The reformists and revolutionaries had never ruled anything, and that indeed would engender the only possible outcome, disintegration of all cohesion and orderly rule into anarchy that could only be remedied by imposition of another absolutism. That eventually emerged, as quoted above, in the form of “a fearsome set of internationalists and logicians buil[ding] a sub-human structure upon the ruins of Christian civilization”.
Tag Archives: Russian Revolution
The Uses of History, 23 – Russia the Long-Suffering, 5 – 1914-1917
…. all the shortcomings and failures to reform the administration and the infrastructure of the Empire, along with the rampant nepotism and self-absorption of the aristocracy in its management of affairs at the highest level, came home to roost. Massive territorial losses, dreadful casualties, abominable failures of supply that left the armies woefully short of everything essential, accumulated to sap morale in the army and navy, and leave the civilian population in desperate straits. Even then, the Tsar was virtually deaf to appeals to take drastic action and enable capable men to take charge of every aspect of the national war effort.
The Uses of History, 22 – Russia the Long-Suffering, 4 – 1905-1914
In mid-summer 1914, the Great Tempest slammed into the ship, seemingly very suddenly. This typhoon of typhoons was unlooked for in a year which, internationally, seemed to at last promise a respite from the litany of major European crises which had beset the continent almost continually since 1907.
What would this mean for autocratic Imperial Russia under a weak Tsar and an uncertain administration? Could it weather the storm?
The Uses of History, 9 – From France, 1812 to Russia, 1917, 6
In our modern age in the West, ideology now largely replaces religion. The God-shaped void in the human soul must and will be filled with something. With Christianity now largely treated as irrelevant, ideology readily steps into the vacuum. Often, the ideology just slithers into the emptiness via materialist rewards, peer pressure, educational indoctrination, and popular culture. With the modern doctrine of the separation of Church and State cemented in place, even many professing Christians leave their religion inside the Church door, then lock in a set of ideological constructs, sometimes sprinkled with Holy Water or, in the Fundamentalist formulation, with the “Blood of Jesus”, to salve their consciences.
The Uses of History, 4 – From France to Russia, 1812-1917, 1
These were the seeds that were paid forward into the next hundred plus years (and right to our time) along with the hope awakened among ordinary folks and citizens for better days and more equal distribution of resources and opportunities. The shoots which sprouted would feed forward both openly where they could, and under the surface in states which maintained repressive, anti-democratic governments. These were the streams that would run forward to Karl Marx, Bukharin, and a host of others to engender the Socialist International, the trade unions movement, the powerful thrust by the bourgeoisie (middle class) to win its way to power and open the doors for all to be free and to fairly try their chance.
The Uses of History, 3 – The French Revolution, 1789-99, 2
The links from the United States and France were close and multiple, including inspiration at the beginning and ongoing sympathy as the USA hoped to see a sister republic emerge as a great power in Europe, and thus challenge the British so that Britain would not consider attempting to restore its old empire. The War of 1812-14 between the United States and Britain was a direct offshoot of the long struggle between Britain and France in Europe.
World.V.You 