The Mind in the Machine 221work on it; some officers who turned up out of curiosity saw the disorder and
chased the men away, but were themselves attracted by the books and
minerals.' Murav·yev acknowledges frankly that he himself could not resist 'a
few novels which ... l read at night and then, to save the extra weight, used as
fuel for the stove'.^92 In this instance the men did not have the excuse of
hunger, although in their defence it should be added that other armies behaved
in like fashion; according to Murav· yev the Prussian troops took more than
the Russians did.
Looting was a particular scourge in the Balkans, where there was no civil
government infrastructure to protect the population against the troops'
ravages, but on the contrary the local notables enthusiastically joined in their
exactions. A recent student of the problem states that 'when the various plans
for .logistical support broke down, the army often simply took what it
needed'.^93 The military leaders issued ferocious orders against looters-in 1810
Kamensky II ordered culprits to be given 12,000 blows with the stick for this
offence^94 -but such violent measures were neither effective nor justified, given
the fact that official supply policy was based on much the same arbitrary prin-
ciple. The population of the 'liberated' areas was expected to maintain the Im-
perial armed forces in lieu of providing men themselves.^95
The Russian soldier certainly made a vital contribution to the empire's
expansion. Yet he scarcely constituted a stable element in maintaining order in
the annexed regions since he lacked the cultural prerequisites for such a func-
tion. He was indifferent, if not actively hostile, to ethr.ic groups whose ways
differed from his own. The very fact of conquest seemed to show that they
were inferior, and so reinforced his prejudices. This chauvinistic outlook was
seldom articulated, and in this it differed from the nationalism that was now
gaining currency in educated circles. It ensured that conflict rather than co-
operation became the hallmark of social interaction at the lowest level between
the various nationalities that made up the empire.
Was the outlook of the Russian soldier maturing? Many foreign cnt1cs
thought so. The anonymous author of a memorandum written for the French
government in the late 1790s argued that
wars have taught him that everywhere he can live better than in his native land; his pre-
judices are gradually disappearing and desertion has begun to spread. Besides this the
troops do not obey so blindly as before, dare to criticize orders by their superiors, and
often refuse to carry them out.^96
Another contemporary was still more sanguine: the soldiers had become less
staunch in battle and fought only because 'they now have cannon trained on
92 Murav·yev [-Karsky], 'Zapiski', RA (1886), 5, pp. 86-8.
93 Jewsbury, 'Russian Army's Role', p. 151.
94 Petrov, Russkaya voyennaya sila, ii. 272.^95 Stcherbatow, Paskevitsch, p. 35.
96 'Observations sur le militaire', MAE, M et D, Russie 14 (1745-1825, Forces militaires),
r. 123.