(This had never been done in Russia before. The Emperor had always appointed all ministers himself.)
Goremykin: You mean deliver an ultimatum to the Tsar? That the Council of Ministers resigns and a new government is found that suits the requirements of the Progressive Bloc? Foisting on the Tsar persons uncongenial to him I consider an impossibility. My views are archaic, but it is too late for me to change them.
Samarin was a late arrival. And although a week earlier he had been mainly responsible for the idea of collective resignation, he now exhibited his independence.
I would have difficulty in putting my name to any reference to the wishes of the whole country, since no survey has been made and nobody knows what people are really hoping for. It cannot be assumed that the State Duma expresses the opinion of all Russia, for its uncompromising demands stem from party interests and calculations. If a change of government is our personal demand we have no right to shift the burden of choice onto the Tsar and so aggravate his difficult position. We must present His Majesty with the basis of a program and at the same time report that the Council of Ministers is not united and that we therefore appeal to him to form another government in place of ourselves. It will be our duty to indicate an acceptable person, for generalities about public confidence mean nothing and are merely a propaganda device. If the Emperor rejects our collective appeal, each of us will have to obey the dictates of his sense of duty as a loyal subject of his Tsar and servant of Russia.
The fog had thickened and Goremykin could no longer simply add the missing date to the draft decree dissolving the Duma. Now that the Emperor was no longer nearby he naturally went out to Tsarskoye Selo to seek reassurance and instructions from the Empress. Expressions of approval flowed first from her to her spouse in Mogilev.
By this act you have saved Russia and the throne. You have fulfilled your duty. Here begins the triumph of your reign. (Our Friend has said so!) I have never seen such firmness in you before. You have had to win a battle single-handed against them all. You have conducted yourself with the ministers like a real Tsar, and I am proud of you. Oh, my darling, do you now feel your own strength and wisdom, feel that you are master, and can refuse to let others dominate you? You have shown that you are the autocrat without whom Russia cannot exist. Now order Nikolasha not to dally on the way but to go south quickly. All sorts of bad elements congregate around him and try to use him as a banner.
She goes on to mention new causes of anxiety.
They [the Duma] cannot stomach your firmness—so carry on in the same vein! Now that you have asserted yourself it is easy to continue, show how energetic you can be, use your broom! The Duma has given you more trouble than joy. They ought now to be at work in the places they come from—but here they are, trying to interfere and to talk about things that do not concern them. Nothing but evil can come from them, they talk too much. The wretches try to play a big role, and to interfere in matters they should not venture to touch. Close the Duma quickly, before they get their interpellations in. (They don’t dare mention our Friend.) It should have been closed down two weeks ago.
Things proved little better in the Council of Ministers.
If you give way to them just once they will become even worse. Several ministers ought to be turned out, and Goremykin left in place. He is a dear old man. One can talk to him quite frankly, it’s simply a pleasure, he sees everything so clearly. And he is frank with our Friend. I long to see the ministers united. Goremykin and I are thinking about it. I try to keep up his energy. Oh, how they all need to feel an iron hand and iron will! So far yours has been a reign of gentleness, but now they must bow before your wisdom and your firmness. Forgive me, my angel, for pestering you so much. It’s because others won’t tell you anything that I express my opinion so frankly. I am so touched, dearest, that you want my help. I am always ready to do anything for you, but I have never liked interfering without being asked. May Almighty God help me to be a helper worthy of you. Tell the ministers to ask permission to present themselves to me singly and I will earnestly pray and make every effort to be really useful to you. I will hear what they have to say and pass it on to you. I have donned invisible immortal trousers, and long to show them to those cowards. We must give them all a shaking and show them how to think and act.
So it had taken only a few days for the Emperor’s absence to be felt in the capital. Goremykin’s visits to the Empress became known and were mentioned in the press. And Goremykin transported his old bones to Mogilev to receive the Emperor’s decision on the Duma and report on the latest ministerial mutiny.
This old man, the laughingstock of Russia’s educated society, still had all the courage and steadiness of vision which his ministers and the Duma leaders lacked in the prime of life. He saw with undimmed eyes that the ministers’ hullabaloo was artificial, but that they were losing all self-control. He said as he left for GHQ:
It troubles me to have to upset the Emperor by telling him that the Council of Ministers is losing its nerve. My job is to divert attacks and discontent from the Tsar to myself. Let them blame and revile me—I am an old man and have not long to live. But as long as I am alive I shall fight for the inviolability of the monarchy. Russia’s strength depends entirely on the monarchy. Without it we would be in such a mess that all would be lost. We must finish the war first, not preoccupy ourselves with reforms. When all around you see faith failing and spirits flagging you would a thousand times sooner go off to the trenches and perish there.
In Mogilev he told the Emperor about all the dissension in the government and offered his resignation as a solution. The Emperor’s orders were that the Council of Ministers should stay as it was and the Duma should be sent on vacation immediately. The Emperor refused to call a Council of War with ministerial participation. He did, however, promise to talk to the ministers when the crisis at the front was over.
Goremykin got back from GHQ on 14 September. At the cabinet meeting on 15 September ministers were more edgy than ever before, and Sazonov was almost hysterical. Polivanov, if we can believe the secretary, raved uncontrollably and was fit to be tied. His treatment of Goremykin was quite improper. Krivoshein was sad and hopeless. (He had finally brought himself to act straightforwardly—and events had defeated his efforts.) The discussion jumped around erratically, lost itself, returned to where it had started …
Polivanov: Everybody expects the dissolution of the Duma to have serious consequences, including a general strike.
Goremykin: That’s just scaremongering, nothing will happen.
Sazonov: It’s said that some members of the Duma, together with the Congresses of the Unions of Zemstvos and Towns, mean to declare themselves a Constituent Assembly. Everything is in ferment, it’s getting desperate, and in the middle of this dangerous situation comes the dissolution of the Duma. Where are they taking us, where are they taking Russia? It is clear to every Russian that the consequences will be terrible, that the very existence of the state is at stake. What has prompted His Majesty to give such a harsh order?
Goremykin: The definitively expressed will of the monarch is not a subject for discussion by the Council of Ministers.
But the situation was indeed dismaying. The recently initiated Special Conferences claimed the right to control the whole military supply system through the nongovernmental agencies, and even to send a representative of Zemgor, rather than a government agent, to make purchases with state funds in America.
Shcherbatov: The Unions of Zemstvos and Towns are a colossal mistake on the part of the government. It should not have allowed such organizations without a charter defining their competence. Their structure and membership are not regulated by law, or known to the government. They are really a rallying point for people evading service at the front, opposition elements, and gentlemen with a political past. These Unions have expanded their powers and their activities by usurpation.
Krivoshein: Prince Lvov has become de facto president of a sort of parallel government�
�he is the saviour of the situation, he supplies the army, feeds the hungry, heals the sick, organizes barbershops for soldiers—he’s a sort of ubiquitous department store. But who are his intimates, his collaborators, his agents? That nobody knows. No one checks on his activities, although he is showered with hundreds of millions in state money.
Could these two dubious Unions be thinking of joining forces in a Constituent Assembly? They were, at this very time, loudly and threateningly, in congress in Moscow.
Shcherbatov: Moscow is in turmoil, everybody is exasperated, violently antigovernment, looking for salvation only in radical changes. The cream of the opposition intelligentsia has gathered there and is demanding power.
And since these Congresses represented themselves as legitimate private institutions, the law could not even send government officials as observers. Their sessions should, therefore, have been closed to the public, but there was no way of ensuring this.
Goremykin: In Moscow emergency regulations are in force, so you can send the police to any meeting. If people let their tongues run away with them a meeting can be terminated. If it clearly presents a threat to public order. The duty of a government is to prevent ugly happenings, not to win prizes for scrupulousness.
Shcherbatov: But what would be your instructions for me as Minister of the Interior when I am not fully in control in Moscow because the military give all the orders? Disturbances may occur at any minute, and the authorities in Moscow have hardly any forces at their disposal—one reserve battalion, eight hundred strong, half of them on guard duty, a company of Cossacks, and two militia units on the outskirts. And none of these are reliable—using them against the crowd wouldn’t be easy. In the surrounding countryside there are no troops at all. The city and district police both fall short of requirements. Then again, there are 30,000 hospitalized soldiers in Moscow—an unruly mob, impossible to discipline, brawling in the streets, and fighting with the police to rescue anybody arrested. If there are disturbances this whole horde will side with the rioters.
How defenseless the Russian state was! It was there for them to see—but they could not understand.
Sazonov: And the Congress of the two Unions will take place just as the dissolution of the Duma sets the scene. I expect the worst.
Shcherbatov: It’s said that in the event of dissolution some deputies intend to go to Moscow and organize a second Vyborg. If they hole up in private premises and draft a new appeal to the public what can the government do?
Krivoshein: And just remember who is now running GHQ, who is our Supreme Commander! It’s terrible to think what the inevitable conclusions must be. It’s a disastrous time. And you, Ivan Longinovich, what do you think you should do when members of the executive are convinced of the need for different measures and the whole machinery of government in your hands is opposed to you?
Goremykin: I shall do my duty to the Sovereign Emperor to the end, however much opposition and disapproval I encounter.
Sazonov: Tomorrow the streets will be running with blood! And Russia will plunge into the abyss!
Goremykin: Tomorrow the Duma will be dissolved, and no blood will flow anywhere.
Sazonov: I will have no part in a deed in which I see the beginning of my country’s ruin.
Goremykin closed the session. Sazonov loudly called him insane (in French).
To speed up its victory the Progressive Bloc went over the heads of the virtually nonexistent government and addressed a memorandum directly to the Tsar, calling on him to set up a “government of trust” immediately and to define future policy precisely (and, needless to say, to the advantage of “society”). All this they thought perfectly possible in the existing situation. There was unrest among Moscow workers, and in Petrograd a strike at the Putilov plant brought out the metalworkers in sympathy. (The strikers were copiously subsidized throughout from some secret source.) The workers opposed the dissolution of the Duma and called for the return of the Bolshevik deputies from Siberia.
Meanwhile (although the front had now stabilized) the exodus from regions near the battle zones continued. People fled, with their livestock and all their possessions, “spontaneously” (with Cossack whips at their backs), threatening the inner provinces with impossible congestion. The reorganized GHQ confirmed that even Kiev must prepare for surrender, and a multitude of military authorities took uncoordinated and contradictory steps, spreading panic and confusion through the city. Polivanov sarcastically observed that “the need to abandon Kiev to the mercy of fate has now been confirmed by His Imperial Majesty the Supreme Commander.”
Goremykin was uncertain what to do with the sacred relics in Kiev. The Emperor said that they should not be removed, the Germans would not touch them. But Samarin announced that the Holy Synod had already given its ruling and that removal had begun.
The decree suspending the work of the Duma was published on 16 September, with no sign of the threatened “shock to the whole army.”
The ringleaders of the Bloc were kept informed of the cabinet’s secrets by Polivanov and other ministers, and the executive body of the Bloc met in a private apartment the night before the decree was promulgated. They strove to come up with an answer to this fresh act of imperial impudence.
Efremov: If we reconcile ourselves to dissolution all our words will have been wasted. We must start the fight by making all members of the Bloc withdraw from the Special Conferences.
V. Maklakov (imperturbable and precise as ever): Participation in the Conferences is not a show of confidence in the government but work for Russia. Should the Unions also stop work—and let Russia perish? If the whole country went on strike the regime might give way, but that is not the kind of victory I would want. Our best reaction to dismissal is to say nothing.
Kovalevsky: If we walk out of the Conferences, what complexion will that put on our patriotism? Our allies, and the neutrals, will say they’re sacrificing the defense of their country to get even with old Goremykin.
A. Obolensky: Some Englishman has said that Russians are more interested in the grand gesture than in getting results. At this moment of danger for our motherland it is important for us—don’t you see—to be not just useful but morally correct. If the Germans beat us, and we try to put all the blame on the government, people will call us childish. No, we must not allow the dissolution of the Duma to set off a conflagration.
Milyukov: Our first step must be to topple Goremykin. And that can be done by a policy of restraint.
Restraint! Yet again? Their program had been one of restraint—and had it been appreciated? Had they been invited to join the government? (The Empress’s remark about the City Duma leaked, and was passed around: “Let those wretches stick to their sewers.”)
The gulf between themselves and the regime was impassable.
How then should they respond? By refusing to disperse? By declaring themselves a Constituent Assembly?
The action shifted to Moscow, the center of exasperation with the government. Political circles in Moscow had thought of something: the creation of “coalition committees” to support the Bloc throughout the empire. They also tried to bring forward the Congresses of the Unions of Zemstvos and Towns, summoning extraordinary meetings for 20 September by telegram.
Meanwhile the Empress was keeping GHQ informed, and warned, at length, in daily letters.
The leftists are furious, because everything is slipping out of their hands. Forbid the Congress in Moscow, it will be worse than the Duma. The Duma deputies also want to meet in Moscow—warn them that if they do the recall of the Duma will be delayed. I’m losing patience with those windbags who want to meddle in everything. Firm action is necessary to prevent them from making mischief when they return. The press too must be taken firmly in hand—they are getting ready to launch a campaign against Anya, which means against me. They mean to write things about our Friend and Anya, simply in order to implicate me.
(The War Minister’s deputy in charge of censorship got orders to bar all
articles about Rasputin and Vyrubova.)
I’m sure that Guchkov is at the bottom of all this. We ought to get rid of him. But how? That’s the question. We are at war—couldn’t we find some excuse to lock him up? He aims to create anarchy, and he is hostile to our dynasty—it’s sickening, the game he’s playing, his speeches, his underhand activities … Can we really not have Guchkov hanged? … A serious railroad disaster, in which he was the only casualty, would be fitting, and well-deserved, divine punishment.
The Moscow workers (now feeling themselves in a strong position: they were no longer taken by the army, in fact some of those previously drafted were coming back, since labor was short everywhere) responded to the dissolution with a three-day strike, the most conspicuous effect of which was that the Moscow trams stopped running. As they hunted newly expensive cabs or trudged block after block on foot, Moscow politicos felt the full force of this physical argument. And they began to waver, to realize that any rebellion was a help to the enemy without.
The Kadets now regretted that the Bloc had not made greater concessions in its recent exchanges with the government, and that Milyukov and Efremov had not been more flexible. Nobody seriously believed that Prince Lvov could head a government. It would be quite sufficient for Krivoshein to replace Goremykin: he was capable of steering a course between the purely bureaucratic and the wishes of society. Now that agreement with the regime had become impossible the demands of the opposition were toned down.
How, though, should they conduct the Congresses of the Unions, and what should they say there? This was discussed the night before in Chelnokov’s apartment, and as if to inflame the minds of those assembled, they were presented with a gloomy, indeed a spine-chilling exposé produced by supporters of Russkie Vedomosti, that most enlightened and “professorial” of Russian newspapers.
The story was that, as a counterweight to the Progressive, or as its enemies called it the “Yellow,” Bloc, a Black Bloc had been secretly formed. Its members were Germanophiles, they had already driven all Russian patriots away from the steps of the throne, established an inert government, exiled Nikolai Nikolaevich, and taken the Emperor firmly in hand. Given his irresoluteness, they counted on preventing any decisive engagement and inducing him to betray his allies! (A black scheme if ever there was one! This made all the actions of the regime comprehensible!) The arguments put before the Black Bloc’s royal prisoner were that a separate peace would strengthen the dynasty, whereas an Allied victory would mean the diminution or even extinguishment of the royal power; and that, under a separate peace, Russia would give up turbulent Poland, but would reinforce its Russianness by acquiring the Russian areas of Galica. An iron union of the Emperor of All the Russias and the Emperor of Germany would be a formidable hammer, capable of smashing the whole world. (Why have we been blind for so long to this treason?!) Of course, the Emperor could not take responsibility for such an inglorious about-face. But if a general strike broke out in Russia, if there were disturbances, if the people lost its organic ties with the army and the army lost faith in the people, a separate peace could legitimately be concluded, ostensibly for the salvation of Russia. Moreover, the whole blame could be put on revolutionary circles and the Duma opposition! This was why the regime was trying to sow general discontent and sedition throughout the country! The regime—no one else—was stirring up the depths and instigating rebellion. (These ravings were the origin of the insidious legend that would so fatally affect Russia’s fortunes—the legend that the Russian monarchy was preparing to make a separate peace.)
November 1916 Page 42