ochakov. All the guns taken there were somewhere in the rear warehouses and coastal fortresses, but until 1 August 1914, none of them fell into the western fortresses.
Once again, I note that all these ship and coastal guns are hopelessly outdated to combat fleet, but they could become formidable weapons of fortresses and fortified areas. The same French set up several hundred large-caliber coastal and naval guns, manufactured from 1874 to 1904, in their fortresses and fortified areas (some of them were installed on railway platforms). The result is obvious: by 1917, when the Germans stood on the Riga – Dvinsk – Baranovichi – Pinsk line, they never went deeper into French territory for more than 150 km.
The same famous French fortress Verdun defended the entire war, being less than 50 km from the German border. South of Verdun, up to the Swiss border, to the 1917, the year passed approximately along the Franco-German border. Although, of course, the fate of Verdun was decided not so much by the power of French artillery as the presence of fortified areas to the right and left of it, thanks to which the Germans failed to surround the fortress.
BEFORE THE LAST RUSSIAN SOLDIER
The pre-war plans of the German General Staff did not include an offensive inland. On the contrary, the main blow was inflicted in Belgium and France. And on the Russian front there were parts of the cover.
Any cabinet theorist would be indignant - Germany, having defeated France, would have struck Russia! Sorry, in the 1914 year, the Germans, unlike the 1940 of the year, did not have tanks or motorized divisions. One way or another, the battles for Verdun and other French fortresses would drag on for long weeks, if not months. Needless to say that the Anglo-Saxons under no circumstances would not have allowed the capture of France by the Kaiser. There would have been a total mobilization in England. From the French and English colonies, 20 – 40 “colored” divisions would be sent. The United States would have entered the war not in 1917, but in 1914, etc. In any case, the war on the Western Front would have continued for several years.
But Russia would be in the position of a monkey sitting on a mountain and observing the tigers' fight in the valley with interest. After the exhaustion of both sides on the Western Front, the Russian government could dictate its terms of peace and even become an arbitrator. Naturally, for the fee in the form of the Black Sea straits, the return of the original Armenian territories in Asia Minor, etc. Unfortunately, everything happened exactly the opposite. The French sat out in Verdun and other fortresses and were ready to fight to the last soldier, of course, German and Russian.
Well, a second chance to become a winner in the Great War was missed by Russia ... in the summer of 1920. And again, due to the fault of the Russian generals.
At dawn on 25 on April 1920, Polish troops launched a decisive offensive on the whole front, from Pripyat to the Dnieper. Two weeks later, the Poles took Kiev. General Alexei Brusilov, who was living in Moscow at that time, wrote: “It was incomprehensible to me how the Russian, white generals lead their troops alongside the Poles, as they did not understand that the Poles, having taken possession of our western gubernias, would not give them back without a new war and bloodshed. [...] I thought that while the Bolsheviks were guarding our former borders, while the Red Army did not allow the Poles into the former Russia, I was with them along the way. They will disappear, and Russia will remain. I thought they would understand me there, in the south. But no, they did not understand! .. ”
5 May 1920 The Pravda newspaper published an appeal by Brusilov to the officers of the former tsarist army calling for support of the Red Army in the fight against the Poles: “At this critical historical moment, we, your senior comrades, appeal to your feelings of love and devotion to the Motherland and appeal to urge you to forget all the wrongs, no matter where and against them, and voluntarily go with complete selflessness and hunting to the Red Army, to the front or to the rear, wherever the government of Soviet Workers' and Peasants Russia may appoint you, and serve t We are not for fear, but for conscience, so that with our honest service, not sparing our lives, to defend Russia dear to us at all costs and not to allow her to be plundered, for in the latter case it can be lost forever, and then our descendants will be justly blame and blame for the fact that we, because of the egoistic feelings of the class struggle, did not use our combat knowledge and experience, forgot our native Russian people and ruined our mother Russia. ”
I note that in Moscow nobody pressed Brusilov, and he acted solely by conviction. Well, in distant Paris, Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich had the same feelings for the Poles: “When in the early spring of 1920 I saw the headlines of French newspapers announcing the triumphal march of Pilsudski on the wheat fields of Little Russia, something inside me could not stand, and I forgot about the fact that a year has not passed since the day my brothers were shot. I only thought: “The Poles are about to take Kiev! The eternal enemies of Russia are about to cut off the empire from its western frontiers! ” I did not dare to speak openly, but, listening to the absurd chatter of the refugees and looking into their faces, I wished with all my heart the Red Army's victory. ”
Could Wrangel in May 1920 of the year at least conclude a truce with Soviet Russia? Of course, he could. Recall how, at the end of 1919, the Bolsheviks made peace with Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The Red Army could easily occupy their territory. But Moscow needed a break in the war and a “window to Europe”. As a result, the peace was concluded on the terms of the Baltic nationalists, and after a couple of weeks dozens of trains with goods from Russia went to Riga and Revel.
But instead, Wrangel escaped from the Crimea and started a war on the territory of Soviet Russia. Further well known.
And suppose that in the Crimea there would be a coup. To power would come, for example, Lieutenant-General Yakov Slaschov. By the way, in the spring of 1920, he proposed peace plans with the Bolsheviks. In this case, units of the Red Army would have been removed from the Southern Front and sent to beat the lords.
Immediately after the attack of Pilsudski’s army on Soviet Russia, left-wing deputies of the Reichstag and a number of generals led by the Commander-in-Chief of the Reichswehr, Colonel-General Hans von Sect, demanded a defensive-offensive alliance with Soviet Russia. The purpose of such a union was the elimination of the shameful articles of the Versailles Treaty and the restoration of the common border of Germany and Russia "for as long as possible" (quoted from the statement of Von Sect).
After the capture of Warsaw by the Red Army, the German troops were to occupy Pomerania and Upper Silesia. In addition to the German troops, the army of Prince Avalov (Bermont) was to take part in the attack on the Poles. This army consisted of Russian and Baltic Germans and in the year 1919 led intensive fighting against Latvian nationalists. Despite the insistent demands of General Yudenich to join his troops, who were advancing on Petrograd, Avalov, in principle, refused to fight against the Bolsheviks. At the end of 1919, at the request of the Entente, the Avalov army was withdrawn from the Baltic States and redeployed to Germany. But she was not dismissed, but kept under arms "just in case."
As you know, in the 1920, the Red Army was a bit short of power to take Warsaw. The 80 of thousands of bayonets and sabers of the Southern Front could become this "slightly", especially if Slaschev strengthened them with British tanks and high-speed bombers "De Hevilland."
The "ugly offspring of the Versailles Pact" (Molotov's phrase, said in the 1939 year) would have been ended by 19 years earlier. The boundaries of 1914 of the year would be restored, and Soviet Russia would become the winner in the Great War.
Alas, the coup in the Crimea did not happen, and the white baron, who was obsessed with the maniacal idea to enter Moscow on a white horse, arranged a massacre in Northern Tavria, then fled to the Crimea, and from there to Constantinople. During the massacre in Northern Tavria in May – December, 1920 of the year paid with their lives at least 70 thousand white officers, and Russia lost Western Ukraine and Western Belarus.
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