Aleksandr II

When Aleksandr II ascended the throne of Russia, he had to immediately confront the issue of the Crimean War. In a way, the situation resembled a cruel joke that had been played on Russia. In 1815, Russian armies stood victorious in the triumph over Napoleon, and it was tsar Aleksandr I who had led the march down the Champs Elysees in Paris. (almost) Nicholas II had then ruled Russia for over twenty years, seemingly emphasizing the military might of Russia that entire time and ruling like a commanding general, but then along came this nasty little conflict between Russia and the Ottoman Empire, and suddenly the allies that had helped Russia in the struggle with Napoleon were turned against Russia and allied with the Turks. In addition to that little bit of irony, it was the Turks, French and British who invaded Russian territory on the Crimean peninsula, and it was those armies, supplied over a tenuous thousand mile sea voyage, who were doing better than the Russian armies. While the Russians fought bravely, they were terribly under-supplied and forced to fight in dreadful circumstances. So, when Aleksandr became tsar he had to deal with the war situation (he almost immediately began peace negotiations which turned out better than the Russians could have expected), and then he had to figure out what had put Russia into the debacle. His answer was that Russia needed to reform itself if it was to remain a great power.