Tsar Nicholas II (1868-1918) and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (Alix) (1872-1918)

[COUNTESS]

They were often responsible for creating an atomosphere for violent attacks. Not that one should justify murder. Alexander II, was actually trying to reduce suffering of his people, but by that time, anger had welled to a great proportion. Nicholas and Alexandra were unrealistic, weak and dreadful monarchs. That still does not justify their murder and certainly that of their children. Those under them suffered far more than they.

[BorisRom]

Originally Posted by COUNTESS

They were often responsible for creating an atomosphere for violent attacks. Not that one should justify murder. Alexander II, was actually trying to reduce suffering of his people, but by that time, anger had welled to a great proportion. Nicholas and Alexandra were unrealistic, weak and dreadful monarchs. That still does not justify their murder and certainly that of their children. Those under them suffered far more than they.

Countess,
Let me to repeat here my post from other theme (August of this year, "Does Russia...")
I think, many at this forum will agree that Nicholas II has been defamed (by "an irreconcilable opposition") else at time of his life and that false myths about him have been hundredfold increased by the Soviet historians and that many of these wrong stamps are alive even till now.
I think the following seven theses are most needing in objective consideration:
__1. Nicholas II was a man of weak will.
__2. Positive achievements of Russia in 1894-1914 have been made by famous clever ministers of his government (by Vitte and Stolypin) - and Nicholas II has prevented from their reforms more likely, than helped them.
__3. Nicholas II aspired to «small victorious war» against Japan.
__4. Nicholas II is guilty of awful events of "Bloody Sunday» on January, 9, 1905.
__5. Nicholas II has made a mistake, having headed Russian army in August, 1915 owing to what Russia has ostensibly lost the war by 1917 and revolution began.
__6. Nicholas II has not undertaken sufficient efforts for prevention and suppression of revolt in Petrograd in February, 1917.
__7. Rasputin has strongly and negatively influenced on an acceptance of political decisions in Imperial family through empress Alexandra.
I think, these seven are the main false myths about Nicholas II. There are still other wrong stamps, but these seven are main, I think.
Certainly, I don’t think that Nicholas II was «the ideal ruler» of Russia. He made mistakes and had some wrong ideas (for example, he was the anti-semite always; and other things), but I am going to expose these seven main false myths here.

You can read detailed discussion of the theme " False miths about Nicholas II " on my topic at the other forum:
http://www.kingandwilson.com/forum/read.php?51,6232,6232#msg-6232

In addition to the theme of "false myths", - I have found out recently, that the President of USA Taft (? – I don’t know English transcription of his name) in 1912 has told about Nicholas II:
"Russian emperor has created such perfect working legislation of what any democratic state till now cannot brag".
Really, the social status of workers in Russia those years was rather good (relatively Europe and USA). Nicholas conducted active social policy for improvement of position of city workers at factories. Whether you know, that till 1905 the police frequently acted on the side of workers in their conflicts against employers (during strikes)? It was Nicholas's internal policy.
Boris

[COUNTESS]

Nicholas II, was a man who governed with little passion and without any clear idea as to what his people fully needed. He was indifferent to poverty, nor did he really understand it. He seemed to be incapble of formulating a coherent politcal stance on his own. Russia at that time was struggling to adapt to the modernity of the western world and still trying to remain Russian. Out of his profound religious and politcal conviction he was very committed to autocracy and not to any great democratic change. His wife was no help, as she was so myopic to their situation, which was bad enough, but prevented him from seeing his country's problems over his personal ones. He wasn't a stupid man. He knew change was coming, yet he tried to hang on to the old ways. Russia is a vast nation with many different regional ethnicities. Perhaps, this placed the country in a vortex of confusion on how they were to proceed. In 1914, Russia was in pretty good shape. The economic revolution had started to bear fruit and some political reforms had started to change the nation for the better. Nicholas II was not a bad man, by any standard. I do think he had little poltical acumen and, obviously, had no good sight on how to proceed during WWI. I agree that by the time he "took over" running the army, all was lost. Secondly, he could not effect change fast enough or did he try, to stem the oncoming revolution. He was not a leader. He was cursed by his position in life. He could have been a good and able employee and a wonderful family man. Had he been a constitutional monarch, where his presence would have been mostly ceremonial, he would have been a big success.

[royalone3]

I recently read a book about Nicholas and Alexandra,very sad how it all went so terribly wrong.

[Russophile]

Yes, it is. And to think they had a lot of power to ensure that it didn't go wrong and they didn't do anything to prevent it. . .

[Furienna]

I guess they just didn't think anything like that could happen. There had been tsars in Russia for centuries, and they were more powerful than many kings and emperors in Western Europe. Even thinking that a tsar family would be not only dethrowned but also assasinated was beyond them until it was too late.

[Russophile]

Which means they surely didn't do their homework on their ancestors! Peter III was assassinated , Paul I was assassinated , Alexander II was assassinated, Alexander III had attempts. . .

[royalone3]

Ignorance was not bliss in their case.

[Russophile]

They weren't quite ignorant. Rasputin's "warning" letter tipped them off. But they seemed to just "give up" after that. Crazy.

[lexi4]

And might I add that he and his misquided wife were blinded by the belief that Nicholas was ordained by God to rule Russia.
Lexi

[Furienna]

They were the Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette of Russia. They weren't excactly evil people, but they kept on living in the luxury and power of past times, while the commoners were getting it worse and worse. They denied or ignored the problems, if they even knew of all the problems. It was hard for royals those days to understand how ordinary people lived. And their executions lead to communist dictatures.

[lexi4]

I find it difficult to compare Alexandra to Marie Antoinette, although I am aware that many do. It would make for an intereseting discussion.

[Russophile]

That would be interesting, as, I'll bet a topic on their female ancestors compare/contrast (Victoria and Empress Maria Theresa).

[lexi4]

Originally Posted by COUNTESS

They were often responsible for creating an atomosphere for violent attacks. Not that one should justify murder. Alexander II, was actually trying to reduce suffering of his people, but by that time, anger had welled to a great proportion. Nicholas and Alexandra were unrealistic, weak and dreadful monarchs. That still does not justify their murder and certainly that of their children. Those under them suffered far more than they.

Countess,
I couldn't agree more with your assessment of Nicholas and Alexandra. I think part of the problem was that they both believed feverantly that Nicholas was predistined by God to rule Russia. This belief was instilled in both of them I think that is one of the reason reform came so hard for Nicholas. That belief totally disabled him from being able to compromise or bring about reform. Recall the failed attempts of others to convince Nicholas to establish the Duma. He could not do it and Alex supported him every time. Personally, I think Alex should not have been so concerned with Russian politics, it was something she could not understand. She didn't grow up in Russia and had no understanding of the vastness of the country or the spirit of the Russian people. She meddled way to much and she was obsessed that the Russian throne remain in tact for her son.
Lexi

[Russophile]

Lexi, didn't Greg King and Penny Wilson in FOTR mention that Alexandra was exposed to weak men (her mother with her father, a minor princeling, grandmother, Victoria and Albert) and just slid into her role as dominating? So that's one of the reasons why she was so meddling?

[lexi4]

I think that is right Russo. And she married a weak man. You know, his parents were opposed to the marriage. I've always wondered who they would have chosen for his bride. Alex wouldn't have even made the 5th runner up list.

[Russophile]

But it was a "love match" and Granny was happy with that.
That would be an interesting topic for discussion: Nicholas II choice of a bride.

[ysbel]

Originally Posted by COUNTESS

He was cursed by his position in life. He could have been a good and able employee and a wonderful family man. Had he been a constitutional monarch, where his presence would have been mostly ceremonial, he would have been a big success.

I agree with that. Robert Massie in his book, Nicholas and Alexandra, points out the similarities between Nicholas II and George V and noted that George V was by all accounts seen as a success while Nicholas II was seen as a failure. I often wondered whether Nicholas got his perception of what a successful monarch does by watching others on his family visits to Denmark and England - two countries that by this time had constitutional monarchies. Nicholas often reminds me of the well-meaning but hapless Louis XV who thought he would save himself and his family by reading up on the follies of Charles I of England so that he wouldn't repeat Charles' mistakes. He didn't repeat Charles' mistakes but since his situation was different, he made quite a few of his own.

In Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, he mentions the plight of Russia in the late eighteen hundreds. Russia for many years was seen as socially, politically, and intellectually backwards compared to Western Europe and despite Peter the Great's attempts to force Russia into the modern world, it was still considered backwards. In the eighteen hundreds, Russia superficially got some modern technologies (like the railroads) that seemed to exacerbate their problems rather than help them.

Conversely, one of the failings of the Russian system is that it couldn't get stuff moved around in a timely manner. There were stories of troops and rations being held up thousands of miles away from the front lines because there was no system of transport. The riots that ended with the abdication of Nicholas II started because bread shipments were so screwed up that the people of Moscow and St. Petersburg began rioting of their own accord.

In Massie's book, he goes into great detail about the inefficiencies of the Russian government at the time. All power was centered in the czar so much that a Moscow resident had to appeal directly to the Czar to get a divorce. Half of Nicholas' time was spent with foolish stuff like this. The push to get a Duma was less a push to give the people a voice in their government but rather a push to get some system of government that could deal with matters quickly and efficiently. Up until the bolsheviks took over, the Russians didn't have a system for anything so everything took an incredibly long time to complete. Everything was dependent on the person of the Czar and even if Nicholas had been the most competent and benevolent ruler on the planet there was no way that he could rule such a large and diverse country to the level of detail that was expected of a Czar.

The system itself was defective because there was no system - autocratic or democratic.

[ysbel]

Originally Posted by lexi4