M utiny amid Repression Indiana-Michigan Series in Russian and East European Studies Alexander Rabinowitch and William G. Rosenberg, general editors Advisory Board Deming Brown A. Benoit Eklof Robert W. Campbell Zvi Gitelman Katerina Clark Michael Holquist Henry Cooper Roman Szporluk Herbert Eagle William Zimmerman M utiny amid Repression Russian Soldiers in the Revolution of 1905-1906 John Bushnell Indiana University Press • Bloomington This book was brought to publication with the assistance of a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to the Russian and East European Institute, Indiana University, and the Center for Russian and East European Studies, University of Michigan. © 1985 by John Bushnell All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses' Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition. Manufactured in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Bushnell, John, 1945- Mutiny amid repression. (Indiana-Michigan series in Russian and East European studies) Bibliography: p. Includes index. 1. Soviet Union. ArmifiH—History—Revolution of 1905. 2. Sociology, Military—Soviet Union—History— 20th century. I. Title. II. Series. UA772.B87 1985 355 1 334 0947 84-48849 ISBN 0-253-33960-X 1 2 3 4 5 89 88 87 86 85 Contents Introduction vii Conventions x I. Officers and Men in the Russian Army 1 The Two Russias and the Army, 2; The Tsarist Army's Peasant Economy, 11; The Moral Economy: Exploitation, Distance, Incomprehension, 15 II. Enemies Domestic: Russia Moves toward Revolution 24 A Brief Socio-Military History of Nineteenth-Century Russia, 24; Revolutionaries and the Army, 34; The Russo- Japanese War and the Rebellion of Polite Society, 38 III. Failing to Contain Revolution: January-October 1905 44 The Social and Psychological Contours of Revolution in Russia, 44; Soldiers under Pressure, 51; The Potemkin and the Revolutionaries: Mutiny Misunderstood, 58; October: Did the Army Fail the Regime? 65 IV. Revolution in the Army 74 Discipline Shattered, 78; Mutiny, 86; Social Revolution, 100; Impact, 105 V. December 1905: Mutineers Save the Regime 109 Punitive Expeditions on the Periphery, 113; Mutineers against Revolution: The Response to Insurrection, 120; Collapse of the Soldiers' Revolution: Perceptions of Authority, 138 VI. Preparations for the Second Round 143 Anticipating Upheaval, 146; Organizing for Military Revolution, 160; Bidding for the Soldiers' Loyalty, 160 VII. "These Words Pleased Us Very Much": Soldiers and Politics 171 Soldiers and the Duma, 173; Mutinies Deliberate and Political, 180; Impact, 191 v Contents VI MIL July 1906: The Revolution That Might Have Been 198 Reining in Revolutionary Sbldiers, 200; The Duma Dissolved, Revolutionaries Divided, 206; Soldiers Rise Alone, 212; Revolutionary Theory versus the Psychology of Revolution, 221 Conclusion: Russian Society Viewed through RussianM utiny 225 , Abbreviations Used in Appendix Notes,a nd Bibliography 231 Appendix I. Mutinies in 1905 233 Appendix II. Mutinies in 1906 248 Notes 259 Bibliography 315 Index 327 Tables III- i. Workers on Strike, as Reported by the Factory Inspectorate, and Peasant Disorders, as Recorded by the Department of Police and Central Newspapers, January-October 1905 46 IV- i. Strikes, Peasant Disorders, and Mutinies, October-December 1905 76 V- i. Biweekly Total of Mutinies, October 18-December 31, 1905, by Region 141 VII-i. Strikes, Peasant Disorders, and Mutinies, 1906 173 Introduction This study began with the discovery of an anomaly: very large numbers of mutinies in the Tsarist armed forces took place in 1905 and 1906. There were, at last count, a minimum of 211 mutinies between October 17 and December 31, 1905, another 202 in 1906. Long before the full extent of the upheaval in the army became apparent, the evidence appeared to indicate that disaffection among soldiers had far surpassed the level that could be accommodated by the universally accepted as­ sumption—my own assumption—that the principal role of the army during the 1903 Revolution was suppression of civil disorder. And the army had, indubitably, suppressed revolution. My first supposition was, therefore, that with perhaps a few exceptions the mutinies could not have been of much consequence. Presentation of a petition of ser­ vice-related grievances—the high point of most of the disorders in the army—may have been mutiny as defined by law but appeared to be a feeble challenge to the military order, and no threat at all to the Tsarist regime. However, collation of mutinies with units garrisoned in Euro­ pean Russia in late 1905 disclosed that one-third of the infantry regi­ ments with which the regime presumably crushed revolution had mutinied. Even had the mutinies been of little account individually, their number made them significant. A closer look at the mutinies showed that they were not individually inconsequential, and that they were the tangible issue of a military revolution that went far beyond mutiny and involved many more than mutinous units. The mutinies of 1905 could not be explained away and so presented something of a puzzle. The mutinies of 1906 were positively unsettling, because by 1906 revolution was supposed to have been over. This book, then, emerged from the questions raised by the soldiers' behavior in 1905 and 1906. The obvious question is how the Tsarist regime managed to survive with its army so thoroughly disaffected. The equally obvious answer— that soldiers could at almost the same time mutiny and suppress revolu­ tion—is very nearly the initial question rephrased, but at least points to the critical importance of understanding the soldiers' psychology. One probes collective mentalities gingerly and ever alert for treacherous mis­ steps. My own endeavor moved progressively from inferences that VII Introduction Vlll could reasonably be drawn from the soldiers' behavior, to an examina­ tion of service in the Imperial Russian'army as soldiers experienced it, to exploration of the characteristics of Tsarist society that shaped the army, its officers and its men. The soldiers' behavior during the 1905 Revolu­ tion turned out to hinge on features of Russian history far removed from the revolution and even from the army. The regime's ability to survive widespread mutiny in 1905 and 1906 suggests that its existence may not in fact have rested on its ability to suppress civilian discontent. The mutinies, though noteworthy, would in that case not have been terribly threatening in themselves. However, investigation of the army's repressive role in 1905 and 1906, and of the policing duties that the army routinely performed even in the absence of revolution, underscored the regime's dependence upon the availability of a large and reliable punitive force. The mutinies did pose a potentially mortal threat to the regime, and the regime's survival in 1905 and 1906 thus turned on the psychology of its soldiers. Russia did not lack for men and women who sought to destroy the regime, and who grasped eagerly at every opportunity to do so. The efforts they made to destabilize and win support in the army—though occupying a minor place in the history of the revolutionary movement— assume importance once it is recognized that there was, even briefly, severe revolutionary discontent in the armed forces. The outcome of the revolution alone tells us that revolutionaries failed to turn the mutinies to their advantage. The soldiers' mentality was one obstacle, but the assumptions revolutionaries made about the soldiers' role in revolution reduced their ability to exploit, and affected the course, of the revolution in the army. These assumptions did not emerge from a vacuum in 1905, but were a product of the intellectual and organizational history of the revolutionary movement. Finally, and to return to the initial impetus for the study, the mutinies must be accommodated within the 1905 Revolution itself. The Western understanding that the revolution reached its high point in the general strike that wrung the October Manifesto from the Tsar, and that the regime handily suppressed the December insurrections and so brought revolution to an end, does not readily encompass the mutinies that swept through the army after October 17. The mutinies of 1906 do not fit that scheme at all. Finding a place for the mutinies required modification of the prevailing view of the situation in the Russian empire in late 1905, and a rather more complete redrawing of the accepted picture of 1906. What began as an effort to account for the 400-odd mutinies that occurred in 1905 and 1906 has thus grown into a good deal more than a close analysis of the mutinies themselves. The logic of the inquiry led to a lengthy excursus on the relationship between army and society in Imperial Russia—society molding the army, the army holding society Introduction IX together—detours down some byways of the revolutionary movement, and reconceptualization of the 1905 Revolution. The result, I hope, is a demonstration that the mutinies were not anomalous after all. I have received generous support for this study from many sources. The International Research and Exchanges Board and the Committee on Fulbright-Hays Fellowships sponsored and funded a year of research in the Soviet Union, and Indiana University supported another year of research with an Edwards Fellowship. I am indebted to Boris Sapir of the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam for granting me access to the SR Party archive in his charge. A grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities permitted work at Columbia Univer­ sity's Bakhmeteff Archive and the Bund Archive in New York, and the American Philosophical Society provided funds for research at the Ar­ chives Nationales in Paris. My gratitude to those institutes is not the less for the fact that I owe even more to Progress Publishers, which em­ ployed my wife and me as translators and so provided the opportunity for three years of research in the Soviet Union beyond the year we spent on academic exchange. Only prolonged access to Soviet libraries made it possible to pursue the puzzling mutinies of 1905 and 1906, and to turn what was meant to be no more than an introduction to a dissertation on revolutionary activity in the garrisons in 1917 into the present study. Debts to friends and colleagues are not so easily measured. Alexander Rabinowitch, who directed my dissertation, has offered encouragement and advice and—most important of all—exhibited exceptional forbear­ ance toward a student who scrapped a dissertation topic when the work was well under way. Ben Eklof was present at the inception of this study, and his interest in it then and since has made the labor seem worthwhile; I have drawn heavily—far more than the footnotes indi­ cate—on his study of peasants, and he offered valuable advice on the manuscript. Allan Wildman, too, provided a critical reading of the manuscript and important suggestions. Bill Fuller shared both his thoughts and his manuscript on Civil-Military Conflict in Imperial Russia, 1881-1914, which complements my own work and yielded a wealth of valuable material. Roberta Manning was kind enough to provide a manuscript copy of her fascinating Crisis of the Old Order in Russia prior to publication. The history departments of Carnegie-Mellon and North­ western Universities have provided intellectual stimulation, a truly con­ genial atmosphere, and the example of their own high standards. The gentle prodding of senior colleagues has encouraged me to bring this book, at last, to completion. I cannot, without seeming to belittle it, convey the magnitude of my appreciation and indebtedness to Kristine Bushnell, who has over the years tolerated my preoccupation with mutiny and suffered my work to intrude on her own. Conventions Dates follow the Julian calendar. Transliteration is according to the Library of Congress system for the social sciences, except that the unsightly "yi" ending has been changed to "y" in the text (but not in the notes). Familiar names are given in their familiar spellings. Place names are those in use at the time (thus Helsingfors and not Helsinki, Tiflis and not Tbilisi), except for some Polish cities that were known in both Polish and Russian spellings.