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Updated: May 31, 2025
Rather they were roused to further action, and on 8 January Trepov gave place to Prince Golitzin, a mere agent of obstruction, while Protopopov proceeded with his measures to provoke disorder. The Duma was prorogued and machine guns made in England were diverted from the front to dominate the capital.
When Guchkov, president of the War Industries Committee, attempted to get the appeal printed in the newspapers he was prevented by action emanating from the office of Protopopov. Through all the early days of March there was labor unrest in Petrograd, as well as in some other cities. Petrograd was, naturally, the storm center. There were small strikes, but, fortunately, not much rioting.
Proletarian exclusiveness came later, but on March 13th the appeal of the Council was "to the entire population." March 14th saw the arrest of many of the leading reactionaries, including Protopopov and the traitor Sukhomlinov, and an approach to order.
If some one must have the credit or blame, it is Protopopov who was at the time suspected of being queer mentally and who has since lost his reason entirely. He was so sure of himself and of his ability to put down the uprising and thereby show himself a real statesman that he concluded not to wait for the revolution to come in the ordinary course of events, but to hurry it a bit.
In conversation with a journalist two months before the outbreak of the revolution, the Minister of the Interior, Protopopov, a protégé of Rasputin, said that he was aware of the revolutionary propaganda and that he was ready to face any attempt that might be made to overthrow the government.
Hunger reigned in the cities and the food reserves for the army were deliberately reduced to a two days' supply. The terror of hunger spread through the large cities and through the army at the front like prairie fire. It became evident that Protopopov was carrying out the plans of the Germanophiles, deliberately trying to disorganize the life of the nation and make successful warfare impossible.
It became known, too, that large numbers of machine-guns were being distributed among the police in Petrograd and placed at strategic points throughout the city. It was said that Protopopov was mad, but it was the methodical madness of a desperate, reactionary, autocratic régime.
There are a number of reasons why the Government collapsed so easily. It was not really overthrown but it toppled over like a rotten tree, and until it fell, the people did not realize how decayed it actually was. Its misconduct of the war, scandals like that of Rasputin, ministers such as Protopopov discredited and disgraced the dynasty and when the end came, it had few friends who shed tears.
But a permanent peace is not wanted by Sturmer and Protopopov, they wish to keep the people under the heel of a strong Germany. Apart from the Germans no one will protect them from the revolution. For her pains she received an order to retire to her estate, and her husband, who held a very prominent position, left the capital with her.
Protopopov and Sturmer and their associates recognized as clearly as the liberals did the natural kinship and interdependence of the three great autocracies, the Romanov, Habsburg, and Hohenzollern dynasties. They knew well that the crushing of autocracy in Austria-Hungary and Germany would make it impossible to maintain autocracy in Russia.
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