I think that there are a dozen different things that end up being where we end up. For example, if Nicholas II of Russia had been smart and granted a Duma and constitution and ended up no longer being an autocrat, revolution would have been thwarted and Communism very possibly avoided. Then Stalin would have possibly become a decorated general in the Tsarist military and ended up being a key fighter against the Nazis in WWII while Lenin would have been a university professor teaching something other than the finer academic points of a genocidal philosophy.
But then, if he had not married Alix of Hesse, who became Empress Alexandra, who ended up giving birht to a hemophiliac son, relying on Rasputin who encouraged Alexandra to push her husband against granting a constitutional form of government, well, maybe there would have been a different outcome.
It’s all a matter (I think) of whether or not there is a disturbance in the natural flow of things. If the German government had taken the overthrow seriously, then Hitler would have been shot and then the Nazi party, as a real legitimate politicial movement would have been thwarted. Hitler was a driving force behind the Nazis, without him there would have been nothing and the monsters would have remained in the backrooms of beer halls or the basements of ratty shacks in the middle of nowhere.
Wiemar was really, really weak. Germany went Nazi in reaction to Russia going communist.
I did quite a bit of research into Peter Stolypin. Did a paper on him. Had the revolution not occurred, Russia would have become a constitutional monarchy on par with the UK. Much of the suffering of the 20th century would have been avoided.
not really. remember that autocracy is nearly always ended with bloodshed (think of the English doing it first with Charles I, then the french revolution). When Nicolae relented and became "soft" after 1904's defeat to Japan, people saw that the Europeans had it better and demanded more
It's like Bahrain of today but on a larger scale