Thread by @kamilkazani

Great article. I could only add that we tend to judge Russian capacities based on Soviet performance. Which may be wrong. In many respects modern Russia may be closer to the pre-1917 Russian empire. That's why it avoids a mass mobilization - too risky

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

Chadayev, a pro Putin and pro war Russian politician, makes exactly this argument when discussing the hesitancy if Kremlin. Russia is too much like the Russian empire. Small wars like in Poland, Caucasus, Turkestan are ok. Because very few troops actually fight there

But. If you do a mass mobilization, you:

1. Forcefully put millions in the movement
2. Give them arms

No matter how advantageous it is military wise, politics wise it can destroy your all socio political structure. As it did in 1917

Russian Revolution would never happen the way it happened, unless the Tsar:

1. Forcibly put the millions of peasants into movement
2. Gave them arms

Sociopolitical peace of the empire relied on peasants staying where they are. Once this changed, empire spiralled into the chaos

I would even say that fiction may give better understanding of the 1917 than nonfiction. Fiction written by contemporaries usually includes what non fiction misses. The picturesque descriptions of millions armed peasants in uniform running home and killing any officer who objects

Also - why would peasants run home specifically, in 1917? That may be literally the most funny thing about the late Russian empire that I am aware of. It all comes to an unbelievably stupid law passed in 1893. The end