THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION: MARCH–NOVEMBER 1917 In the case of every great revolution the accretion of legend is bound to precede the work of historical investigation. And the bigger, more fundamental and more dramatic the revolution, the more difficult it is for the historian to brush aside the legend. Finally and definitely to get rid of it is almost impossible. Some elements of it become indeed so popular, so endeared to the imagination that they are almost ineradicable.
Up to quite recent times legend had taken complete control of the Russian Revolution and it is only lately that critical investigation has begun to substitute for it a solid basis of historical facts. Although it is safe to say that every phase of the Revolution has been distorted by passion and prejudice it was the beginning of the great event which suffered most from the mythopoeic principle. Two diametrically contradictory ver sions of what happened were current. According to one the Revolution was introduced by the enemy (Germany) with the obvious aim of bringing down the already undermined imperial regime and in this way of destroying the war-aims of the Triple Entente. According to the other the Revolution was provoked by the Russian Government itself in order that it might be crushed before it could fully muster its forces. It is sufficient to oppose these two versions ; to reject them both as absurdities. To believe in the possibility of importing a revolution even in normal circumstances would be childish enough ; but to credit it in time of war, when even to receive a foreign newspaper is almost impossible, would be the very height of absurdity. And yet in the case of the Russian Revolution people for want of a better explanation were ready to accept the theory that the upheaval which in five days swept away the monarchy and secured the allegiance of the entire nation had been organized and staged in Germany. The rival theory, which attributed the outbreak of the Revolution to deliberate provocation on the part of the Government, is equally preposterous, even if all allowances are made for the sinister influence of the hysterical empress and her circle and for the possible madness of the chief minister Proto popov.
The Russian Government at this time was guilty doubtless of the maddest and most unaccountable actions and this criminal incompetence necessarily contributed impetus to the revolutionary movement. The deplorable handling of the food question or the sudden arrest of the Worker representatives on the All-Russian Munition Committees are notorious cases in point. But such blunders as these can hardly be construed as deliberate provoca tion of Revolution. That the Government had prepared a plan for fighting the Revolution has never been denied. But whatever plan Protopopov had prepared was obviously designed to fight a post-War Revolution; and, madman though he may have been, he scarcely deserves to go down in history as the agent provoca teur of the Russian Revolution.
The stark historical truth is that nobody either organized or provoked the Revolution. Even when the Revolution was in full swing few persons suspected that it had actually begun. All eye witnesses of the events of the few days prior to March II, 1917, when the Petrograd garrison suddenly went over to the side of the people, are unanimous in declaring that its previous movements lacked any semblance of organization or leadership. The strike of the Petrograd workers and the manifestations in the streets were purely elemental in character and merely voiced an aimless ex pression of dissatisfaction. The same testimony to the unex pectedness of the Revolution is borne by the mass of new docu ments which have recently been released from the State and Party archives. That the Revolution was neither organized nor expected by any of the existing parties or political groups is now established beyond question. This is the more surprising as not only was the i possibility of a Revolution breaking out freely admitted, but it was almost taken for granted that it must break out if the War were lost or if radical constitutional reforms were delayed.