Why did the Russians lose the Russo Japanese War?

Answer 1

In truth, just plain bad luck. However, if the Russians would've stuck to it (and Japan knew this by the way, that's why they had Teddy Roosevelt broker a settlement quickly) they would've won the war...because the Trans-Siberian Railroad was working up to full throttle bringing in fresh infantrymen. Japan was running out of both money & men; although the Russians had lost TWO out of their 3 battleship fleets (the Black Sea Battleship Fleet was the only Survivor) they were stronger on land than they were at sea...and Russia had plenty of manpower to fill their army; Japan didn't.

Answer 2

Three reasons, basically: hubris, incompetence and supply lines.

Tsar Nicholas II, a weak leader at the best of times, was persuaded by bureaucrats that "a short victorious war" would "stem the tide of revolution" which, in 1905, was even then endangering his rule. So he supported squatters' rights of Russian claimants to much of the Korean peninsula, which Japan believed was its property. Japan began the war, which descended into what a British observer described as "a primeval scrimmage." Russia sent a fleet of ships around the world to defeat the Japanese fleet.

The war was lost on land and sea because, first, the Japanese generals were better than the Russian ones and, second, because Russia had a 5,000-mile supply line to the front, across Siberia, through which the railway was not yet complete. The Russian fleet was soundly defeated at the Battle of Tsushima. The Russian defeat hastened and perhaps ensured the eventual fall of the Tsar; in Japan, a tradition of military hegemony was born which, 30 years later, would have profound consequences.