Alexander B. Arbekov

Candidate of Historical Sciences, Researcher

Tula State Arms Museum

(Tula, Russia)

DOI: https://doi.org/10.22405/2712-8407-2023-1-6-23

Abstract. The article studies the process of evolution of Russian military-strategic planning in the western direction during the 80-s of the 19th century based on a comparison of the documentation of the Russian General Staff and reports of the strategic war games of 1882 – 1884, held in the Warsaw military district. The basis of the study are records from the Military Scientific and Mobilization Committees of the General Staff of the Russian Imperial Army and the headquarters of the Warsaw Military District. In addition, this study uses documents from the personal fund of D. A. Milyutin, the War Minister; of the Department of Manuscripts of the Russian State Library; reports of the Intelligence Department of War Office of Great Britain from the digitized collections of the National Archives, Kew, military statistical collections published by the Military-Scientific Committee of the General Staff on the basis of Russian military intelligence, materials of the Russian periodical press of the second half of the 80-s of the 19th century, as well as sources of personal origin – memoirs and diaries of contemporaries. According to the results of this study, dynamics of changes in the military plans of the Russian Empire against Germany and Austria-Hungary in the 80-s of the 19th century was traced. The projects being drawn up at the General Staff in St. Petersburg were systematically tested in the Warsaw Military District by strategic war games. Several points of war plans were subjected to testing, which made it possible to consistently make appropriate adjustments to them and determine the vector of development of the defense capability of the Russian Empire on the western direction.
Keywords: Eastern Question, Russian Empire, Austria-Hungary, Germany, military intelligence, military-strategic planning, General Staff, war games.

Full text of the article (PDF)

For citation: Arbekov, AB 2023, ‘"The State Without Strong Defense is Like a Building Without a Roof ...": Russian Strategic Planning on the Western Frontiers in the 80-s of the 19th Century’, Tula Scientific Bulletin. History. Linguistics, issue 1 (13), pp. 6–23, http://doi.org/10.22405/2712-8407-2023-1-6-23 (in Russ.)

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