第87期 Nikolai II Alexandrovich R

Nikolai II Alexandrovich Romanov was born on the 18th of May, 1868 and was executed with his entire family (his wife Alexander of Hesse,  four daughters, and one son) on the 17th of July 1918 by Bolsheviks, the order was sent by Vladimir Lenin. 

Nicholas II was in power on the 5th of May, 1896 after his father Alexander III died. Both Nicholas II and his wife insist that the Tsar should be the autocrat-absolute ruler of Russia. They are also very religious. They believe God is on their side.

All was well before World War One, even though there was a huge amount of negative comment about Nicholas II himself, but that was just accumulating the anger for the next breakpoint, Nearly nothing can threaten Tsar's crown as the entire government was corrupted. Then World War One started.

In 1915, just a few months after the July Crisis, the Tsar took overall command of the conduct of the war.  The propaganda issued in 1916 tells us that the Tsar is now fully in charge of all military commands as the Russian flag on the left-hand side symbolizes the ground troops (air forces as well, even though it was not significant), and the blue crossed flag symbolizes the Russian NAVY.

The unqualified commander soon made terrible mistakes including the insufficient supplement of war materials, faulty orders, and corruption. For example, when Germany turned the full weight of its power against Russia and launched a series of offensives against the Russian army. The Russians were beaten and large areas of Russian territory were overrun. 1.5 million Russian soldiers were killed. On the other hand, the war and tsar have taken so much and given so much pressure to the peasants (80% of the population). Their living condition was poor, they are required to work long hours with low wages, and they are starving. As he was fully in charge, he can no longer blame anyone, like what he did before, therefore people riots. They blame Tsar for ruining their life, for not being a good leader of Russia and the revolution began.

Kerensky was the first guy to successfully overrun the tsar ’s government, but shortly after, Vladimir Lenin ’s Bolsheviks took over and executed the entire family of Tsar for eliminating his concerns. The moment Lenin was in power, Russia immediately quit the war in 1917.

As to lots of people who say, the tsar is not a stupid guy, in fact, he is quite a nice person. He devoted lots of time to his family rather than ruling the country properly. His family pictures were all over every corridor in his palace, from that we can see he loves a lot more to his family than his country. However, he is cruel and merciless to his enemy. He could not stand opposition, he would not accept any opinion or people against him, and he has no patience for political issues. 

Overall, his only way to rule is by violence, by forcing the peasants to work and ordering soldiers to follow orders which have no difference to suicide. Therefore when the people start to revolt against his government in communities like the Bolsheviks, the entire nation was ignited and nothing could be standing in the wave of revolution.