The Impact of the Russian Military System on Nineteenth Century Russian Expansionism in the Caucasus and Central Asia

This work explores the Russian military system after the Napoleonic Wars, and the impact the military ideologies developed therein had on Russian expansionist efforts in two separate conflicts. The Russian conquests of the Caucasus and Central Asian regions are the expansionist efforts under focus, and specifically battles at Dargo in the Caucasus and Khiva in Central Asia are analyzed. It is argued that, due to a Russian military system that refused to move away from Napoleonic era tactics and ideas, the conquest of the Caucasus was a far more difficult endeavor than the Russian seizure of Central Asia, where largely similar tactics were employed. The established Russian military system created a military that was ill-suited for combat in the Caucasus, and disabled its ability to learn from that conflict. This same system was equally responsible for allowing the Russians to easily defeat their enemies in a Central Asian setting.