The war caused 1.7 million Russians to die, and the poor people died

The Russian Empire embarked on World War 1 and stepped out with heavy losses, setting the stage for the Russian October Revolution to break out, ending the Tsarist rule for hundreds of years.

World War 1 was considered the last catastrophe for the Russian empire, resulting in an inevitable collapse in October 1917.

The last Tsar family of Russia, Nikolai II.

The Russians fought in the struggle against the rise of the German empire, but the terrible great casualties at that time created deep conflicts within Russia.

According to Russian newspaper RBTH, 1.7 million soldiers were killed, 4.9 million were injured just the beginning. Because after withdrawing from World War 1, Russia fell into a spiral of civil war between Tsar Nikolai II supporters and Bolsheviks.

The battle changed history

At the beginning of World War 1 with a fiery atmosphere, the Russians were soon cold-blooded by the Germans in the battle of Tannenberg in 1914.

On August 1, 1914, the German Empire declared war on the Russian Empire. According to Count Alfred von Schliffen's plan, the Germans intended to end the war early by defeating France in 4 to 6 weeks, then moving to the Eastern front to fight Russia.

Tannenberg is a battle to destroy Russia's 2nd Army.

Russians know this should actively open the first attack in the territory adjacent to East Prussia and Russia. Taking place from August 26-30, 1914, the Battle of Tannenberg helped Germany escape Russia's siege on the Eastern Front. The Germans determined that Russia was a potential threat, so the German emperor decided to defend the 8th Army (equivalent to 100,000-150,000 people) in East Prussia.

In the early morning of August 26, Russia attacked Dong Pho with the strength of the First and 2nd Army, which had superiority over the German 8th Army. Due to weak command and lack of synergies, Russian troops were quickly attacked and pushed back by the enemy.

Judging from this failure, historians have stated that General Alexander Samsonov was unable to link and received the necessary support from the First Army Group led by General Paul Rennenkampf. As a result, Samsonov's 2nd Army was alone in fighting with the army commander of General Erich Ludendorff and Paul von Hindenburg.

As a result, two wings of the Russian Second Army were in turn broken. The entire 2nd Army was completely destroyed. Of the 200,000 soldiers of the Second Army, only 10,000 were able to escape.

General Alexander Samsonov committed suicide after the destruction of the 2nd Army.

On the evening of August 30, instead of announcing the failure, General Samsonov walked alone into the forest and committed suicide. Samsonov's body was only found a year later and was returned to Russia.

The Germans only wounded 20,000 people but took 500 cannons. After the decisive battle at Tannenberg, the Russian empire fell into a passive position, then forced to withdraw from Poland and Ukraine, before the large-scale general attack of the German Empire in 1915.

Particularly in the campaign to withdraw from Poland, the Russians lost up to 500,000 people, greatly damaging the soldiers' will to fight.

The Russian Empire collapsed

By 1917, the Russian economy could not stand the weight of war, the miserable people, the unemployment, widespread famine.

Repeated failures caused high dissatisfaction among the Russian people and army. The soldiers were suffering because of war and hated the aristocratic class, no patriotism as when the war broke out.

The order to mobilize 10 million people to join the army makes Russia's agricultural production seriously degraded. From 1916-1917, food production decreased by 20%.

Crop failure, hunger occur everywhere. Industrial production also stagnated, leading to high unemployment. Russia's finances fall into crisis.

From August 1914 to March 1917, Tsar Russia spent the war of 29.6 billion rubles, three times higher than the total revenue of national defense. In order to have money for the war, Tsar Nikolai II constantly applied new taxes and issued debt bonds to the people. The number of loans has increased to 36.6 billion rupees in 1917.

VILenin leader, who successfully led the Russian October Revolution.

By 1917, the Russian revolution broke out. Tsar abdicated in March 1917, Russian troops disintegrated. Lenin as leader of the Bolshevik Party, won the government during the Russian October Revolution.

Faced with a hostile situation in the outside world, Lenin signed the Brest-litovs treaty with the German empire alone, giving Germany to Poland, West Belarus, Ukraine and the Baltic states, compensating 6 billion gold marks to Germany.

The concession of Germany is in Lenin's plan, that the German empire will soon fail in World War 1. The signed peace treaty will therefore become ineffective, Russia does not need to compensate for any more funds. This comment is somewhat accurate when Germany was defeated after only 8 months.

Soviet Russia then moved back to eastern Ukraine and Belarus. In the end, Russia lost 842,000 km2 of territory (equivalent to 15.4%), which is home to 31.5 million people (23.3% of the population before the war).

The collapse of the Russian empire led to the formation of new countries, including Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and for the first time, Finland won its independence in history.

Today, the geopolitical situation in Eastern Europe remains tense, stemming from the defeat of the Russian Empire in World War 1, the Russian newspaper RBTH concluded.