7 – Tsar Nicholas II
If we could not discuss King Louis XVI of France without referring back to King Charles I of England, then we certainly can’t talk about Nicholas II of Russia without considering his royal predecessors as well. Louis might have learned a lot from the problems that befell Charles and Nicholas certainly could have looked back at the sticky ends that befell his forebears, particularly in the perils of doing nothing, being lead astray and lacking gumption when sitting at the top of an autocratic system.
Nicholas was one of Europe’s last remaining autocratic monarchs when he took power in Russia in 1894. He was born to rule, the eldest son of his father, Alexander III, and became the heir after the death of his grandfather, Alexander II, who was assassinated in 1881. Despite being next in line, Nicholas’ father did little to prepare him for his future as the ruler of over 100 million people. Alexander III had assumed the throne at the age of 36 and was supposed to live for a long time, with Nicholas likely to have a prolonged apprenticeship before taking over. Of course, it didn’t pan out like that. When Alexander died in 1894, his son was just 26 and totally unprepared for the task at hand.
He inherited an Empire that was massively backward compared to other European nations. The vast majority of the population were peasants and the country had a tiny industrial sector. Furthermore, while other states functioned as constitutional monarchies or democracies, Russia was ruled centrally by the Tsar in St Petersburg. Many in the country were pushing for reform, but Nicholas was adamant that his autocracy would continue.
His misrule would be total. In 1905, he botched a war with Japan, sending the entire Russian fleet halfway around the world only to see it destroyed. Nicholas was hugely embarrassed by the defeat. He had tried to use the war to boost his popularity and to raise patriotic fervor, instead he drained the treasury and made himself look like a fool. It would get worse too, as starving workers marched on St Petersburg to deliver a petition to the Tsar asking for reforms, only for Nicholas to refuse to meet them. His troops fired on the crowd and nearly a hundred were killed. This sparked a wave of strikes and the Tsar was forced to bring in liberal reforms.
Over the next decade, however, he would act to undermine them at every turn. He closed the Duma, the Russian Parliament, on three occasions and became increasingly distant. By the time the First World War broke out, Nicholas was back in near-autocratic power. The war went dreadfully for the Russians and in 1915, Nicholas decided that he needed to take control of the army to put it right. Instead of turning the tide, he essentially made himself the prime target for blame as the conflict slipped away from Russia. His wife, the German-born Alexandra, was left in charge in St Petersburg: Russia was now fighting a war against Germany while being ostensibly ruled by a German, and a German who was in thrall to a maniacal priest, the famed Rasputin, at that.
By the start of 1917, the vast majority of people simply wanted the war to stop, the soldiers to come home and the chronic famines that blighted Russia to end. Strikes again broke out and when the troops were sent in to crush them, they joined the strikers. Nicholas was forced to abdicate his throne and attempted to flee to England. He was unable to escape and, as the February Revolution turned into the socialist October Revolution, the entire royal family was arrested.
It was thought that Nicholas would be put on trial, but it was not to be. On the night of July 17, 1918, the Russian royal family were woken from their beds in Yekaterinburg and executed by a Soviet firing squad. Nicholas, who had done almost everything in his power to consolidate his own position while the rest of Russia starved and who had prevaricated about reform at every opportunity, found himself on the wrong side of his own people.
His example was one of the starkest we have seen, but perhaps the most dramatic and violent of our overthrown dictators is the next on the list. As the communist forces rose in the East, Fascism was to come to prominence in the West of Europe. Our next dictator is the man who brought the idea to fruition in Italy, and eventually paid for his actions: Benito Mussolini.