Cossacks in the Civil War. Part IV. And what did you fight for?
Don froze more 3 on January 1920 of the year and the Soviet commander Shorin ordered his 1 Horse Mounted and 8 armies to be forced from the cities of Nakhichevan and Aksai. General Sidorin ordered to prevent this and smash the enemy at the crossings, which was done. After this failure, the 1-I Cavalry Army was assigned to the reserve and to replenish. 16 January 1920, the Southeast Front was renamed Caucasian, commanded by Tukhachevsky on February 4. He was tasked with completing the rout of General Denikin’s armies and seizing the North Caucasus before the war with Poland began. Three reserve Latvian divisions and one Estonian are transferred to reinforcement of this front. In the front line, the number of red troops reached 60 thousands of bayonets and sabers against 46 thousands of whites. In turn, General Denikin also prepared the offensive with the aim of returning Rostov and Novocherkassk. In early February, the Red cavalry corps of Dumenko was defeated on Manych, and as a result of the onset of the Kutepov Volunteer Corps and the 3rd Don 20 Corps of February, White again captured Rostov and Novocherkassk, which, according to Denikin, “caused an explosion of exaggerated hopes in Ekaterinodar and Novorossiysk ... However, the movement to the north could not get development, because the enemy went already to the deep rear of the Volunteer Corps - to Tikhoretskaya ".
The fact is that simultaneously with the onset of the Volunteer Corps, the shock group of the 10 Army of the Reds broke through the defenses of the whites in the area of responsibility of the unstable and decaying Kuban Army, and the 1 Cavalry Army was introduced into the breakthrough to develop success on Tikhoretskaya. The equestrian group of General Pavlov (II and IV Don corps) was advanced against her. On the night of February 19, Pavlov's equestrian group struck at Trading, but White's bitter attacks were repulsed. The white cavalry was forced to retreat to Middle Egorlyk in a bitter cold. Leaving the Merchant, the Cossack regiments joined the main forces, which were in a very unattractive position, located under the open sky on the snow, in a terrible frost. The morning awakening was terrible and there were quite a few frozen ones in the corpus. To turn the tide in their favor, the White Command 25 of February decided to strike at the rear of the 1 Cavalry Army. Budyonny was aware of the movement of Pavlov’s group, and he prepared for battle. Rifle divisions took positions. Horse regiments lined up in columns. The head brigade of the IV Corps was unexpectedly attacked by Budyonny's cavalry, crumpled and turned into erratic flight, which upset the following columns. As a result, to the south of strategically important Middle Egorlyk 25 February, a battle takes place - the largest for the whole history civil war oncoming equestrian battle of up to 25 thousands of sabers on both sides (15 thousands of reds against 10 thousands of whites). The battle was distinguished by a purely cavalry character. The attacks of opponents took turns within a few hours and were distinguished by extreme bitterness. Horse attacks occurred with alternating alternation of movements of horse masses from one side to another. The retreating masses of one cavalry were pursued by the enemy’s horse mass rushing after it to their reserves, when approaching which the attackers fell under heavy artillery and machine-gun fire. The attackers stopped and turned back, but at this time the enemy's cavalry, recovering and replenishing their reserves, proceeded to the pursuit and drove the enemy also to its original position, where the attackers fell into the same position. After artillery and machine-gun fire, they turned back, pursued by the returning cavalry of the enemy. Fluctuations of horse masses, occurring from one height to another through the vast basin that divided them, continued from 11 in the afternoon until the evening. A Soviet author, evaluating the operation of Pavlov's equestrian group, concludes: "The once white glorious cavalry that thundered with glorious battles and dashing attacks, the best white cavalry, lost much of its menacing meaning on Denikin and our Caucasian fronts." This moment for the Don cavalry in the history of the civil war was decisive, and after that everything went to the fact that the Don cavalry quickly lost its moral stability and, without resistance, began to quickly roll towards the Caucasus Mountains. This battle actually decided the fate of the battle for the Kuban. The cavalry army of Budyonny, leaving its cover in the direction of Tikhoretskaya with the support of several infantry divisions, moved to pursue the remnants of the equestrian group of General Pavlov. After this battle, the white army, having lost the will to resist, retreated. The Reds won the war in the southeast against the Cossacks. The civil war between the Whites and the Reds of the Southeastern Front practically ended in this battle of the select horsemen of both warring parties.
Fig. 1 Battle of the 1 Mounted Army under Egorlyk
March 1 The volunteer corps left Rostov, and the white armies began to retreat to the Kuban River. The Cossack units of the Kuban Army (the most unstable part of the Volyn) completely decayed and began to surrender en masse to red or go over to the "green" side, which led to the collapse of the white front and the retreat of the remnants of the Volunteer Army in Novorossiysk. The next most significant events were the crossing over the Kuban, the Novorossiysk evacuation, and the transfer of part of the whites to the Crimea. 3 March Red troops approached Yekaterinodar. Stavropol was commissioned more 18 February. The Kuban region was overwhelmed by retreating and advancing waves of the contending parties, large batches of greens were formed in the mountains, which declared that they were against the Reds and against the Whites, in fact it was one of the ways to get out of the war, and the greens (if necessary) easily turned into red. By the spring of 1920, in the rear of the whites, the 12-thousand-strong guerrilla army of greens was active, providing substantial assistance to the five advancing red armies, under the blows of which the front of the All-Soviet Union was falling apart, and the Cossacks were massively switching to the green ones. The volunteer army with the remnants of the Cossack units retreated to Novorossiysk, the Reds moved after. The success of the Tikhoretskaya operation allowed them to proceed to the Kuban-Novorossiysk operation, during which the 17 of March the 9-I army of the Caucasian Front under the command of I.P. Uborevicha took Ekaterinodar and forced the Kuban. Leaving Yekaterinodar and crossing over the Kuban, the refugees and military units fell into unfavorable environmental conditions. The low and swampy banks of the Kuban River and numerous rivers flowing from the mountains with swampy shocks impeded their movement. Circassian auls with a population irreconcilably hostile and white and red were scattered along the foothills. The few stanitsas of the Kuban Cossacks were with a strong admixture of nonresident, most sympathizing with the Bolsheviks. In the mountains dominated the green. Negotiations with them led to nothing. Dobromrmiya and the I Don Corps retreated to Novorossiysk, which was a "vile sight." Behind the agonizing front in Novorossiysk, tens of thousands of people have accumulated, most of whom were completely healthy and fit with weapons in the hands to defend their right to exist. It was difficult to observe these representatives of the bankrupt government and intelligentsia: landowners, officials, the bourgeoisie, dozens and hundreds of generals, thousands of officers who were trying to quickly leave, angry, frustrated and cursing everyone and everything. Novorossiysk, in general, was a military camp and a rear nativity scene. In the meantime, in the port of Novorossiysk, troops were being loaded onto vessels of all types, more reminiscent of fistfights. All ships were provided for loading the Volunteer Corps, which 26-27 March from Novorossiysk went by sea to the Crimea. Not a single ship was given for parts of the Don Army, and General Sidorin, who had lost his temper, went to Novorossiysk with the goal of failing to ship Don units to shoot Denikin. This did not help, there were simply no ships, and the 9 Army of the Reds 27 in March captured Novorossiysk. Cossack units located in the Novorossiysk area were forced to surrender in red.
Fig. 2 Evacuation of whites from Novorossiysk
The other part of the Don Army, together with the Kuban units, was drawn into the mountainous hungry region and moved on Tuapse. March 20 I Kuban Shefner-Markevich occupied Tuapse, easily expelled from it occupied the red part of the city. Then he moved further to Sochi, and the cover of Tuapse was entrusted to the II Kuban Corps. The number of troops and refugees departing on Tuapse turned up to 57 LLC. There was only one solution left: to go to the borders of Georgia. But in the talks that began, Georgia refused to let the armed mass across the border, as it had neither food nor sufficient funds not only for the refugees, but even for itself. However, the movement towards Georgia nevertheless continued, and the Cossacks reached Georgia without any complications.
Faced with the defeat of his troops with the intensification of opposition sentiments in the white movement, Denikin 4 April left the post of Commander-in-Chief of the All-Soviet Union, handed over command to General Wrangel and the same day on the English battleship "The Emperor of India" departed with his friend, comrade and former chief of staff of the Soviet. General Romanovsky in England with an intermediate stop in Constantinople, where the latter was shot dead in the Russian Embassy in Constantinople by a lieutenant Kharuzin, a former counterintelligence officer and VSYUR.
April 20 from the Crimea to Tuapse, Sochi, Sukhum and Poti arrived military vessels to load the Cossacks and transport them to the Crimea. But only people who decided to part with their comrades, horses, were loaded, since the transportation could be carried out without horses and horse equipment. It should be said that the most implacable were evacuated. So the 80 th Zungar regiment did not accept the terms of surrender, did not lay down arms, and in full force along with the remnants of the Don units was evacuated to the Crimea. In Crimea, the 80 th Zungar regiment, consisting of the Salsk-Kalmyk Cossacks, marched in front of the Supreme Commander of the All-Soviet Union of Persons and Persons, P.N. Wrangel, as among the units evacuated from Novorossiysk and Adler, besides this regiment there was not a single armed unit. Most of the Cossack regiments, pressed to the shore, accepted the terms of the surrender and surrendered to parts of the Red Army. According to the Bolsheviks, on the Adler coast, they took 40 LLC man and 10 000 horses. It should be said that during the civil war, the Soviet leadership somewhat adjusted its policy regarding the Cossacks, trying not only to split it even more, but also to attract as much as possible to its side. For the leadership of the Red Cossacks and for agitation purposes, in order to show that not all Cossacks are against the Soviet power, a Cossack department is created under the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. As the Cossack military governments became increasingly dependent on the “white” generals, the Cossacks, one by one, and in groups began to side with the Bolsheviks. At the beginning of 1920, these transitions become widespread. In the Red Army, whole divisions of Cossacks begin to be created. Especially many Cossacks join the Red Army, when the White Guards are evacuated to the Crimea and throw tens of thousands of Don and Kuban residents onto the Black Sea coast. Most of the abandoned Cossacks, after filtration, are credited to the Red Army and sent to the Polish front. In particular, it was then that Guy's 3 Cavalry Corps, which was recorded in the Guinness Book of Records as “the best cavalry of all times and peoples”, was formed from prisoners of the White Cossacks. Along with the White Cossacks, a large number of white officers are credited to the Red Army. Then a joke was born: “The Red Army is like a radish, it’s red outside, it’s white inside.” Due to the large number of former whites in the Red Army, the military leadership of the Bolsheviks even imposed a limit on the number of white officers in the Red Army - no more than 25% of the commanding staff. "Surpluses" were sent to the rear, or went to teach in military schools. In all, about 15 of thousands of white officers served during the civil war in the Red Army. Many of these officers linked their fate with the Red Army, and some achieved a high position. So, for example, from this “appeal” the former adjoining the Don Army Shapkin TT during the Patriotic War, he was a lieutenant-general and a comic book, and the former Kolchak artillery headquarters captain L. Govorov. became the front and one of the marshals of Victory. However, the 25 March 1920, the Bolsheviks issued a decree on the abolition of the Cossack military lands. Soviet power was finally established on the Don and adjacent territories. The great Don Army ceased to exist. Thus ended the civil war on the lands of the Don and Kuban Cossacks and the entire southeast.
The Crimean peninsula was the last stage of the civil war in the southeast. He responded both in terms of geographical location and political aspiration of the leaders of the Volunteer Army, because he represented a neutral zone, independent of the power of the Cossack administration and the claims of the Cossacks for internal independence and sovereignty. Parts of the Cossacks transported from the Black Sea coast, in psychology, were also volunteers who left their territories and were deprived of the opportunity to fight directly for their lands, houses and property. The command of the Volunteer Army was relieved of the need to reckon with the governments of the Don, Kuban and Terek, but it was deprived of their economic base, necessary for the successful conduct of the war. It was obvious that the Crimean region was not a reliable territory for the continuation of the civil war, and for the continuation of the struggle it was necessary to build calculations only for unforeseen happy circumstances, or for a miracle, or to prepare for a final exit from the war and look for a way out. The number of army, refugees and rear services amounted to one and a half million people, especially those who were not inclined to put up with the Bolsheviks. Western countries with keen attention and curiosity watched the tragedy in Russia. England, which had previously taken an active part in the history of the white movement in Russia, was inclined to end civil strife, with the goal of concluding a trade agreement with the Soviets. General Wrangel, who replaced Denikin, was well acquainted with the general situation in Russia and in the West and had no bright hopes for a successful continuation of the war. Peace with the Bolsheviks was impossible, negotiations on concluding peace agreements were excluded, there was only one inevitable decision: to prepare the basis for a possible safe exit from the struggle, i.e. evacuation. Having entered command, General Wrangel vigorously stood up to continue the struggle, at the same time he directed all efforts to putting the ships and ships of the Black Sea in order fleet. At this time, an unexpected ally appeared in the struggle. Poland entered the war against the Bolsheviks, which opened up the possibility for the white command to have at least this very slippery and temporary ally in the struggle. Poland, taking advantage of the internal turmoil in Russia, began to spread the borders of its territory to the east and decided to occupy Kiev. On April 25, 1920, the Polish army, equipped at the expense of France, invaded Soviet Ukraine and on May 6 occupied Kiev.
Fig. 3 Soviet poster of the year 1920
Head of the Polish State U. Pilsudski hatched a plan to create a confederative state "from sea to sea", which would include the territory of Poland, Ukraine, Belarus, and Lithuania. Disregarding the claims of Poland unacceptable to Russian politics, General Wrangel agreed to an agreement with Pilsudski and concluded a military treaty with him. However, these plans were not destined to come true. The Reds began to take measures against the threat coming from the west. The Soviet-Polish war began. This war took the character of a national war among the Russian people and began successfully. On May 14, a counter-offensive began on the forces of the Western Front (commander M.N. Tukhachevsky), 26 May - South-West (Commander A.I. Egorov). Polish troops quickly began to retreat, did not hold Kiev, and in mid-July the Reds approached the borders of Poland. The Politburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), clearly overestimating its own forces and underestimating the forces of the enemy, set the Red Army command a new strategic task: to enter the territory of Poland with battles, take its capital and create conditions for the proclamation of Soviet power in the country. According to the statements of the Bolshevik leaders, in general, it was an attempt to push the "red bayonet" into Europe and thereby "stir up the Western European proletariat" and push it to support the world revolution. Speaking at 22 in September of 1920 at the 9th All-Russian Conference of the RCP (B), Lenin said: “We decided to use our military forces to help the Sovietization of Poland. From this followed the further general policy. We formulated it not in the official resolution recorded in the minutes of the Central Committee and representing the law for the party until the new congress. But among themselves we said that we should probe with bayonets, whether the social revolution of the proletariat in Poland had not matured. ” The order of Tukhachevsky to the troops of the Western Front No. 1423 from 2 July 1920 sounded even clearer and clearer: “In the West, the fate of the world revolution is decided. Through the corpse of White Poland Poland is the path to a global fire. On bayonets, we will carry happiness to working mankind! ” However, some military leaders, including Trotsky, feared for the success of the offensive and offered to respond to the proposals of the Poles for peace. Trotsky, who knew the state of the Red Army well, wrote in his memoirs: “There were hot hopes for the uprising of the Polish workers .... Lenin had a firm plan: to bring the matter to the end, that is, to join Warsaw in order to help the Polish working masses to overturn the Pilsudski government and seize power ... I found in the center a very strong mood in favor of bringing the war to the end. I strongly opposed this. The Poles have already asked for peace. I thought that we had reached the culmination point of success, and if, without calculating our strength, we go further, then we can pass by the already won victory - to defeat. ” Despite the views of Trotsky, Lenin and almost all members of the Politburo rejected his proposal for an immediate peace with Poland. The attack on Warsaw was entrusted to the Western Front, and to Lviv South-Western. The successful advance of the Red Army to the west created a great threat to Central and Western Europe. The Red cavalry invaded Galicia and threatened to occupy Lvov.
The attempt to invade Poland ended in disaster. The troops of the Western Front in August 1920 were routed near Warsaw (the so-called “Miracle on the Vistula”), and rolled back. During the battle of the five armies of the Western Front only 3-I survived, which managed to retreat. The rest of the armies were defeated or destroyed: the 4 Army and part of the 15 fled to East Prussia and were interned, the Mozyr group, the 15 and 16 armies were also defeated. More than 120 thousands of Red Army soldiers captured during the battle near Warsaw were taken prisoner, and 40 thousands more soldiers were in East Prussia in internment camps. This defeat of the Red Army is the most catastrophic in the history of the civil war. According to Russian sources, in the future about 80 thousands of Red Army soldiers out of the total number of Polish prisoners were killed by starvation, disease, torture, harassment, executions, or did not return to their homeland. It is reliably known only about the number of returned prisoners of war and interned - 75 699 people. In the estimates of the total number of prisoners of war, the Russian and Polish sides diverge - from 85 to 157 thousand people. The Soviets were forced to enter into peace negotiations. In October, the parties concluded a truce, and in March 1921, another “obscene world” was concluded, like Brest, only with Poland and also with a large contribution. According to its conditions for Poland, a significant part of the land in the west of Ukraine and Belarus with 10 million Ukrainians and Belarusians. None of the parties during the war reached its goals: Belarus and Ukraine were divided between Poland and the Soviet republics, which entered the Soviet Union in 1922 year. The territory of Lithuania was divided between Poland and the independent Lithuanian state. The RSFSR, for its part, recognized the independence of Poland and the legitimacy of the Pilsudski government, temporarily abandoned plans for a "world revolution" and the abolition of the Versailles system. Despite the signing of a peace treaty, relations between the USSR and Poland remained very tense over the following years, which ultimately led to the participation of the USSR in the partition of Poland in the 1939 year. During the Soviet-Polish war between the countries of the Entente disagreements arose on the issue of military-financial support of Poland. Negotiations on the transfer of part of the property and weapons captured by the Poles to Wrangel’s army also did not lead to any results due to the failure of the leadership of the white movement to recognize Poland’s independence. All this led to a gradual cooling and termination of the support of many countries of the white movement and anti-Bolshevik forces in general, and subsequently to the international recognition of the Soviet Union.
At the height of the Soviet-Polish war, Baron P.N. moved to active operations in the south. Wrangell. With the help of harsh measures of influence, including public executions of demoralized soldiers and officers, the general turned scattered Denikin divisions into a disciplined and efficient army. After the start of the Soviet-Polish war, the Russian Army (formerly-armed forces of the Soviet Union), which had recovered from the unsuccessful attack on Moscow, launched from the Crimea and by the middle of June occupied Northern Tavria. Military operations on the territory of the Tauride region can be attributed to military historians as examples of brilliant military art. But soon the resources of the Crimea were almost exhausted. In the supply of weapons and ammunition, Wrangel was forced to rely only on France, since England had already stopped helping White back in 1919. August 14 A landing party (1920 thousand bayonets and sabers) was landed from the Crimea in the Kuban under the direction of General S. G. Ulagai, with the aim of uniting with numerous rebels and opening a second front against the Bolsheviks. But the initial successes of the assault force, when the Cossacks, having crushed the red units thrown against them, had already reached the approaches to Ekaterinodar, could not be developed because of Ulagai’s mistakes, which, contrary to the original plan of the swift attack on the capital of the Kuban, had stopped the offensive and started regrouping the troops. This allowed the red to tighten reserves, create a numerical advantage and block parts of Ulagay. The Cossacks retreated to the coast of the Sea of Azov, to Achuev, from where 4,5 of September was evacuated to the Crimea, taking with them 7 of thousands of insurgents who joined them. Planted on Taman and in the area of Abrau-Durso, a few paratroopers to divert the forces of the Red Army from the main Ulagayev paratrooper after stubborn battles were also taken back to the Crimea. 10-thousandth guerrilla army Fostikova, operating in the area of Armavir-Maykop, to get to the aid of the landing force could not. In July-August, the main forces of the Wranglewiers fought successfully in defensive battles in Northern Tavria. After the failure of the assault force on the Kuban, realizing that the army blocked in the Crimea was doomed, Wrangel decided to break the encirclement and make his way towards the advancing Polish army.
But before moving the fighting to the right bank of the Dnieper, Wrangel threw parts of his Russian army to the Donbass in order to crush the Red Army units operating there and prevent them from striking the rear of the white army’s main forces, which they successfully managed . October 3 began the White offensive on the Right Bank. But the initial success failed to develop and October 15 Wrangel moved to the left bank of the Dnieper. Meanwhile, the Poles, contrary to the promises given to Wrangel, 12 of October 1920 of the year concluded an armistice with the Bolsheviks, who immediately began to deploy troops from the Polish front against the white army. October 28 units of the Southern Red Front, commanded by M.V. Frunze launched a counterattack, in order to encircle and defeat the Russian army of General Wrangel in Northern Tavria, not allowing it to withdraw to the Crimea. But the planned environment failed. The main part of Wrangel’s army to 3 November was transferred to the Crimea, where it consolidated on the prepared lines of defense. MV Frunze, concentrating around 190 thousands of fighters against 41 thousands of bayonets and sabers at Wrangel, on November 7 began storming the Crimea. Frunze wrote an appeal to General Wrangel, which was broadcast by the front radio station. After the text of the radio telegram was reported to Wrangel, he ordered the closure of all radio stations, except one, which was served by officers, in order to prevent the troops from familiarizing themselves with Frunze’s address. No reply was sent.
Fig. 4 Comfront M.V. Frunze
Despite the significant superiority in manpower and weapons, the Red forces could not for several days break the defenders of the Crimea. On the night of November 10, the machine-gun regiment on the carts and the cavalry brigade of the insurgent army of Makhno, under the command of Karetnik, forced the Sivash along the bottom. They were counterattacked under Yushun and Karpova Balka by the cavalry corps of General Barbovich. Against the Barbovich cavalry corps (4590 sabers, 150 machine guns, 30 cannons, 5 armored cars), the Makhnovists used their favorite tactical technique of the “false counter cavalry attack”. Cartwright located in the battle line immediately behind the lava of the cavalry Kozhin machine-gun regiment on the carts and led the lava to the oncoming battle. But when 400 - 500 meters remained up to White's horse lava, the Makhnov lava spread out on the sides of the flanks, the cart quickly turned around and machine gunners opened heavy fire from close range at the attacking enemy, who had nowhere to go. The fire was conducted with the highest voltage, creating a fire density up to 60 bullets per running meter of the front per minute. The Makhnovian cavalry at that time entered the enemy’s flank and defeated it with cold weapons. The machine-gun regiment of the Makhnovists, which was a mobile reserve of the brigade, in one battle completely destroyed almost the entire cavalry of the Wrangel army, which decided the result of the whole battle. Having smashed the Barbovich's cavalry corps, the Makhnovists and the red Cossacks of the 2 Cavalry Army Mironov went to the rear of Wrangel’s forces defending the Perekop Isthmus, which contributed to the success of the entire Crimean operation. The defense of the whites was broken and the Red Army broke into the Crimea. November 12 red was taken Dzhankoy, November 13 - Simferopol, November 15 - Sevastopol, November November 16 - Kerch.
Fig. 5 Liberation of the Crimea from the whites
After the Bolsheviks seized the Crimea, mass shootings of the civilian and military population began on the peninsula. The evacuation of the Russian army and civilians also began. For three days, troops, families of officers, and part of the civilian population from the Crimean ports of Sevastopol, Yalta, Theodosia, and Kerch were sunk on 126 ships. 14-16 November 1920, the armada of ships under the flag of St. Andrew’s left the Crimea, taking white regiments and tens of thousands of civilian refugees to foreign lands. The total number of voluntary exiles was 150 thousand people. Coming out on an improvised "armada" to the open sea and becoming inaccessible to the Reds, the commander of the armada sent a telegram addressed to "all ... all ... all ..." with a statement of the situation and a request for assistance.
Fig. 6 Running
France responded to the call for help, her government agreed to accept the army as emigrants for its support. After receiving consent, the fleet moved towards Constantinople, then the volunteer corps was sent to the Gallipoli peninsula (then it was the territory of Greece), and the Cossack units, after some stay in Chataldja camp, were sent to the island of Lemnos, one of the islands of the Ionian archipelago. After a year-long stay of the Cossacks in the camps, an agreement was reached with the Slavic Balkan countries on the deployment of military units and emigration in these countries, with a financial guarantee for their food, but without the right of free accommodation in the country. Under the difficult conditions of camp emigration, epidemics and famine were frequent and many of the Cossacks who left their homeland died. But this stage became the base from which accommodation of emigrants began in other countries, as opportunities for entry into European countries to work on contract with groups or individuals opened up, with permission to search for work on site, depending on professional training and personal abilities. About 30 thousands of Cossacks, once again believed the promises of the Bolsheviks and in 1922-1925 returned to Soviet Russia. Later, they were repressed. So for many years the white Russian army became for the whole world the vanguard and an example of an uncompromising struggle against communism, and the Russian emigration began to serve for all countries as a reproach and moral antidote to this threat.
With the fall of the White Crimea, organized resistance to the power of the Bolsheviks in the European part of Russia was stopped. But on the agenda for the red "dictatorship of the proletariat" there was an acute question of the struggle against peasant uprisings that swept all over Russia and directed against this power. Peasant uprisings, which have not stopped since 1918, turned into real peasant wars by the beginning of 1921, which was facilitated by the demobilization of the Red Army, as a result of which millions of men familiar with military affairs came from the army. These uprisings swept the Tambov region, Ukraine, the Don, Kuban, Volga region, the Urals and Siberia. Peasants demanded, first of all, changes in tax and agricultural policies. Regular units of the Red Army with artillery, armored vehicles and aviation. In February 1921, strikes and protest rallies of workers with political and economic demands also began in Petrograd. The Petrograd Committee of the RCP (B) qualified the unrest in the factories of the city as a rebellion and imposed martial law in the city, arresting workers' activists. But discontent spread to the armed forces. The Baltic Fleet and Kronstadt became agitated, once, as Lenin called them in 1917, "the beauty and pride of the revolution." However, the then “beauty and pride of the revolution” has long been either disappointed in the revolution, or perished on the fronts of the civil war, or together with another, swarthy and curly “beauty and pride of the revolution” from Little Russian and Belorussian places, planted the “dictatorship of the proletariat” in a peasant country . And now the Kronstadt garrison consisted of the same mobilized peasants, whom the "beauty and pride of the revolution" made happy with a new life.
Fig. 7 Beauty and pride of the revolution in the village
1 March 1921 of the year seamen and Red Army soldiers of Kronstadt Fortress (26 garrison of thousands of people) under the slogan “For Soviets without Communists!” Issued a resolution on supporting the workers of Petrograd, created a revkom and appealed to the country. Since in him, and in the softest form, almost all the demands of the people of that time were formulated, it makes sense to bring it in full:
Our country is going through a difficult moment. Hunger, cold, economic ruin have been holding us in iron grip for three years now. The Communist Party, ruling the country, broke away from the masses and was not able to bring it out of the state of general disruption. It did not count with the unrest that had recently taken place in Petrograd and Moscow, which rather clearly indicated that the party had lost the trust of the working masses. Not considered with the requirements of the workers. She considers them the machinations of counter-revolution. She is deeply mistaken. These unrest, these demands - the voice of the whole people, of all the working people. All the workers, sailors and Red Army men clearly see at the moment that only by common efforts, by the common will of the working people, can the country be given bread, firewood, coal, clothed and disheveled, and brought the republic out of the impasse ...
1. Since the present Soviets no longer reflect the will of the workers and peasants, immediately hold new, secret elections and for the election campaign provide full freedom of agitation among the workers and soldiers;
2. To grant freedom of speech and press to workers and peasants, as well as to all anarchist and left-socialist parties;
3. To guarantee freedom of assembly and coalition to all trade unions and peasant organizations;
4. To convene an over-party conference of workers, Red Army men and sailors of St. Petersburg, Kronstadt and St. Petersburg province, which should be held at the latest on March 10 on March 1921;
5. Release all political prisoners belonging to socialist parties, and release from prison all workers, peasants and sailors who were arrested in connection with workers and peasant unrest;
6. To verify the affairs of the remaining prisoners in prison and concentration camps, elect an audit commission;
7. Eliminate all political departments, since no party has the right to claim special privileges to distribute their ideas or financial support for this from the government; instead, establish cultural and educational commissions to be elected locally and funded by the government;
8. Immediately dissolve all barrage units;
9. Establish an equal size of the food ration for all workers, except for those whose work is particularly dangerous from a medical point of view;
10. Eliminate special communist departments in all formations of the Red Army and communist security groups in enterprises and replace them, where necessary, with compounds that should be allocated by the army itself, and in enterprises - formed by the workers themselves;
11. To give the peasants complete freedom to dispose of their land, as well as the right to own their livestock, provided that they manage their own means, that is, without hiring labor;
12. To request all soldiers, sailors and cadets to support our demands;
13. Ensure that these solutions are distributed in print;
14. To appoint a traveling control commission;
15. Allow the freedom of artisanal production, if it is not based on the exploitation of foreign labor. "
Convinced of the impossibility of reaching an agreement with the sailors, the authorities began to prepare for the suppression of the uprising. March 5 was restored 7-I army under the command of Mikhail Tukhachevsky, who were instructed "to suppress the uprising in Kronstadt as soon as possible." March 7 artillery began shelling Kronstadt. The leader of the uprising, S. Petrichenko, later wrote: "Standing up to the waist in the blood of working people, bloody field marshal Trotsky first opened fire on revolutionary Kronstadt, who rebelled against the sovereignty of the communists to restore the true power of the Soviets." 8 March 1921, on the opening day of the 10th Congress of the RCP (b), units of the Red Army launched an assault on Kronstadt. But the assault was repulsed, punitive troops, suffering heavy losses, retreated to their original lines. Sharing the demands of the rebels, many Red Army and army units refused to participate in suppressing the uprising. Began mass executions. For the second assault on Kronstadt, the most loyal units were put into battle, and even delegates to the party congress were thrown into battle. On the night of March 16, after an intensive shelling of the fortress, a new assault began. Thanks to the tactics of the shooting of retreating barrage detachments and the superiority of forces and means, Tukhachevsky's troops broke into the fortress, fierce street battles began, and only by the morning of March 18 the resistance in Kronstadt was broken. Part of the defenders of the fortress died in battle, the other went to Finland (8 thousand), the rest surrendered (of them shot by verdicts of the revtribunals - 2103 people). But the victims were not in vain. This uprising was the last straw that filled the cup of national patience, and made a tremendous impression on the Bolsheviks. 14 March 1921, the X congress of the RCP (b) adopted the new economic policy "NEP", which changed the policy of "war communism", carried out during the civil war.
By 1921, Russia literally lay in ruins. The territories of Poland, Finland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Western Ukraine, Western Belarus, the Kara region (in Armenia), and Bessarabia were separated from the former Russian Empire. The population in the remaining territories did not reach 135 million people. Losses in these territories as a result of wars, epidemics, emigration, reduction in the birth rate amounted to at least 1914 million people with 25. During the war, mining enterprises of the Donetsk coal basin, the Baku oil region, the Urals and Siberia suffered especially, many mines and mines were destroyed. Due to the lack of fuel and raw materials, the plants stopped. The workers were forced to leave the cities and leave for the village. The overall industry level has declined more than 6 times. The equipment has not been updated for a long time. Metallurgy produced as much metal as it was smelted under Peter I. Rural production declined by 40%. During the civil war, hunger, disease, terror, and in battles killed (according to various sources) from 8 to 13 million. Erlihman V.V. cites the following data: about 2,5 million people were killed and died from wounds, including 0,95 million Red Army soldiers; 0,65 million white soldiers and national armies; 0,9 million rebels of different colors. About 2,5 million people died as a result of terror. About 6 million people died from hunger and epidemics. Total killed about 10,5 million.
Emigrated from the country to 2 million. The number of street children has dramatically increased. According to different data in 1921-1922, in Russia there were from 4,5 to 7 million homeless. The damage to the national economy amounted to about 50 billion gold rubles. Industrial production fell in various industries to 4-20% of the year’s level of 1913. As a result of the civil war, the Russian people remained under the authority of the communists. The result of the Bolshevik domination was the outbreak of an apocalyptic general hunger, which covered Russia with millions of corpses. In order to avoid further hunger and general disruption, the Communists did not have any methods in the arsenal, and their brilliant leader, Ulyanov, decided to introduce the new economic program under the name NEP, to destroy the foundations of which they had taken all imaginable and inconceivable measures. November 19, 1919, in his speech, he said: “Farmers do not all understand that free trade in bread is a state crime: I produced bread; this is my product, and I have the right to trade them: this is how the peasant reasoned the old way. And we say it's a state crime. " Now, not only free trade in bread was introduced, but also in all others. Moreover, private property was restored, private enterprises were returned to their own enterprises, private initiative and wage labor were allowed. These measures satisfied the bulk of the country's population, above all the peasantry. After all, 85% of the population of the country were small proprietors, first of all peasants, and the workers were - it is ridiculous to say, a little more than 1% of the population. In 1921, the population of Soviet Russia in the then limits was 134,2 million, and industrial workers were 1 million 400 thousand. NEP was a turn on 180 degrees. Such a reboot was not to the liking of many Bolsheviks. Even their brilliant leader, who possessed a titanic mind and will, survived dozens of incredible metamorphoses and twists in his political biography, based on his crazy dialectics and bare, unprincipled, pragmatism, could not stand such ideological kulbit and soon lost his mind. And how many of his comrades-in-law have lost their minds or have committed suicide from changing the course, history is silent about this. In the party matured discontent, the political leadership responded with mass party cleansing.
Fig. 8 Lenin before death
With the introduction of the NEP, the country quickly came to life, and life in all respects began to revive in the country. The civil war, having lost economic reasons and a massive social base, quickly began to stop. And then it's time to ask questions: And what did you fight for? What have you achieved? What conquered? For the sake of what destroyed the country and put millions of lives of representatives of its people? After all, they returned almost to the starting points of being and ideology, from which the civil war began. The Bolsheviks and their followers do not like to answer these questions.
The answer to the question of who is responsible for the outbreak of a civil war in Russia does not depend on the facts, but depends on the political orientation of the people. The followers of the Reds naturally began the war of the whites, while the followers of the Whites naturally started the Bolsheviks. Do not strongly argue only about the places and dates of its beginning, as well as the time and place of its end. It ended in March 1921 of the year at the X Congress of the RCP (B.) With the introduction of the NEP, i.e. with the abolition of the policy of "war communism". And no matter how hard the Communists are and they do not mislead, this circumstance automatically gives the correct answer to the question posed. It was the irresponsible introduction of class chimeras of Bolshevism into the life and life of a peasant country that became the main cause of the civil war, and the abolition of these chimeras became the signal for its end. It also automatically solves the question of responsibility for all its consequences. Although history does not accept the subjunctive mood, but the whole course and especially the final of the war speak for the fact that if the Bolsheviks did not break the people's life through the knee, then there would not be such a bloody war. This is very eloquently indicated by the defeat of Dutov and Kaledin at the beginning of 1918. The Cossacks responded to their atamans clearly and concretely: “The Bolsheviks have done nothing wrong to us. Why do we go to fight with them? ". But everything changed dramatically after a few months of the real stay of the Bolsheviks in power, and in response, mass uprisings began. Throughout its history, humanity has unleashed a lot of senseless wars. Among them, civil wars are most often not only the most senseless, but also the most cruel and merciless. But even in this series of transcendental human idiocy, the civil war in Russia is phenomenal. It ended after the restoration of political and economic conditions of management, due to the cancellation of which, in fact, began. The bloody circle of crazy voluntarism closed. So what did you fight for? And who won?
The war ended, but it was necessary to solve the problem of deceived heroes of the civil war. There were many of them, for several years on foot and on horseback they were extracting a bright future for themselves, promised by commissars of all ranks and all nationalities, and now they demanded, if not communism, then at least a tolerable life for themselves and loved ones, to satisfy their most minimal needs. The heroes of the civil war occupied a significant and important place on the historical scene of 20's, and it was more difficult to cope with them than with a passive, frightened people. But they did their job, and it was their time to leave the historical scene, leaving it to other actors. Heroes were gradually declared oppositionists, deviationists, enemies of the party or the people, and doomed to destruction. For this, new frames were found, more obedient and loyal to the regime. The strategic goal of the leaders of communism was the world revolution and the destruction of the existing world order. Having seized the power and means of the Great Country, having a favorable international situation as a result of the World War, they turned out to be incapable of achieving their goals and could not successfully demonstrate their activities outside of Russia. The most encouraging success of the Reds was the promotion of their army to the line of the Vistula River. But after the crushing defeat of the “obscene world” with Poland, their claims to the world revolution and the advance into the depths of Europe before World War II were put to the limit.
Costly revolution Cossacks. During the brutal, fratricidal war, the Cossacks suffered huge losses: human, material and spiritual and moral. Only on the Don, where 1 1917 4 people of different classes lived on 428 January 846, did 1 1921 2 people stay on 252 January 973 of the year. In fact, every second was cut out. Of course, not everyone was “cut out” in the literal sense, many simply left their native Cossack districts, fleeing from the terror and arbitrariness of local combos and komchyacheek. The same picture was in all other territories of the Cossack Troops. In February, 1920, the 1-th All-Russian Congress of Labor Cossacks took place. He adopted a resolution on the abolition of the Cossacks as a special class. Cossack ranks and titles were eliminated, awards and insignia were abolished. Separate Cossack troops were liquidated and the Cossacks merged with the entire people of Russia. In the resolution "On the construction of Soviet power in the Cossack regions" the congress "recognized the inexpedient existence of separate Cossack authorities (military executive committees)" stipulated by the decree of the Council of People's Commissars of June 1 of 1918. In accordance with this decision, the Cossack villages and farms were now part of the provinces in which they were located. The Cossacks of Russia suffered a severe defeat. After a few years, the Cossack villages will be renamed volosts and the very word "Cossack" will begin to disappear from everyday life. Only on the Don and Kuban Cossack traditions and orders still existed, and dashing and detached, sad and intimate Cossack songs were sung.
It seemed that the Bolshevik rasskazyvanie took place abruptly, completely and irrevocably, and the Cossacks could never forgive this. But, despite all the atrocities, the overwhelming majority of the Cossacks, during the Great Patriotic War, resisted the patriotic positions and in the hard times took part in the war on the side of the Red Army. Only a few Cossacks betrayed their homeland and took the side of Germany. The Nazis declared these traitors descendants of the Ostrogoths. But that's another story.
Materials used:
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