Assess the importance of the events that occurred between 1894 and 1905 to the decline of the Romanov Dynasty

Nicholas’ personal qualities and attributes can account for the decline of the Romanov Dynasty. Whilst we cannot blame him for this, one of Nicholas’ great faults was that he simply did not possess the qualities required to govern Russia. He was completely oblivious to the state of affairs in Russia at the time and his ignorance of the conditions faced by the peasants was almost astonishing. Once again, Nicholas’ personal characteristics play quite an important role in the decline of the dynasty as he had the power to basically do what we wished – whether that was issuing orders or introducing new laws, taxes etc.. Had Nicholas the vision, or perhaps intelligence, to foresee that the role of a 20th Century Tsar would need some alterations, the whole scenario could have been reversed and the dynasty would have never even begun to decline. The people would have still loved him and his position would not be at risk. What Nicholas did not realize was that in order for the dynasty to survive and flourish, it was him who needed to change and become more compatible – not the system. Nicholas character further thwarts his chance to stop the decline by trying to maintain a ‘benevolent dictator’ status. He tries to display compassion and give off an appearance of consideration and at the same time wishes to run an autocratic government. This led to confusion amongst the people with them not knowing exactly where they stood with the Tsar. Consequently, a feeling of uncertainty and insecurity was generated in Russia – another quandary in the Romanov’s decline.  

The Russo-Japanese War can be seen as an event of great consequence in the context of the Romanov’s decline. To Nicholas, the East offered status, money, territory and perhaps most importantly, the chance to enhance Russia’s reputation. Nicholas felt that a campaign in the East would be an ideal opportunity to assert Russian dominance in Asia. What’s more, it allowed Nicholas to distract the people about the socio-economic problems Russia was currently facing. Going back to Nicholas’ personal attributes, at no time had his pompous nature ever considered the possibly of being defeated by Japan – a ‘nobody’ on the world scale. A huge drought made the recruitment of troops a fairly effortless job with thousands of men keen to participate in what should have been an ‘easy victory’..

The significance of Russia’s humiliating defeat is slightly greater than the above two ‘events’ in relation to the decline of the dynasty. The reason for this lies in the fact that a defeat of such magnitude could not be censored or concealed. In history, censorship had played a key role in protecting the Tsar’s ‘mistakes’ but with the Russo- Japanese War, everybody found out and consequently felt the urge to lay blame. Even though the defeat was down more to unmanageable factors i.e. the sheer size of Russia, Nicholas was forced to bear the brunt of much criticism.

The events of January 22 1905 have gone in history as ‘Bloody Sunday’ – a day where Nicholas II’s soldiers fired upon hundreds of peaceful and religious marchers. This event is undoubtedly the most important of the above four in the decline of the Romanov Dynasty. Up until this day, the people had been growing annoyed with the Tsar but still did not have any real incentives to revolt. The massacre that took place basically destroyed the Tsar’s reputation – even though he had no say in the actual events that unfolded. It was the first time that he was truly seen to be at blame as people began to realize that this man who they idolized, didn’t really even know they existed (let alone were being killed!)  It was highly significant in accelerating the decline of the Romanov Dynasty.