Revolution 1917 red and white. The largest civil wars

CIVIL WAR IN RUSSIA

Causes and main stages of the civil war. After the liquidation of the monarchy, the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries feared civil war most of all, which is why they agreed to an agreement with the Cadets. As for the Bolsheviks, they regarded it as a "natural" continuation of the revolution. Therefore, many contemporaries of those events considered the armed seizure of power by the Bolsheviks to be the beginning of the civil war in Russia. Its chronological framework covers the period from October 1917 to October 1922, that is, from the uprising in Petrograd to the end of the armed struggle in the Far East. Until the spring of 1918, hostilities were mostly local in nature. The main anti-Bolshevik forces were either engaged in political struggle (moderate socialists) or were in the stage of organizational formation (white movement).

From the spring-summer of 1918, a fierce political struggle began to develop into the form of an open military confrontation between the Bolsheviks and their opponents: moderate socialists, some foreign formations, the White Army, and the Cossacks. The second - "front stage" stage of the civil war begins, which, in turn, can be divided into several periods.

Summer-autumn 1918 - the period of escalation of the war. It was caused by the introduction of a food dictatorship. This led to the discontent of the middle peasants and wealthy peasants and the creation of a mass base for the anti-Bolshevik movement, which, in turn, contributed to the strengthening of the Socialist-Revolutionary-Menshevik "democratic counter-revolution" and the White armies.

December 1918 - June 1919 - the period of confrontation between the regular red and white armies. In the armed struggle against the Soviet regime, the white movement achieved the greatest success. One part of the revolutionary democracy went to cooperate with the Soviet government, the other fought on two fronts: with the White regime and the Bolshevik dictatorship.

The second half of 1919 - autumn 1920 - the period of the military defeat of the Whites. The Bolsheviks somewhat softened their position in relation to the middle peasantry, declaring "the need for a more attentive attitude towards their needs." The peasantry bowed to the side of the Soviet government.

The end of 1920 - 1922 - the period of the "small civil war". Deployment of mass peasant uprisings against the policy of "war communism". Growing dissatisfaction of the workers and the performance of the Kronstadt sailors. The influence of the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks increased again. All this forced the Bolsheviks to retreat, to introduce a new economic policy, which contributed to the gradual fading of the civil war.

The first outbreaks of the civil war. Formation of the white movement.

At the head of the anti-Bolshevik movement on the Don stood Ataman A. M. Kaledin. He declared the insubordination of the Don Cossacks to Soviet power. Everyone dissatisfied with the new regime began to flock to the Don. At the end of November 1917, General M.V. Alekseev began to form the Volunteer Army from the officers who had made their way to the Don. L. G. Kornilov, who had escaped from captivity, became its commander. The volunteer army marked the beginning of the white movement, so named in contrast to the red - revolutionary. White color symbolized law and order. The participants in the white movement considered themselves to be the spokesmen for the idea of ​​restoring the former power and might of the Russian state, the "Russian state principle" and a merciless struggle against those forces that, in their opinion, plunged Russia into chaos and anarchy - with the Bolsheviks, as well as with representatives of other socialist parties.

The Soviet government managed to form an army of 10,000, which in mid-January 1918 entered the territory of the Don. Most of the Cossacks adopted a policy of benevolent neutrality towards the new government. The decree on land gave little to the Cossacks, they had land, but they were impressed by the decree on peace. Part of the population provided armed support to the Reds. Considering his cause lost, Ataman Kaledin shot himself. The volunteer army, burdened with carts with children, women, politicians, went to the steppes, hoping to continue their work in the Kuban. On April 17, 1918, its commander Kornilov was killed, this post was taken by General A. I. Denikin.

Simultaneously with the anti-Soviet speeches on the Don, the movement of the Cossacks in the South Urals began. A. I. Dutov, the ataman of the Orenburg Cossack army, stood at its head. In Transbaikalia, the ataman G.S. Semenov fought against the new government.

The first uprisings against the Bolsheviks were spontaneous and scattered, did not enjoy the mass support of the population and took place against the backdrop of a relatively quick and peaceful establishment of the power of the Soviets almost everywhere ("the triumphal march of Soviet power", as Lenin said). However, already at the very beginning of the confrontation, two main centers of resistance to the power of the Bolsheviks developed: to the east of the Volga, in Siberia, where wealthy peasant owners predominated, often united in cooperatives and under the influence of the Social Revolutionaries, and also in the south - in the territories inhabited by the Cossacks, known for his love of freedom and commitment to a special way of economic and public life. The main fronts of the civil war were the Eastern and Southern.

Creation of the Red Army. Lenin was an adherent of the Marxist position that after the victory of the socialist revolution, the regular army, as one of the main attributes of bourgeois society, should be replaced by a people's militia, which would be convened only in case of military danger. However, the scope of anti-Bolshevik speeches required a different approach. On January 15, 1918, a decree of the Council of People's Commissars proclaimed the creation of the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army (RKKA). On January 29, the Red Fleet was formed.

The volunteer recruitment principle, which was initially applied, led to organizational disunity and decentralization in command and control, which had a detrimental effect on the combat effectiveness and discipline of the Red Army. She suffered a number of serious defeats. That is why, in order to achieve the highest strategic goal - to preserve the power of the Bolsheviks - Lenin considered it possible to abandon his views in the field of military development and return to the traditional, "bourgeois", i.e. to universal military service and unity of command. In July 1918, a decree was published on the general military service of the male population aged 18 to 40 years. During the summer - autumn of 1918, 300 thousand people were mobilized into the ranks of the Red Army. In 1920, the number of Red Army soldiers approached 5 million.

Much attention was paid to the formation of command personnel. In 1917-1919. in addition to short-term courses and schools, senior military officers were opened from the most distinguished Red Army soldiers to train the middle command level educational establishments. In March 1918, a notice was published in the press about the recruitment of military specialists from the tsarist army. By January 1, 1919, approximately 165,000 former tsarist officers had joined the ranks of the Red Army. The involvement of military experts was accompanied by strict "class" control over their activities. To this end, in April 1918, the party sent military commissars to the ships and troops, who oversaw command personnel and carried out the political education of sailors and Red Army men.

In September 1918, a unified command and control structure for fronts and armies was created. Each front (army) was headed by a Revolutionary Military Council (Revolutionary Military Council, or RVS), which consisted of a front (army) commander and two commissars. All military institutions were headed by the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, headed by L. D. Trotsky, who also took the post of People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs. Measures were taken to tighten discipline. Representatives of the Revolutionary Military Council, endowed with emergency powers (up to the execution of traitors and cowards without trial or investigation), went to the most tense sectors of the front. In November 1918, the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense was formed, headed by Lenin. He concentrated in his hands the fullness of state power.

Intervention. From the very beginning, the civil war in Russia was complicated by the intervention of foreign states in it. In December 1917, Romania, taking advantage of the weakness of the young Soviet government, occupied Bessarabia. The government of the Central Council proclaimed the independence of Ukraine and, having concluded a separate agreement with the Austro-German bloc in Brest-Litovsk, returned to Kyiv in March together with the Austro-German troops, which occupied almost all of Ukraine. Taking advantage of the fact that there were no clearly fixed borders between Ukraine and Russia, German troops invaded the Orel, Kursk, Voronezh provinces, captured Simferopol, Rostov and crossed the Don. In April 1918, Turkish troops crossed the state border and moved into the depths of Transcaucasia. In May, a German corps also landed in Georgia.

From the end of 1917, British, American and Japanese warships began to arrive in Russian ports in the North and the Far East, ostensibly to protect them from possible German aggression. At first, the Soviet government took this calmly and even agreed to accept aid from the Entente countries in the form of food and weapons. But after the conclusion of the Brest Peace, the presence of the Entente began to be seen as a threat to Soviet power. However, it was already too late. On March 6, 1918, an English landing force landed in the port of Murmansk. At a meeting of the heads of government of the Entente countries, it was decided not to recognize the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and to interfere in the internal affairs of Russia. In April 1918, Japanese paratroopers landed in Vladivostok. Then they were joined by British, American, French troops. And although the governments of these countries did not declare war on Soviet Russia, moreover, they covered themselves with the idea of ​​fulfilling "allied duty", foreign soldiers behaved like conquerors. Lenin regarded these actions as an intervention and called for a rebuff to the aggressors.

Since the autumn of 1918, after the defeat of Germany, the military presence of the Entente countries has become more widespread. In January 1919, landings were made in Odessa, the Crimea, Baku, and the number of troops in the ports of the North and the Far East was increased. However, this caused a negative reaction from the personnel of the expeditionary forces, for whom the end of the war was delayed for an indefinite period. Therefore, the Black Sea and Caspian landing forces were evacuated in the spring of 1919; the British left Arkhangelsk and Murmansk in the autumn of 1919. In 1920, British and American units were forced to leave the Far East. Only the Japanese remained there until October 1922. A large-scale intervention did not take place, primarily because the governments of the leading countries of Europe and the USA were frightened by the growing movement of their peoples in support of the Russian revolution. Revolutions broke out in Germany and Austria-Hungary, under the pressure of which these major monarchies collapsed.

"Democratic counter-revolution". Eastern front. The beginning of the "front" stage of the civil war was characterized by an armed confrontation between the Bolsheviks and moderate socialists, primarily the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, which, after the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, felt itself forcibly removed from its legitimate power. The decision to start an armed struggle against the Bolsheviks was strengthened after the latter dispersed in April-May 1918 many newly elected local Soviets, which were dominated by representatives of the Menshevik and Socialist-Revolutionary bloc.

The turning point of the new phase of the civil war was the appearance of the corps, consisting of prisoners of war of the Czechs and Slovaks of the former Austro-Hungarian army, who expressed a desire to participate in hostilities on the side of the Entente. The leadership of the corps proclaimed itself part of the Czechoslovak army, which was under the command of the commander-in-chief of the French troops. An agreement was concluded between Russia and France on the transfer of the Czechoslovaks to the western front. They were supposed to follow the Trans-Siberian Railway to Vladivostok, there they boarded ships and sailed to Europe. By the end of May 1918, trains with corps units (more than 45 thousand people) were stretched along railway from Rtishchevo station (near Penza) to Vladivostok over 7 thousand km. There was a rumor that the local Soviets were ordered to disarm the corps and extradite the Czechoslovaks as prisoners of war to Austria-Hungary and Germany. At a meeting of regimental commanders, a decision was made - not to hand over weapons and fight their way to Vladivostok. On May 25, the commander of the Czechoslovak units, R. Gaida, ordered his subordinates to seize the stations where they were at the moment. In a relatively short time, with the help of the Czechoslovak corps, Soviet power was overthrown in the Volga region, the Urals, Siberia and the Far East.

The main springboard for the Socialist-Revolutionary struggle for national power was the territories liberated by the Czechoslovaks from the Bolsheviks. In the summer of 1918, regional governments were created, consisting mainly of members of the AKP: in Samara - the Committee of Members of the Constituent Assembly (Komuch), in Yekaterinburg - the Ural Regional Government, in Tomsk - the Provisional Siberian Government. The Socialist-Revolutionary-Menshevik authorities acted under the flag of two main slogans: "Power not to the Soviets, but to the Constituent Assembly!" and "Liquidation of the Brest Peace!" Part of the population supported these slogans. The new governments managed to form their own armed detachments. With the support of the Czechoslovaks, Komuch's People's Army took Kazan on August 6, hoping then to move on Moscow.

The Soviet government created the Eastern Front, which included five formed in the shortest time armies. The armored train of L. D. Trotsky went to the front with a select combat team and a military revolutionary tribunal, which had unlimited powers. The first concentration camps were set up in Murom, Arzamas, and Sviyazhsk. Between the front and the rear, special barrage detachments were formed to deal with deserters. On September 2, 1918, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee declared the Soviet Republic a military camp. In early September, the Red Army managed to stop the enemy, and then go on the offensive. In September - early October, she liberated Kazan, Simbirsk, Syzran and Samara. Czechoslovak troops retreated to the Urals.

In September 1918, a meeting of representatives of the anti-Bolshevik forces was held in Ufa, which formed a single "All-Russian" government - the Ufa directory, in which the Socialist-Revolutionaries played the main role. The offensive of the Red Army forced the directory to move to Omsk in October. Admiral A. V. Kolchak was invited to the post of Minister of War. The Socialist-Revolutionary leaders of the directory hoped that the popularity he enjoyed in the Russian army would make it possible to unite the disparate military formations that acted against the Soviet regime in the expanses of the Urals and Siberia. However, on the night of November 17-18, 1918, a group of conspirators from the officers of the Cossack units stationed in Omsk arrested the socialists - members of the directory, and all power passed to Admiral Kolchak, who accepted the title of "Supreme Ruler of Russia" and the baton of the fight against the Bolsheviks on the Eastern Front.

"Red Terror". Liquidation of the House of Romanov. Along with economic and military measures, the Bolsheviks began to pursue a policy of intimidation of the population on a state scale, which was called the "Red Terror". In the cities, it assumed wide proportions from September 1918 - after the assassination of the chairman of the Petrograd Cheka, M. S. Uritsky, and the attempt in Moscow on the life of Lenin.

The terror was widespread. Only in response to the assassination attempt on Lenin, the Petrograd Chekists shot, according to official reports, 500 hostages.

One of the sinister pages of the "red terror" was the destruction of the royal family. October found the former Russian emperor and his relatives in Tobolsk, where in August 1917 they were sent into exile. In April 1918, the royal family was secretly transferred to Yekaterinburg and placed in a house that had previously belonged to the engineer Ipatiev. On July 16, 1918, apparently in agreement with the Council of People's Commissars, the Ural Regional Council decided to execute the tsar and his family. On the night of July 17, Nikolai, his wife, five children and servants were shot - a total of 11 people. Even earlier, on July 13, the tsar's brother Mikhail was killed in Perm. On July 18, 18 more members of the imperial family were executed in Alapaevsk.

Southern front. In the spring of 1918, the Don was filled with rumors about the upcoming equalizing redistribution of land. The Cossacks murmured. Then the order arrived in time for the surrender of weapons and the requisition of bread. The Cossacks revolted. It coincided with the arrival of the Germans on the Don. The Cossack leaders, forgetting about past patriotism, entered into negotiations with a recent enemy. On April 21, the Provisional Don Government was created, which began the formation of the Don Army. On May 16, the Cossack "Round of Don Salvation" elected General P. N. Krasnov as ataman of the Don Cossacks, endowing him with almost dictatorial powers. Relying on the support of the German generals, Krasnov declared the state independence of the Region of the Great Don Army. Parts of Krasnov, together with the German troops, launched military operations against the Red Army.

From the troops located in the region of Voronezh, Tsaritsyn and the North Caucasus, the Soviet government created in September 1918 the Southern Front, consisting of five armies. In November 1918, Krasnov's army inflicted a serious defeat on the Red Army and began to move north. At the cost of incredible efforts in December 1918, the Reds managed to stop the advance of the Cossack troops.

At the same time, the Volunteer Army of A.I. Denikin began its second campaign against the Kuban. The "volunteers" adhered to the Entente orientation and tried not to interact with Krasnov's pro-German detachments. Meanwhile, the foreign policy situation has changed dramatically. At the beginning of November 1918, the World War ended with the defeat of Germany and its allies. Under pressure and with the active help of the Entente countries, at the end of 1918, all the anti-Bolshevik armed forces of the South of Russia were united under the command of Denikin.

Military operations on the Eastern Front in 1919. On November 28, 1918, Admiral Kolchak, at a meeting with representatives of the press, stated that his immediate goal was to create a strong and efficient army for a merciless struggle against the Bolsheviks, which should be facilitated by the sole form of power. After the liquidation of the Bolsheviks, the National Assembly should be convened "for the establishment of law and order in the country." All economic and social reforms must also be postponed until the end of the fight against the Bolsheviks. Kolchak announced mobilization and put 400 thousand people under arms.

In the spring of 1919, having achieved a numerical superiority in manpower, Kolchak went on the offensive. In March-April, his armies captured Sarapul, Izhevsk, Ufa, Sterlitamak. The advanced units were located several tens of kilometers from Kazan, Samara and Simbirsk. This success allowed the Whites to outline a new perspective - the possibility of Kolchak's campaign against Moscow while simultaneously leaving the left flank of his army to join Denikin.

The counteroffensive of the Red Army began on April 28, 1919. The troops under the command of M.V. Frunze in the battles near Samara defeated the elite Kolchak units and took Ufa in June. On July 14 Yekaterinburg was liberated. In November, the capital of Kolchak, Omsk, fell. The remnants of his army rolled further east. Under the blows of the Reds, the Kolchak government was forced to move to Irkutsk. On December 24, 1919, an anti-Kolchak uprising was raised in Irkutsk. Allied troops and the remaining Czechoslovak detachments declared their neutrality. In early January 1920, the Czechs handed over Kolchak to the leaders of the uprising, in February 1920 he was shot.

The Red Army suspended its offensive in Transbaikalia. On April 6, 1920, in the city of Verkhneudinsk (now Ulan-Ude), the creation of the Far Eastern Republic was proclaimed - a "buffer" bourgeois-democratic state, formally independent of the RSFSR, but actually led by the Far Eastern Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b).

Campaign to Petrograd. At a time when the Red Army was winning victories over the Kolchak troops, a serious threat hung over Petrograd. After the victory of the Bolsheviks, many senior officials, industrialists and financiers emigrated to Finland. About 2.5 thousand officers of the tsarist army found shelter here. The emigrants created a Russian political committee in Finland, headed by General N. N. Yudenich. With the consent of the Finnish authorities, he began to form a White Guard army in Finland.

In the first half of May 1919, Yudenich launched an offensive against Petrograd. Having broken through the front of the Red Army between Narva and Lake Peipus, his troops created real threat city. On May 22, the Central Committee of the RCP(b) issued an appeal to the inhabitants of the country, which said: "Soviet Russia cannot give up Petrograd even for the shortest time ... The importance of this city, which was the first to raise the banner of insurrection against the bourgeoisie, is too great."

On June 13, the situation in Petrograd became even more complicated: anti-Bolshevik demonstrations by the Red Army broke out in the forts of Krasnaya Gorka, Gray Horse, and Obruchev. Not only the regular units of the Red Army, but also the naval artillery of the Baltic Fleet were used against the rebels. After the suppression of these speeches, the troops of the Petrograd Front went on the offensive and threw Yudenich's units back into Estonian territory. In October 1919, Yudenich's second offensive against Petrograd also ended in failure. In February 1920, the Red Army liberated Arkhangelsk, and in March, Murmansk.

Events on the Southern Front. Having received significant assistance from the Entente countries, Denikin's army in May-June 1919 went on the offensive along the entire front. By June 1919, she captured the Donbass, a significant part of Ukraine, Belgorod, Tsaritsyn. An attack on Moscow began, during which the Whites entered Kursk and Orel, and occupied Voronezh.

On Soviet territory, another wave of mobilization of forces and means began under the motto: "Everyone to fight Denikin!" In October 1919, the Red Army launched a counteroffensive. S. M. Budyonny's First Cavalry Army played a major role in changing the situation at the front. The rapid advance of the Reds in the autumn of 1919 led to the division of the Volunteer Army into two parts - the Crimean (it was headed by General P. N. Wrangel) and the North Caucasian. In February-March 1920, its main forces were defeated, the Volunteer Army ceased to exist.

In order to involve the entire Russian population in the fight against the Bolsheviks, Wrangel decided to turn the Crimea - the last springboard of the White movement - into a kind of "experimental field", recreating the democratic order interrupted by October there. On May 25, 1920, the "Law on Land" was published, the author of which was Stolypin's closest associate A.V. Krivoshey, who headed the "government of the South of Russia" in 1920.

For the former owners, part of their possessions is retained, but the size of this part is not fixed in advance, but is the subject of judgment of the volost and uyezd institutions, which are most familiar with local economic conditions ... Payment for alienated land must be paid by the new owners in grain, which is annually poured into the state reserve ... The state's proceeds from the new owners' grain contributions should serve as the main source of remuneration for the expropriated land of its former owners, with whom the Government considers it obligatory to pay.

The "Law on Volost Zemstvos and Rural Communities" was also issued, which could become bodies of peasant self-government instead of rural Soviets. In an effort to win over the Cossacks, Wrangel approved a new regulation on the order of regional autonomy for the Cossack lands. The workers were promised factory legislation that really protected their rights. However, time has been lost. In addition, Lenin was well aware of the threat to the Bolshevik government posed by the plan conceived by Wrangel. Decisive measures were taken to eliminate as quickly as possible the last "hotbed of counter-revolution" in Russia.

War with Poland. Defeat of Wrangel. Nevertheless, the main event of 1920 was the war between Soviet Russia and Poland. In April 1920, the head of independent Poland, J. Pilsudski, ordered an attack on Kyiv. It was officially announced that it was only a matter of helping the Ukrainian people to eliminate Soviet power and restore the independence of Ukraine. On the night of May 7, Kyiv was taken. However, the intervention of the Poles was perceived by the population of Ukraine as an occupation. These sentiments were taken advantage of by the Bolsheviks, who managed to rally various sections of society in the face of external danger.

Almost all the forces of the Red Army were thrown against Poland, united in the Western and Southwestern fronts. Their commanders were former officers of the tsarist army M.N. Tukhachevsky and A.I. Egorov. On June 12, Kyiv was liberated. Soon the Red Army reached the border with Poland, which aroused hopes among some of the Bolshevik leaders for the speedy implementation of the idea of ​​a world revolution in Western Europe. In an order on the Western Front, Tukhachevsky wrote: "On our bayonets we will bring happiness and peace to working humanity. To the West!" However, the Red Army, which entered Polish territory, was rebuffed. The idea of ​​a world revolution was not supported by the Polish workers, who defended the state sovereignty of their country with weapons in their hands. On October 12, 1920, a peace treaty was signed in Riga with Poland, according to which the territories of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus passed to it.

Having made peace with Poland, the Soviet command concentrated all the power of the Red Army to fight Wrangel's army. The troops of the newly created Southern Front under the command of Frunze in November 1920 stormed the positions on Perekop and Chongar, forced the Sivash. The last fight between the Reds and the Whites was especially fierce and cruel. The remnants of the once formidable Volunteer Army rushed to the ships of the Black Sea squadron concentrated in the Crimean ports. Almost 100 thousand people were forced to leave their homeland.

Peasant uprisings in Central Russia. The clashes between the regular units of the Red Army and the White Guards were a facade of the civil war, demonstrating its two extreme poles, not the most numerous, but the most organized. Meanwhile, the victory of one side or another depended on the sympathy and support of the people, and above all the peasantry.

The decree on land gave the villagers what they had been striving for so long - landowners' land. On this, the peasants considered their revolutionary mission ended. They were grateful to the Soviet government for the land, but they were in no hurry to fight for this power with weapons in their hands, hoping to wait out the anxious time in their village, near their own allotment. The emergency food policy was met with hostility by the peasants. Clashes with food detachments began in the village. In July-August 1918 alone, more than 150 such clashes were recorded in Central Russia.

When the Revolutionary Military Council announced mobilization into the Red Army, the peasants responded by mass evasion of it. Up to 75% of recruits did not appear at the recruiting stations (in some districts of the Kursk province, the number of evaders reached 100%). On the eve of the first anniversary of the October Revolution, peasant uprisings broke out almost simultaneously in 80 districts of Central Russia. The mobilized peasants, seizing weapons from the recruiting stations, raised their fellow villagers to defeat the commanders, the Soviets, and party cells. The main political demand of the peasantry was the slogan "Soviets without communists!". The Bolsheviks declared the peasant uprisings to be "kulak", although both the middle peasants and even the poor took part in them. True, the very concept of "fist" was very vague and had more political than economic meaning (if you are dissatisfied with the Soviet regime, it means "fist").

Units of the Red Army and detachments of the Cheka were sent to suppress the uprisings. Leaders, instigators of protests, hostages were shot on the spot. The punitive organs carried out mass arrests of former officers, teachers, officials.

"Retelling". Wide sections of the Cossacks hesitated for a long time in choosing between red and white. However, some Bolshevik leaders unconditionally considered the entire Cossacks as a counter-revolutionary force, eternally hostile to the rest of the people. Repressive measures were carried out against the Cossacks, which were called "decossackization".

In response, an uprising broke out in Veshenskaya and other villages of Verkh-nedonya. The Cossacks announced the mobilization of men from 19 to 45 years old. The created regiments and divisions numbered about 30 thousand people. Handicraft production of pikes, sabers, and ammunition developed in forges and workshops. The approach to the villages was surrounded by trenches and trenches.

The Revolutionary Military Council of the Southern Front ordered the troops to crush the uprising "by applying the most severe measures" up to the burning of the rebelled farms, the merciless execution of "all without exception" participants in the speech, the execution of every fifth adult male, and the mass taking of hostages. By order of Trotsky, an expeditionary corps was created to fight the rebellious Cossacks.

The Veshensk uprising, having chained significant forces of the Red Army to itself, suspended the offensive of units of the Southern Front that had successfully begun in January 1919. Denikin immediately took advantage of this. His troops launched a counteroffensive along a wide front in the direction of the Donbass, Ukraine, Crimea, the Upper Don and Tsaritsyn. On June 5, the Veshenskaya rebels and parts of the White Guard breakthrough united.

These events forced the Bolsheviks to reconsider their policy towards the Cossacks. On the basis of the expeditionary corps, a corps was formed from the Cossacks who were in the service of the Red Army. F. K. Mironov, who was very popular among the Cossacks, was appointed its commander. In August 1919, the Council of People's Commissars declared that "it is not going to forcibly tell anyone, it does not go against the Cossack way of life, leaving the working Cossacks their villages and farms, their lands, the right to wear whatever uniform they want (for example, stripes)". The Bolsheviks assured that they would not take revenge on the Cossacks for the past. In October, by decision of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), Mironov turned to the Don Cossacks. The appeal of the most popular figure among the Cossacks played a huge role, the Cossacks in their bulk went over to the side of the Soviet authorities.

Peasants against whites. The mass discontent of the peasants was also observed in the rear of the white armies. However, it had a slightly different focus than in the rear of the Reds. If the peasants of the central regions of Russia opposed the introduction of emergency measures, but not against the Soviet regime as such, then the peasant movement in the rear of the White armies arose as a reaction to attempts to restore the old land order and, therefore, inevitably took on a pro-Bolshevik orientation. After all, it was the Bolsheviks who gave the peasants land. At the same time, the workers also became allies of the peasants in these areas, which made it possible to create a broad anti-White Guard front, which was strengthened by the entry into it of the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, who did not find a common language with the White Guard rulers.

One of the most important reasons for the temporary victory of the anti-Bolshevik forces in Siberia in the summer of 1918 was the vacillation of the Siberian peasantry. The fact is that in Siberia there was no landownership, so the decree on land changed little in the position of local farmers, nevertheless, they managed to get hold of at the expense of cabinet, state and monastery lands.

But with the establishment of the power of Kolchak, who canceled all the decrees of the Soviet government, the position of the peasantry worsened. In response to mass mobilization into the army of the "supreme ruler of Russia," peasant uprisings broke out in a number of districts of the Altai, Tobolsk, Tomsk, and Yenisei provinces. In an effort to turn the tide, Kolchak embarked on the path of exceptional laws, introducing the death penalty, martial law, organizing punitive expeditions. All these measures caused mass discontent among the population. Peasant uprisings engulfed all of Siberia. The partisan movement expanded.

Events developed in the same way in the South of Russia. In March 1919, the Denikin government published a draft land reform. However, the final solution of the land question was postponed until the complete victory over Bolshevism and was assigned to the future legislative assembly. In the meantime, the government of the South of Russia demanded to provide the owners of the occupied lands with a third of the total harvest. Some representatives of Denikin's administration went even further, starting to settle the expelled landlords in the old ashes. This caused massive discontent among the peasants.

"Greens". Makhnovist movement. The peasant movement developed somewhat differently in the areas bordering the Red and White fronts, where power was constantly changing, but each of them demanded obedience to its own orders and laws, sought to replenish its ranks by mobilizing the local population. Deserting from both the White and the Red Army, the peasants, fleeing from the new mobilization, took refuge in the forests and created partisan detachments. They chose as their symbol green color- the color of will and freedom, at the same time opposing itself to both red and white movements. "Oh, apple, ripe colors, we beat red on the left, white on the right," they sang in the peasant detachments. The performances of the "greens" covered the entire south of Russia: the Black Sea region, the North Caucasus, and the Crimea.

The peasant movement reached its greatest extent in the south of Ukraine. This was largely due to the personality of the leader of the rebel army N. I. Makhno. Even during the first revolution, he joined the anarchists, participated in terrorist acts, and served indefinite hard labor. In March 1917, Makhno returned to his homeland - to the village of Gulyai-Pole, Yekaterinoslav province, where he was elected chairman of the local Council. On September 25, he signed a decree on the liquidation of landownership in Gulyai-Pole, ahead of Lenin in this matter by exactly a month. When Ukraine was occupied by Austro-German troops, Makhno assembled a detachment that raided German posts and burned the estates of the landowners. Fighters began to flock to the "dad" from all sides. Fighting both the Germans and the Ukrainian nationalists - Petliurists, Makhno did not let the Reds with their food detachments into the territory liberated by his detachments. In December 1918, Makhno's army captured the largest city in the South - Ekaterino-Slav. By February 1919, the Makhnovist army had grown to 30,000 regular fighters and 20,000 unarmed reserves. Under his control were the most grain-growing districts of Ukraine, a number of the most important railway junctions.

Makhno agreed to join the Red Army with his detachments for a joint fight against Denikin. For the victories won over Denikin, he, according to some reports, was among the first to be awarded the Order of the Red Banner. And General Denikin promised half a million rubles for Makhno's head. However, while providing military support to the Red Army, Makhno took an independent political position, establishing his own rules, ignoring the instructions of the central authorities. In addition, in the army of the "father" partisan orders reigned, the election of commanders. The Makhnovists did not disdain robberies and wholesale executions of white officers. Therefore, Makhno came into conflict with the leadership of the Red Army. Nevertheless, the rebel army took part in the defeat of Wrangel, was thrown into the most difficult areas, suffered huge losses, after which it was disarmed. Makhno, with a small detachment, continued the struggle against the Soviet regime. After several clashes with units of the Red Army, he went abroad with a handful of loyal people.

"Small Civil War". Despite the end of the war by the Reds and Whites, the policy of the Bolsheviks towards the peasantry did not change. Moreover, in many grain-producing provinces of Russia, the surplus appraisal has become even more stringent. In the spring and summer of 1921, a terrible famine broke out in the Volga region. It was provoked not so much by a severe drought, but by the fact that after the confiscation of surplus products in the fall, the peasants had neither grain for sowing, nor the desire to sow and cultivate the land. More than 5 million people died from starvation.

A particularly tense situation developed in the Tambov province, where the summer of 1920 turned out to be dry. And when the Tambov peasants received a surplus plan that did not take this circumstance into account, they rebelled. The uprising was led by the former police chief of the Kirsanov district of the Tambov province, the Social Revolutionary A. S. Antonov.

Simultaneously with Tambov, uprisings broke out in the Volga region, on the Don, Kuban, in Western and Eastern Siberia, in the Urals, in Belarus, Karelia, and Central Asia. The period of peasant uprisings 1920-1921. was called by contemporaries a "small civil war". The peasants created their own armies, which stormed and captured cities, put forward political demands, and formed government bodies. The Union of the Working Peasantry of the Tambov Province defined its main task as follows: "the overthrow of the power of the Communist Bolsheviks, who brought the country to poverty, death and disgrace." The peasant detachments of the Volga region put forward the slogan of replacing Soviet power with a Constituent Assembly. In Western Siberia, the peasants demanded the establishment of a peasant dictatorship, the convocation of a Constituent Assembly, the denationalization of industry, and equal land tenure.

The whole power of the regular Red Army was thrown to suppress the peasant uprisings. Combat operations were commanded by commanders who became famous on the fields of the civil war - Tukhachevsky, Frunze, Budyonny and others. Methods of mass intimidation of the population were used on a large scale - taking hostages, shooting relatives of "bandits", deporting entire villages "sympathetic to the bandits" to the North.

Kronstadt uprising. The consequences of the civil war also affected the city. Due to the lack of raw materials and fuel, many enterprises were closed. The workers were on the street. Many of them went to the countryside in search of food. In 1921 Moscow lost half of its workers, Petrograd two thirds. Labor productivity in industry fell sharply. In some branches it reached only 20% of the pre-war level. In 1922, there were 538 strikes, and the number of strikers exceeded 200,000.

On February 11, 1921, 93 industrial enterprises, including such large plants as Putilovsky, Sestroretsky, and Triangle, were announced in Petrograd due to the lack of raw materials and fuel. Outraged workers took to the streets, strikes began. By order of the authorities, the demonstrations were dispersed by parts of the Petrograd cadets.

The unrest reached Kronstadt. On February 28, 1921, a meeting was convened on the battleship Petropavlovsk. Its chairman, the senior clerk S. Petrichenko, announced the resolution: immediate re-election of the Soviets by secret ballot, since "real Soviets do not express the will of the workers and peasants"; freedom of speech and press; the release of "political prisoners - members of the socialist parties"; liquidation of food requisitioning and food orders; freedom of trade, freedom for the peasants to work the land and have livestock; power to the Soviets, not to the parties. The main idea of ​​the rebels was the elimination of the Bolsheviks' monopoly on power. On March 1, this resolution was adopted at a joint meeting of the garrison and the inhabitants of the city. A delegation of Kronstadters sent to Petrograd, where there were mass strikes of workers, was arrested. In response, a Provisional Revolutionary Committee was set up in Kronstadt. On March 2, the Soviet government declared the Kronstadt uprising a mutiny and introduced a state of siege in Petrograd.

Any negotiations with the "rebels" were rejected by the Bolsheviks, and Trotsky, who arrived in Petrograd on March 5, spoke to the sailors in the language of an ultimatum. Kronstadt did not respond to the ultimatum. Then troops began to gather on the coast of the Gulf of Finland. Commander-in-Chief of the Red Army S. S. Kamenev and M. N. Tukhachevsky arrived to lead the operation to storm the fortress. Military experts could not help but understand how great the victims would be. But still the order to go on the assault was given. The Red Army soldiers advanced on loose March ice, in open space, under continuous fire. The first assault was unsuccessful. Delegates from the 10th Congress of the RCP(b) took part in the second assault. On March 18, Kronstadt ceased resistance. Part of the sailors, 6-8 thousand, went to Finland, more than 2.5 thousand were taken prisoner. Severe punishment awaited them.

Causes of the defeat of the white movement. The armed confrontation between the Whites and the Reds ended in victory for the Reds. The leaders of the white movement failed to offer the people an attractive program. In the territories they controlled, the laws of the Russian Empire were restored, property was returned to its former owners. And although none of the white governments openly put forward the idea of ​​restoring the monarchical order, the people perceived them as fighters for the old power, for the return of the tsar and the landlords. The national policy of the white generals, their fanatical adherence to the slogan "united and indivisible Russia" was not popular either.

The White movement could not become the core consolidating all the anti-Bolshevik forces. Moreover, by refusing to cooperate with the socialist parties, the generals themselves split the anti-Bolshevik front, turning the Mensheviks, Socialist-Revolutionaries, anarchists and their supporters into their opponents. And in the white camp itself there was no unity and interaction either in the political or in the military field. The movement did not have such a leader, whose authority would be recognized by all, who would understand that a civil war is not a battle of armies, but a battle of political programs.

And finally, according to the bitter admission of the white generals themselves, one of the reasons for the defeat was the moral decay of the army, the use of measures against the population that did not fit into the code of honor: robberies, pogroms, punitive expeditions, violence. The White movement was started by "almost saints" and finished by "almost bandits" - such a verdict was passed by one of the ideologists of the movement, the leader of Russian nationalists V. V. Shulgin.

The emergence of nation-states on the outskirts of Russia. The national outskirts of Russia were drawn into the civil war. On October 29, the power of the Provisional Government was overthrown in Kyiv. However, the Central Rada refused to recognize the Bolshevik Council of People's Commissars as the legitimate government of Russia. At the All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets convened in Kyiv, the supporters of the Rada had the majority. The Bolsheviks left the congress. On November 7, 1917, the Central Rada proclaimed the creation of the Ukrainian people's republic.

The Bolsheviks who left the Kyiv Congress in December 1917 in Kharkov, populated mainly by Russians, convened the 1st All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets, which proclaimed Ukraine a Soviet republic. The congress decided to establish federal relations with Soviet Russia, elected the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets and formed the Ukrainian Soviet government. At the request of this government, troops from Soviet Russia arrived in Ukraine to fight the Central Rada. In January 1918, armed protests by workers broke out in a number of Ukrainian cities, during which Soviet power was established. On January 26 (February 8), 1918, Kyiv was taken by the Red Army. On January 27, the Central Rada turned to Germany for help. Soviet power in Ukraine was liquidated at the cost of the Austro-German occupation. In April 1918 the Central Rada was dispersed. General P. P. Skoropadsky became the hetman, proclaiming the creation of the "Ukrainian State".

Relatively quickly, Soviet power won in Belarus, Estonia and the unoccupied part of Latvia. However, the revolutionary transformations that had begun were interrupted by the German offensive. In February 1918, Minsk was captured by German troops. With the permission of the German command, a bourgeois-nationalist government was created here, which announced the creation of the Belarusian People's Republic and the separation of Belarus from Russia.

In the frontline territory of Latvia, controlled by Russian troops, the positions of the Bolsheviks were strong. They managed to fulfill the task set by the party - to prevent the transfer of troops loyal to the Provisional Government from the front to Petrograd. The revolutionary units became an active force in the establishment of Soviet power in the unoccupied territory of Latvia. By decision of the party, a company of Latvian riflemen was sent to Petrograd to protect the Smolny and the Bolshevik leadership. In February 1918, the entire territory of Latvia was captured by German troops; the old order began to be restored. Even after the defeat of Germany, with the consent of the Entente, its troops remained in Latvia. On November 18, 1918, the Provisional Bourgeois Government was established here, declaring Latvia an independent republic.

On February 18, 1918 German troops invaded Estonia. In November 1918, the Provisional Bourgeois Government began to operate here, signing on November 19 an agreement with Germany on the transfer of all power to it. In December 1917, the "Lithuanian Council" - the bourgeois Lithuanian government - issued a declaration "on the eternal allied ties of the Lithuanian state with Germany." In February 1918, with the consent of the German occupation authorities, the "Lithuanian Council" adopted an act of independence for Lithuania.

Events in Transcaucasia developed somewhat differently. In November 1917, the Menshevik Transcaucasian Commissariat and national military units were created here. The activities of the Soviets and the Bolshevik Party were banned. In February 1918, a new body of power arose - the Seim, which declared Transcaucasia "an independent federal democratic republic." However, in May 1918 this association collapsed, after which three bourgeois republics arose - Georgian, Azerbaijani and Armenian, headed by governments of moderate socialists.

Construction of the Soviet Federation. Part of the national outskirts, which declared their sovereignty, became part of the Russian Federation. In Turkestan, on November 1, 1917, power passed into the hands of the Regional Council and the executive committee of the Tashkent Council, which consisted of Russians. At the end of November, at the Extraordinary All-Muslim Congress in Kokand, the question of the autonomy of Turkestan and the creation of a national government was raised, but in February 1918, the Kokand autonomy was liquidated by detachments of local Red Guards. The Regional Congress of Soviets, which met at the end of April, adopted the "Regulations on the Turkestan Soviet Federative Republic" as part of the RSFSR. Part of the Muslim population perceived these events as an attack on Islamic traditions. The organization of partisan detachments began, challenging the power of the Soviets in Turkestan. The members of these detachments were called Basmachi.

In March 1918, a decree was published declaring part of the territory of the Southern Urals and the Middle Volga the Tatar-Bashkir Soviet Republic within the RSFSR. In May 1918, the Congress of Soviets of the Kuban and the Black Sea region proclaimed the Kuban-Black Sea Republic integral part RSFSR. At the same time, the Don Autonomous Republic, the Soviet Republic of Taurida in the Crimea were formed.

Having proclaimed Russia a Soviet federal republic, the Bolsheviks at first did not define clear principles for its structure. Often it was conceived as a federation of Soviets, i.e. territories where Soviet power existed. For example, the Moscow region, which is part of the RSFSR, was a federation of 14 provincial Soviets, each of which had its own government.

As the power of the Bolsheviks consolidated, their views on the construction of a federal state became more definite. State independence began to be recognized only for the peoples who organized their national councils, and not for each regional council, as was the case in 1918. The Bashkir, Tatar, Kirghiz (Kazakh), Mountain, Dagestan national autonomous republics were created as part of the Russian Federation, and also the Chuvash, Kalmyk, Mari, Udmurt Autonomous Regions, the Karelian Labor Commune and the Commune of the Volga Germans.

The establishment of Soviet power in Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltic states. On November 13, 1918, the Soviet government annulled the Brest Treaty. The issue of expanding the Soviet system through the liberation of the territories occupied by the German-Austrian troops was on the agenda. This task was completed rather quickly, which was facilitated by three circumstances: 1) the presence of a significant number of the Russian population, which sought to restore a single state; 2) armed intervention of the Red Army; 3) the existence in these territories of communist organizations that were part of a single party. "Sovietization", as a rule, took place according to a single scenario: the preparation of an armed uprising by the communists and the call, allegedly on behalf of the people, to the Red Army to provide assistance to establish Soviet power.

In November 1918, the Ukrainian Soviet Republic was recreated, and the Provisional Workers' and Peasants' Government of Ukraine was formed. However, on December 14, 1918, the bourgeois-nationalist Directory, headed by V.K. Vinnichenko and S.V. Petlyura, seized power in Kyiv. In February 1919, Soviet troops occupied Kyiv, and later the territory of Ukraine became the arena of confrontation between the Red Army and Denikin's army. In 1920, Polish troops invaded Ukraine. However, neither the Germans, nor the Poles, nor the White Army of Denikin enjoyed the support of the population.

But the national governments - the Central Rada and the directory - did not have mass support either. This happened because national issues were paramount for them, while the peasantry was waiting for the agrarian reform. That is why the Ukrainian peasants ardently supported the Makhnovist anarchists. The nationalists could not count on the support of the urban population either, since in major cities a large percentage, above all of the proletariat, were Russians. Over time, the Reds were able to finally gain a foothold in Kyiv. In 1920, Soviet power was established in the left-bank Moldavia, which became part of the Ukrainian SSR. But the main part of Moldova - Bessarabia - remained under the rule of Romania, which occupied it in December 1917.

The Red Army was victorious in the Baltics. In November 1918, the Austro-German troops were expelled from there. Soviet republics emerged in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. In November, the Red Army entered the territory of Belarus. On December 31, the communists formed the Provisional Workers' and Peasants' Government, and on January 1, 1919, this government proclaimed the creation of the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic. The All-Russian Central Executive Committee recognized the independence of the new Soviet republics and expressed its readiness to render them all possible assistance. Nevertheless, Soviet power in the Baltic countries did not last long, and in 1919-1920. with the help of European states, the power of national governments was restored there.

Establishment of Soviet power in Transcaucasia. By mid-April 1920, Soviet power was restored throughout the North Caucasus. In the republics of Transcaucasia - Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia - power remained in the hands of national governments. In April 1920, the Central Committee of the RCP(b) formed a special Caucasian Bureau (Kavbyuro) at the headquarters of the 11th Army operating in the North Caucasus. On April 27, Azerbaijani communists presented the government with an ultimatum to transfer power to the Soviets. On April 28, units of the Red Army were brought into Baku, with which prominent figures of the Bolshevik Party G.K. Ordzhonikidze, S.M. Kirov, A.I. Mikoyan arrived. The Provisional Revolutionary Committee proclaimed Azerbaijan a Soviet Socialist Republic.

Chairman of the Caucasian Bureau Ordzhonikidze on November 27 presented an ultimatum to the Armenian government: to transfer power to the Revolutionary Committee of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, formed in Azerbaijan. Without waiting for the expiration of the ultimatum, the 11th Army entered the territory of Armenia. Armenia was proclaimed a sovereign socialist state.

The Georgian Menshevik government enjoyed prestige among the population, had enough a strong army. In May 1920, during the war with Poland, the Council of People's Commissars signed an agreement with Georgia, which recognized the independence and sovereignty of the Georgian state. In return, the Georgian government undertook to allow the activities of the Communist Party and withdraw foreign military units from Georgia. S. M. Kirov was appointed Plenipotentiary Representative of the RSFSR in Georgia. In February 1921, a Military Revolutionary Committee was created in a small Georgian village, asking the Red Army for help in the fight against the government. On February 25, the regiments of the 11th Army entered Tiflis, Georgia was proclaimed a Soviet socialist republic.

The fight against Basmachi. During the civil war, the Turkestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was cut off from Central Russia. The Red Army of Turkestan was created here. In September 1919, the troops of the Turkestan Front under the command of M.V. Frunze broke through the encirclement and restored the connection of the Turkestan Republic with the center of Russia.

On February 1, 1920, under the leadership of the Communists, an uprising was raised against the Khan of Khiva. The rebels were supported by the Red Army. The Congress of Soviets of People's Representatives (Kurultai) held soon in Khiva proclaimed the creation of the Khorezm People's Republic. In August 1920, the pro-communist forces raised an uprising in Chardzhou and turned to the Red Army for help. The Red troops under the command of M.V. Frunze took Bukhara in stubborn battles, the emir fled. The All-Bukhara People's Kurultai, which met in early October 1920, proclaimed the formation of the Bukhara People's Republic.

In 1921, the Basmachi movement entered a new phase. It was headed by the former Minister of War of the Turkish government, Enver Pasha, who hatched plans to create a state allied with Turkey in Turkestan. He managed to unite the scattered Basmachi detachments and create a single army, establish close ties with the Afghans, who supplied the Basmachi with weapons and gave them shelter. In the spring of 1922, the army of Enver Pasha captured a significant part of the territory of the Bukhara People's Republic. The Soviet government sent a regular army from Central Russia to Central Asia, reinforced by aviation. In August 1922, Enver Pasha was killed in battle. The Turkestan Bureau of the Central Committee compromised with the adherents of Islam. Mosques were given back their land holdings, Sharia courts and religious schools were restored. This policy has paid off. Basmachism lost the mass support of the population.

What you need to know about this topic:

Socio-economic and political development of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century. Nicholas II.

Domestic policy of tsarism. Nicholas II. Strengthening repression. "Police socialism".

Russo-Japanese War. Reasons, course, results.

Revolution of 1905 - 1907 The nature, driving forces and features of the Russian revolution of 1905-1907. stages of the revolution. The reasons for the defeat and the significance of the revolution.

Elections to the State Duma. I State Duma. The agrarian question in the Duma. Dispersal of the Duma. II State Duma. Coup d'état June 3, 1907

Third June political system. Electoral law June 3, 1907 III State Duma. The alignment of political forces in the Duma. Duma activities. government terror. The decline of the labor movement in 1907-1910

Stolypin agrarian reform.

IV State Duma. Party composition and Duma factions. Duma activities.

The political crisis in Russia on the eve of the war. labor movement in the summer of 1914. The crisis of the upper classes.

The international position of Russia at the beginning of the 20th century.

Beginning of the First World War. Origin and nature of war. Russia's entry into the war. Attitude towards the war of parties and classes.

The course of hostilities. Strategic forces and plans of the parties. Results of the war. The role of the Eastern Front in the First World War.

The Russian economy during the First World War.

Workers' and peasants' movement in 1915-1916. Revolutionary movement in the army and navy. Growing anti-war sentiment. Formation of the bourgeois opposition.

Russian culture of the 19th - early 20th centuries.

Aggravation of socio-political contradictions in the country in January-February 1917. The beginning, prerequisites and nature of the revolution. Uprising in Petrograd. Formation of the Petrograd Soviet. Provisional Committee of the State Duma. Order N I. Formation of the Provisional Government. Abdication of Nicholas II. Causes of dual power and its essence. February coup in Moscow, at the front, in the provinces.

From February to October. The policy of the Provisional Government regarding war and peace, on agrarian, national, labor issues. Relations between the Provisional Government and the Soviets. The arrival of V.I. Lenin in Petrograd.

Political parties (Kadets, Social Revolutionaries, Mensheviks, Bolsheviks): political programs, influence among the masses.

Crises of the Provisional Government. An attempted military coup in the country. Growth of revolutionary sentiment among the masses. Bolshevization of the capital Soviets.

Preparation and conduct of an armed uprising in Petrograd.

II All-Russian Congress of Soviets. Decisions about power, peace, land. Formation of public authorities and management. Composition of the first Soviet government.

The victory of the armed uprising in Moscow. Government agreement with the Left SRs. Elections to the Constituent Assembly, its convocation and dissolution.

The first socio-economic transformations in the field of industry, agriculture, finance, labor and women's issues. Church and State.

Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, its terms and significance.

Economic tasks of the Soviet government in the spring of 1918. Aggravation of the food issue. The introduction of food dictatorship. Working squads. Comedy.

The revolt of the left SRs and the collapse of the two-party system in Russia.

First Soviet Constitution.

Causes of intervention and civil war. The course of hostilities. Human and material losses of the period of the civil war and military intervention.

The internal policy of the Soviet leadership during the war. "War Communism". GOELRO plan.

The policy of the new government in relation to culture.

Foreign policy. Treaties with border countries. Participation of Russia in the Genoa, Hague, Moscow and Lausanne conferences. Diplomatic recognition of the USSR by the main capitalist countries.

Domestic policy. Socio-economic and political crisis of the early 20s. Famine of 1921-1922 Transition to new economic policy. The essence of the NEP. NEP in the field of agriculture, trade, industry. financial reform. Economic recovery. Crises during the NEP and its curtailment.

Creation projects USSR. I Congress of Soviets of the USSR. The first government and the Constitution of the USSR.

Illness and death of V.I. Lenin. Intraparty struggle. The beginning of the formation of Stalin's regime of power.

Industrialization and collectivization. Development and implementation of the first five-year plans. Socialist competition - purpose, forms, leaders.

Formation and strengthening state system economic management.

The course towards complete collectivization. Dispossession.

Results of industrialization and collectivization.

Political, national-state development in the 30s. Intraparty struggle. political repression. Formation of the nomenklatura as a layer of managers. Stalinist regime and the constitution of the USSR in 1936

Soviet culture in the 20-30s.

Foreign policy of the second half of the 20s - mid-30s.

Domestic policy. The growth of military production. Extraordinary measures in the field of labor legislation. Measures to solve the grain problem. Armed forces. Growth of the Red Army. military reform. Repressions against the command personnel of the Red Army and the Red Army.

Foreign policy. Non-aggression pact and treaty of friendship and borders between the USSR and Germany. The entry of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus into the USSR. Soviet-Finnish War. The inclusion of the Baltic republics and other territories in the USSR.

Periodization of the Great Patriotic War. The initial stage of the war. Turning the country into a military camp. Military defeats 1941-1942 and their reasons. Major military events Capitulation of Nazi Germany. Participation of the USSR in the war with Japan.

Soviet rear during the war.

Deportation of peoples.

Partisan struggle.

Human and material losses during the war.

Creation of the anti-Hitler coalition. Declaration of the United Nations. The problem of the second front. Conferences of the "Big Three". Problems of post-war peace settlement and all-round cooperation. USSR and UN.

Beginning of the Cold War. The contribution of the USSR to the creation of the "socialist camp". CMEA formation.

Domestic policy of the USSR in the mid-1940s - early 1950s. Restoration of the national economy.

Socio-political life. Politics in the field of science and culture. Continued repression. "Leningrad business". Campaign against cosmopolitanism. "Doctors' Case".

Socio-economic development of Soviet society in the mid-50s - the first half of the 60s.

Socio-political development: XX Congress of the CPSU and the condemnation of Stalin's personality cult. Rehabilitation of victims of repressions and deportations. Intra-party struggle in the second half of the 1950s.

Foreign policy: the creation of the ATS. The entry of Soviet troops into Hungary. Exacerbation of Soviet-Chinese relations. The split of the "socialist camp". Soviet-American Relations and the Caribbean Crisis. USSR and third world countries. Reducing the strength of the armed forces of the USSR. Moscow Treaty on the Limitation of Nuclear Tests.

USSR in the mid-60s - the first half of the 80s.

Socio-economic development: economic reform 1965

Growing difficulties of economic development. Decline in the rate of socio-economic growth.

USSR Constitution 1977

Socio-political life of the USSR in the 1970s - early 1980s.

Foreign Policy: Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Consolidation of post-war borders in Europe. Moscow treaty with Germany. Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE). Soviet-American treaties of the 70s. Soviet-Chinese relations. The entry of Soviet troops into Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan. Exacerbation of international tension and the USSR. Strengthening of the Soviet-American confrontation in the early 80s.

USSR in 1985-1991

Domestic policy: an attempt to accelerate the socio-economic development of the country. An attempt to reform the political system of Soviet society. Congresses of People's Deputies. Election of the President of the USSR. Multi-party system. Exacerbation of the political crisis.

Exacerbation of the national question. Attempts to reform the national-state structure of the USSR. Declaration on State Sovereignty of the RSFSR. "Novogarevsky process". The collapse of the USSR.

Foreign policy: Soviet-American relations and the problem of disarmament. Treaties with leading capitalist countries. The withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan. Changing relations with the countries of the socialist community. Disintegration of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact.

Russian Federation in 1992-2000

Domestic policy: "Shock therapy" in the economy: price liberalization, stages of privatization of commercial and industrial enterprises. Fall in production. Increased social tension. Growth and slowdown in financial inflation. The aggravation of the struggle between the executive and legislative branches. The dissolution of the Supreme Soviet and the Congress of People's Deputies. October events of 1993. Abolition of local bodies of Soviet power. Elections to the Federal Assembly. The Constitution of the Russian Federation of 1993 Formation of the presidential republic. Aggravation and overcoming of national conflicts in the North Caucasus.

Parliamentary elections 1995 Presidential elections 1996 Power and opposition. An attempt to return to the course of liberal reforms (spring 1997) and its failure. The financial crisis of August 1998: causes, economic and political consequences. "Second Chechen War". Parliamentary elections in 1999 and early presidential elections in 2000 Foreign policy: Russia in the CIS. The participation of Russian troops in the "hot spots" of the near abroad: Moldova, Georgia, Tajikistan. Russia's relations with foreign countries. The withdrawal of Russian troops from Europe and neighboring countries. Russian-American agreements. Russia and NATO. Russia and the Council of Europe. Yugoslav crises (1999-2000) and Russia's position.

• Danilov A.A., Kosulina L.G. History of the state and peoples of Russia. XX century.

After the October Revolution, a tense socio-political situation developed in the country. The establishment of Soviet power in the autumn of 1917 - in the spring of 1918 was accompanied by many anti-Bolshevik demonstrations in different regions of Russia, but all of them were scattered and had a local character. At first, only separate, not numerous groups of the population were drawn into them. A large-scale struggle, in which huge masses from various social strata joined on both sides, marked the development of the Civil War - a general social armed confrontation.

In historiography, there is no consensus on the time of the start of the Civil War. Some historians attribute it to October 1917, others to the spring-summer of 1918, when strong political and well-organized anti-Soviet pockets formed and foreign intervention began. Disputes among historians also raise the question of who was responsible for unleashing this fratricidal war: representatives of the classes that had lost power, property and influence; the Bolshevik leadership, which imposed its own method of transforming society on the country; or both of these socio-political forces, which the popular masses used in the struggle for power.

The overthrow of the Provisional Government and the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly, the economic and socio-political measures of the Soviet government set against it the nobles, the bourgeoisie, the wealthy intelligentsia, the clergy, and the officers. The discrepancy between the goals of transforming society and the methods for achieving them alienated the democratic intelligentsia, the Cossacks, the kulaks and the middle peasants from the Bolsheviks. Thus, the internal policy of the Bolshevik leadership was one of the causes of the Civil War.

The nationalization of all the land and the confiscation of the landowner's aroused fierce resistance from its former owners. The bourgeoisie, confused by the sweep of the nationalization of industry, wanted to return factories and plants. The liquidation of commodity-money relations and the establishment of a state monopoly on the distribution of products and commodities dealt a painful blow to the property position of the middle and petty bourgeoisie. Thus, the desire of the overthrown classes to preserve private property and their privileged position was the reason for the start of the Civil War.

The creation of a one-party political system and the "dictatorship of the proletariat", in fact, the dictatorship of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), alienated the socialist parties and democratic public organizations from the Bolsheviks. With the Decrees "On the Arrest of the Leaders of the Civil War against the Revolution" (November 1917) and on the "Red Terror", the Bolshevik leadership legally justified the "right" to violent reprisals against their political opponents. Therefore, the Mensheviks, right and left SRs, anarchists refused to cooperate with the new government and took part in the Civil War.

The peculiarity of the Civil War in Russia was the close interweaving of the internal political struggle with foreign intervention. Both Germany and the Entente allies incited the anti-Bolshevik forces, supplied them with weapons, ammunition, financial and political support. On the one hand, their policy was dictated by the desire to put an end to the Bolshevik regime, to return the lost property foreign citizens to prevent the "spread" of the revolution. On the other hand, they pursued their own expansionist plans aimed at dismembering Russia, gaining new territories and spheres of influence at the expense of it.

Civil War in 1918

In 1918, the main centers of the anti-Bolshevik movement were formed, differing in their socio-political composition. In February, the "Union of the Revival of Russia" arose in Moscow and Petrograd, uniting the Cadets, Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries. In March 1918, the "Union for the Defense of the Motherland and Freedom" was formed under the leadership of the well-known Social Revolutionary, terrorist B.V. Savinkov. A strong anti-Bolshevik movement unfolded among the Cossacks. In the Don and Kuban they were led by General P. N. Krasnov, in the Southern Urals - Ataman A. I. Dutov. In the south of Russia and the North Caucasus, under the leadership of Generals M. V. Alekseev and L. I. Kornilov began to form an officer Volunteer Army. She became the basis of the White movement. After the death of L. G. Kornilov, General A. I. Denikin took command.

In the spring of 1918 foreign intervention began. German troops occupied Ukraine, Crimea and part of the North Caucasus. Romania captured Bessarabia. The Entente countries signed an agreement on the non-recognition of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and the future division of Russia into spheres of influence. In March, an English expeditionary force was landed in Murmansk, which was later joined by French and American troops. In April, Vladivostok was occupied by Japanese troops. Then detachments of the British, French and Americans appeared in the Far East.

In May 1918, the soldiers of the Czechoslovak Corps rebelled. Slavic prisoners of war from the Austro-Hungarian army were gathered there, who expressed a desire to participate in the war against Germany on the side of the Entente. The corps was sent by the Soviet government along the Trans-Siberian Railway to the Far East. It was assumed that he would then be delivered to France. The uprising led to the overthrow of Soviet power in the Volga region and Siberia. In Samara, Ufa and Omsk, governments were created from the Cadets, Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks. Their activities were based on the idea of ​​the revival of the Constituent Assembly, expressed in opposition to both the Bolsheviks and the extreme right-wing monarchists. These governments did not last long and were swept away during the Civil War.

In the summer of 1918, the anti-Bolshevik movement led by the Socialist-Revolutionaries assumed enormous proportions. They organized performances in many cities of Central Russia (Yaroslavl, Rybinsk, etc.). On July 6-7, the Left SRs attempted to overthrow the Soviet government in Moscow. It ended in complete failure. As a result, many of their leaders were arrested. Representatives of the Left SRs who opposed the policies of the Bolsheviks were expelled from the Soviets of all levels and state bodies.

The complication of the military-political situation in the country affected the fate of the imperial family. In the spring of 1918, Nicholas II with his wife and children, under the pretext of activating the monarchists, was transferred from Tobolsk to Yekaterinburg. Having coordinated their actions with the center, the Ural Regional Council on July 16, 1918 shot the tsar and his family. In the same days, the tsar's brother Michael and 18 other members of the imperial family were killed.

The Soviet government launched active actions to protect its power. The Red Army was reorganized on new military-political principles. A transition was made to universal military service, and extensive mobilization was launched. Strict discipline was established in the army, the institution of military commissars was introduced. Organizational measures to strengthen the Red Army were completed by the creation of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic (RVSR) and the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense.

In June 1918, the Eastern Front was formed against the rebellious Czechoslovak corps and the anti-Soviet forces of the Urals and Siberia under the command of I. I. Vatsetis (since July 1919 - S. S. Kamenev). At the beginning of September 1918, the Red Army went on the offensive and during October-November drove the enemy beyond the Urals. The restoration of Soviet power in the Urals and the Volga region ended the first stage of the Civil War.

Escalation of the Civil War

In late 1918 - early 1919, the white movement reached its maximum scope. In Siberia, Admiral A.V. Kolchak, who was declared the "Supreme Ruler of Russia", seized power. In the Kuban and the North Caucasus, A.I. Denikin united the Don and Volunteer armies into the Armed Forces of the South of Russia. In the north, with the help of the Entente, General E. K. Miller formed his army. In the Baltic states, General N. N. Yudenich was preparing for a campaign against Petrograd. From November 1918, after the end of the First World War, the Allies increased their assistance to the White movement, supplying it with ammunition, uniforms, tanks, and aircraft. The scale of intervention has expanded. The British occupied Baku, landed in Batum and Novorossiysk, the French - in Odessa and Sevastopol.

In November 1918, A.V. Kolchak launched an offensive in the Urals with the aim of connecting with the detachments of General E.K. Miller and organizing a joint attack on Moscow. Again, the Eastern Front became the main one. On December 25, the troops of A. V. Kolchak took Perm, but already on December 31, their offensive was stopped by the Red Army. In the east, the front temporarily stabilized.

In 1919, a plan was created for a simultaneous attack on Soviet power: from the east (A. V. Kolchak), the south (A. I. Denikin) and the west (N. N. Yudenich). However, it was not possible to carry out a combined performance.

In March 1919, A.V. Kolchak launched a new offensive from the Urals towards the Volga. In April, the troops of S. S. Kamenev and M. V. Frunze stopped him, and in the summer they drove him to Siberia. A powerful peasant uprising and partisan movement against the government of A.V. Kolchak helped the Red Army to establish Soviet power in Siberia. In February 1920, by the verdict of the Irkutsk Revolutionary Committee, Admiral A.V. Kolchak was shot.

In May 1919, when the Red Army was winning decisive victories in the east, N. N. Yudenich moved to Petrograd. In June, he was stopped and his troops driven back to Estonia, where the bourgeoisie came to power. The second offensive of N. N. Yudenich on Petrograd in October 1919 also ended in defeat. His troops were disarmed and interned by the Estonian government, which did not want to come into conflict with Soviet Russia, which offered to recognize the independence of Estonia.

In July 1919, A. I. Denikin captured Ukraine and, having carried out a mobilization, launched an attack on Moscow (Moscow directive) In September, Kursk, Orel and Voronezh occupied his troops. I. Denikin. The Southern Front was formed under the command of A.I. Egorov. In October, the Red Army went on the offensive. She was supported by the insurgent peasant movement led by N. I. Makhno, who deployed a “second front” in the rear of the Volunteer Army. In December 1919 - early 1920, the troops of A.I. Denikin were defeated. Soviet power was restored in southern Russia, Ukraine and the North Caucasus. The remnants of the Volunteer Army took refuge on the Crimean Peninsula, the command of which A. I. Denikin transferred to General P. N. Wrangel.

In 1919, revolutionary fermentation began in the occupying units of the Allies, intensified by Bolshevik propaganda. The interventionists were forced to withdraw their troops. This was facilitated by a powerful social movement in Europe and the USA under the slogan "Hands off Soviet Russia!".

The final stage of the Civil War

In 1920, the main events were the Soviet-Polish war and the fight against P. N. Wrangel. Having recognized the independence of Poland, the Soviet government began negotiations with it on territorial delimitation and the establishment of a state border. They reached a dead end, as the Polish government, headed by Marshal Yu. Pilsudski, presented exorbitant territorial claims. To restore "Greater Poland", Polish troops invaded Belarus and Ukraine in May, captured Kyiv. The Red Army under the command of M. N. Tukhachevsky and A. I. Yegorov in July 1920 defeated the Polish grouping in Ukraine and Belarus. The attack on Warsaw began. It was perceived by the Polish people as an intervention. In this regard, all the forces of the Poles, materially supported by Western countries, were directed to resist the Red Army. In August, the offensive of M. N. Tukhachevsky bogged down. The Soviet-Polish war was ended by a peace signed in Riga in March 1921. According to it, Poland received the lands of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus. In Eastern Belarus, the power of the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic remained.

Since April 1920, the anti-Soviet struggle was led by General P. N. Wrangel, who was elected "ruler of the south of Russia." He formed the “Russian Army” in Crimea, which launched an offensive against the Donbass in June. To repel it, the Southern Front was formed under the command of M.V. Frunze. At the end of October, the troops of P. I. Wrangel were defeated in Northern Tavria and pushed back to the Crimea. In November, units of the Red Army stormed the fortifications of the Perekop Isthmus, crossed Lake Sivash and broke into the Crimea. The defeat of P. N. Wrangel marked the end of the Civil War. The remnants of his troops and part of the civilian population opposed to the Soviet regime were evacuated with the help of the allies to Turkey. In November 1920, the Civil War actually ended. Only isolated pockets of resistance to Soviet power remained on the outskirts of Russia.

In 1920, with the support of the troops of the Turkestan Front (under the command of M.V. Frunze), the power of the Emir of Bukhara and the Khan of Khiva was overthrown. The Bukhara and Khorezm People's Soviet Republics were formed on the territory of Central Asia. In Transcaucasia, Soviet power was established as a result of military intervention by the government of the RSFSR, material and moral and political assistance from the Central Committee of the RCP (b). In April 1920, the Musavatist government was overthrown and the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic was formed. In November 1920, after the liquidation of the power of the Dashnaks, the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic was created. In February 1921, Soviet troops, violating the peace treaty with the government of Georgia (May 1920), captured Tiflis, where the creation of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic was proclaimed. In April 1920, by decision of the Central Committee of the RCP(b) and the government of the RSFSR, a buffer Far Eastern Republic was created, and in 1922 the Far East was finally liberated from the Japanese invaders. Thus, on the territory of the former Russian Empire (with the exception of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland and Finland), the Soviet government won.

The Bolsheviks won the Civil War and repelled foreign intervention. They managed to keep the main part of the territory of the former Russian Empire. At the same time, Poland, Finland, and the Baltic states separated from Russia and gained independence. Western Ukraine, Western Belarus and Bessarabia were lost.

Reasons for the victory of the Bolsheviks

The defeat of the anti-Soviet forces was due to a number of reasons. Their leaders canceled the Decree on Land and returned the land to its former owners. This turned the peasants against them. The slogan of preserving "one and indivisible Russia" contradicted the hopes of many peoples for independence. The unwillingness of the leaders of the white movement to cooperate with the liberal and socialist parties narrowed its socio-political base. Punitive expeditions, pogroms, mass executions of prisoners, widespread violation of legal norms - all this caused discontent among the population, up to armed resistance. During the Civil War, the opponents of the Bolsheviks failed to agree on a single program and a single leader of the movement. Their actions were poorly coordinated.

The Bolsheviks won the Civil War because they managed to mobilize all the resources of the country and turn it into a single military camp. The Central Committee of the RCP(b) and the Council of People's Commissars created a politicized Red Army, ready to defend Soviet power. Various social groups were attracted by loud revolutionary slogans, the promise of social and national justice. The leadership of the Bolsheviks managed to present themselves as the defenders of the Fatherland and accuse their opponents of betrayal national interests. Of great importance was international solidarity, the help of the proletariat of Europe and the USA.

The civil war was a terrible disaster for Russia. It led to a further deterioration of the economic situation in the country, to complete economic ruin. Material damage amounted to more than 50 billion rubles. gold. Industrial production decreased by 7 times. Was completely paralyzed transport system. Many segments of the population, forcibly drawn into the war by the opposing sides, became its innocent victims. In battles, from hunger, disease and terror, 8 million people died, 2 million people were forced to emigrate. Among them were many members of the intellectual elite. Irreplaceable moral and ethical losses had profound socio-cultural consequences, which for a long time affected the history of the Soviet country.

The Great Russian Revolution of 1917 was the impetus for the deployment of armed struggle between different groups of the population. The revolution deprived some of them of everything, while for others it seemed to give everything, but did not say how it could be obtained. There were more dissatisfied people than one could imagine. The military-political structures formed during the days of the revolution, and state formations on the territory of the former Russian Empire, were divided into two groups, which were assigned the names "white" and "red". The spontaneously arising military and socio-political groups, which were called the "third force" (insurgent, partisan detachments, and others), did not stand aside. Foreign states, or interventionists, did not stand aside from the civil confrontation in Russia either.

Stages and chronology of the Civil War

Until now, historians have no consensus on how to determine the chronology of the Civil War. There are experts who believe that the war began with the February bourgeois revolution, while others defend May 1918. There is also no final opinion on when the war ended.

The next stage can be called the period until April 1919, when the intervention of the Entente is expanding. The Entente set itself the main task of supporting the anti-Bolshevik forces, strengthening its interests and resolving the issue that had been troubling it for many years: the fear of socialist influence.

The next stage is the most active on all fronts. Soviet Russia simultaneously waged a struggle against the interventionists and against the White armies.

Causes of the Civil War

Naturally, the beginning of the Civil War cannot be reduced to one reason. The contradictions that had accumulated in society by this time went off scale. The First World War aggravated them to the extreme, the values ​​of human life were devalued.

Of no small importance in the aggravation of the situation were changes in the state political system, especially the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly by the Bolsheviks, the creation of which many counted on. The actions of the Bolsheviks in the countryside gave rise to great unrest. The Decree on Land was announced, but new decrees reduced it to zero. The nationalization and confiscation of land plots from the landlords gave rise to a harsh rebuff from the owners. The bourgeoisie was also extremely dissatisfied with the nationalization that had taken place and sought to return factories and factories.

The actual withdrawal from the war, the Treaty of Brest - all this played against the Bolsheviks, which made it possible to accuse them of "the destruction of Russia."

The right of peoples to self-determination, which was proclaimed by the Bolsheviks, contributed to the emergence of independent states. This also caused irritation as a betrayal of Russia's interests.

Not everyone agreed with the policy of the new government, which broke with its past and ancient traditions. The anti-church policy was especially rejected.

There were many forms of the Civil War. Uprisings, armed clashes, large-scale operations involving regular armies. Partisan actions, terror, sabotage. The war was bloody and extremely long.

Major events of the Civil War

We offer you the following chronicle of the events of the Civil War:

1917

1918

1919

1920

1921

1922

Results of the Civil War

The civil war ended, its main result was the establishment of Soviet power.

During the war years, the Red Army was able to turn into a well-organized and well-armed force. She learned a lot from her opponents, but her talented and original commanders also appeared a lot.

The Bolsheviks actively used the political mood of the masses, their propaganda set clear goals, promptly resolved issues of peace and land, etc. The government of the young republic was able to organize control over the central provinces of Russia, where the main military enterprises were located. The anti-Bolshevik forces were never able to unite until the end of the war.

The war ended, and Bolshevik power was established throughout the country, as well as in most national regions. According to various estimates, more than 15 million people died or died due to disease and starvation. More than 2.5 million people have gone abroad. The country was in a state of severe economic crisis. Entire social groups were on the verge of destruction, primarily the officers, the intelligentsia, the Cossacks, the clergy and the nobility.

At the first stage of the Civil War of 1917 - 1922/23, two powerful opposing forces took shape - "red" and "white". The first represented the Bolshevik camp, whose goal was a radical change in the existing system and the construction of a socialist regime, the second - the anti-Bolshevik camp, striving to return the order of the pre-revolutionary period.

The period between the February and October revolutions is the time of the formation and development of the Bolshevik regime, the stage of accumulation of forces. The main tasks of the Bolsheviks before the outbreak of the Civil War were: the formation of a social support, transformations in the country that would allow them to gain a foothold at the top of power in the country, and protect the achievements of the February Revolution.

The methods of the Bolsheviks in strengthening power were effective. First of all, this concerns propaganda among the population - the slogans of the Bolsheviks were relevant and helped to quickly form the social support of the "Reds".

The first armed detachments of the "Reds" began to appear on preparatory stage from March to October 1917. The main driving force behind such detachments were workers from industrial regions - this was the main force of the Bolsheviks, which helped them come to power during the October Revolution. At the time of the revolutionary events, the detachment numbered about 200,000 people.

The stage of formation of the power of the Bolsheviks required the protection of what was achieved during the revolution - for this, at the end of December 1917, the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission was created, headed by F. Dzerzhinsky. On January 15, 1918, the Cheka adopted a Decree on the creation of the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army, and on January 29, the Red Fleet was created.

Analyzing the actions of the Bolsheviks, historians do not come to a consensus about their goals and motivations:

The most common opinion is that the “Reds” initially planned a large-scale Civil War, which would be a logical continuation of the revolution. The fighting, the purpose of which was to promote the ideas of the revolution, would consolidate the power of the Bolsheviks and spread socialism throughout the world. During the war, the Bolsheviks planned to destroy the bourgeoisie as a class. Thus, based on this, the ultimate goal of the "Reds" is a world revolution.

One of the admirers of the second concept is V. Galin. This version is fundamentally different from the first - according to historians, the Bolsheviks had no intention of turning the revolution into a Civil War. The goal of the Bolsheviks was to seize power, which they succeeded in the course of the revolution. But the continuation of hostilities was not included in the plans. The arguments of the fans of this concept: the transformations planned by the "Reds" demanded peace in the country, at the first stage of the struggle, the "Reds" were tolerant of other political forces. A turning point regarding political opponents occurred when in 1918 there was a threat to lose power in the state. By 1918, the "Reds" had a strong, professionally trained enemy - the White Army. Its backbone was the military times of the Russian Empire. By 1918, the fight against this enemy became purposeful, the army of the "Reds" acquired a pronounced structure.

At the first stage of the war, the actions of the Red Army were not successful. Why?

Recruitment to the army was carried out on a voluntary basis, which led to decentralization and disunity. The army was created spontaneously, without a specific structure - this led to a low level of discipline, problems in managing a large number of volunteers. The chaotic army was not characterized by a high level of combat capability. Only since 1918, when the Bolshevik power was under threat, did the "Reds" decide to recruit troops according to the mobilization principle. From June 1918, they began to mobilize the military of the tsarist army.

The second reason is closely related to the first - against the chaotic, non-professional army of the "Reds" were organized, professional military, which at the time of the Civil War, participated in more than one battle. The "Whites" with a high level of patriotism were united not only by professionalism, but also by the idea - the White movement stood for a united and indivisible Russia, for order in the state.

The most characteristic feature of the Red Army is uniformity. First of all, it concerns the class origin. Unlike the "whites", whose army included professional soldiers, workers, and peasants, the "reds" accepted only proletarians and peasants into their ranks. The bourgeoisie was to be destroyed, so an important task was to prevent hostile elements from entering the Red Army.

In parallel with the hostilities, the Bolsheviks were implementing a political and economic program. The Bolsheviks pursued a policy of "red terror" against hostile social classes. In the economic sphere, "war communism" was introduced - a set of measures in the domestic policy of the Bolsheviks throughout the Civil War.

Biggest victories for the Reds:

• 1918 - 1919 - the establishment of Bolshevik power on the territory of Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia.
• The beginning of 1919 - the Red Army goes on the counteroffensive, defeating the "white" army of Krasnov.
• Spring-summer 1919 - Kolchak's troops fell under the blows of the "Reds".
• The beginning of 1920 - the "Reds" ousted the "Whites" from the northern cities of Russia.
• February-March 1920 - the defeat of the rest of the forces of Denikin's Volunteer Army.
• November 1920 - the "Reds" ousted the "Whites" from the Crimea.
• By the end of 1920, the "Reds" were opposed by scattered groups of the White Army. The civil war ended with the victory of the Bolsheviks.

Where did the terms "red" and "white" come from? The Civil War also knew the "greens", "cadets", "SRs" and other formations. What is their fundamental difference?

In this article, we will answer not only these questions, but also get acquainted briefly with the history of formation in the country. Let's talk about the confrontation between the White Guard and the Red Army.

Origin of the terms "red" and "white"

Today, the history of the Fatherland is less and less concerned with young people. According to polls, many do not even have an idea, what can we say about the Patriotic War of 1812...

However, such words and phrases as "red" and "white", "Civil War" and "October Revolution" are still well known. Most, however, do not know the details, but they have heard the terms.

Let's take a closer look at this issue. We should start with where the two opposing camps came from - "white" and "red" in the Civil War. In principle, it was just an ideological move by Soviet propagandists and nothing more. Now you will understand this riddle yourself.

If you turn to the textbooks and reference books of the Soviet Union, it explains that the “whites” are the White Guards, supporters of the tsar and enemies of the “reds”, the Bolsheviks.

It seems that everything was like that. But in fact, this is another enemy that the Soviets fought.

After all, the country has lived for seventy years in opposition to fictitious opponents. These were the "whites", the kulaks, the decaying West, the capitalists. Very often, such a vague definition of the enemy served as the foundation for slander and terror.

Next, we will discuss the causes of the Civil War. The "Whites", according to the Bolshevik ideology, were monarchists. But here's the catch, there were practically no monarchists in the war. They had no one to fight for, and honor did not suffer from this. Nicholas II abdicated the throne, but his brother did not accept the crown. Thus, all the royal officers were free from the oath.

Where, then, did this “color” difference come from? If the Bolsheviks did have a red flag, then their opponents never had a white one. The answer lies in the history of a century and a half ago.

The Great French Revolution gave the world two opposing camps. The royal troops wore a white banner, a sign of the dynasty of the French rulers. Their opponents, after the seizure of power, hung a red canvas in the window of the city hall as a sign of the introduction of wartime. On such days, any gathering of people was dispersed by soldiers.

The Bolsheviks were opposed not by monarchists, but by supporters of the convocation of the Constituent Assembly (Constitutional Democrats, Cadets), anarchists (Makhnovists), "Green Army" (fought against the "Reds", "Whites", interventionists) and those who wanted to separate their territory into a free state .

Thus, the term "whites" has been cleverly used by ideologues to define a common enemy. His winning position turned out to be that any Red Army soldier could explain in a nutshell what he was fighting for, unlike all the other rebels. It attracted ordinary people on the side of the Bolsheviks and made it possible for the latter to win the Civil War.

Background of the war

When the Civil War is studied in the classroom, the table is simply necessary for a good assimilation of the material. Below are the stages of this military conflict, which will help you better navigate not only in the article, but also in this period of the history of the Fatherland.

Now that we have decided who the “reds” and “whites” are, the Civil War, or rather its stages, will be more understandable. You can proceed to a deeper study of them. Let's start with the prerequisites.

So, the main reason for such a heat of passion, which subsequently resulted in a five-year Civil War, was the accumulated contradictions and problems.

First, the participation of the Russian Empire in the First World War destroyed the economy and drained resources in the country. The bulk of the male population was in the army; Agriculture and urban industry. The soldiers were tired of fighting for other people's ideals when there were hungry families at home.

The second reason was agrarian and industrial issues. There were too many peasants and workers who lived below the poverty line and destitution. The Bolsheviks took full advantage of this.

In order to turn participation in the world war into an interclass struggle, certain steps were taken.

First, the first wave of nationalization of enterprises, banks, and lands took place. Then the Brest Treaty was signed, which plunged Russia into the abyss of complete ruin. Against the background of the general devastation, the Red Army men staged a terror in order to stay in power.

To justify their behavior, they built an ideology of struggle against the White Guards and interventionists.

background

Let's take a closer look at why the Civil War began. The table we cited earlier illustrates the stages of conflict. But we will start with the events that took place before the Great October Revolution.

Weakened by participation in the First World War, the Russian Empire is in decline. Nicholas II abdicates the throne. More importantly, he does not have a successor. In the light of such events, two new forces are being formed simultaneously - the Provisional Government and the Soviet of Workers' Deputies.

The former begin to deal with the social and political spheres of the crisis, while the Bolsheviks concentrated on increasing their influence in the army. This path led them subsequently to the opportunity to become the only ruling force in the country.
It was the confusion in the administration of the state that led to the formation of "red" and "white". The civil war was only the apotheosis of their differences. Which is to be expected.

October Revolution

In fact, the tragedy of the Civil War begins with the October Revolution. The Bolsheviks were gaining strength and more confidently went to power. In mid-October 1917, a very tense situation began to develop in Petrograd.

October 25 Alexander Kerensky, head of the Provisional Government, leaves Petrograd for Pskov for help. He personally assesses the events in the city as an uprising.

In Pskov, he asks to help him with troops. Kerensky seems to be getting support from the Cossacks, but suddenly the Cadets leave the regular army. Now the Constitutional Democrats refuse to support the head of government.

Not finding proper support in Pskov, Alexander Fedorovich travels to the city of Ostrov, where he meets with General Krasnov. At the same time, the Winter Palace was stormed in Petrograd. In Soviet history, this event is presented as a key one. But in fact, it happened without resistance from the deputies.

After a blank shot from the Aurora cruiser, the sailors, soldiers and workers approached the palace and arrested all the members of the Provisional Government who were present there. In addition, the Second Congress of Soviets took place, where a number of basic declarations were adopted and executions at the front were abolished.

In view of the coup, Krasnov decides to help Alexander Kerensky. On October 26, a cavalry detachment of seven hundred people leaves in the direction of Petrograd. It was assumed that in the city itself they would be supported by the uprising of the Junkers. But it was suppressed by the Bolsheviks.

In the current situation, it became clear that the Provisional Government no longer had power. Kerensky fled, General Krasnov bargained with the Bolsheviks for the opportunity to return to Ostrov with the detachment without hindrance.

Meanwhile, the Socialist-Revolutionaries begin a radical struggle against the Bolsheviks, who, in their opinion, have gained more power. The answer to the murders of some "red" leaders was the terror of the Bolsheviks, and the Civil War began (1917-1922). We now consider further developments.

Establishment of "red" power

As we said above, the tragedy of the Civil War began long before the October Revolution. The common people, soldiers, workers and peasants were dissatisfied with the current situation. If in the central regions many paramilitary detachments were under the tight control of the Headquarters, then completely different moods reigned in the eastern detachments.

Precisely the presence a large number reserve troops and their unwillingness to go to war with Germany helped the Bolsheviks quickly and bloodlessly gain the support of almost two-thirds of the army. Only 15 large cities resisted the "red" government, while 84, on their own initiative, passed into their hands.

An unexpected surprise for the Bolsheviks in the form of amazing support from the confused and tired soldiers was announced by the "Reds" as a "triumphal march of the Soviets."

The civil war (1917-1922) only worsened after the signing of the devastating for Russia Under the terms of the agreement, the former empire was losing more than a million square kilometers of territory. These included: the Baltic States, Belarus, Ukraine, the Caucasus, Romania, the Don territories. In addition, they had to pay Germany six billion marks indemnity.

This decision provoked protest both within the country and from the side of the Entente. Simultaneously with the intensification of various local conflicts, the military intervention of Western states on the territory of Russia begins.

The entry of the Entente troops in Siberia was reinforced by a revolt of the Kuban Cossacks led by General Krasnov. The defeated detachments of the White Guards and some interventionists went to Central Asia and continued the struggle against Soviet power for many more years.

Second period of the Civil War

It was at this stage that the White Guard Heroes of the Civil War were the most active. History has preserved such names as Kolchak, Yudenich, Denikin, Yuzefovich, Miller and others.

Each of these commanders had his own vision of the future for the state. Some tried to interact with the troops of the Entente in order to overthrow the Bolshevik government and still convene the Constituent Assembly. Others wanted to become local princelings. This includes such as Makhno, Grigoriev and others.

The complexity of this period lies in the fact that as soon as the First World War was completed, the German troops had to leave the territory of Russia only after the arrival of the Entente. But according to a secret agreement, they left earlier, handing over the cities to the Bolsheviks.

As history shows us, it is after such a turn of events that the Civil War enters a phase of particular cruelty and bloodshed. The failure of the commanders, who were guided by Western governments, was aggravated by the fact that they were sorely lacking in qualified officers. So, the armies of Miller, Yudenich and some other formations disintegrated only because, with a lack of middle-level commanders, the main influx of forces came from captured Red Army soldiers.

Newspaper reports of this period are characterized by headlines of this type: "Two thousand servicemen with three guns went over to the side of the Red Army."

The final stage

Historians tend to associate the beginning of the last period of the war of 1917-1922 with the Polish War. With the help of his western neighbors, Piłsudski wanted to create a confederation with territory from the Baltic to the Black Sea. But his aspirations were not destined to come true. The armies of the Civil War, led by Yegorov and Tukhachevsky, fought their way deep into Western Ukraine and reached the Polish border.

The victory over this enemy was to rouse the workers in Europe to the struggle. But all the plans of the Red Army leaders failed after a devastating defeat in the battle, which has been preserved under the name "Miracle on the Vistula."

After the conclusion of a peace treaty between the Soviets and Poland, disagreements begin in the Entente camp. As a result, the financing of the "white" movement decreased, and the Civil War in Russia began to decline.

In the early 1920s, similar changes in the foreign policy of Western states led to the fact that the Soviet Union was recognized by most countries.

The heroes of the Civil War of the final period fought against Wrangel in Ukraine, the interventionists in the Caucasus and Central Asia, in Siberia. Among the particularly distinguished commanders, Tukhachevsky, Blucher, Frunze and some others should be noted.

Thus, as a result of five years of bloody battles, a new state was formed on the territory of the Russian Empire. Subsequently, it became the second superpower, the only rival of which was the United States.

Reasons for victory

Let's see why the "whites" were defeated in the Civil War. We will compare the assessments of the opposing camps and try to come to a common conclusion.

Soviet historians saw the main reason for their victory in the fact that they received massive support from the oppressed sections of society. Particular emphasis was placed on those who suffered as a result of the 1905 revolution. Because they unconditionally went over to the side of the Bolsheviks.

"Whites", on the contrary, complained about the lack of human and material resources. In the occupied territories with a million people, they could not even carry out a minimal mobilization to replenish the ranks.

Of particular interest are the statistics provided by the Civil War. The "Reds", "Whites" (table below) suffered particularly from desertion. Unbearable living conditions, as well as the lack of clear goals, made themselves felt. The data relates only to the Bolshevik forces, since the White Guard records did not save intelligible figures.

The main point noted by modern historians was the conflict.

The White Guards, firstly, did not have a centralized command and minimal cooperation between units. They fought locally, each for their own interests. The second feature was the absence of political workers and a clear program. These moments were often assigned to officers who only knew how to fight, but not to conduct diplomatic negotiations.

The Red Army soldiers created a powerful ideological network. A clear system of concepts was developed, which were hammered into the heads of workers and soldiers. The slogans made it possible for even the most downtrodden peasant to understand what he was going to fight for.

It was this policy that allowed the Bolsheviks to get the maximum support of the population.

Effects

The victory of the "Reds" in the Civil War was given to the state very dearly. The economy was completely destroyed. The country has lost territories with a population of more than 135 million people.

Agriculture and productivity, food production have decreased by 40-50 percent. Prodrazverstka and "red-white" terror in different regions led to the death of a huge number of people from starvation, torture and execution.

Industry, according to experts, has sunk to the level of the Russian Empire during the reign of Peter the Great. According to the researchers, production figures have fallen to 20 percent of the volume in 1913, and in some areas up to 4 percent.

As a result, a mass exodus of workers from cities to villages began. Since there was at least some hope not to die of hunger.

"Whites" in the Civil War reflected the aspirations of the nobility and higher ranks return to the old conditions of life. But their isolation from the real moods that prevailed among the common people led to the total defeat of the old order.

Reflection in culture

The leaders of the Civil War have been immortalized in thousands of different works - from cinema to paintings, from stories to sculptures and songs.

For example, such productions as "Days of the Turbins", "Running", "Optimistic Tragedy" immersed people in the tense atmosphere of wartime.

The films "Chapaev", "Red Devils", "We are from Kronstadt" showed the efforts that the "Reds" made in the Civil War to win their ideals.

The literary work of Babel, Bulgakov, Gaidar, Pasternak, Ostrovsky illustrates the life of representatives of different strata of society in those difficult days.

You can give examples almost endlessly, because the social catastrophe that resulted in the Civil War found a powerful response in the hearts of hundreds of artists.

Thus, today we have learned not only the origin of the concepts of "white" and "red", but also briefly got acquainted with the course of events of the Civil War.

Remember that any crisis contains the seed of future changes for the better.