<P> One of the Tsar's principal rationales for risking war in 1914 was his desire to restore the prestige that Russia had lost amid the debacles of the Russo - Japanese war . Nicholas also sought to foster a greater sense of national unity with a war against a common and ancient enemy . The Russian Empire was an agglomeration of diverse ethnicities that had shown significant signs of disunity in the years before the First World War . Nicholas believed in part that the shared peril and tribulation of a foreign war would mitigate the social unrest over the persistent issues of poverty, inequality, and inhuman working conditions . Instead of restoring Russia's political and military standing, World War I led to the horrifying slaughter of Russian troops and military defeats that undermined both the monarchy and society in general to the point of collapse . </P> <P> The outbreak of war in August 1914 initially served to quiet the prevalent social and political protests, focusing hostilities against a common external enemy, but this patriotic unity did not last long . As the war dragged on inconclusively, war - weariness gradually took its toll . More important, though, was a deeper fragility: although many ordinary Russians joined anti-German demonstrations in the first few weeks of the war, the most widespread reaction appears to have been skepticism and fatalism . Hostility toward the Kaiser and the desire to defend their land and their lives did not necessarily translate into enthusiasm for the Tsar or the government . </P> <P> Russia's first major battle of the war was a disaster: in the 1914 Battle of Tannenberg, over 30,000 Russian troops were killed or wounded and 90,000 captured, while Germany suffered just 12,000 casualties . However, Austro - Hungarian forces allied to Germany were driven back deep into the Galicia region by the end of the year . In the autumn of 1915, Nicholas had taken direct command of the army, personally overseeing Russia's main theatre of war and leaving his ambitious but incapable wife Alexandra in charge of the government . Reports of corruption and incompetence in the Imperial government began to emerge, and the growing influence of Grigori Rasputin in the Imperial family was widely resented . In the eyes of Michael Lynch, a revisionist historian (member of the School of Historical Studies at the University of Leicester) who focuses on the role of the people, Rasputin was a "fatal disease" to the Tsarist regime . </P> <P> In 1915, things took a critical turn for the worse when Germany shifted its focus of attack to the Eastern front . The superior German army--better led, better trained and better supplied--was terrifyingly effective against the ill - equipped Russian forces, driving the Russians out of Galicia, as well as Russian Poland, during the Gorlice--Tarnów Offensive campaign . By the end of October 1916, Russia had lost between 1,600,000 and 1,800,000 soldiers, with an additional 2,000,000 prisoners of war and 1,000,000 missing, all making up a total of nearly 5,000,000 men . </P>

The fall of the tsar in russia in 1917