WEBVTT - S4 – 8: A Time to Live 0:00:01.120 --> 0:00:04.360 Welcomed Unobscured, a production of I Heart Radio and Aaron Minky. 0:00:07.920 --> 0:00:11.200 The road is steep and narrow. You're a passenger in 0:00:11.200 --> 0:00:14.040 the car. Next to you are the people you love most, 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:16.759 and all of your lives are in danger. The car 0:00:16.880 --> 0:00:19.959 is careening around the turns, and one slip and it 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:23.040 could all be over. And the worst problem is the 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:26.880 driver is asleep at the wheel. But there is hope. 0:00:27.360 --> 0:00:30.040 You know how to drive, and so do other people 0:00:30.080 --> 0:00:32.400 in the car. You try to wake the man at 0:00:32.400 --> 0:00:34.880 the wheel and convince him to make the dangerous move 0:00:35.000 --> 0:00:38.680 of trading places with someone else. But even awake, he's 0:00:38.720 --> 0:00:41.960 hardly any better. He tightens his grip and refuses to 0:00:42.040 --> 0:00:45.720 let go. With bloodshot eyes, the driver screams not to 0:00:45.720 --> 0:00:50.920 touch him. Meanwhile, the car barrels forward toward destruction. It's 0:00:50.960 --> 0:00:53.640 too dangerous to fight for the wheel. It's too dangerous 0:00:53.680 --> 0:00:57.640 to do nothing. Both action and inaction seem to promise 0:00:57.720 --> 0:01:01.760 the same carnage. What should you you? This is the 0:01:01.840 --> 0:01:04.800 question that was asked in the Moscow Gazette on September 0:01:04.880 --> 0:01:08.440 seventeenth of nineteen fifteen. The journalist who wrote the story 0:01:08.680 --> 0:01:12.039 was a member of the Duma Russia's parliament. The passengers 0:01:12.040 --> 0:01:14.680 in the car were his fellow Russians, and the mad 0:01:14.800 --> 0:01:17.759 chauffeur at the wheel was the one who claimed divine 0:01:17.840 --> 0:01:20.959 right to steer the nation forward through the perils of war, 0:01:21.600 --> 0:01:26.240 Zar Nicholas himself, and who could blame one furious statesman 0:01:26.280 --> 0:01:30.600 for seeing things this way? Supplies, reinforcements, and hospitals for 0:01:30.640 --> 0:01:33.520 the army were planned so badly that trains filled with 0:01:33.600 --> 0:01:36.480 dying men were parked on the tracks because there was 0:01:36.520 --> 0:01:39.800 nowhere for them to unload their priceless cargo. What was 0:01:39.880 --> 0:01:45.640 Russia's experience of the war in nineteen fift It was death, grief, blood, 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:51.560 and failure. Steel coffins slowly turning men into corpses. Was 0:01:51.640 --> 0:01:55.320 not the legacy that Zar Nicholas imagined for the Romanov dynasty, 0:01:55.840 --> 0:01:58.160 but more and more Russians were coming to see it 0:01:58.200 --> 0:02:01.440 as his stamp on the nation's history, because it was 0:02:01.480 --> 0:02:04.400 the nation's present. And who should be to blame if 0:02:04.400 --> 0:02:07.640 not for the man in charge. And when it comes 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:10.840 to anger at the Czar, we're not just talking about peasants. 0:02:11.200 --> 0:02:13.720 The members of the Duma saw it, they felt it, 0:02:14.040 --> 0:02:17.919 and published their articles damning Nicholas and so did Russia's 0:02:17.960 --> 0:02:21.720 other aristocratic families. Their sons had also gone to war, 0:02:22.040 --> 0:02:25.519 their children had also been killed, and they wanted answers. 0:02:26.400 --> 0:02:29.600 What was the Tsar going to do about all this suffering? 0:02:31.240 --> 0:02:33.240 But if the calls were for him to put someone 0:02:33.280 --> 0:02:36.400 else at the wheel, Nicholas took the opposite course. He 0:02:36.480 --> 0:02:38.880 thought that maybe the problem was that he had shirked 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:42.240 his duty and allowed his muscle bound cousin Nikolasha to 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:45.239 take the lead. The job had certainly not been done right, 0:02:45.680 --> 0:02:48.959 so Nicholas decided to do it himself. He had already 0:02:48.960 --> 0:02:51.440 been spending as much time as he could at Stavka, 0:02:51.639 --> 0:02:55.640 the Russian military headquarters. The camp where battle plans were laid, 0:02:55.720 --> 0:02:59.240 was established off the Moscow Warsaw Road, nestled between the 0:02:59.240 --> 0:03:02.080 trunks of pine and birch trees and surrounded by ring 0:03:02.160 --> 0:03:06.639 after ring of centuries. Nicholas found all of that invigorating 0:03:06.960 --> 0:03:09.680 to him. It was a masculine place, a place for 0:03:09.720 --> 0:03:13.400 a rugged, disciplined life, a place where every second counted 0:03:13.440 --> 0:03:16.079 and every man was about his work. The urgency in 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:19.760 order reminded him of his fondest memories his younger years 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:22.760 in the cavalry, before he had taken up the responsibilities 0:03:22.800 --> 0:03:26.080 of the czar, but in the summer of nineteen fifteen, 0:03:26.160 --> 0:03:29.359 it was the responsibilities that he shouldered. The Czar's place 0:03:29.520 --> 0:03:32.560 was with his troops. Nicholas believed it so strongly that 0:03:32.600 --> 0:03:35.600 it was almost mystical. He even made up his mind 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:38.400 in the church. It was while he was standing in 0:03:38.440 --> 0:03:41.880 the cathedral, with his eyes fixated on an image of Jesus, 0:03:42.160 --> 0:03:46.240 that he felt a voice speak in his mind. Maybe 0:03:46.240 --> 0:03:48.400 the reason his man had lost the war with Japan 0:03:48.480 --> 0:03:50.800 ten years before was that he had stayed in the 0:03:50.840 --> 0:03:54.000 palaces and left the work to others. He didn't want 0:03:54.040 --> 0:03:57.160 to make the same mistake twice in a time of war. 0:03:57.320 --> 0:03:59.800 It wasn't right for the Tsar to hide in palaces 0:03:59.840 --> 0:04:02.800 and float offshore in yachts. It was time for him 0:04:02.840 --> 0:04:05.400 to take action. It was time for him to bear 0:04:05.440 --> 0:04:08.760 the weight of the empire on his own shoulders. So, 0:04:09.000 --> 0:04:11.440 no matter what anyone else was shouting to the heavens, 0:04:11.800 --> 0:04:15.360 Nicolas tightened his grip on the wheel. Nikolasha was out 0:04:15.920 --> 0:04:21.600 and the Tzar was in. The move was dramatically, universally unpopular. 0:04:22.080 --> 0:04:24.560 Even the rest of the Romanov family tried to argue 0:04:24.560 --> 0:04:27.760 with Nicholas to make him reverse his decision and leave 0:04:27.800 --> 0:04:31.760 the war to others. But finally Nicholas had found a spine. 0:04:32.520 --> 0:04:34.880 When his ministers approached him at the end of August 0:04:34.960 --> 0:04:39.480 begging him to reconsider, Nicholas sat and listened, sweating profusely 0:04:39.640 --> 0:04:42.839 and clutching an icon to support his spiritual conviction that 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:45.599 he was meant to lead, an icon he had received 0:04:45.600 --> 0:04:50.359 from his spiritual adviser and friend, Grigory Rasputin. His conviction 0:04:50.880 --> 0:04:54.799 was unshaken, and in the coming days it would become 0:04:54.839 --> 0:04:57.400 clear that the Czar wasn't the only one seizing his 0:04:57.520 --> 0:05:00.920 royal prerogative. As the wheels of war continue to turn, 0:05:01.400 --> 0:05:03.960 there was someone else who didn't fear putting their hands 0:05:04.040 --> 0:05:11.040 on the controls. The Empress herself, Alexandra, this is unobscured. 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:37.680 I'm Aaron Manky. Felix Yusupov was an aristocrat, and a 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:41.240 wealthy one too. His family was among Russia's richest, and 0:05:41.279 --> 0:05:43.720 while they weren't the most powerful, they were like many 0:05:43.800 --> 0:05:47.919 other oligarchs. They had their fingers in every pie, and 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:51.080 Felix had his finger on the pulse too. When Nicholas 0:05:51.160 --> 0:05:54.159 took over the command of Russia's armies. Felix wrote down 0:05:54.200 --> 0:05:58.279 just how worried his elite friends had become. The news 0:05:58.400 --> 0:06:01.920 on the whole was badly received. He wrote, everyone knew 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:04.120 that pressure had been brought to bear on the Tsar 0:06:04.240 --> 0:06:07.440 by Rasputin. In fact, Felix wrote that the Tsar was 0:06:07.520 --> 0:06:10.240 only going to the front because Rasputin told him to. 0:06:10.760 --> 0:06:13.560 Nicholas had caved because the Holy Man had played on 0:06:13.600 --> 0:06:16.640 the religious feelings that Nicholas had about his god given 0:06:16.720 --> 0:06:19.720 role as the ruler of his people. But if this 0:06:19.800 --> 0:06:23.159 was some kind of spiritual con game, why was Rasputin 0:06:23.240 --> 0:06:26.760 doing it? Felix thought he knew. He wrote that it 0:06:26.839 --> 0:06:30.120 was in Rasputin's interest to remove the Tsar as far 0:06:30.200 --> 0:06:34.440 from Petrograd as possible, because he said, when Rasputin had 0:06:34.440 --> 0:06:37.680 pushed the Czar out of the palace, that left Alexandra 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:41.760 in his power. That was what Felix Usupov and the 0:06:41.800 --> 0:06:45.640 other wealthy Russians believe and what they feared. Of course, 0:06:45.720 --> 0:06:49.680 the reality, though, was far more complicated. First of all, 0:06:49.760 --> 0:06:52.920 there was the fact that Alexandra and Rasputin too, We're 0:06:52.960 --> 0:06:56.960 actually against Nicolas spending time in Stovka. Maybe no one 0:06:57.000 --> 0:06:58.719 else saw it at the time, but it was clear 0:06:58.760 --> 0:07:02.200 in the Empress's writings over and over. In her letters 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:05.119 in the early months of that year, Alexandra was urging 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:08.120 Nicholas to come back home. She wanted her husband to 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:10.600 stay in the capital with her, and she told him 0:07:10.640 --> 0:07:14.560 that Resputant thought the same. In fact, the reason Alexandra 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:17.400 was worried was the same reason that the Duma and 0:07:17.440 --> 0:07:21.680 the aristocrats like Felix Yusupov worried about Rasputin. It was 0:07:21.720 --> 0:07:25.440 all about how Nicholas would be influenced. In June of 0:07:25.480 --> 0:07:28.880 nineteen fifteen, during one of the Tsar's many visits to Stavka, 0:07:29.240 --> 0:07:32.800 Alexandra wrote to Nicholas a letter showing her hand. She 0:07:33.000 --> 0:07:36.240 and Rasputin were worried, she said, because when Nicholas was 0:07:36.320 --> 0:07:39.400 far from the palace and far from her, there were 0:07:39.440 --> 0:07:42.080 people who could make him do things that he shouldn't do. 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:45.840 When he was at Strafka, there were untold numbers of 0:07:45.880 --> 0:07:49.440 advisers and generals and liars to push the czar around. 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:53.520 It would be healthier, Alexandra wrote, if Nicholas would take 0:07:53.520 --> 0:07:58.080 care of things quickly and just come home. When Nicholas 0:07:58.080 --> 0:08:01.040 made the opposite choice a few months later and took command. 0:08:01.400 --> 0:08:04.120 He made his place at Stavka all the more prominent. 0:08:04.640 --> 0:08:08.400 Alexandra's letters only became more urgent and came more often. 0:08:08.760 --> 0:08:10.920 If the Czar wasn't going to be at her side. 0:08:11.280 --> 0:08:14.440 Alexandra was determined that she would still have his ear. 0:08:15.040 --> 0:08:21.520 Here's historian Helen Rappaport to tell us more. The wartime 0:08:21.520 --> 0:08:26.800 correspondence is predominantly her long haranguing letters to Nicholas, telling 0:08:26.880 --> 0:08:29.080 him to do this, that and the other, and complaining 0:08:29.080 --> 0:08:33.000 about the girls being hormonal and argumentative, and um, you know, 0:08:33.080 --> 0:08:35.800 telling him to sack this minister and higher that minister. 0:08:36.200 --> 0:08:40.480 The war yor letters are very revealing of her controlling 0:08:40.520 --> 0:08:45.400 influence over him. But if Alexandra had a controlling influence 0:08:45.400 --> 0:08:48.440 over Nicholas, it's just as likely that Nicholas had his 0:08:48.480 --> 0:08:52.120 own influence over Alexandra. When they were together, Nicholas could 0:08:52.160 --> 0:08:54.840 bear the duties of state, the two could talk, and 0:08:54.880 --> 0:08:58.240 Alexandra was free to rest and retreat while Nicholas kept 0:08:58.320 --> 0:09:02.040 up an endless series of meetings with ministers and bureaucrats. 0:09:02.080 --> 0:09:05.400 But now with the Czar far away, pressing matters still 0:09:05.480 --> 0:09:07.679 had to be dealt with. And if it was the 0:09:07.760 --> 0:09:10.319 duty of the emperor to get his hands dirty, how 0:09:10.400 --> 0:09:13.400 much different could it be for the empress. Alexandra felt 0:09:13.400 --> 0:09:17.479 that she had to act as well, and act she did. 0:09:17.760 --> 0:09:20.880 To begin with, Alexandra didn't miss how much care was 0:09:20.960 --> 0:09:26.640 needed for the wounded men. She immediately threw herself, despite 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:30.679 a lot of physical problems by then the scietic who 0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:34.400 was awful, she threw herself into war work. She organized 0:09:34.480 --> 0:09:39.520 hospital trains, She organized ladies at the court to to 0:09:39.520 --> 0:09:43.600 to set up collecting dressings and you know, bringing to 0:09:43.960 --> 0:09:47.960 bringing together sewing garments so the wounded. She set up 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:51.720 various hospitals in St. Pete but Wells and Petrograd in 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:55.800 the war, in the capital city and out at saskos At. 0:09:56.040 --> 0:10:00.400 Alexandra did far more during the war than people are 0:10:00.440 --> 0:10:03.360 aware of, many because it's not really being written about. 0:10:03.920 --> 0:10:06.679 But if it's true that Alexandra's work in the hospitals 0:10:06.760 --> 0:10:09.440 was overlooked, there was another side of her life that 0:10:09.520 --> 0:10:12.880 drew far too many eyes because she wasn't just organizing 0:10:12.920 --> 0:10:17.199 medical care. Alexandra was taking the reins of the states herself. 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:20.680 It started at the very top, while Nicholas was away 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:23.480 at the front, Alexandra met with the Prime Minister almost 0:10:23.520 --> 0:10:26.959 every day. It helped that he was on Alexandra's side, 0:10:27.280 --> 0:10:30.800 the side of absolute monarchy. In fact, when Nicholas left 0:10:30.840 --> 0:10:33.439 for the front, the Prime Minister even suggested that the 0:10:33.520 --> 0:10:37.280 Duma should be dissolved. What Russia needed, he believed, was 0:10:37.360 --> 0:10:41.600 to be united behind the Romanovs. Alexandra could only agree, 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:43.720 and when things on the front lines of the war 0:10:43.800 --> 0:10:47.160 went south, it only strengthened her resolve. When members of 0:10:47.200 --> 0:10:49.760 the Duma gathered together to meet with the Prime Minister 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:52.720 and begged him to send more supplies and more ammunition 0:10:52.720 --> 0:10:57.640 to the army, Alexandra wrote to Nicholas, these elected representatives 0:10:57.640 --> 0:11:00.800 were meddling with things above their pay grade. The war 0:11:01.000 --> 0:11:04.320 was none of their business, she said. They were merely 0:11:04.360 --> 0:11:07.520 fostering discontent. To her, it didn't matter that they had 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:11.000 been the legislature of the empire. That's not what God wanted. 0:11:11.320 --> 0:11:14.320 No God wanted an autocrat to rule. If the Prime 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:17.480 Minister listened to other voices, Alexandra was sure that it 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:21.160 would only bring the Empire more trouble. So she beat 0:11:21.200 --> 0:11:25.800 back political advisors and advice from the disbanded Duma more 0:11:25.880 --> 0:11:28.760 and more she took matters into her own hands. Where 0:11:28.800 --> 0:11:32.199 supplies needed at the front were more nurses needed at home, 0:11:32.679 --> 0:11:36.480 Alexandra would decide it for herself, and she revealed to 0:11:36.559 --> 0:11:39.320 Nicholas just how much she wanted that power and just 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:43.240 how little she could see what was coming. When she wrote, Russia, 0:11:43.360 --> 0:11:51.840 thank God, is not a constitutional country. It shouldn't be 0:11:51.880 --> 0:11:55.240 a surprise that Rasputant sent his own letter to Stavka. 0:11:55.480 --> 0:11:57.520 He said that the Virgin Mary had appeared to him 0:11:57.559 --> 0:11:59.880 in a vision. She told him to travel from the 0:12:00.040 --> 0:12:03.680 capital and visit the military headquarters. There he could help 0:12:03.720 --> 0:12:06.720 plan the fight. He had ideas about the war, He 0:12:06.800 --> 0:12:10.120 had ideas about the economy. God would speak through him 0:12:10.160 --> 0:12:13.679 and deliver Russia from the tide of violence. He got 0:12:13.720 --> 0:12:16.280 a letter back from the Tsar's cousin. The man wrote 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:19.120 Respute in a similar note. He said that Mary had 0:12:19.160 --> 0:12:21.600 appeared to him as well. She told him that if 0:12:21.600 --> 0:12:25.720 Grigory Rasputin ever came to Stavka, Nikolasha would hang him 0:12:25.760 --> 0:12:29.320 from the nearest lamp post. It was in the months 0:12:29.320 --> 0:12:32.680 before Nicholas would relieve him of command. Needless to say, 0:12:32.800 --> 0:12:36.880 Resputant stay at home by Alexandra's side, and it was 0:12:36.960 --> 0:12:40.040 a sign of how much things had changed. In the beginning, 0:12:40.120 --> 0:12:43.520 it was Nikolasha and the sisters Stana and Melitza who 0:12:43.559 --> 0:12:46.720 had introduced Respute into the Tsar's but by now the 0:12:46.720 --> 0:12:50.000 tzar's cousin saw a real dark side to Gregory's influence 0:12:50.040 --> 0:12:54.160 over the imperial couple. For years, even decades, they had 0:12:54.200 --> 0:12:58.120 been friends, Nikolasha, Stana, Melitsa. They were the ones who 0:12:58.120 --> 0:13:00.240 had helped her the most when she was a rush 0:13:00.360 --> 0:13:04.120 young empress first stepping into her new home. But these 0:13:04.160 --> 0:13:07.440 were not those years, and as Nikolasha made it clear 0:13:07.520 --> 0:13:10.719 just how much contempt he had for Grigory Resputin, a 0:13:10.800 --> 0:13:14.200 man the Empress trusted most, she started to suspect that 0:13:14.280 --> 0:13:18.600 even her closest companions were plotting against her family. With 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:24.360 Nikolasha now threatening Resputant's life outright, Alexandra feared betrayal. Maybe 0:13:24.360 --> 0:13:27.760 he was even scheming to take the throne. She had 0:13:27.800 --> 0:13:30.520 all the evidence necessary to have one of those bulletin 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:33.839 boards with photos and pins and red string. It seemed 0:13:33.840 --> 0:13:36.240 that in the months before Nicholas took control of the army, 0:13:36.320 --> 0:13:40.400 Nikolasha had been meeting with the government ministers without the Czar. 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:43.199 In fact, Alexander learned that the ministers had been taking 0:13:43.240 --> 0:13:46.880 reports to Nikolasha and not to her husband, even when 0:13:46.880 --> 0:13:49.480 the matters didn't concern the fighting on the front lines. 0:13:50.600 --> 0:13:52.720 It might not seem so strange to us now looking 0:13:52.760 --> 0:13:56.040 back on how important Nikolasha was as the man directing 0:13:56.040 --> 0:13:58.760 the war efforts, but to Alexandra it was a sign 0:13:58.800 --> 0:14:01.880 that Nikolasha was making in a play to sideline Nicholas. 0:14:02.320 --> 0:14:04.560 As much as she hated to have her husband leave 0:14:04.600 --> 0:14:07.320 her side and go to the front, she was convinced 0:14:07.400 --> 0:14:11.760 that Nikolasha needed to be crushed. I have absolutely no 0:14:11.880 --> 0:14:15.400 faith in Nikolasha, she wrote to the Czar. Having gone 0:14:15.480 --> 0:14:18.760 against a man of God, his work can't be blessed. 0:14:19.560 --> 0:14:22.480 It didn't help that Nikolasha was in fact deeply loyal 0:14:22.520 --> 0:14:26.160 to Nicholas and to Russia. He was against Rasputin, and 0:14:26.240 --> 0:14:28.320 it was no secret that he wasn't the only one. 0:14:28.680 --> 0:14:31.760 So if Nikolasha had to go, what about the others. 0:14:32.480 --> 0:14:36.400 Here's more from Helen Rappaport. Nicholas was a long way 0:14:36.440 --> 0:14:39.880 way at Army h Q, and she was always very 0:14:39.880 --> 0:14:44.560 opinionated about what kind of ministers Nicholas should appoint. Generally, 0:14:44.600 --> 0:14:49.400 a lot of toadies and yesmen were appointed during Nicholas's reign, 0:14:49.520 --> 0:14:53.600 who were often incompetent and weak and ineffectual. But Alexandra 0:14:54.040 --> 0:14:56.680 was the one who wanted to have a retinue of 0:14:56.800 --> 0:15:02.280 yes men who did as she felt, you know, things 0:15:02.280 --> 0:15:08.320 should be done. And she constantly harangued Nicholas, pressing him 0:15:08.360 --> 0:15:12.560 into sucking this minister. I don't like that, minister. You know, 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:14.880 you should get rid of so and so. And it 0:15:15.000 --> 0:15:18.840 was normally because they wouldn't the line, the line they 0:15:18.840 --> 0:15:22.080 wouldn't tow was the one set by Alexandra, of course. 0:15:22.320 --> 0:15:25.240 And when it came to qualifications, Alexandra had at least 0:15:25.280 --> 0:15:29.000 one easy test. What did they think of Rasputin? Were 0:15:29.000 --> 0:15:31.200 they on the side of Nikolasha and so many others 0:15:31.520 --> 0:15:33.920 an enemy of the friend God put by their side, 0:15:34.320 --> 0:15:37.680 then they couldn't possibly be suitable candidates to govern the empire. 0:15:38.760 --> 0:15:41.240 No one's job was safe, not even the men who 0:15:41.240 --> 0:15:45.320 Grigory and Alexandra selected to lead the Russian government. One 0:15:45.320 --> 0:15:48.160 wrong move and they went from inside track to out 0:15:48.200 --> 0:15:51.240 in the cold. Here's Douglas Smith to tell us more 0:15:52.360 --> 0:15:56.760 this phenomenon that becomes known as ministerial leap frog, where basically, 0:15:56.800 --> 0:15:59.200 like one prime minister is being sacked, a new one 0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:02.120 hired every other month. There's a there's a new head 0:16:02.160 --> 0:16:05.520 of the police, there's changes at the upper echelons of 0:16:05.560 --> 0:16:09.440 the military and other um posts in the government, Minister 0:16:09.560 --> 0:16:12.520 of Interior and what have you. By those latter years, 0:16:12.800 --> 0:16:19.160 Risputant is exercising more influence on ministerial appointments, has more 0:16:19.200 --> 0:16:23.480 opinion about these things, and Alexandra listens to him and 0:16:23.520 --> 0:16:27.360 tries to lean on Nicholas to make some of these changes. 0:16:28.320 --> 0:16:31.160 Bizarre was still the one with the final word, but 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:34.400 more and more Nicholas made appointments and fired officials from 0:16:34.480 --> 0:16:38.720 a distance on Alexandra's advice, and the whole time she 0:16:38.840 --> 0:16:42.880 was looking out for her friend, Rasputants enemies are like 0:16:43.000 --> 0:16:47.200 spiders around us. Alexandra wrote to Nicholas, Russia will not 0:16:47.320 --> 0:16:50.040 be blessed if we let a man of God be persecuted. 0:16:50.680 --> 0:16:54.480 She demanded that intrigues against their spiritual advisor be forbidden. 0:16:54.760 --> 0:16:58.520 She didn't even want government officials talking about him. Anyone 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:02.800 who disobeyed should be pushed out of power. To Alexandra, 0:17:02.960 --> 0:17:05.680 with the war needed was government officials who would support 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:08.679 the guidance that the Czar was receiving from God and 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:11.920 from Gregory. And what better way to find the right 0:17:12.000 --> 0:17:15.959 help than to consult Resputin himself. After all, Alexander had 0:17:15.960 --> 0:17:18.959 spent her years as empress avoiding the mess of elite 0:17:19.000 --> 0:17:23.520 Russian life. Retreats after retreat to yachts, hunting, lodges, and 0:17:23.600 --> 0:17:26.080 her bed had left her with very little clue of 0:17:26.080 --> 0:17:29.360 where to turn when she actually needed help. She couldn't 0:17:29.400 --> 0:17:32.879 even rely on Stanta and Melitza, so who was left 0:17:33.640 --> 0:17:37.480 well just one man. Suddenly, the thing that resputants critics 0:17:37.520 --> 0:17:40.600 had feared for so long was coming true. For years, 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:43.400 the rumors that Resputant was pulling the strings had been 0:17:43.560 --> 0:17:48.159 merely that, just rumors. His advice had been mostly encouragement 0:17:48.240 --> 0:17:51.920 for a troubled royal family. But now a new opportunity 0:17:52.040 --> 0:17:56.800 was presenting itself. With Nicholas away and Alexandra taking control, 0:17:57.119 --> 0:18:00.520 Grigory could finally become a real force behind the throne. 0:18:00.880 --> 0:18:03.600 And Grigory had his own reasons for wanting to grip 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:06.560 the wheel. After all, the scar that still crossed his 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:09.600 stomach was a testament to just how much his enemies 0:18:09.640 --> 0:18:14.240 wanted him dead. Here's Douglas Smith to remind us what's 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:17.359 important to remember is that part of the reason Resputant 0:18:17.359 --> 0:18:20.720 is doing this is he is very much fearful for 0:18:20.840 --> 0:18:25.480 his life. There have been several attempted assassinations of resputing 0:18:25.760 --> 0:18:30.240 and he is terrified that the people in charged with 0:18:30.359 --> 0:18:33.360 keeping him safe are in fact the ones that want 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:36.760 him dead. And so he is very much leaning on 0:18:36.920 --> 0:18:40.000 Alexandra to make sure that the people they hired to be, 0:18:40.080 --> 0:18:42.080 for example, the head of the police or the Ministry 0:18:42.080 --> 0:18:45.000 of the Interior, are in fact allies of his and 0:18:45.080 --> 0:18:48.720 not enemies just waiting to do him in. As we've seen, 0:18:48.840 --> 0:18:53.040 if Grigory was driven by his personal paranoia, so was Alexandra. 0:18:53.440 --> 0:18:55.720 They were relying on each other to see their way 0:18:55.720 --> 0:18:59.600 through the empire's dark days. Gregory relied on his empress, 0:19:00.040 --> 0:19:03.760 Alexandra relied on Gregory's insight from God. But there was 0:19:03.840 --> 0:19:06.800 little insight to be found, and in the coming days, 0:19:06.840 --> 0:19:09.400 as more power came into their hands, they would come 0:19:09.440 --> 0:19:13.680 to see clearly that Grigory Rasputin was right about one thing. 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:17.880 At least, he had enemies on every side, and they 0:19:17.920 --> 0:19:24.920 were coming for his life, someone you can do business with. 0:19:25.640 --> 0:19:28.719 That's what they called grigory. It was obvious to everyone 0:19:28.760 --> 0:19:31.720 how things at the top were starting to change. Restputants 0:19:31.760 --> 0:19:35.400 critics were being thrown from the moving car. But if 0:19:35.440 --> 0:19:38.480 you were a political schemer and you wanted to get in, well, 0:19:38.560 --> 0:19:41.000 now there was an empty seat just waiting for you. 0:19:41.359 --> 0:19:43.760 The czar may have always been out of reach, but 0:19:43.840 --> 0:19:47.399 what about the elevated Siberian peasant with a penchant for drink, 0:19:47.520 --> 0:19:51.120 expensive clothes and nights out on the town. If other 0:19:51.119 --> 0:19:53.919 officials and ministers had tried to save Russia by tearing 0:19:54.000 --> 0:19:59.000 Rasputant down, a very different approach was now on offer. Flattery, gifts, 0:19:59.040 --> 0:20:02.080 and gossip. They were the stock in trade for many 0:20:02.160 --> 0:20:05.199 who had always been held on the outside. Now the 0:20:05.240 --> 0:20:09.240 wheelers and dealers around Petrograd saw doors opening for them 0:20:09.280 --> 0:20:14.000 as well. The opportunist with the Czarina's ear, well, that 0:20:14.040 --> 0:20:17.200 looked like an opportunity. But for men like the ones 0:20:17.240 --> 0:20:20.440 who stepped into the picture, Resputant was only valuable when 0:20:20.480 --> 0:20:23.199 he was still their route to the palace. Once they 0:20:23.200 --> 0:20:26.760 found themselves in the government's inner circle. Though, grigory respute 0:20:26.760 --> 0:20:30.639 and went from being an opportunity to a liability because 0:20:30.680 --> 0:20:33.800 anyone who wanted to use resputant to get to Alexandra 0:20:34.160 --> 0:20:36.760 soon found they would have to dispose of him if 0:20:36.800 --> 0:20:39.160 they wanted to get their own way. So the next 0:20:39.160 --> 0:20:42.360 time a call came threatening Grigory's life, it came from 0:20:42.400 --> 0:20:45.760 inside the house that he built. Here's Douglas Smith to 0:20:45.800 --> 0:20:49.480 give us the fascinating details. There are several plots and 0:20:49.520 --> 0:20:52.000 assassinations that were in the gainst for spute in his lifetime, 0:20:52.040 --> 0:20:54.520 and one of the more bizarre was put together by 0:20:54.560 --> 0:20:56.800 the so called troy Ka the Threesome, the head of 0:20:56.800 --> 0:21:01.120 which was the Minister of Interior, man named Stoff, who 0:21:01.160 --> 0:21:04.560 in fact got the job as minister claiming to be 0:21:04.640 --> 0:21:07.919 a defender of respute and an ally of Resputing the 0:21:07.960 --> 0:21:10.200 fact that he was even chosen at all, though, shows 0:21:10.280 --> 0:21:13.760 just how naive Gregory and Alexandra were, because while it 0:21:13.880 --> 0:21:16.520 was true that their new Minister of Interior was a 0:21:16.560 --> 0:21:19.280 well known and well connected man, the thing he was 0:21:19.359 --> 0:21:23.280 mostly known for was corruption. Yes, he had been a 0:21:23.320 --> 0:21:26.360 member of Eliador's right wing terrorist group, but he had 0:21:26.400 --> 0:21:29.440 also been a provincial governor. He had been elected to 0:21:29.480 --> 0:21:32.399 the Duma, but he didn't make friends there. The others 0:21:32.440 --> 0:21:35.800 called him a hooligan, a criminal, and a scoundrel. His 0:21:35.880 --> 0:21:39.720 patriotism was flamboyant and his hatred for Germans was real, 0:21:40.240 --> 0:21:42.920 but anyone who actually knew him could see that he 0:21:43.000 --> 0:21:47.240 was really just out for himself. When he was first appointed, 0:21:47.320 --> 0:21:50.920 Grigory was overjoyed resput and thought that finally he had 0:21:50.920 --> 0:21:54.200 a man in the government who would attend directly to him. 0:21:54.240 --> 0:21:56.639 After all, the new minister had made every promise that 0:21:56.680 --> 0:22:00.000 Gregory and Alexandra wanted to hear. He would crack down 0:22:00.080 --> 0:22:03.080 the press, he would help get Rasputants allies into other 0:22:03.160 --> 0:22:06.480 high positions. He would even supply Gregory with a regular 0:22:06.520 --> 0:22:10.720 allowance of money from the government coffers. When Gregory returned 0:22:10.760 --> 0:22:13.120 to Petrograd from a trip to Siberia in the fall 0:22:13.160 --> 0:22:16.720 of nineteen fifteen, he was buzzing with excitements. Things were 0:22:16.760 --> 0:22:19.480 finally going his way, but it was all too good 0:22:19.520 --> 0:22:21.919 to be true. Once he was appointed to serve in 0:22:21.920 --> 0:22:24.800 the Tsar's government as an ally to Rasputin, the new 0:22:24.840 --> 0:22:28.320 minister's true colors were on display. He very quickly then 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:32.080 shifts to the other side, to the competing camp, and 0:22:32.119 --> 0:22:35.760 starts trying to dream up ways to to do in Resputin. 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:38.480 He he plots to have him put on a train 0:22:38.560 --> 0:22:42.159 and sent off outside the capital, and then someone was 0:22:42.200 --> 0:22:44.160 going to come and pick him up and throw him 0:22:44.160 --> 0:22:48.560 off a speeding train. Um. There's attempts to put together 0:22:48.640 --> 0:22:52.720 a bottle of poison wine that he will drink and die. Um. 0:22:52.760 --> 0:22:55.040 And then together with a couple of others, he comes 0:22:55.119 --> 0:22:59.760 up with trying to lure Iliador, who by this time 0:23:00.000 --> 0:23:04.440 has fled Russia for Norway, to pay iliad Or sixty 0:23:04.520 --> 0:23:09.640 thousand rubles if iliad Or could get some of his 0:23:09.960 --> 0:23:15.679 allies who are still in Russia to shoot and kill Resputing. 0:23:16.520 --> 0:23:20.640 Now this plotting gets very complex. It's like a bizarre 0:23:20.680 --> 0:23:24.120 sort of crime story, but it all comes to light 0:23:24.160 --> 0:23:27.639 before it can happen. The moves that Nicholas was making 0:23:27.920 --> 0:23:31.520 at Alexandra and Rasputin's advice, of course, were turning his 0:23:31.560 --> 0:23:34.600 administration into a kind of wild West, the kind of 0:23:34.640 --> 0:23:36.880 place where, even once he was caught to the new 0:23:36.920 --> 0:23:40.240 minister thought he could simply talk his way out of consequences. 0:23:41.040 --> 0:23:43.480 Plus Stoff claims that no, no, no, I was never 0:23:43.520 --> 0:23:46.159 trying to kill Resputin. I was trying to out a 0:23:46.280 --> 0:23:48.960 plot to kill Resputin, but in the end of the 0:23:48.960 --> 0:23:51.680 whole thing blows up in his face. But it offers 0:23:51.760 --> 0:23:55.480 further proof to Alexander and Resputing that even the people 0:23:55.520 --> 0:23:58.800 that they hire in place and positions of power to 0:23:58.880 --> 0:24:02.959