A history of Russia

by Riazanovsky

  A history of Russia

  Riazanovsky

  A HISTORY OF

  RUSSIA

  SIXTH EDITION

  NICHOLAS V. RIASANOVSKY

  To My Students

  Copyright 2000 by Oxford University Press, Inc.

  PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

  For a student of Russian history to write a complete history of Russia is, in a sense, to give an account of his entire intellectual and academic life. And his indebtedness to others is, of course, enormous. I know at least where to begin the listing of my debts: my father, Valentin A. Riasanovsky, made a huge contribution to this History of Russia both by his participation in the writing of the book and, still more important, by teaching me Russian history. Next I must mention my teachers of Russian history at Harvard and Oxford, notably the late Professor Michael Karpovich, the late Warden B. H. Sumner, and Professor Sir Isaiah Berlin. A number of colleagues read sections of the manuscript and made very helpful comments. To name only those who read large parts of the work, I thank Professors Gregory Grossman, Richard Herr, and Martin Malia of the University of California at Berkeley, my former teacher Professor Dimitri Obolensky of Oxford University, Professor Richard Pipes of Harvard University, and Professor Charles Jelavich of Indiana University.

  I wish, further, to thank the personnel of the Oxford University Press both for great help of every kind and for letting me have things my own way. I am also indebted to several University of California graduate students who served as my research assistants during the years in which this work was written and prepared for publication; in particular, to Mrs. Patricia Grimsted and Mr. Walter Sablinsky, who were largely responsible for the Bibliography and the Index, respectively. Nor will I forget libraries and librarians, especially those in Berkeley. The publication of this volume can be considered a tribute to my wife and my students: my wife, because of her persistent and devoted aid in every stage of the enterprise; my students, because A History of Russia developed through teaching them and has its main raison d'etre in answering their needs.

  I would also like gratefully to acknowledge specific contributions of material to my History of Russia. The following publishers allowed me to quote at length from the works cited.

  Harvard University Press for Merle Fainsod, How Russia Is Ruled (Cambridge, 1954), pp. 372-73.

  American Committee for Liberation for News Briefs on Soviet Activities, Vol. II, No. 3, June 1959.

  Houghton Mifflin Company for George Z. F. Bereday, William W.

  Brickman, and Gerald H. Read, editors, The Changing Soviet School (Boston, 1960), pp. 8-9.

  Further, I am deeply grateful to the Rand Corporation and to Harvard University Press for their permission to use Table 51 on page 210 of Abram Bergson, The Real National Income of Soviet Russia Since 1928 (Cambridge, 1961). A condensed version of that table constitutes an appendix to my history. Professor Bergson not only gave his personal permission to use this material but advised me kindly on this and certain related matters.

  Several people have been most generous in lending material for the illustrations. I should like to thank Mr. George R. Hann for making available to me prints of his superb collection of icons: Mrs. Henry Shapiro, who lent photographs taken by her and her husband during recent years spent in Russia; Professor Theodore Von Laue, who took the pictures I have used from our trip to Russia in 1958; Miss Malvina Hoffman, who lent the pictures of Pavlova and Diaghilev; and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, which permitted reproduction of a painting in their collection, Winter by Vasily Kandinsky.

  As every writer - and reader - in the Russian field knows, there is no completely satisfactory solution to the problems of transliteration and transcription of proper names. I relied on the Library of Congress system, but with certain modifications: notably, I omitted the soft sign, except in the very few cases where it seemed desirable to render it by using i, and I used y as the ending of family names. A few of these names, such as that of the composer Tchaikovsky, I spelled in the generally accepted Western manner, although this does not agree with the system of transliteration adopted in this book. As to first names, I preferred their English equivalents, although I transliterated the Russian forms of such well-known names as Ivan and used transliterated forms in some other instances as well, as with Vissarion, not Bessarion, Belinsky. The names of the Soviet astronauts are written as spelled in the daily press. I avoided patronymics. In general I tried to utilize English terms and forms where possible. I might have gone too far in that direction; in any case, I feel uneasy about my translation of kholopy as "slaves."

  As with transliteration, there is no satisfactory solution to constructing an effective bibliography to a general history of a country. I finally decided simply to list the principal relevant works of the scholars mentioned by name in the text. This should enable the interested reader who knows the required languages to pursue further the views of the men in question, and it should provide something of an introduction to the literature on Russian history. The main asset of such a bibliography is that it is manageable. Its chief liability lies in the fact that it encompasses only a fraction of the works on

  which this volume is based and of necessity omits important authors and studies.

  I decided to have as appendixes only the genealogical tables of Russian rulers, which are indispensable for an understanding of the succession to the throne in the eighteenth century and at some other times, and Professor Bergson's estimate of the growth of the gross national product in the U.S.S.R.

  Berkeley, California Nicholas V. Riasanovsky

  September 24,1962

  PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

  The second edition of my History of Russia follows in all essentials the first. Still, the passage of time and the continuous development of scholarship resulted in many additions and modifications. In particular, the Soviet period was expanded both to encompass the last six years and to devote a little more attention to certain topics. A dozen additional authors proved important enough to be cited by name in the second edition, and thus enter the bibliography. Numerous other researchers in the field, some of equal importance to me, received no personal citation. In addition to the text and the bibliography, changes were made in the maps and the illustrations. In the appendixes, the table of the U.S.S.R. gross national product was brought up to date and a table of the administrative divisions of the U.S.S.R. was added. Moreover, a new appendix containing a select list of readings in English on Russian history was included in the second edition.

  Again, I have very many people to thank. In the first place, I want to thank my students and students throughout the United States who have used my History and have thus given it its true test. I have tried to utilize their experience and their opinions. I am also deeply grateful to very numerous colleagues who used History of Russia in their courses, or simply read it, and made corrections or comments. While it is not feasible to list all the appropriate names, I must mention at least Professor Gregory Grossman of the University of California at Berkeley, without whom the gross national product table would not have been possible and who, in addition, paid careful attention to the entire section on the Soviet Union, and the Soviet scholar V. B. Vilinbakhov, who has subjected my presentation of the early periods of Russian history to a thorough and searching criticism. Needless to say, as I thank these and other scholars for their help, I must state that they are not responsible for the opinions or the final form of my book. I am further indebted to my research assistants Mrs. Victoria King and Mr. Vladimir Pavloff and, most especially, to my wife.

  Berkeley, California Nicholas V. Riasanovsky

  December 19, 1968

  PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION

  No attempt has been mad
e in this third edition of A History of Russia to alter the character and basic design of previous editions. The passage of time since the completion of the second edition in 1968 has brought us from the occupation of Czechoslovakia to the Twenty-fifth Party Congress in 1976 and the current Tenth Five-Year Plan. Numerous changes have therefore been made in the text as a consequence of recent events and of recent scholarship as well. The bibliography and especially the English reading list have been expanded. The section on the Soviet period has grown slightly in proportion to the whole, although the aim remains to present a single balanced volume.

  Many people deserve my special gratitude. Professor Gregory Grossman of the University of California at Berkeley again brought up to date the gross national product table and, moreover, was of invaluable help in up dating the entire Soviet section. Other Berkeley colleagues generously contributed their knowledge and wisdom in regard to subjects which preoccupied me during the preparation of this third edition. Colleagues else where were equally helpful as they used A History of Russia as a textbook and informed me of their experience or simply commented on the work. I would like to thank particularly many conscientious reviewers, such as Professor Walter Leitsch of Vienna. Mr. Gerald Surh and Mr. Jacob Picheny proved to be excellent research assistants, who aided me in every way and most notably in the preparation of the English reading list and the index. The mistakes and other deficiencies that remain after all that help are, I am afraid, mine, and, taking into account the scope of the book, they may well be considerable. My most fundamental gratitude goes to my constant helper, my wife, and to the students for whom this textbook was written and who have been using it. May the group of students who recently called me across the continent from Brown University to discuss my History of Russia and whose names I do not know accept the thanks I extend to them, as the representatives of students everywhere.

  Berkeley, California Nicholas V. Riasanovsky

  March 12,1976

  PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION

  The death of Leonid Ilich Brezhnev on November 10, 1982, and Iurii Vladimirovich Andropov's prompt succession to the leadership of the Soviet Union have provided a striking terminal point to this fourth edition of my History of Russia. The new material in the book covers the last seven years of the Brezhnev regime. It includes also additions and changes in all previous parts of Russian and Soviet history as well as the updating of the two bibliographies.

  Acknowledging my overall fundamental and grateful indebtedness to the scholarship in the field, I must record special thanks to my colleagues, particularly Berkeley colleagues, who contributed directly to the preparation of this edition. Professor Gregory Grossman again updated the population and gross national product table and, beyond that, offered invaluable help based on his matchless knowledge of the Soviet economy and of the Soviet Union in general. Other colleagues, such as Professor George Breslauer, whose notable book Khrushchev and Brezhnev as Leaders: Building Authority in Soviet Politics came out just as Brezhnev died, were also generous with their time and expert advice. For checking, rechecking, typing, preparing the index, and much else, I was blessed with an excellent research assistant, Mr. Maciej Siekierski, who also contributed his special knowledge of Poland and Lithuania, and an excellent secretary, Ms. Dorothy Shannon. And, once more, I must emphasize my indebtedness to my students and my wife: the students have been using A History of Russia, often both enthusiastically and critically, for some twenty years; my debt to my wife is even more basic as well as of a still longer duration.

  Berkeley, California Nicholas V. Riasanovsky

  September 1983

  PREFACE TO THE FIFTH EDITION

  I ended the first four editions of A History of Russia with a comment on the contemporary Soviet conundrum. I wrote that the Soviet Union was neither a stable nor a happy country, but that the problem of change, either by revolution or by evolution, was, in its case, an extremely difficult one, which I could not clearly foresee. The last sentences were,

  To conclude, the Soviet system is not likely to last, not likely to change fundamentally by evolution, and not likely to be overthrown by a revolution. History, to be sure, has a way of advancing even when that means leaving historians behind.

  Shortly after this assessment appeared in print, an author of a generally kind and even flattering review wrote in exasperation that Professor Riasanovsky, unfortunately, terminated 710 lucid pages with a murky sentence. In response to my critic, I have considered and reconsidered my conclusion throughout the years and with every edition, but always retained it. To be sure, it was not distinguished by perspicacity or precision, but it was the best I could offer. Now, however, I am moving it from the conclusion to the preface. Historians, and all others as well, have been left behind. The first part of my commentary, on the instability and unhappiness in the Soviet Union, needs no elaboration. The second, on the difficulty of change, is something the citizens of the former Soviet Union and even other people in the world are living through day by day.

  To be sure, as many friends have advised me, it would be wiser to wait with a new edition of A History of Russia. I am not waiting for two reasons: I have always been in favor of writing contemporary history, no matter how contemporary, as well as other kinds, and Oxford University Press has provided me with an excellent determined editor with whom I have been working for many years. Let us hope that the next edition will be lucid in its final as well as its earlier pages. (And, incidentally, that it will bring reliably up to date Tables 5 and 6 of the Appendix, an impossibility at present.)

  The next edition may also be richer in historiography. Glasnost has been perhaps the most striking substantive change in the Soviet Union in the past few years. It does represent the breaking out from a totalitarian straight jacket so characteristic of Soviet society and culture. It may be irreversible. But so far, because of the shortage of time and other reasons, it has not transformed Soviet historiography. Having participated in the conference,

  held in Moscow in April 1990, on rewriting Soviet history, having read Soviet publications, and having talked with Soviet historians, I must conclude that the change has been slow. I do not want to minimize the work of such revisionist historians as Evgeny Viktorovich Anisimov, all the more so because to them probably belongs the future, but I have been on the whole impressed and depressed by the difficulty of change. Understandably, if often unfortunately, people who have spent many years or a lifetime at hard work try to retain at least some of their accomplishment rather than sweep it away. Bolder and more important historiographical developments should appear in the coming years.

  In the preparation of this new edition, I made the usual additions and changes throughout the manuscript, and considered or introduced at least fifty-seven emendations in Soviet history prior to 1985. If not always minor - the figure of Soviet casualties in the Second World War was raised from 20 million to 27 million, and that is 7 million more dead - they were brief and precise. The last narrative chapter was, of course, written anew, and the "Concluding Remarks" underwent considerable change.

  As always, I am deeply indebted to many people: my colleagues at the University of California, Berkeley; other colleagues whom I met at the Wilson Center and the Kennan Institute in Washington, D.C., where I spent the 1989-1990 academic year; still other American colleagues elsewhere as well as extremely numerous Soviet scholars and other Soviet visitors. I must emphasize my gratitude to Professor Gregory Grossman, whose help has been, again, invaluable in the treatment of the Soviet economy in the volume and, moreover, whom I consider in general to be our best specialist on the Soviet Union. I am grateful to Nancy Lane and her colleagues at Oxford University Press; to my secretary, Nadine Ghammache; and to my research assistants, Theodore Weeks, John W. Randolph, Jr., and Ilya Vinkovetsky, who had the major responsibility for revising the index. More generally, I am grateful for the continuing response to my History abroad as well as in the United States. Since the publication of the fourth American edition
, there appeared another and different Italian edition, a French edition, and even a pirated Korean edition in South Korea of the imperial part of my volume (I was told that the earlier part is being prepared for publication). But as usual, in these fluid times, too, my main indebtedness is to my students and my wife.

  Berkeley, California Nicholas V. Riasanovsky

  April 1992

  PREFACE TO THE SIXTH EDITION

  The seven years that passed since the last edition of my A History of Russia proved to be less definitive for that country than many specialists, as well as the general public, had expected. Russia is still in transition and under great stress and strain. Its economy continues to decline. Indeed, the financial collapse of August 1998 delivered a major blow even to those groups in society which had formerly prospered because of the transformation. Still, grim as numerous forecasts of the Russian future are, they do not include a return to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. For well or ill the country has entered a new historical period, that of Russian Federation. The great importance attached to the forthcoming elections is one clear indication that the scenario has changed.

  As with earlier editions, and probably more so, I tried to keep up with the latest developments, especially for the new chapter on "Yeltsin's Russia," and also to profit by the opening of the Russian archives, particularly for the Soviet period. Fortunately some of the best work based on these archives has been done by our Berkeley Ph.Ds and Ph.D. candidates. I used opportunities to go to Russia, attend scholarly conferences, and engage in discussion with many Russian scholars (as well as with many more when they came to Berkeley or to international or our national conferences), and I lectured in Moscow (in the Kremlin, no less). I want to thank here warmly my Russian hosts and interlocutors. I am also deeply grateful to American colleagues and helpers. Professor Gregory Grossman, as before, was invaluable in the area of economics, but also for his unsurpassed knowledge of the Soviet Union in general. Other colleagues who usefully read and criticized parts of the manuscript included Professors Robert Middle-kauff, Alexander Vucinich, and Reginald Zelnik. Dr. John Dunlop of the Hoover Institution provided some very valuable newly-available source material. My research assistant, Ilya Vinkovetsky, demonstrated again his marvelous acquaintance with the Soviet and contemporary Russian scene, and he also worked on the index. Ms. Nadine Ghammache supplied once more fine and eager secretarial help. Further, I want to acknowledge the prompt and effective work of what is for me a new Oxford University Press "team" of Ms. Gioia Stevens, Ms. Stacie Caminos, and Mr. Benjamin Clark. Our daughter Maria helped me with the photographs and in certain other matters. Finally, I am most in debt, for reasons too long to list here, to my wife Arlene.