Reflections on the Limits of the Possible: Admiral Z.P. Rozhestvensky as assessed by Russian historians

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article examines the disputes between Russian memoirists, historians, and naval writers over Admiral Z. P. Rozhestvensky that have taken place for more than 100 years. After the Battle of Tsushima, Admiral Rozhestvensky came in for sustained criticism from several generations of pre-revolutionary and Soviet historians. They were inclined to put all the blame for the Tsushima defeat on the Commander of the Second Pacific Squadron. However, a complete revision of attitudes toward Rozhestvensky began in the time of Perestroika from the late 1980s, when censorship and ideological barriers to alternative viewpoints were finally lifted. During the 1990s–early 2000s, the personality of Rozhestvensky became the subject of heated debate. The authors of this article claim that modern Russian historians are no less politically motivated in their opinions of Rozhestvensky than their predecessors.