With the unsuccessful and bloody Russo-Japanese War

With the unsuccessful and bloody Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905) there was unrest in army reserve units. On January 2, 1905 Port Arthur was lost, and the Russian Baltic Fleet mauled at Tsushima; in February 1905, the Russian army was defeated at Mukden, losing almost 80,000 men in the process. Witte was dispatched to make peace, negotiating the Treaty of Portsmouth (signed 18 September [O.S. 5 September] 1905). In 1905, there were naval mutinies at Sevastopol (see Sevastopol Uprising), Vladivostok, and Kronstadt, peaking in June with the mutiny aboard the Battleship Potemkin — some sources claim over 2,000 sailors died in the restoration of order.[2] The mutinies were disorganised and quickly crushed. Despite these mutinies, the armed forces were largely apolitical and remained mostly loyal, if dissatisfied — and were widely used by the government to control the 1905 unrest.