Heroic defense of the Port Arthur fortress. Fall of Port Arthur Results of the siege of Port Arthur

The heroic defense of Port Arthur collapsed due to the short-sighted decisions of the generals. This defeat of the Russian troops predetermined the outcome of the Russo-Japanese War.

Beginning of the war

With the attack of Japanese destroyers on the outer roadstead of Port Arthur on the Russian squadron on January 26, 1904, large-scale fighting Russian-Japanese war. The Japanese torpedoed and temporarily disabled the best Russian battleships Tsesarevich and Retvizan, as well as the cruiser Pallada. Measures to protect ships in the outer roadstead turned out to be clearly insufficient. It is worth recognizing that none of the Russian ships received fatal damage, and after an artillery battle on the morning of January 27, the Japanese fleet was forced to retreat. The moral factor played a fatal role - the Japanese fleet managed to seize the initiative. In the following days, our squadron began to suffer ridiculous and unjustified losses due to poor interaction and control. So, just two days after the start of the war, the minelayer "Yenisei" and the cruiser "Boyarin" were killed by their own mines.

Mine war

During the struggle for Port Arthur, both sides actively used minefields: the Russians to protect the approach to the fortress, and the Japanese to strengthen the blockade measures. Moreover, the losses from mines in ships and personnel for both sides turned out to be much greater than in all artillery naval battles at Port Arthur combined. As a result of an explosion on Japanese mines, the battleship Petropavlovsk sank (Vice Admiral Stepan Makarov, his staff and most of the crew were killed on the ship), the gunboat Gremyashchiy and four destroyers. During the fighting, Russian ships laid 1,442 mines on the approaches to the fortress, the victims of which were 12 Japanese ships, including the battleships Hatsuse and Yashima. Thus, the Japanese fleet suffered the heaviest losses in the war of 1904-1905 from Russian mines near Port Arthur.

Who does time work for?

The events at Port Arthur to a large extent determined the general course of military operations of the Russo-Japanese War. The Russian command had a need to carry out a series of offensive actions in order to unblock the fortress. This forced us to go on the offensive. The results of such forced and poorly prepared offensives were failures at Wafangou and Shahe.

For the Japanese, who planned to capture Port Arthur immediately, a long siege also turned out to be a difficult task. It pinned down a third of all Japanese troops on the continent. Attempts to solve the problem with one powerful assault (as on the eve of the battles on Shahe) led to colossal losses with minimal military results. The surrender of the fortress on January 5, 1905 allowed the Japanese command to timely transfer the 3rd Army from Port Arthur to Manchuria shortly before the largest battle of the war near Mukden.

Food

During the struggle for Port Arthur, both the Russian and Japanese armies experienced food shortages. The situation in the fortress was aggravated by General Stoessel’s ban on the local Chinese population from fishing, which could be a serious help in the fight against food shortages. And if the reserves of flour, crackers and sugar at the time of surrender of the fortress remained for another month and a half, then there was practically no meat and vegetables. Scurvy began to rage among the garrison.

Japanese troops experienced no less difficulties. Initially, the Japanese food system was not adapted to combat operations on the continent in conditions of a climate more severe than on the Japanese islands and the frosty winter of 1904-1905. The huge loss in the Japanese army near Port Arthur (up to 112 thousand people, according to domestic historians) was due not only to combat losses, but also to huge sanitary losses.

Death of General Kondratenko

A heavy loss for the defenders of Port Arthur, which accelerated the fall of the fortress, was the death of the chief of land defense, Lieutenant General Roman Kondratenko. The name of this man, who became the soul of the defense of Port Arthur, is associated with a number of measures to strengthen the defense of the fortress. Under the leadership of Kondratenko, the defense of Port Arthur was virtually rebuilt. The concentration of large forces in the direction of the enemy's main attacks more than once allowed Kondratenko to repel the onslaught of superior Japanese forces. Kondratenko paid much attention to the introduction of technical innovations (mortars, barbed wire with electric shock). Being a fearless defender of Port Arthur, at the same time, Kondratenko advocated for an early end to the war with Japan, pointing out the need to sign peace before the Japanese were able to capture Port Arthur. After the death of Kondratenko on December 2, 1904, generals Stessel and Fock began to actively pursue a policy aimed at surrendering the fortress to the Japanese.

High

Vysoka (height 203) was one of the key defense points of Port Arthur. From Vysoka you could see the fortress and the inner roadstead, where most of the ships of the 1st Pacific Squadron were located. Japanese troops made repeated attempts to capture this height. The most fierce battles on Vysokaya took place in mid-November 1904, when the Japanese threw two divisions into battle and concentrated the fire of heavy 280 mm siege howitzers, from the shells of which no protection could be saved. On November 23, the Japanese finally captured Vysoka, gaining the opportunity to adjust siege artillery fire on Russian ships in Port Arthur, which predetermined the death of most of the squadron.

However, heavy losses in the battles for Vysokaya (5 thousand killed and 7 thousand wounded in the November battles alone) forced the Japanese command to abandon further large-scale frontal attacks, focusing on operations against individual Russian fortifications.

Stessel

Not the least negative role in the defense of Port Arthur was played by Lieutenant General Anatoly Stessel. In literature he is often called the commandant of the fortress, although this is not so. Stessel was the head of the Kwantung fortified region; after the abolition of the latter in June 1904, he, contrary to orders, remained in Port Arthur. He did not show himself as a military leader, sending reports with exaggerated data about Russian losses and the number of Japanese troops. Infamously known for a number of very shady financial affairs in the besieged fortress. On January 2, 1905, contrary to the opinion of the military council, he began negotiations with the Japanese on the surrender of Port Arthur. After the war, under pressure from public opinion, he was put on trial and sentenced to 10 years in a fortress, but six months later he was released by decision of the emperor and hastened to go abroad.

The Russian-Chinese Convention of 1898 leased Port Arthur to Russia for 25 years with the right to extend this period. The Russians, finding themselves on the Liaodong Peninsula, began to remake everything in their own way: so a small Chinese village in a few years turned into the main base of the Russian navy on Pacific Ocean. In Port Arthur, by 1904, the Russian-Chinese Bank was operating, the buildings of the engineering department and the headquarters of the military administration were towering, and numerous soldier barracks stretched around. By that time, more than 50 thousand people lived in the city.

Port Arthur before the war. (Pinterest)

In anticipation, not all Russian military leaders saw the danger of the siege of Port Arthur. For example, the commander-in-chief of the Russian troops in Manchuria, Yevgeny Alekseev, in his plan of military operations indicated that “an offensive by the Japanese army to Port Arthur is unthinkable, why can only a garrison with small additions be appointed for its defense.” At the same time, the Daily Mail war correspondent Benjamin Norrigaard, noting the poor training of the troops, wrote: “The Russians, however, were not in the know modern development fortification art and most of their fortifications were of the same type that were used in half of the last century.” Major General Kostenko speaks even more pessimistically about the defense of the fortress: “Arthur not only had neither the right nor the grounds to be considered a “stronghold,” but then he really did not have the character of a fortified camp. In his original form, Arthur was positively hopeless in terms of protection and vulnerable at any point. The remark of one of our most popular generals that “macaques” are starting a war with “someones” was also fully justified in Arthur’s case.”

Be that as it may, on the eve of the summer of 1904, Port Arthur found itself cut off by land from the Manchurian army, after some time sea communications were blocked, and finally, on July 30, 1904, the siege of the fortress by Japanese troops actually began.

2nd platoon of the 3rd foot hunting team of the 16th rifle regiment. (Pinterest)

In early August, the Japanese attacked the forward fortifications of the fortress: as a result of stubborn battles, at the cost of serious losses, the Japanese were able to capture the Dagushan and Xiaogushan redoubts. The first successes gave the Japanese leadership confidence - the troops of General Nogi immediately began to prepare for the assault.

“It was necessary to recruit such commanders to Port Arthur,” Admiral Von Essen complains in his diary. Describing the confusion during the first assault, he says: “The boat “Rattling” was commanded by captain 2nd rank Nikolaev - already very old man, sent to the east to serve his qualifications. This commander fell ill immediately as soon as his boat was presented with the prospect of taking part in hostilities. “Gilyak” was commanded by Stronsky, a young officer, but not possessing either the energy or courage so necessary for a commander.”

Doctors in the Port Arthur fortress. (Pinterest)

An employee of the Port Arthur newspaper “New Region” Larenko in his memoirs describes the Japanese assault on the fortress as follows: “Today, since the very morning, there has been a whole hell on our batteries, the Japanese are bombarding our north-eastern front, concentrating fire on one battery or another, our batteries fire just as hard. The mountains are covered with smoke from exploding Japanese shells and from shots from our guns, and above this black smoke and dust, shrapnel bursts into the air in white hazes, like shreds of cotton wool, showering positions with a rain of bullets. The hum and rumble merge so that it is impossible to make out who is shooting from where and where the shells are exploding.”

“Continuous volleys of guns thundered until darkness, and in the fortress, in the area where the 10th regiment was located, music thundered and repeated explosions of “hurray” were heard - this is the 14th regiment, standing here in reserve, continuing its regimental holiday: there is thunderous explosions , battle and death, and here there are cheerful shouts and not at all warlike sounds of the regimental orchestra,” Colonel Rashevsky recalls this day in his diary.

Burial of the victims in Port Arthur. (Pinterest)

For four days, the Japanese general Nogi unsuccessfully tried to capture the fortress: as a result, according to historians, he lost almost half of his soldiers - about 20 thousand killed. Russian losses amounted to about 3 thousand people. Despite this, the inhabitants of the fortress were indignant. So, for example, engineer Mikhail Lilje writes: “There was melancholy in my soul and at the same time a dull anger at the St. Petersburg careerists, at the Korean timber merchants, at all those who lived so sweetly far from these places, where because of them the people’s people’s faith was now flowing in streams. Russian blood."

The unsuccessful assault forced the Japanese military leaders to switch to a long siege: they waited for reinforcements and built siege structures. Already in the first months of the sea and land blockade, the Russians began to experience problems with food. Journalist Larenko mentions: “While life from hand to mouth has set in everywhere, in the city and in the positions, we learn that General Stessel has another hundred pigs and many other edible animals. He stocked up thoroughly with everything. Evilly ironic remarks are heard addressed to him; among other things, the question is asked - if General Stessel has 100 pigs, then how many pigs are there in total? The answers don't add up."

Defensive line of the fortress. (Pinterest)

With all this, the Japanese also did not have to relax. The English journalist Norrigaard, who lived in a Japanese military camp, says in his materials: “The firefight did not stop day or night, sometimes shrapnel and shells fell into the trenches, so the soldiers could never be calm and had to be constantly on alert for a week which they carried out in these trenches. If they forgot themselves for even a minute and stuck their heads out of the trench, they were subjected to fire and were often killed on the spot, since the Russians assigned their best shooters to this task.”

The Japanese carried out the second assault in early September. “The main attention of the Japanese is drawn to the High Mountain. There, all the time, without ceasing, there is a very strong gun battle, which at times is joined by the roar of guns, sending whole clouds of Lyddite shells. From the outside, it seems completely incomprehensible how one can remain safe and sound in this hell and continue to repel the enemy’s desperate attacks,” Russian army engineer Mikhail Lilye recalled the first day of the assault. Indeed, a fierce and stubborn battle took place over the High Mountain, which the Japanese never managed to take. Particular heroism, according to eyewitnesses of that battle, was shown by Lieutenant Podgursky, who with three hunters knocked out three companies of Japanese who occupied the fortifications with sabers. The next attack was repulsed, as a result of which the Japanese lost four times as many soldiers (about 6,000) as the Russians.

Soldiers after another assault. (Pinterest)

After another failure, the Japanese concentrated on sapper work: they dug trenches to the forts and fortifications of Port Arthur. During the long siege, food supplies were completely depleted: front-line soldiers received horse meat twice a week, the rest of the time they had to be content with bread. In addition, scurvy was rampant in the fortress, which, no worse than bullets and shells, reduced the number of the garrison.

The Japanese army again failed in the third assault at the end of October: the general attack ended in the defeat of the Japanese. “In general, despite the hellish fire, the Japanese did not capture more than one solid fortification: if we also manage to repulse the next assault, then, perhaps, we will sit out altogether,” - this was the entry in his diary by Colonel Rashevsky on the day of the Japanese attack.

Abandoned artillery pieces. (Pinterest)

Indeed, the next assault did not take long to arrive: having received reinforcements, General Noga’s army launched the largest attack on the Port Arthur fortress at the end of November. In ten days, the Japanese were unable to break through the Russian front, but they accomplished an important strategic goal - they occupied Mount Vysokaya, from which the entire Port Arthur harbor was visible. Immediately, Japanese artillerymen opened fire from 11-inch howitzers on the city and the ships of the Port Arthur squadron. Russian battleships and cruisers were irretrievably lost. At the same time, the British journalist Norrigaard wrote not about the successes of the Japanese, but about the heroic feat of the Russian soldiers: “Both sides fought madly, especially the Russians, who attacked that day with unparalleled courage. No one could resist their furious attack. General Nakamura was seriously wounded, Lieutenant Colonel Okuba was killed and over a thousand soldiers were out of action.”

"TO High mountain The company of sailors set off in stretched formation. People walk cheerfully, calmly - towards almost certain death. The sound of an explosion made us look back towards the harbor. There, a huge cloud of yellowish-brown smoke rose above the battleship Poltava. Probably an enemy 11-inch shell hit the ship's powder magazine. P. came and said that the Japanese are already at the very top high mountain. I can't believe it. I wouldn’t like to believe it!” - Larenko, an employee of the newspaper “Novy Krai”, recalls those days.

Mutilated soldiers of the Port Arthur garrison. (Pinterest)

The Port Arthur fortress held out for less than a month from the end of the last assault. Commandant Stessel, contrary to the decision of the Military Council of the fortress, which advocated continuing the defense, surrendered Port Arthur. On January 5, 1905, the garrison, exhausted by the siege, surrendered its weapons and handed over Port Arthur. The officers who promised not to fight any more in this war were sent home.

“The history of the siege of Port Arthur is, from beginning to end, a tragedy of Japanese weapons. Neither in the field of strategy nor in the field of military art was anything outstanding or particularly remarkable shown on the part of the Japanese. Everything was limited to the fact that thousands of people were placed as close as possible to enemy positions and rushed into continuous attacks,” the English correspondent Ellis Bartlett, who was in the camp of the Japanese troops all this time, would later write.

General Nogi, feeling guilty for the death of thousands of soldiers, wanted to commit the ritual of seppuku - ritual suicide by cutting open the abdomen. However, the emperor forbade him to do this. The general and his wife fulfilled their intention after the death of the emperor.

The defeat of the Russian army in the war with Japan in 1904-1905, the shameful peace concluded as a result of it, the first Russian revolution and the anti-patriotic sentiments that reigned in Russian society at that time left the war itself unattended, in particular, one of the most important and heroic episodes - the defense of Port Arthur.

The whole of that distant, now forgotten war still raises many questions, doubts and disputes among researchers, and simply lovers of military history.

It is known from various sources that Port Arthur was never properly prepared for defense; the main reason for this situation is associated with the lack of necessary government funding; in those days, the Russian army was plagued by the same funding problems as now.

According to the plans of the military department, it was planned to completely complete all construction work and other measures to bring the fortress to full combat readiness only by 1909, however, the tsarist Ministry of Finance began to allocate money for construction work only with the beginning of the war; in total they managed to allocate about 4.5 million rubles out of 15 million planned, which was approximately less than one third of what was needed.

As a result, by the beginning of hostilities in the fortress, only a little more than half of all work had been completed, and the greatest attention was paid to the coastal front, that is, they were going to defend themselves from the enemy mainly from the sea, and not from land.

Another miscalculation during the construction of Port Arthur is the fact that its defensive line was too closely adjacent to the city and the harbor, this gave the Japanese the opportunity to subsequently shell most of the fortress, almost from the very first days of the siege, including the sea harbor itself with naval warships.

It turned out that in terms of military engineering, Port Arthur simply did not fit in its engineering parameters to the standards of the then modern fortress like Verdun or Brest-Litovsk, the so-called classical fortresses. Port Arthur was not a fortress, but most likely was a complex of various defensive positions and structures. The Russian military command, fully aware of all the weak points in the defense of Port Arthur, built the entire system of main fortifications based on the terrain, which was quite favorable for defense.

Most of the fortifications were mainly built on dominant heights, opposite which to the north of the fortress there was a relatively flat space, which, as it approached the fortifications, turned into open sloping terrain; this entire area was turned by the defenders into a zone of continuous artillery and rifle fire . The rear slopes of the heights provided good cover for people and guns.

With the outbreak of hostilities, the construction of fortifications accelerated, work was carried out day and night. Trains with troops, artillery, machine guns and ammunition continued to arrive at the fortress until the very last moment. But it was not possible to completely complete all the engineering and construction work in five months, which was expected to take five years.

It is also known from various sources that by July 1904 the Port Arthur fortress was armed with only 646 artillery pieces and 62 machine guns; of this total, 514 guns and 47 machine guns were installed on the land front.

There were about 400 shells for each gun. For transportation of cargo, materiel, combat supplies, food, etc. there were over 4.5 thousand horses in the fortress.

By the beginning of the defensive battles, the garrison of Port Arthur was provided with food, incl. flour and sugar for six months, meat and canned food for only one month. Then they had to be content with horse meat; there were few supplies of greens, which is why during the siege there were many cases of scurvy in the garrison.

The total number of the fortress garrison numbered 41,780 soldiers and 665 officers. In addition, in Port Arthur Bay there were 6 battleships, 6 cruisers, 2 mine cruisers, 4 gunboats, 19 destroyers and the Amur mine transport.

The personnel on the squadron and the Kwantung naval crew numbered up to 8 thousand people; it was a truly well-trained, professional army, consisting of conscript soldiers, average age who were no older than 30 years old, so the soldiers from the Port Arthur garrison, unlike the soldiers of Kuropatkin’s army, which consisted mostly of reservists, fought professionally, with minimal losses of their own, while inflicting maximum damage on the enemy.

The defense of Port Arthur was led by General A. M. Stessel, to whom all ground and engineering troops, as well as fortress artillery. However, what was interesting to note is that the fleet, which was based in the bay of the fortress, was not subordinate to Stoessel, but to the commander-in-chief, who was in Manchuria and could not really control it.

Even in the absence of a sufficient number of long-term, well-fortified structures, Port Arthur met the enemy with organized defense and, as subsequent events showed, became a real grave for the Japanese ground army.

The Japanese sought to capture Port Arthur, first of all, in order to destroy it as the main base of the Russian navy, that is, the land army acted in the interests of the fleet, the events of the war showed that the Japanese fleet fought much better than ground troops. For the siege and capture of Port Arthur, the Japanese formed a special 3rd Army, which consisted of three infantry divisions, two reserve brigades, one field artillery brigade, two naval artillery detachments and a reserve engineer battalion.

On initial stage During the siege, not counting the special troops, the commander, General Nogi, had under his command over 50 thousand bayonets, more than 400 guns, of which 198 were special siege artillery barrels.

Subsequently, the siege group of Japanese troops constantly increased and soon reached about 100 thousand soldiers, and this is not counting the reserves, with which the Japanese kept up to 200 thousand soldiers and officers at Port Arthur.

The fighting for Port Arthur began in the first half of May 1904. on the distant approaches to it, from the so-called Battle of Panshan. This place was called the Jinzhou Isthmus, about 4 km wide (the narrowest point of the Kwantung Peninsula), the position was defended by the reinforced 5th East Siberian Rifle Regiment of the 4th East Siberian rifle division, which totaled about 3 thousand 800 people with 65 guns and 10 machine guns. For 13 hours, the regiment confronted units of the Japanese 2nd Army, about 35 thousand people with 216 guns and 48 machine guns. At first, the Japanese acted according to a template, tried to storm the heights head-on, literally walked over the corpses of their dead soldiers, 8 consecutive attacks were repulsed by the Russians without much difficulty.

In the end, without receiving reinforcements, the regiment was forced to retreat from the tactically advantageous and well-fortified position it occupied. As a result of the first battle, the troops of Lieutenant General Yasukata Oku lost 4.5 thousand of the 30 thousand people who participated in the battle. The losses of Russian troops amounted to about 1 thousand people. This was just the beginning; the main casualties of the siege were still to come for the Japanese.

Further, the assaults on the fortifications of Port Arthur were carried out by the Japanese in strict order, as if according to a schedule, so, for example,
the assault, carried out from August 19 to 24, ended in the complete defeat of the Japanese, one of the reasons for which was the remarkable night shooting of the Russian artillery. The result of the assault - in two weeks of continuous fighting, the Japanese killed more than 15 thousand of their soldiers, some units, or even entire units of General Nogi, simply ceased to exist or were no longer ready for combat, Russian troops also suffered serious losses of approximately 3 thousand people.

In the period from September 15 to 30, General Nogi launched his next dense, massive frontal attack, this time successfully. The Japanese even managed to capture some secondary positions, but the key point of the entire defensive system - Hill 203 - repelled all attacks. The shock columns were swept down again and again until the hillsides were covered with the corpses of Japanese soldiers. In this battle, the Japanese lost 7 thousand 500 people, the Russians - about 1 thousand 500 people.

Particularly successful and effective in repelling all these Japanese assaults were units of Russian machine gunners, line after line they mowed down countless chains of Japanese, sending them in dozens, or even hundreds, to heaven to their Japanese gods, the barrels became red-hot and did not have time to cool down, from the intense operation, the machine guns were out of order, the carriers barely had time to bring cartridges with belts, there was the roar of battle all around, the corpses of the enemy lay in bulk, the Japanese soldiers, like zombies, continued to move forward, and only death awaited them.

In November, the next so-called “fifth general” offensive of the Japanese took place and again it was repulsed by the Russians in all positions and cost the Japanese more than 12 thousand lives.

And only, finally, on November 22 (December 5) the enemy completely occupied height 203 (Vysokaya Mountain). The total losses of the Japanese during the assault on the mountain amounted to about 10 thousand people. Russian troops lost 5 thousand. soldiers and officers, these were the largest one-time losses of Russian troops during the entire defense of Port Arthur.

From the captured mountain, the Japanese began to adjust the fire of heavy siege weapons on the Russian ships. Soon, most of the ships of the 1st Pacific Squadron were sunk in the Port Arthur roadstead. The fate of the fortress was predetermined. The failure of constant assaults, as well as the entire siege of the fortress as a whole, sharply complicated the situation in the Japanese siege army. In many formations the “limit of so-called stability” was exceeded, as a result of which the morale of the Japanese troops dropped sharply.

There were cases of disobedience and even an attempt at rebellion, and this was among the always disciplined Japanese, who had their own philosophy of life and death, unique from all peoples, who, as Japanese experts say, were never afraid to die for their emperor, apparently not everyone was so afraid - they were afraid and how they were afraid. The behavior of the Japanese high command itself, which abandoned tens of thousands of its soldiers directly to slaughter, is also interesting; one can directly say that the Japanese literally overwhelmed the defenders of the fortress with the corpses of their soldiers.

According to various sources, it is known that during the siege of Port Arthur, the Japanese army lost from 90 to 110 thousand of its soldiers killed, wounded, or died from wounds and diseases - these were truly horrific losses. Russian losses amounted to only 15 thousand dead, of which direct combat losses amounted to 7,800 soldiers and officers.

On December 23, 1904 (January 5, 1905) a capitulation was concluded, according to which a garrison of 23 thousand people (counting the sick) surrendered as prisoners of war with all supplies of combat equipment.

In those days, knightly traditions were still in effect and the Japanese allowed Russian officers to return to their homeland. Those who agreed to give their word of honor that they would not participate in hostilities.

Still remains controversial issue, could Port Arthur continue to resist, or were the garrison’s resistance forces really completely exhausted? Who is the head of the garrison, General Stessel - a criminal who surrendered the fortress to the enemy or a hostage of the prevailing circumstances. Some researchers argue that further resistance by the defenders of the fortress was futile; completely blocked from sea and land, without ammunition and sufficient food supplies, Port Arthur was doomed, and Stessel’s actions as a commander were justified; they made it possible to save the surviving defenders of the fortress. There is another opinion that Stoessel committed treason, since he surrendered all his artillery to the Japanese, which was at least 500 units. artillery pieces of various calibers and systems, large reserves of provisions and other material assets, which at the time of surrender continued to remain in the fortress.

Stoessel nevertheless appeared before a military tribunal, which sentenced him to death for the surrender of the fortress and port. The court found that during the entire period of defense, Stessel did not direct the actions of the garrison to defend the fortress, but, on the contrary, deliberately prepared it for surrender. However, the sentence was later replaced by a 10-year imprisonment, but already in May 1909 he was forgiven by the tsar. The society of that time Russia was not at all interested in the details of the lost war; students and female students were then more interested in bombers and revolutionaries of various stripes, and the heroic defense of Port Arthur, located on the other side of the world, the war with some Japanese - all this was perceived by the majority society rather as exotic and nothing more.

During the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, the heroic defense of the Russian naval fortress of Port Arthur, which lasted from February 9, 1904, ended. Despite the fact that the majority of participants in the military council, which took place on December 29, spoke in favor of continuing the defense, the head of this fortified area located on the Kwantung Peninsula, Lieutenant General Anatoly Stessel, decided to surrender Port Arthur. As a result, about 25 thousand people were captured by the Japanese. The losses of Japanese troops amounted to over 110 thousand people and 15 warships. During the battles near Port Arthur she received further development defense using engineering structures and barriers; for the first time, mortars and hand grenades were designed and used, and searchlights were used to repel night assaults.

Port Arthur capitulated

This event is one of greatest events modern. These three words, transmitted yesterday by telegraph to all corners of the civilized world, produce an overwhelming impression, the impression of a huge and terrible disaster, a misfortune that is difficult to express in words. The moral strength of a mighty empire is collapsing, the prestige of a young race, which has not yet had time to develop properly, is dimming. A sentence is pronounced on an entire political system, a long series of claims are cut short, mighty efforts are broken. Of course, the fall of Port Arthur had long been foreseen, they had long since gotten off with words and consoled themselves with ready-made phrases. But a tangible, brute fact shatters all conventional lies. The significance of the collapse cannot now be diminished. For the first time, the old world is humiliated by the irreparable defeat inflicted on it by the new world, so mysterious and, apparently, adolescently young, only yesterday called to civilization.”

This is what one reputable European bourgeois newspaper wrote under the direct impression of the event. And, we must admit, she managed not only to clearly express the mood of the entire European bourgeoisie. Through the mouth of this newspaper speaks the true class instinct of the bourgeoisie of the old world, concerned about the successes of the new bourgeois world, alarmed by the collapse of the Russian military force, which has long been considered the most reliable bastion of European reaction. It is not surprising that even the European bourgeoisie not participating in the war still feels humiliated and depressed. She is so accustomed to identifying the moral strength of Russia with military force European gendarme. For her, the prestige of the young Russian race was inextricably linked with the prestige of the unshakably strong tsarist power, which firmly guarded the modern “order.” It is not surprising that the catastrophe of the ruling and commanding Russia seems “terrible” to the entire European bourgeoisie: this catastrophe means a gigantic acceleration of world capitalist development, an acceleration of history, and the bourgeoisie knows very well, too well, knows from bitter experience that such an acceleration is an acceleration social revolution proletariat. The Western European bourgeoisie felt so calm in an atmosphere of long stagnation, under the wing of a “mighty empire,” and suddenly some “mysterious, adolescently young” force dares to break this stagnation and break these supports.

Yes, the European bourgeoisie has something to be afraid of. The proletariat has something to rejoice about. The catastrophe of our worst enemy does not only mean the approach of Russian freedom. It also foreshadows a new revolutionary upsurge of the European proletariat.

But why and to what extent is the fall of Port Arthur truly a historical catastrophe?

First of all, the significance of this event during the war is striking. the main objective war has been achieved for the Japanese. Progressive, advanced Asia dealt an irreparable blow to backward and reactionary Europe. Ten years ago, this reactionary Europe, with Russia at its head, became alarmed at the defeat of China by young Japan and united to take away from her the best fruits of victory. Europe protected the established relations and privileges of the old world, its preferential right, the centuries-honored primordial right to exploit the Asian peoples. The return of Port Arthur by Japan is a blow dealt to the entire reactionary Europe. Russia owned Port Arthur for six years, spending hundreds and hundreds of millions of rubles on strategic railways, for the creation of ports, for the construction of new cities, for the strengthening of the fortress, which the entire mass of European newspapers bribed by Russia and subservient to Russia glorified as impregnable. Military writers say that Port Arthur was equal in strength to six Sevastopols. And so, small, hitherto despised by everyone, Japan took possession of this stronghold in eight months, after England and France had been busy together for a whole year with the capture of Sevastopol alone. The military blow is irreparable. The question of dominance at sea has been resolved - the main and fundamental issue of the present war. The Russian Pacific Fleet, which at first was no less, if not more, powerful than the Japanese, was completely destroyed. The very base for the operations of the fleet has been taken away, and Rozhdestvensky’s squadron can only shamefully return back, after the useless expenditure of new millions, after the great victory of the formidable battleships over the English fishing boats. It is believed that Russia's material loss in the fleet alone amounts to three hundred million rubles. But even more important is the loss of tens of thousands of the best naval crew, the loss of an entire land army. Many European newspapers are now trying to weaken the significance of these losses, while being ridiculously zealous, agreeing to the point that Kuropatkin is “relieved”, “freed” from worries about Port Arthur! Russian army the whole army was also liberated. The number of prisoners reaches, according to the latest English data, 48,000 people, and how many thousands more died in the battles of Kinchau and the fortress itself. The Japanese finally take possession of all of Liaodong, acquire a stronghold of immeasurable importance for influencing Korea, China and Manchuria, release a seasoned army of 80-100 thousand people and, moreover, with huge heavy artillery, the delivery of which to the Shahe River will give them an overwhelming advantage over the main Russian forces.

The autocratic government, according to news from foreign newspapers, decided to continue the war at all costs and send 200,000 troops to Kuropatkin. It is very possible that the war will continue for a long time, but its hopelessness is already obvious, and all delays will only aggravate the innumerable disasters that the Russian people are suffering for the fact that they still suffer the autocracy on their necks. Until now, the Japanese have reinforced their military forces more quickly and abundantly after each major battle than the Russians. And now, having achieved complete dominance at sea and the complete destruction of one of the Russian armies, they will be able to send twice as many reinforcements as the Russians. The Japanese still beat and beat the Russian generals, despite the fact that the entire mass of their best artillery was occupied in the fortress war. The Japanese have now achieved complete concentration of their forces, and the Russians have to fear not only for Sakhalin, but also for Vladivostok. The Japanese occupied the best and most populated part of Manchuria, where they can maintain an army at the expense of the conquered country and with the help of China. And the Russians have to increasingly limit themselves to supplies brought from Russia, and a further increase in the army will soon become impossible for Kuropatkin due to the impossibility of delivering a sufficient amount of supplies.

But the military collapse suffered by the autocracy takes on even greater significance as a sign of the collapse of our entire political system. Those times when wars were waged by mercenaries or representatives of a caste half divorced from the people have irrevocably sunk into eternity. Wars are now waged by peoples - even Kuropatkin, according to Nemirovich-Danchenko, now began to understand that this truth is not suitable for copybooks alone. Wars are now waged by peoples, and therefore the great quality of war now stands out especially clearly: the exposure in practice, before the eyes of tens of millions of people, of the discrepancy between the people and the government, which hitherto was visible only to a small conscious minority. The criticism of autocracy on the part of all advanced Russian people, on the part of Russian Social Democracy, on the part of the Russian proletariat is now confirmed by criticism of the Japanese, confirmed in such a way that the impossibility of living under autocracy is felt more and more even by those who do not know what autocracy means, even by those who knows this and would like to defend autocracy with all his soul. The incompatibility of autocracy with the interests of all social development, with the interests of the entire people (except for a handful of officials and bigwigs) came to the surface as soon as the people actually had to pay for the autocracy with their blood. With its stupid and criminal colonial adventure, the autocracy has led itself into a dead end from which only the people themselves can free themselves, and only at the cost of destroying tsarism.

The fall of Port Arthur brings one of the greatest historical results to those crimes of tsarism that began to be revealed from the very beginning of the war and which will now be revealed even more widely, even more uncontrollably. After us there might be a flood! - every little and big Alekseev reasoned, without thinking about it, not believing that the flood would really come. The generals and commanders turned out to be mediocrities and nonentities. The entire history of the 1904 campaign was, according to the authoritative testimony of one English military observer (in the Times), “a criminal disregard for the elementary principles of naval and land strategy.” The civil and military bureaucracy turned out to be just as parasitious and corrupt as during the days of serfdom. The officers turned out to be uneducated, undeveloped, unprepared, deprived close connection with soldiers and not enjoying their trust. The darkness, ignorance, illiteracy, and downtroddenness of the peasant masses emerged with terrifying frankness when confronted by progressive people in modern warfare, which just as necessarily requires high-quality human material as modern technology. Without an enterprising, conscientious soldier and sailor, success in modern warfare is impossible. No stamina, no physical strength, no herd and cohesion of mass struggle can give an advantage in the era of rapid-fire small-caliber rifles, machine guns, complex technical devices on ships, in loose formation in land battles. The military power of autocratic Russia turned out to be tawdry. Tsarism turned out to be an obstacle to the modern, up-to-date organization of military affairs - the very cause to which tsarism devoted itself with all its soul, of which it was most proud, to which it made immeasurable sacrifices, not embarrassed by any popular opposition. A sealed coffin - that's what the autocracy turned out to be in the field of external defense, the specialty that was closest and dearest to it, so to speak. Events confirmed the rightness of those foreigners who laughed, seeing how tens and hundreds of millions of rubles were thrown into the purchase and construction of magnificent military ships, and spoke of the futility of these costs in the absence of the ability to handle modern ships, in the absence of people capable of competently using the latest improvements military equipment. The navy, the fortress, the field fortifications, and the land army turned out to be backward and worthless.

Connection between military organization the country and its entire economic and cultural system has never been as close as it is at the present time. The military collapse could not but turn out to be the beginning of a deep political crisis. The war between an advanced country and a backward country played this time, as many times in history, a great revolutionary role. And the conscious proletariat, being a merciless enemy of war, the inevitable and irremovable companion of any class rule in general, cannot turn a blind eye to this revolutionary task being carried out by the Japanese bourgeoisie, which defeated the autocracy. The proletariat is hostile to every bourgeoisie and every manifestation of the bourgeois system, but this hostility does not relieve it of the duty of distinguishing between historically progressive and reactionary representatives of the bourgeoisie. It is therefore quite understandable that the most consistent and decisive representatives of revolutionary international social democracy, Jules Guesde in France and Hyndman in England, bluntly expressed their sympathy for Japan, which was smashing the Russian autocracy. In Russia, of course, we found socialists who showed confusion of thought on this issue as well. “ Revolutionary Russia”4 reprimanded Guede and Hyndman, declaring that a socialist can only be for a workers’, people’s Japan, and not for a bourgeois Japan. This reprimand is as absurd as if one began to condemn a socialist for recognizing the progressiveness of the free-trade bourgeoisie in comparison with the protectionist bourgeoisie5. Guesde and Hyndman did not defend the Japanese bourgeoisie and Japanese imperialism, but on the issue of the clash between two bourgeois countries, they correctly noted the historically progressive role of one of them. The confusion of thought of the “socialist revolutionaries” was, of course, the inevitable result of a misunderstanding of the class point of view and historical materialism by our radical intelligentsia. The new Iskra could not help but show confusion. At first she said a lot of phrases about peace at all costs. She then rushed to “get better” when Jaurès clearly showed whose interests, the progressive or reactionary bourgeoisie, should be served by a quasi-socialist campaign in favor of peace in general. She now ended with vulgar arguments about how inappropriate it is to “speculate” (!!?) on the victory of the Japanese bourgeoisie, and that war is a disaster “regardless of whether” it ends in victory or defeat of the autocracy. No. The cause of Russian freedom and the struggle of the Russian (and world) proletariat for socialism very much depends on the military defeats of the autocracy. This business has benefited greatly from the military collapse that inspires fear in all European guardians of order. The revolutionary proletariat must tirelessly agitate against war, always remembering that wars are inevitable as long as class rule in general continues. Banal phrases about peace à la Jaurès will not help the oppressed class, which is not responsible for the bourgeois war between two bourgeois nations, which does everything to overthrow any bourgeoisie in general, which knows the immensity of people’s misfortunes even during “peaceful” capitalist exploitation. But, fighting against free competition, we cannot forget its progressiveness in comparison with the semi-serf system. Fighting against every war and every bourgeoisie, we must strictly distinguish in our agitation the progressive bourgeoisie from the feudal autocracy, we must always celebrate the great revolutionary role historical war, in which the Russian worker is an involuntary participant.

It was not the Russian people, but the Russian autocracy that started this colonial war, which turned into a war between the old and new bourgeois world. It was not the Russian people, but the autocracy that came to a shameful defeat. The Russian people benefited from the defeat of the autocracy. The capitulation of Port Arthur is a prologue to the capitulation of tsarism. The war is far from over, but every step in its continuation vastly expands ferment and indignation among the Russian people, bringing closer the moment of a new great war, wars of the people against the autocracy, wars of the proletariat for freedom. It is not for nothing that the calmest and most sober European bourgeoisie, which would wholeheartedly sympathize with the liberal concessions of the Russian autocracy, but which fears the Russian revolution as the prologue of the European revolution, is so worried.

“The opinion is firmly rooted,” writes one of these sober organs of the German bourgeoisie, “that an explosion of revolution in Russia is a completely impossible thing. They defend this opinion with all kinds of arguments. They refer to the immobility of the Russian peasantry, their faith in the Tsar, and dependence on the clergy. It is said that the extreme elements among the dissatisfied are represented by only a small handful of people who can organize coups (small outbreaks) and terrorist attempts, but in no way cause a general uprising. The broad mass of dissatisfied people, we are told, lack organization, weapons, and most importantly, the determination to risk themselves. The Russian intellectual, on the other hand, is usually revolutionary only until he is about thirty years old, and then he settles into the cozy nest of a government place, and most of the hotheads transform into ordinary officials.” But now, the newspaper continues, a number of signs indicate a major change. It is no longer only revolutionaries who speak about the revolution in Russia, but such completely alien to “hobbies”, solid pillars of order, as Prince Trubetskoy, whose letter to the Minister of Internal Affairs is now being reprinted by the entire foreign press6. “The fear of revolution in Russia apparently has a basis in fact. True, no one thinks that Russian peasants will take up pitchforks and go fight for the constitution. But are revolutions made in villages? Carriers revolutionary movement V modern history have been for a long time big cities. And in Russia, it is in the cities that there is fermentation from south to north and from east to west. No one will undertake to predict how this will end, but that the number of people who consider revolution in Russia impossible is decreasing every day is an undoubted fact. And if a serious revolutionary explosion follows, it is more than doubtful that the autocracy, weakened by the war in the Far East, will cope with it.”

Yes. Autocracy has been weakened. The most unbelievers begin to believe in the revolution. Universal faith in the revolution is already the beginning of the revolution. The government itself is ensuring its continuation with its military adventure. The Russian proletariat will take care of supporting and expanding the serious revolutionary onslaught.

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The Central Party Archive of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism contains Lenin's manuscripts of the preparatory materials for this article: several versions of the plan entitled “The Surrender (Fall) of Port Arthur” were published in Lenin Collection V, 1929, pp. 57-59; numerous extracts from the foreign and Russian press were published in Lenin collections XVI, 1931, pp. 37-42 and XXVI, 1934, pp. 242-251.

2 This refers to the Belgian bourgeois newspaper “L"Independence Belge”, which in its issue dated January 4, 1904 published the editorial “Port Arthur”, quoted by Lenin (see Lenin collection XVI, 1931, p. 37).

3 “The Times” is a daily newspaper founded in 1785 in London; one of the major conservative newspapers of the English bourgeoisie.

4 “Revolutionary Russia” - an illegal newspaper of the Socialist Revolutionaries; published since the end of 1900 in Russia by the “Union of Socialists-Revolutionaries” (No. 1, marked 1900, actually came out in January 1901). From January 1902 to December 1905 it was published abroad (Geneva) as the official organ of the Socialist Revolutionary Party.

5 Free trade is a direction of economic policy of the bourgeoisie, requiring freedom of trade and non-interference of the state in private economic activity. Free trade arose in the second half of the 18th century in England during the period industrial revolution; reflected the interest of the industrial bourgeoisie in the abolition of high import duties on grain and raw materials, in expanding foreign trade and in using free trade to oust weaker competitors from world markets. The stronghold of free trade in England in the 30s and 40s of the 19th century were the industrialists of Manchester. Therefore, free traders were also called “Manchesterians”.

Free trade received its theoretical justification in the works of A. Smith and D. Ricardo

In Russia, free trade views became widespread mainly among that part of the landowners who were interested in the free sale of grain on the world market.

The class essence of free trade was revealed by K. Marx in “Speech on Free Trade” (1848) and other works. Without denying the progressiveness of the demand for free trade, since it accelerates the development of capitalism and aggravates class contradictions, Marx showed that the bourgeoisie uses the slogan of free trade for the purposes of social demagoguery and deception masses, covering up with it their desire for unlimited exploitation of the proletariat, colonial expansion and economic enslavement of underdeveloped countries.

For a description of free trade, see V. I. Lenin’s work “On the Characteristics of Economic Romanticism. Sismondi and our domestic Sismondists” (Works, 5th ed., volume 2, pp. 248-262).

Protectionism is a system of economic measures aimed at developing capitalist industry or Agriculture of a given country and protecting them from foreign competition. The most important among these measures are high customs duties on foreign goods in order to reduce their imports, quantitative restrictions on imports, currency bans, encouraging the export of domestic goods by lowering export duties, issuing cash subsidies to individual capitalists, etc.

Protectionism arose in the era of primitive accumulation in England and became widespread in the era of industrial capitalism, especially under imperialism. Under the conditions of imperialism, the goal of the policy of protectionism is to ensure that capitalist monopolies sell goods on the domestic market at increased prices and obtain monopoly super profits by robbing the masses.

6 A letter from the Moscow provincial leader of the nobility, Prince P.N. Trubetskoy, to the Minister of Internal Affairs Svyatopolk-Mirsky was written on December 15 (28), 1904 and published in No. 62 of “Liberation” dated December 18 (31), 1904. Characterizing the state of the social movement, Trubetskoy wrote that “what is happening now is n”est pas emeute, mais une revolution (not a rebellion, but a revolution. Ed.); that at the same time the Russian people are being pushed into revolution...