ИСТИНА

The beginning of the First World War was marked by a tidal wave of patriotic enthusiasm that swept through all the European Great Powers. City squares were flooded by ecstatic crowds; legislative assemblies declared their unanimous determination to fight to the bitter end. Till then, all political groups concluded party truce and in the name of victory committed themselves to work together. Thanks to the French president R. Poincaré’s good grace, this policy went down in history as “Union Sacrée.” In Russian Empire its own variant of “Union Sacrée” also was established. On the emergency session of the State Duma 8 August 1914 representatives of almost all Russian political parties (apart from the Bolsheviks) declared their unanimous support for the Tsarist government’s military efforts. Scenes of the Duma’s parties rallied around the throne profoundly shocked the contemporaries and made them think, especially the intelligentsia, about the nature and the essence of the patriotic enthusiasm experienced by the Russian society. In the center of the discussions to follow was the issue of Russian nationalism. The present paper is based on a wide range of primary sources including archive documents, memoirs, and diaries, and contains a comparative analysis of views of Russian liberals and conservatives on political and social events of 1914-1915. This approach opens a prospect of better understanding of Russia’s “Union Sacrée” peculiarities and of subsequent revolutionary upheavals.