russia's reasons for PARTICIPATING in ww1 and their role in the fighting. |
Russia was drawn into WW1 by the same missteps and follies that plagued her neighboring European countries, imperialist competition, noxious nationalism, military arrogance, and not enough trust in diplomacy and reliance on alliances. While Russia entered the war for many of the same reasons as other European countries, they did not do so on steady footing. Russia’s economy was still in its early stages of development, and they were still heavily reliant on foreign investments. They could not compete with the industrial powerhouse that was the German economy. They were involved in the war mostly because of their “affinity” with Serbia, their countries held many linguistic, religious, and cultural similarities, so they had an almost “unspoken” allied relationship. This pressured Russia to mobilize their military to protect Serbia when Serbia’s conflict with the Austrian government started over the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand by a radical group called the Black Hand, and Austria send Serbia an ultimatum stating if Serbia did not meet their demands, Austria would declare war on them.
Another perspective on Russia’s involvement in WW1 is that Czar Nicholas Romanoff the Second saw entering ww1 as an opportunity to seize and gain land. Since the napoleonic wars almost a hundred years ago, Russia had limited opportunities to expand. Expansion may seem impractical because of the massive amount of land that Russia already had, but most of their land was frozen over, and they had no and still don’t have any warm water ports. Their involvement in ww1 left their economy in tatters and resulted in a starving, freezing population, which led to the February Revolution. Russia was apart of the Entente Powers, or the Allied Forces. They consisted of The British Empire, the French Republic, and the Russian Empire. Italy was also a player on this team for a while, but they switched back and forth between the Allies and the Central powers. They became involved very early on in 1914. Russia was involved in a major battle in August of 1914, during the first month of war. The Battle of Tannenberg caused the complete destruction of the Russian Second army, and the suicide of the Russian commanding general, Alexander Samsonov. The Battle was between German and Russian forces, and left Russia stumbling until 1915. |