Russian foreign policy: 1815-1917
DAVID SCHIMMELPENNINCK VAN DER QYE
During the final century of Romanov rule, Russian foreign policy was motivated above all by the need to preserve the empire's hard-won status as a European Great Power.[173] The campaigns and diplomacy of Peter I, Catherine II and the other emperors and empresses of the eighteenth century had raised their realm's prestige to the first rank among the states that mattered in the West. The stunning victories in the French revolutionary wars at the turn of the nineteenth century marked the apogee of tsarist global might. By defeating Napoleon's designs for continental dominion in 1812, Tsar Alexander I won an admiration and respect for Russia unparalleled in any other age. The difficult challenge for his heirs would be to keep Alexander's legacy intact.
Despite a reputation for aggression and adventurism, nineteenth-century tsarist diplomacy was essentially conservative. In the West, Russian territorial appetites were sated. Having recently absorbed most of Poland, one traditional foe, and won Finland from its erstwhile Swedish rival, the empire kept its European borders unchanged until the dynasty's demise in 1917. The imperative here was to protect these frontiers, especially the Polish salient. Surrounded on three sides by the Central European powers of Austria and Prussia, Poland never reconciled itself to Russian rule, and the restive nation seemed particularly vulnerable to foreign military aggression and revolutionary agitation. Maintaining the continental status quo therefore appeared to be the best guarantee for securing Russia's western border. For much of the nineteenth century, the Romanovs would strive to maintain stability in close partnership with Europe's other leading conservative autocracies, the Prussian Hohenzollerns and the Austrian Habsburgs.
The strategic landscape on Russia's south-western frontier was more unsettled. The neighbour there was Ottoman Turkey, an empire very much in decline by the reign of Alexander I. There were still some lands to be won in this region if the occasion presented itself, especially earlier in the century. At the same time, many Russians sympathised with Orthodox Christians under Ottoman rule in the Balkans. Yet in the main, St Petersburg preferred order to opportunity in Turkey as well. A very basic strategic calculus dictated caution: Ottoman instability might well invite involvement by European rivals, thereby possibly jeopardising the Turkish Straits and the Black Sea, whose waters washed south-western Russia. Tsars did go to war against Turkey four times during the nineteenth century, albeit with increasing reluctance. While the senescent Ottomans could never match the comparatively stronger military ofthe Romanovs, two such confrontations ledto severe humiliations for Russia when other powers intervened to support Turkey.
The only real arena for Russian expansion after 1815 was in Asia. To the east of Turkey, the empire bordered on states of varying cohesion. Like the Ottomans, the ruling dynasties of Persia and China were also well past their prime. Despite growing internal stresses, both of these governments managed to avert territorial disintegration. Nevertheless, St Petersburg benefited from occasional weakness in Tehran and Peking to improve its position in Asia to the latter's detriment. Between Persia and China, Russia's frontier was even less stable. The steppes that lay in this region were peopled by antiquated khanates and fragile nomadic confederations, whose medieval cavalry proved no match for European rifle and artillery. As in Africa and the American West during this era of colonial expansion, these Central Asian lands were ripe for absorption by a more developed power.
To respond to these divergent imperatives along its vast borders, nineteenth- century St Petersburg basically divided the world beyond into three parts and acted with each according to a distinct strategy. To its west, Russia aspired to maintain its dignity as a leading power and therefore championed the status quo. With regard to Turkey, motivated by anxiety over the Straits, tsarist officials jockeyed for position among European rivals. And in Central and East Asia, they pursued a policy of cautious opportunism, occasionally expanding the realm where and when possible. St Petersburg understood that these three regions did not exist in isolation. Developments in Central Asia, for example a conquest near the Afghan border, might well have implications in the West, by straining ties with a European power like Great Britain. Nevertheless, until the turn of the twentieth century tsarist foreign policy maintained this diplomatic trinity with remarkable consistency. Despite two major setbacks, both involving Turkey, the Russian Empire was able to achieve its primary international imperatives along all three lines. However, when Nicholas II acceded to the throne in 1894, unsteadier hands began to guide Russian foreign affairs, with fatal consequences for both dynasty and empire.
From Holy Alliance to Crimean isolation
The Vienna Conference of 1814-15 set the European diplomatic order of the nineteenth century. Summoned in the wake of Napoleon's defeat, statesmen of the leading powers and a host of lesser monarchies assembled in the Austrian capital to rebuild the peace. After a quarter of a century of revolution and war, the victorious allies - Britain, Russia, Austria and Prussia - sought enduring stability rather than revenge. They hoped to achieve this by restoring the map to a semblance of what it had been before the storming of the Bastille in 1789, as well as setting up a mechanism for jointly resolving major disputes. On the whole, the outcome was successful. The four allies, soon rejoined by France, maintained a relative balance of power for the following century, and Europe avoided another major continental conflagration until 1914.
One of the most contentious issues at Vienna was the fate of Poland. Partitioned by Catherine II in the late eighteenth century between her empire, Austria and Prussia, the nation had regained a semblance of independence under Napoleon. Alexander now proposed to join most of Poland to his own realm as a semi-autonomous kingdom. Reflecting his earlier liberal inclinations, the tsar offered to grant his new possession a constitution and other privileges. Despite strong opposition from Austria and Britain,[174] Alexander won the conference's consent. He also convinced the other delegates to join his 'Holy Alliance', a vague, idealistic appeal to all Christian princes to live together in harmony. Bereft of any concrete apparatus to enforce it and scorned by cynical diplomats, this utopian initiative had little lasting effect, serving more as a reflection ofthe emperor's withdrawal into otherworldly concerns. During the coming years, the diplomatic initiative on the continent was effectively ceded to Austria's conservative foreign minister, Prince Klemens von Metternich.
The disagreement between Russia and Britain in Vienna over Poland augured deeper differences. Both geopolitics and ideology drove this rivalry, which would remain one ofthe most enduring constants of nineteenth-century tsarist diplomacy. Loyal to its tradition of maintaining a balance of power on the continent, the British Foreign Office inevitably sought to counterpoise the strongest European state. To London, the Russian Empire seemed particularly menacing, since its enormous Eurasian landmass seemed to have the potential to affect British interests both at home and in its colonies overseas. This strategic competition was exacerbated by a strong distaste among many in the British public for the repressive ways of the Romanov autocracy. Meanwhile, the anti-Napoleonic alliance inevitably weakened in the absence of a common foe. Already within seven years of the negotiations at Vienna, the conference system foundered over Britain's reluctance to intervene against revolutions in Europe. This difference of opinion only drove St Petersburg closer to the Habsburgs and the Hohenzollerns, whose conservative politics were more reassuring.
173
The five Great Powers of the nineteenth century were Austria, France, Great Britain, Prussia (after 1871, Germany) and Russia. As one standard textbook explains, 'a Power has such rank when acknowledged by others to have it. The fact ofa Power belonging in that category makes it what has been called a Power with general interests, meaning by this one which has automatically a voice in all affairs' (R. Albrecht-Carrie,
174
In contrast to Prussia, which also took advantage from the Congress of Vienna to make major territorial gains.