The Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, which took place in conditions of political instability in the country, revealed many problems both in military construction and in information policy, primarily in the functioning of mass media.

The defeat of the Russian Empire was natural. The highest command staff of the Russian army was not ready to conduct military operations. Many generals were poorly acquainted with new types of weapons and tactics of modern combat. The fighting showed that the material part of the army and its technical equipment were significantly lower than the modest requirements imposed on them. The war revealed the poor combat training of the land army. The Russian Navy performed mainly defensive functions during the war. An attempt to use it to solve an independent strategic task ended with the defeat of the 2nd Pacific Flotilla in the Battle of Tsushima.

The information and propaganda policy of the state in 1904-1905 was also below the required level, despite all the attempts of the authorities to influence the Russian press in various ways. Against the background of a fairly competent information policy of Japan, largely aimed at a comprehensive exaggeration of its success in the war, the government's shortcomings were clearly manifested, both in the formation of a single information space on the territory of the Russian Empire and in the state's policy of covering the war in the international arena.

WAR'S EVE: INFORMATION POLICY...

Freedom of speech in Russia began to be introduced by Emperor Alexander II in the so-called era of relief. The authorities showed their willingness to accept different opinions, take into account constructive ideas coming directly from the public, and recognize the right of the population to exert all possible influence on making socially necessary managerial decisions.

At the beginning of 1859, the Minister of Public Education, E. P. Kovalevsky, prepared a note "On Glasnost and the Press", which later formed the basis of the emperor's circular, which announced his interest in covering abuses and riots by the mass media, although the inviolability of the autocracy and its apparatus was noted. This decision helped the authorities to get information about the activities of state institutions and the socio-economic situation in the country - a kind of feedback. The document was not only a major breakthrough in the information policy of the Russian Empire, but also served as the basis for the development of state legislation in this area and regulation of media activities.

In January 1859, a secret committee on printing was organized, the purpose of which was to form a positive political image of the authorities through the print media and promote ideas that would favor the achievement of a single common goal by the state and society. The committee was entrusted with many functions inherent in modern press services - both creating informational occasions by the authorities, and working with journalists ' appeals to them for materials. The official press organ of the government, the Severnaya Pochta newspaper, began to be published, which to a certain extent can be considered the progenitor of the modern Rossiyskaya Gazeta: it received, for example, the right to be the first to publish all legislative acts of state power.

The Government approved the "Provisional Rules on Censorship and the Press of April 6, 1865" 1, officially abandoning total pre-censorship.

The proclaimed freedom of speech weakened the autocracy, as Sovereign Alexander III was convinced. Under him, the prevailing view was that Russia was not ready for the crisis.

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democratic transformation and freedom of speech.

In August 1882, new "Provisional Rules on the Press" were approved, according to which, for example, decisions to close the publication were considered not by the courts, but by a Meeting of three ministers: the Interior, Public Education, Justice - and the chief prosecutor of the Synod. At the same time, the number of bans on covering specific topics increased, for example, it was forbidden to publish information about the hostile attitude of peasants towards landlords, about riots in universities, or "biased" information about the internal life of educational institutions.2
By the time of the accession of Emperor Nicholas II to the throne, public sentiment in favor of political reforms had increased. In the 90-ies of the XIX century, a large number of publications of liberal, conservative, Marxist and narodnik trends were published on the territory of the Russian Empire. The periodicals discussed quite freely the recently closed topics of public administration and parliamentarism, human rights and freedom of speech.

The government tried in every possible way to protect the people from the influence of"malicious propaganda". But in the new conditions, this was not enough.

Russia has entered a period of large-scale socio-political upheaval.

THE ARMED FORCES...

Russia's military forces were significantly larger than Japan's. By 1904. it had a 1,135,000-strong army and 3.5 million reserves and militias. The tsarist government did not believe that little Japan would be the first to attack Russia, and therefore kept the bulk of the land army at the western and southern borders.

The problem was also the low capacity of railways, especially the Trans-Siberian Railway. Therefore, by the beginning of the war, Russia concentrated only 98 thousand troops in the Manchurian theater of operations.

By the end of the war, 1294566 Russian soldiers and officers and 2,238 guns were sent directly to the place of combat operations.3 But it was too late.

Japan was much better prepared for the war. The active army of Japan numbered by that time 143 thousand soldiers and 8 thousand. officers. The army was trained by German instructors and well-armed.

Along with the ground forces, the naval forces also took an active part in the war. Their power at the beginning of the century was determined primarily by the number of battleships. This class of vessels not only ensured the defense of maritime borders, but also allowed them to influence the foreign policy of the state.

The Tsarist Fleet in the Far East consisted of 75 combat units with a total displacement of 192276 tons, the Japanese fleet consisted of about 100 units with a displacement of 260931 tons. The advantage of the Japanese fleet was that its ships were built and equipped on the basis of the latest achievements in marine technology, while the Russian Fleet, despite the release of huge funds for its construction, had a significant number of obsolete ships armed with artillery that was inferior in power to the Japanese. The ships built for Russia abroad were of poor quality at a huge cost due to embezzlement by naval officials who were part of an agreement with foreign shipyards.

The Pacific Fleet, which was the main participant in the fighting at sea, turned out to be much weaker than the Japanese both in terms of armament and in terms of the technical qualities of the ships themselves. Our ships were less armored, had low unsinkability and had a lower speed.

Even in the tragic Battle of Tsushima, where the Japanese put up 120 ships against 30 Russian warships, including 5 battleships, the decisive role, according to "the greatest English admiral since Nelson" of that time A. Fischer, was played not so much by the huge preponderance of the enemy's forces as by the speed of his ships. The Japanese were 6 to 7 knots ahead of the Russians and performed a classic naval maneuver, directing all their guns at the front - line warships of the 2nd Pacific Squadron (they were built in the form of the letter T) 4.

In addition, the guns on the Japanese ships were twice as fast as the Russians, and the Russian shells contained only 2-3% of the explosive substance, while the Japanese - 11-12%. The shock tubes were completely unsatisfactory in design and very often failed, as a result of which the projectile turned into an antediluvian core 5.

...frames

The war revealed many problems in the system of training Russian military personnel. The experience of combat operations showed that a number of General Staff officers had a weak understanding of the tactics of modern combat, were not sufficiently familiar with the tactical and technical properties of modern weapons, especially artillery, and, most importantly, had poor skills in organizing planning and directing individual battles. The result of the gratuitous retreat of our troops was the fear of flank engagements by the command, as a result of which the military leaders from-

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there was no contact with the enemy.

A participant and researcher of the Russo-Japanese war, General M. V. Grulev, noted that " with such qualities of command of the troops of A. N. Kuropatkin and his assistants, the outcome of the war could not have been different even if the warring armies had changed places in terms of tactical training, i.e., if the Russian command staff... given the best army in the world, it would still be defeated, even if it was comparatively superior in strength, because its superiors lacked either determination, firm will, or understanding of the most important factors of warfare. " 6
One of the reasons for this phenomenon is seen in the fact that the political leadership of the country, when nominating military leaders for the highest command positions, was most often guided not by their business qualities, but by their likes and dislikes.

The officer corps of the Russian army as a whole was up to par, but there were serious gaps in its tactical training. Career officers and ordinary ensigns, made up of non-commissioned officers and field sergeants, proved to be the best. "As for the ensigns and ordinary ensigns who were promoted from the lower ranks for military distinctions," Kuropatkin wrote, " they turned out to be an excellent element in all respects."7. The worst part of the officers, he noted, were the reserve ensigns.

Very serious shortcomings in the training of Russian troops were noted in the work on the history of the Russo-Japanese War, which provides estimates of the English Lieutenant General Hamilton of the battle on the Yalu River on April 18 (May 1), 1904.Mentioning minor losses on the part of the Japanese, he explained this by poor shooting of the Russian infantry. In his opinion, they opened fire too late and from too close distances; our soldier was an inept marksman, the reasons for which he saw in the lack of skills in single shooting and in the enthusiasm for volleys.

A weak point in the training of troops was also the training of a single fighter. It was almost impossible to solve this problem without introducing universal primary education. "In Manchuria," wrote one of the participants in the fighting, " the lack of individual development of an individual fighter made itself felt. The head is undeveloped, the head is helpless, and where there was no management, where there was a lack of a lower-ranking officer-leader, there our commoner submissively exposed himself to the blow of the Japanese or unconsciously, unconsciously went back, not knowing where, why, devoid of any signs of understanding what was happening around"8.At the same time, in the conditions of massive fire impact, which our troops had to face for the first time in combat conditions in the Far East, the role of an individual fighter increased immeasurably.

The combat training of the personnel of Russian ships was also low, but the passivity of the high command was high. The long-term lack of practice of joint maneuvering of ships affected especially when the squadron broke through from Port Arthur to Vladivostok on July 28, 1904. A shell hit the conning tower "Tsesarevich", which disrupted the control of the ship and disabled almost the entire headquarters of the commander, led the Russian squadron to frustration. Without losing a single ship in the battle, she returned to Port Arthur in separate groups, repelling night mine attacks, by the morning of the next day.

However, the morale of the Russian sailors was high. One of the officers of the cruiser Aurora wrote about the behavior of the sailors in battle: "Our teams held up in battle above all praise. Remarkable coolness, resourcefulness and fearlessness were shown by each sailor... They took care not so much about themselves as about their commanders, warning about each enemy shot, covering the officers at the moment of rupture. Covered with wounds and blood, the sailors did not leave their places, preferring to die at the guns. " 9
INFORMATION WARFARE

Japan's public information policy during the war period was entirely focused on coverage of military operations. Although the authorities claimed freedom of speech and the full openness of the state to foreign journalists, in reality there was severe censorship. The newspaper "St. Petersburg Vedomosti" in March 1904 wrote: "In the first days of the war, Japan announced that, having no reason to hide anything, it gives free access to correspondents from all over the world... Japan gave them a brilliant welcome, and having summoned them to Tokyo, put them all together in one hotel specially hired for them... But this courtesy was very expensive for the trusting guests. They are simply captured, because their telegrams and letters are censored in the strictest way, and everything that the Japanese government does not want is not allowed to pass through. " 10
Thus, while maintaining the appearance of complete information openness, the Japanese have concentrated all foreign press in one place, with minimal costs and maximum efficiency, managing all of them.

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information flows to cover the war in the necessary perspective for them.

In Russia, every newspaper of 1904-1905 contained a share of official information, which included government telegrams, circulars, etc.

The Siberian press was a striking example of fully official publications. For example, despite its semi-official nature, the newspaper "Tomsk Gubernskie Vedomosti" for 2 years of the war years did not provide readers with any of its material, even of a descriptive nature.

In the immediate vicinity of the scene - in Chita - the official press, represented by the newspaper "Zabaikalie", for a long time demonstrated the classic type of information presentation. This is official information, descriptive information on duty, and analytical attempts in the form of evaluation materials. It is characterized by an abundance of interviews with a variety of military personnel-from high-ranking officers to ordinary soldiers who were directly involved in military operations. There was also a lot of negative information in the newspaper, exposing the cowardice of some Russian soldiers and the disorganization of the army.

In Manchuria itself, in particular in Harbin, the location of the Russian Empire's troops, the authorities had little influence on the local Russian press. In most cases, the published materials were critical in nature, revealing shortcomings in the provision and organization of the armed forces. The newspaper "Manchuria" criticized the organization of troops, their equipment, "clerical red tape", which "only spreads displeasure" among the soldiers.

This was not the case in the press of the European part of Russia, in particular, in Moscow. For example, an analysis of the publications of the newspaper Moskovskiye Vedomosti shows that the publication was completely dependent on the censorship authorities, publishing only official documents, statistical calculations, and articles describing military operations without analytical elements throughout the war.

The publications of Russkiye Vedomosti are about the same in nature. However, on the pages of this printed publication, along with official information and a description of the events of that time, you can still see attempts at some evaluation materials. So, in July 1904, the newspaper wrote:: "The Japanese abuse of the Red Cross took place again on June 26. When they raised the Red Cross flag on the front line, our troops immediately stopped firing at this place, but, as it turned out, the Japanese placed artillery in a position very close to the flag and then opened fire from there."11
A fundamentally different presentation of information can be traced in the press of St. Petersburg, a vivid example of which is the newspaper "St. Petersburg Vedomosti".

On the one hand, its materials clearly focused on strengthening the spirit of patriotism among the masses. The beginning of one of the many wartime publications is characteristic: "Really, one cannot think of our sailors without a sense of infinite pride. What a good thing it is to repel the last attack!"12.

At the same time, the newspaper rather sharply criticizes the state of the Russian troops. At the same time, the emphasis was placed on links in foreign media and on comments from foreign experts, which allowed the editorial board to somewhat absolve itself of responsibility for published materials. True, it also exposed Japan's propaganda campaign aimed at discrediting Russian troops in front of the world community: "The Japanese and Japanist press does not let up. One fiction is replaced by another, even more sensational and impossible... " 13.

While the Japanese authorities were cunning and prudent in orienting their mass media towards a one-sided presentation of information in favor of their country, and foreign media often swallowed Japanese information "ducks" and excuses, the Russian state hardly tried to build a single information space on its own territory.

The failure of the information and propaganda policy of the tsarist government played its own, although not so noticeable, role in spreading defeatist sentiments in the army and in the country during the Russo-Japanese War.

1 PSZ of the Russian Empire. Sobr. II. Vol. 40. Otd. I. N 41988. SPb., 1867, pp. 396-420.

Arsenyev K. K. 2 Legislation on the press. St. Petersburg, 1903, pp. 137-138.

Beskrovny L. G. 3 Army and Fleet of Russia at the beginning of the XX century. Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1986, pp. 11-12.

Massie Robert K. 4 Dreadnought. Britain, Germany, and the Coming of the Great War. N. Y., Random House, 1991, p. 474.

Russian Imperialism and Fleet Development on the eve of the First World War, Moscow, Nauka Publ., 1968, p. 45.

Zayonchkovsky P. A. 6 Autocracy and the Russian Army at the turn of the XIX-XX centuries 1881-1903. Moscow, Mysl, 1973, p. 339.

7 Ibid., p. 341.

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