Russia & The Struggle for Peace/Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
THE MOBILISATION OF INDUSTRY
THIS period of Russia's military efforts, with all its positive effects upon the immediate supply of the fighting army and its disastrous effects on the general economy of the country, was the outcome of the great crisis which took place after the retreat from Galicia in the summer of 1915. The magnitude of this crisis surpassed even that of the great crisis of 1905, and I am deeply convinced that the Tsardom received its final blow at this time. It is true that the actual Revolution was not achieved till some eighteen months later. None the less, the real beginning of the Revolution can be traced to this terrible military catastrophe and political crisis of 1915. The events of this time are of great importance, and are worth discussing more in detail, but unfortunately the scope of the present volume does not permit me so to discuss them.
From the very beginning of the war the Russian bureaucracy made it perfectly clear that, although the help and support of the entire nation was essential for victory, the direction of the war must remain exclusively in their own hands. It was their intention and their hope that the coming victory should glorify the Monarchy, and establish beyond doubt the wisdom of the Tsar and the efficacy of his Government. Victory was considered a certainty. If the people were allowed a share in the direction of the war, the Tsardom would be robbed of this unique opportunity for increasing its prestige, whereby it was hoped to consolidate its position at least for another fifty or hundred years.
At first the people had no quarrel with the Government as to the war, but were only anxious to do everything they could to help in its prosecution. But, as time went on and the utter incompetence of the Government became more evident, they began to demand a more democratic handling of affairs. With every month of the war they became more and more conscious that a disaster was inevitable. The old corrupt bureaucracy was incapable of managing the war and of co-ordinating and turning to good account the popular energy and enthusiasm. Public opinion demanded—not even the real democracy to which the Russian people aspired—but merely a Government which should take the people into its confidence in the prosecution of the war. But the Tsarist bureaucracy was too rigid and too envious to do this. Then, as things went from bad to worse, the people began to assert themselves. The popular forces came into conflict with the bureaucracy. This period was marked by the rise of the Zemstvos and the consolidation of the Progressive Block in the Duma. And, at a still later stage, when the bankruptcy of Tsardom was complete, the popular forces demanded that the entire direction of the war should be handed over to a representative Government which enjoyed the confidence of the people.
But the Tsar and his Government rightly judged the situation when they saw that the surrender of even a small share in the direction of the war must inevitably lead to the surrender of the whole power of the State. Thus they made the most desperate efforts to exclude the popular forces from the sanctuary of war administration and to keep the entire responsibility in their own hands.
It was not until the terrible disaster in Galicia in 1915 that it became impossible for the Bureaucracy to maintain its attitude any longer. Every soldier knew that this military collapse was due to the utter incompetence of the Government. The Tsar himself now had to invite the help of the hated popular forces. In a manifesto permeated by fear of the popular anger and unrest, he promised an immediate convocation of the Duma and announced his intention of requesting the people's representatives to help the Government in their efforts to save the country.
In its spirit and in the circumstances of its issue this manifesto was on the whole a repetition of the famous October manifesto of 1905. But, whereas the unrest of 1905 was followed by revolutionary changes, the unrest of 1915 did not produce similar results. In effect, the crisis of 1905 took place during a great war; that of 1915 during a greater war, a war with more disastrous possibilities. The people were too much oppressed with the sense of failure and disaster and too much preoccupied by their eagerness to relieve the situation, to think of revolutionary changes. They had too much to do in taking over their new duties and responsibilities in the organisation for victory. The crisis of 1915 did not lead to revolution because the people and the army were not yet ripe for revolution. Only when they were faced with the failure of all their efforts to achieve victory—partly in co-operation with the Tsar's constantly-changing Government, partly in defiance of it—only when they saw that their last endeavours were only leading in the end to greater internal, political, and economic chaos, only then did the Revolution emerge.
The revolutionary crisis of 1915 aimed at a better organisation for victory; the Revolution of 1917 began the struggle for peace. I am convinced that the future historian of the Revolution will adopt my view that the Revolution began with the crisis of 1915, and that the time from 1915 to 1917 was its bellicose period. During this time its hopes and activities were directed towards victory in the war against Germany and Austria. Be this as it may, the fact is that the Galician disaster and the submission of the Tsardom to the popular demands inspired the people with new and great hopes that victory was possible, and led to a revival of that enthusiasm for the war which had been so striking in the early autumn of 1914.
The Galician disaster laid bare the terrible lack of munitions in the Russian Army, which was regarded as the primary cause of the military collapse. This led to the widespread idea that to achieve victory all Russia needed was a great and well-supplied army. The people, therefore, decided to make munitions, and a great movement was started with the watchword, "All for the Army." There had been no precedent for this movement in the earlier months of the war. It commenced its activities with truly virgin enthusiasm. But its foundations and its practical aims were totally unsound, and only served to hasten the rapid exhaustion of the country. In the feverish enthusiasm to supply the troops with ammunition and materials, the need for husbanding the country's resources in machinery, plant, and permanent means of transport was overlooked. Undoubtedly, from the point of view of immediate military advantage, mobilisation of industry was a great and striking success. During the retreat of the Russian Army from the Carpathians the soldiers in many cases had to throw stones at the advancing enemy. At that time the Russian artillery could fire, on an average, only a few rounds with one gun out of a battery of five or six. Sometimes even the infantry had nothing to fight with but sticks. But in a few months after the mobilisation of industry the whole army was well—in some cases exceedingly well—supplied with munitions. But at what price? At the price of the complete and utter exhaustion of Russia. The mobilisation of industry is a most important page in the tragic history of the economic disintegration of Russia.
Certainly, from the point of view of immediate war efficiency, this period was the most brilliant in the conduct of the war. And it was marvellous how soon the popular enthusiasm and the joint efforts of the whole country could achieve such results. But in the actual circumstances of this war the wholesale commandeering of the entire raw materials and of the industrial resources of the country, even down to the smallest shops, for the purpose of turning out munitions, was bound to have a most disastrous effect. It would have been sound policy—either to exploit all the manufacturing resources of the country for the making of munitions and to devote the imports from America and Great Britain primarily to the needs of the civil population—or vice versa. But as it was, by far the greater part of these imports were given over to war supplies, and now in addition the entire home production was mobilised for making munitions. Needless to say, this was a suicidal process, and its disastrous effects were evident only too soon.
The need and the privations of the civilian population grew worse, in proportion as the army was being better supplied with munitions.
The mobilisation of industry was a kind of illness; some sort of fever which took possession of Russian patriotic society. It was a panic movement, striving hastily to repair and to cover over the awful inward disorganisation and inefficiency which were suddenly laid bare by the Galician disaster. The very nervousness of the movement reveals the desperate mood of Russia at that time.
The rapidity with which the mobilisation of industry was achieved was the first great blow to the national economy. With impulsive haste, every little workshop cast aside its ordinary materials and processes for the manufacture of "civilian articles" and turned to the production of war materials. The enormous rate of output was the second blow, being far greater than the Russian factories could stand. "All for the War!" The State encouraged the manufacturers to exploit their plant to the greatest possible extent, and the manufacturers were only too glad of the chance. And then began a period of truly rapacious over-exploitation of plant, machinery, and labour.
Profiteering and patriotism went hand in hand. All for the army, and the more for the army the better—that became the highest aspiration of society. The manufacturers drew their own corollary! Having succeeded in securing enormous contracts at fabulous prices, they did not let any considerations of prudence or economy interfere with them. In fact, such a chance was unique, and never to come to them again. Cheap and obedient labour was easily had; for the workers, under pressure from the public, or themselves infected by this patriotic fever, allowed themselves to be exploited as never before. Raw materials and fuel were supplied by the State or by the War Industrial Committees.
In order to understand the spirit of this period, it should be remembered that the War Industrial Committees, which took over the entire business of supplying the army with materials, were themselves representative of the biggest capitalist interests in the country. Guchkov, the leader of the Octobrist party, which was the political embodiment of capitalism in Russia, was the president of the Central Industrial Committee, whose members were themselves the leading manufacturers and financiers of the country. In every big provincial town there was a local Industrial Committee, again presided over by the local political or industrial chiefs of capitalism, and consisting of the leading manufacturers of the district. These Committees themselves gave the orders which their members had to execute. Revelations published since the Revolution confirmed the many rumours about favouritism and corruption in the distribution and execution of munition orders, even involving highly reputable members of the Industrial Committees.
But whether the motive was patriotism or gain, or both, certain it is that the manufacturers exploited this golden opportunity to the utter exhaustion of industry. The future of industry concerned nobody. All principles of sound economy and care in the use of machinery and plant were thrown over. Why should the manufacturers be concerned about the future? Their profits during this period promised to exceed anything that had ever been dreamt of before, or would ever come again. An intelligent and incorrupt Government would have compelled the manufacturers to enlarge their plant. Less speculative and less rapacious manufacturers would themselves have spared their old plant and made every effort to enlarge it. But the Russian Government was only too glad when the crisis, which might have ended in revolution, brought about such unexpected co-operation with the people. And the manufacturers—whether they saw the coming Revolution or not—had only one thought: of how to increase their output and bleed their resources of machinery to the utmost in that golden time of profit-making.
It was, indeed, a period of rapacious exploitation of plant, machinery, and labour. It was a "bacchanalia of profiteering." And the exhaustion of the country under the mobilisation of industry went further in a few months than a sound economical exploitation of the country's resources, even in war time, could have brought about in as many years. Undoubtedly, the mobilisation of industry enormously increased the supplies of the army, but under it the wants of the civil population became more and more intolerable. In a few months the Russian Army had plenty of munitions, but the nation was exhausted, its transport system paralysed, and its industry almost ruined.
Thus, while all the official and unofficial correspondents were sending joyful messages from Russia—saying how she had safely passed through her grave crisis, and how splendidly the Army was now equipped with guns and munitions—Russia was actually passing into another and much graver crisis which was to lead straight to the Revolution.