Russian Imperial Military Doctrine and Education, 1832-1914

This work examines the evolution of military-scientific research and theory as it was taught to student-officers at the Nicholas Academy. It is the only work (in English or Russian) to focus on this intellectual-institutional dialogue in the context of evolving professional responsibilities of the Russian Imperial General Staff during the 19th and early 20th centuries. The book contains five portraits of influential Russian military theorists and educational administrators. Russian Imperial Doctrine features extensive use of original Russian language bibliographic sources and extensive use of French, British and American archival sources.

Chapter One examines the introduction of post-Napoleonic strategic theory to Russian military traditions via the establishment of a higher military-educational institution to instruct officers of the Russian Imperial Army in the theory of conducting large-scale warfare. Chapter Two illustrates the interaction of the liberal intellectual community at the Academy with the Imperial Russian Geographical Society in the years before the Crimean War (1853-56). Chapter Three begins with a discussion of the confusion in the Russian military liberal-intellectual community over the wild fluctuations in Imperial policy toward reform in the mid to late 1850's. This is followed by a discussion of the era of institution-wide reform in the Russian Army and the Nicholas Academy under the tutelage of the newly appointed War Minister, D.A. Miliutin. Chapter Four discusses the dismissal of War Minister Miliutin in 1881 and the extent to which political conservatism dismantled the reformed military institutions and effected the curriculum of the Nicholas Academy. Chapter Five discusses the reform of military institutions and theory in the wake of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904-05. This book serves equally well as a text for courses in Russian History, European Military Policy and Strategy, the History of Operational Art, and Military Command and Leadership.

CARL VAN DYKE is a researcher at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.