Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
by Stanislav Smirnov
[REGNUM] On the night of May 14, old style (or May 27, new style), 1905, the ships of the Russian squadron under the command of Vice-Admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky entered the Tsushima Strait, leading from the East China Sea to the Sea of Japan. Cruisers, battleships, destroyers and auxiliary vessels "sneaked" into Vladivostok with their lights out. The darkness and fog helped - it seemed that they had already managed to slip past the patrol ships of the Japanese fleet. But at about half past two in the morning the squadron was discovered. The Battle of Tsushima had begun...
The battle between the Russian Second Pacific Squadron of Rozhdestvensky and the Japanese Combined Fleet under the command of Togo Heihachiro, which took place 120 years ago, is considered a key event of the Russo-Japanese War and one of the most sensitive defeats in the history of the Russian fleet and our armed forces as a whole. It was Tsushima, as the last battle of this war, that is considered the event that predetermined Japan's victory. But is this so?
Before answering this question, let us recall the plot of the Battle of Tsushima.
COLLISION ON A SHORT ROUTE
The Second Pacific Squadron under the command of Rozhestvensky was formed in Kronstadt from combat-ready and under-construction ships of the Baltic Fleet back in April 1904, two months after the start of the war. The goal was to assist the 1st Pacific Squadron, which was in Port Arthur.
After a long sea voyage, during which the situation in the theater of military operations changed significantly, the 2nd squadron approached the Japanese archipelago. Rozhestvensky was tasked with breaking through to Vladivostok to join up with the ships of the Siberian flotilla.
It would have been possible to go around it - across the Pacific Ocean to the Sea of Japan through the La Perouse Strait (between the northernmost Japanese island of Hokkaido and Sakhalin, which at that time still belonged entirely to the Russian Empire).
But the squadron commander chose the shortest, but most dangerous route - through the strait between the Japanese island of Kyushu and Japanese-occupied Korea, past the Tsushima archipelago.
At the same time, the squadron command did not have information about where and in what numbers the enemy ships might be. Admiral Togo, for his part, managed to place several cruisers in the path of our ships in advance, and it was not difficult to pull up the main forces of the combined fleet.
The battle lasted two days and ended with a crushing defeat for the Russian squadron. It lost eight squadron battleships, one armored cruiser, three coastal defense battleships, five cruisers and six destroyers.
The cruiser Almaz and the destroyers Grozny and Bravy managed to break through to Vladivostok. Three more cruisers, a destroyer and two transports went to Manila and Shanghai and were interned there. The detachment of Rear Admiral Nikolai Nebogatov, led by the battleship Imperator Nikolai I, did not accept the fight and surrendered.
The destroyer with the ambiguous name "Bedovy", on board of which was Rozhestvensky, who was wounded in battle, tried to break through to the open sea, but was overtaken by the Japanese destroyers "Kagero" and "Sadzanami". Nebogatov, who surrendered and was released from captivity at the end of the war, was court-martialed. Rozhestvensky was forgiven upon his return, but was subjected to newspaper persecution and died of a heart attack in 1909.
LENIN AND THE SAILOR
And Tsushima, through the efforts of journalists and writers (starting with the essays “Madmen and Fruitless Victims” and “For the Sins of Others,” published under the pseudonym A. Zatyorty, a former sailor), began to be considered a symbol of the mediocrity of the “tsarist regime.”
For 70 years, the only correct interpretation was considered to be that given to Tsushima by Vladimir Lenin in an article in the newspaper Proletariy on May 27 (June 9), 1905. In the article with the “selling” title “ The Defeat,” the author did not hide his sympathy for Japan:
"Everyone expected this, but no one thought that the defeat of the Russian fleet would be such a merciless rout. Like a herd of savages, the armada of Russian ships flew straight at the magnificently armed and equipped with all the latest means of protection Japanese fleet.
A two-day battle, and out of twenty Russian warships with a crew of 12-15 thousand people, thirteen were sunk and destroyed, four were captured, and only one (Almaz) was saved and arrived in Vladivostok. More than half of the crew perished, Rozhdestvensky himself and his closest assistant Nebogatov were captured, and the entire Japanese fleet emerged from the battle unscathed, having lost only three destroyers."
The Baltic squadron “still inspired a shadow of hope in Russian patriots” – but, the Bolshevik leader stated, “ now even the last bet has been beaten.”
The only true version was developed and immortalized in the 1930s in the epic " Tsushima " by Maxim Gorky's student, the Soviet writer Alexei Novikov-Priboy, who was also the author of pamphlets from the time of the 1905 revolution, the former sailor A. Zaterty. These pseudonyms were used by Alexei Silantievich Novikov, who served as a non-commissioned officer on the ship of the 2nd flotilla "Orel", who was captured by the Japanese and was clearly propagandized by the revolutionaries there.
But ritual curses against “incompetent admirals” obscured a real assessment of the role of the fleet in the context of the Russo-Japanese War.
UNFAVORABLE NEUTRALITY
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Russian naval forces in the Far East consisted of the 1st Pacific Squadron, based in Port Arthur, and the Vladivostok cruiser detachment.
There were 7 battleships, 4 armored cruisers, 7 cruisers, 2 mine cruisers, 7 gunboats, 24 destroyers and 10 numbered ones in service. The core of the Pacific Fleet was made up of 7 squadron battleships with strong armor protection and large-caliber artillery. In general, they were inferior to the Japanese in the rate of fire of guns, speed and uniformity - qualities that are of great importance when maneuvering a squadron.
It cannot be said that St. Petersburg did not underestimate the weakness of the fleet in the Pacific Ocean.
Since 1898, a special shipbuilding program "for the needs of the Far East" was in effect with the goal of surpassing the capabilities of the Japanese fleet, calculated until the end of 1905. But even then, the need to transfer additional forces from the Baltic was hampered by the need to cover St. Petersburg and the likelihood of complications in relations with Germany. The sending of an armored squadron of the Black Sea through the Turkish straits was opposed by England.
As already noted, although the Russo-Japanese War looked like a clash between two powers, the Japanese Empire had Western powers behind it. Great Britain and the United States maintained an "unfriendly" neutrality. This can be partly said about Germany as well - the Kaiser's instructors trained personnel for the army of Emperor Meiji.
On the eve of the attack, Japan had a battle fleet that was superior to Russia's in quantity and quality: 7 squadron battleships, 4 armored cruisers, 7 light cruisers, 27 destroyers and a large number of auxiliary warships. Its shipbuilding program, aimed at building the latest battleships and cruisers mainly in English shipyards, was completed in 1903.
FATAL EVENT
In a surprise attack on Port Arthur on the night of January 27, 1904, the Japanese disabled the battleships Retvizan and Tsesarevich and the cruiser Pallada. On the same day, in the Korean port of Chemulpo, after an unequal battle, the cruiser Varyag and the gunboat Koreets were sunk. Thus, the struggle for supremacy at sea began with the failure of five Russian warships, including two squadron battleships.
The enemy tried to destroy our squadron or bottle it up in the inner roadstead of Port Arthur. The attempts were repelled by fire from ships and coastal artillery. Admiral Stepan Makarov, commander of the Pacific squadron, who arrived in Port Arthur, began energetic preparations for active actions at sea.
The Retvizan and Tsarevich were quickly repaired, minefields were laid, and cruisers and destroyers were on duty in the outer roadstead.
On March 9, a Japanese armored detachment approached Port Arthur, but was successfully repelled by a Russian squadron that had come out to meet them. On March 29, 1904, Makarov personally led the squadron out to meet the Japanese fleet, which had again approached Port Arthur. But during the battle reorganization, the flagship Petropavlovsk, on which the commander and his staff were located, was blown up by a Japanese mine and sank. The entire crew, including Admiral Makarov, perished.
This had fatal consequences for the struggle at sea.
Weakened by the loss of combat capability of two more battleships and especially by the death of the naval commander, our squadron was no longer able to resist the superior forces of the enemy.
This allowed the landing operation of General Yasukata Oku's 2nd Army in Southern Manchuria to be carried out without hindrance. At the same time, the enemy established a naval blockade of Port Arthur. Japanese ships regularly appeared near the fortress. But they also suffered heavy losses. And overall, our fleet dealt the enemy several sensitive counterattacks.
AFTER THE VARYAG CAME THE RURIK
On May 2, the battleships Hatsuse and Yashima were blown up and sank by minefields laid by the ship Amur. A day later, the same fate befell the destroyer Akatsuki.
The Vladivostok detachment, consisting of 4 cruisers and 10 destroyers, was also active. It managed to carry out several raids in the Sea of Japan, including to the enemy shores. Enemy communications came under attack, a number of transports were sunk, the enemy suffered significant material damage, and the detachment also diverted part of the Japanese naval forces.
In early August 1904, a battle took place in the Korean Strait between three cruisers of the Vladivostok detachment (Rurik, Gromoboy, and Rossiya) and a detachment of four Japanese armored cruisers. The battle was equal. Gromoboy and Rossiya broke out of the encirclement and went to base. Rurik, having lost all its guns and half its crew, was sunk to avoid falling into enemy hands. It disappeared under the water with the St. Andrew's flag flying, repeating the feat of Varyag.
But, alas, the Pacific squadron remained locked in the inner roadstead of Port Arthur. The attempt to break through to Vladivostok ended in failure. The artillery and personnel were tasked with helping defend the fortress. The guns of the Russian battleships and cruisers fired at enemy positions, and some were removed and transferred to the land front. As once in Sevastopol, the crews went ashore and participated in battles at the forts and redoubts.
That is why in April 1904 in St. Petersburg they decided to send some of the Baltic Fleet ships to help Port Arthur. Later, Rozhestvensky's squadron was overtaken by Nebogatov's detachment of five ships and five transports. Rozhestvensky's decision to take a shortcut past the Tsushima archipelago was dictated by the fatigue of the crews.
VICTORY AT A HIGH PRICE
The Battle of Tsushima was by no means an easy victory for the Japanese over the “ cumbersome, absurd, powerless” Russian armada, as one might conclude from Lenin’s article.
The shooting of our gunners was often not inferior to the Japanese. Historians note the combat skill and heroism of the crews of the battleship Admiral Ushakov, the cruisers Dmitry Donskoy and Aurora, the destroyers Grozny, Gromky (reached Vladivostok) and a number of others.
Japanese losses amounted to at least 15 sunken and disabled destroyers. Several enemy battleships and cruisers were seriously damaged by Russian sailors' fire. According to incomplete data, the enemy's battleships alone received up to 150 hits from large-caliber shells.
The flagship Mikasa took more than 30 shells and was out of action for a long time, having suffered great damage and lost over 100 crew members killed and wounded. The battleships Shikishima and Fuji, the armored cruisers Izumo (flagship of naval commander Hikonojo Kamimura ), Asama, Iwata and a number of other enemy ships suffered severely.
But several factors did not work in our favor: the ships of Togo's fleet were distinguished by better equipment, uniformity, speed, and armor protection. The Japanese had almost a year of combat experience, while the crews of the Russian ships mostly consisted of recruits and those called up from the reserve, and also physically and morally exhausted by a seven-month sea voyage.
A SALVO OF INFORMATION WEAPONS
At the same time - and this must be emphasized - the clash at Tsushima, like other naval battles, was not decisive. The fate of the war was determined on land. And here, precisely at the time described, the scales tipped in Russia's favor.
Thanks to the completion of the Siberian route and the transfer of several army corps, our Manchurian armies, firmly established in the fortified Sypingai positions north of Mukden, gained a significant advantage over the enemy, quantitative and qualitative, and it continued to grow.
The army's morale was high. However, thanks to the efforts of the world (primarily Anglo-American) and opposition Russian press, "Tsushima" received an exaggerated significance. Now the demands to stop the "senseless war" were heard ever louder. In essence, an information war was launched against Russia.
In order to calm public opinion, it was decided in St. Petersburg to meet the persistent Japanese proposals for peace negotiations.
The Russo-Japanese War ended for Russia with certain concessions and losses, but by no means with a crushing "defeat" and "shame". One can argue about the correctness of the strategy chosen by the commander-in-chief of the Manchurian armies, General Alexei Kuropatkin, but it must be recognized that, given the enormous advantages of Japan, which had been purposefully prepared for war by "our Western partners" for almost a decade, such a strategy seems justified. The enemy never managed to utterly defeat our armies. There were no fatal encirclements or catastrophic "cauldrons" in this war. There were organized retreats and there were losses commensurate with the losses of the enemy.
The latter circumstance concealed Japan’s main weakness, since in human and material resources it was many times inferior to Russia.
Overall, the Japanese land blitzkrieg was a fiasco, since the enemy did not achieve the goals it set: to capture not only Korea and Manchuria, but also Primorye and the Amur region, to weaken the Pacific Fleet, and to compensate the aggressor for all of its war expenses.
The negotiations in Portsmouth were conducted on the basis of the fact that “Japan did not win – Russia did not lose.”
Emperor Nicholas II demanded from the Russian delegation: not an inch of territory, not a kopeck of contributions, otherwise - continuation of the war until complete victory. By the summer of 1905, Russia had a large advantage in troops, the morale of the Manchurian armies was high. The construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway was completed, its capacity increased from 1904 from three to 14 pairs of trains per day, which ensured the rapid delivery of reinforcements.
But internal turmoil forced the Russian government to agree to peace talks with the subsequent cession of South Sakhalin. Characteristically, the Portsmouth Treaty was regarded in the world as a success for Russian diplomacy, but in Japan it caused a storm of indignation and mass unrest.
Yes, the lack of naval dominance prevented us from achieving a complete victory, ending the war with something like the capture of Berlin in 1945 or the defeat of the Kwantung Army in the fall of that year. But given the balance of power at the start of the events, such an outcome was simply impossible. And the non-military factors that influenced the outcome of the war (primarily the first Russian revolution) are a subject that requires separate consideration.
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