Commanders of the Red Army during the Civil Years. Soviet military leaders - heroes of the civil war

© Shishov A.V., 2016

© LLC Veche Publishing House, 2016

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Word from the author

If the First World War became the Calvary of the Russian Empire, then, in fact, the Civil War that emerged from it bloodily ended old Russia, starting with a coup d'état in October 1917 and ending in 1922 on the shores of the Sea of ​​Japan in Primorye. The world war heated class contradictions to the limit, to which its disasters were added. In other words, the power of the Romanov dynasty did not stand the test of the war, as well as the three empires that disappeared with it into history - German, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman.

The Civil War divided Russia into two irreconcilable camps - the Red Cause and the White Cause. If the vanquished fought to preserve the foundations of the old statehood, then the vanquished dreamed of a world revolution in which Soviet Russia was to become the first proletarian bastion. Those who, for various reasons, did not want to participate in that internal war fell under the pressure of the slogan "Whoever is not with us is against us." And they, too, were forced to take up arms in order to fight with the same as them.

If the vanquished tried in many ways to recreate the old Russian army with its age-old traditions, then the victors created a new type of army - the Red Workers 'and Peasants' Army, abbreviated as the Red Army. Each of them had its commanders and commanders. If in the white troops they were overwhelmingly former tsarist generals and senior officers, then in the red troops, after going through the crucible of the Civil War, as a rule, former junior officers of the old army and its lower ranks who went through the World War became such.

All the characters in this book belong to the elite leaders of the Red Army. They are different in origin: from the proletarian systems of the city and village, from the Cossacks, many from the nobility. Most of them have behind them military schools, the Academy of the General Staff, schools of wartime ensigns. During the Civil War, they were called military specialists (military specialists) in the ranks of the Red Army. A minority learned the art of commanding in war, but not always at the front. Both Supreme Commanders of the Soviet Republic, I. I. Vatsetis and S. S. Kamenev, were former colonels who successfully graduated from the Military Academy of the General Staff.

Four of them were professional underground revolutionaries - V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko, K. E. Voroshilov, L. D. Trotsky and M. V. Frunze. N. I. Makhno can also be counted among them. All of them at different times served as people's commissar for military (and naval) affairs. Only the first of them had a military education, the rest were taught the art of commanding and fighting by the Civil War.

Part of the Red military leaders were "nuggets" of that war, which the revolutionary elements threw to the commanding heights in the Red Army. These are: S. M. Budyonny, O. I. Gorodovikov, P. E. Dybenko, G. I. Kotovsky and V. I. Chapaev. The rest, not named above, wore officer epaulettes on their shoulders during the World War.

The civil war reached a particular intensity in the Cossack regions, the majority of whose population at its beginning swayed to the side of the White Cause. From the Cossack class, the Don O. I. Gorodovikov and F. K. Mironov, the Orenburger N. D. Kashirin and the Kuban I. L. Sorokin became the military leaders of the Red Cause. The fate of the last three Red Cossacks is tragic.

All the heroes of the book began the Civil War with the command of various detachments, regiments, brigades. But among them were those who immediately or almost immediately soared to the heights of the military power of the Red Cause at the very beginning of the all-Russian "fire". These are: V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko, I. I. Vatsetis, P. E. Dybenko, S. S. Kamenev, L. D. Trotsky, M. N. Tukhachevsky and V. I. Shorin. But their fate in the ranks of the Red Army is connected not only with ups and downs, but also with downfalls. Only one of them, Kamenev, died a natural death.

Half of the heroes of the book, who shone in the ranks of the fighting Red Army and left their personal mark on the history of the Civil War, became victims of the Stalinist repressions of the 30s. Their names are: V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko, V. K. Blucher, I. I. Vatsetis, A. I. Gekker, P. E. Dybenko, A. I. Egorov, N. D. Kashirin, A. I. Kork, M. N. Tukhachevsky, I. P. Uborevich, I. F. Fedko, and V. I. Shorin. It is noteworthy that three of them, recognized red commanders, became the first of five people awarded the title of Marshal of the Soviet Union for military service to the socialist Fatherland: Blucher, Yegorov and Tukhachevsky. Vatsetis was the first Commander-in-Chief of the Republic. For almost two decades, their names remained outside the national history. If they were remembered, then with an unkind word.

One person - S. S. Kamenev, the former second Commander-in-Chief of the Republic, was ranked among the "enemies of the people" after his death, "happily" avoiding execution in the 30s by a court verdict. But even he was for a time “marked out” from Soviet history, from the “faceless” history of the Civil War in Russia.

During the years of the Civil War, such "nuggets" in the galaxy of red military leaders as F. K. Mironov and I. L. Sorokin were killed without trial or investigation in Soviet prisons (in Moscow and Stavropol). Both of them came from the Cossacks, the first from the Don, the second from the Kuban. Neither one nor the other did not get along in the ongoing war with the Moscow authorities. So their life ending for history does not look like something incomprehensible, illogical.

Soon after the end of the Civil War, another red "nugget" was killed by his own - G.I. Kotovsky, also a man with a complex, rebellious character. To this day, there is no consensus on the motives for the murder, and there never will be.

Of all the heroes of the book, only one legendary commander, V. I. Chapaev, died in the fire of the Civil War. He died from a bullet sent by the hand of a white Cossack. But who can say what the fate of this "nugget" of the Red Case would have been if he lived to see the Stalinist repressions? The question is controversial and therefore open.

In Mexico, an NKVD agent killed the former chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs during the Civil War, L. D. Trotsky, a personal enemy of Stalin and therefore became an implacable ideological enemy of the Soviet Union. But the fact that he stood at the pinnacle of the military power of the Red Cause during that war is a fact that is difficult to dispute today.

Before the Great Patriotic War, only three book heroes passed away with their death. These are: S. S. Vostretsov (who could well follow the Far Eastern associates Blucher and Uborevich), M. F. Frunze, whose death after the operation raises many questions, and the non-party hero of the Civil War, who made an alliance with the Soviet government three times "father" N I. Makhno, who died unknown in a Warsaw hospital.

Only three of the personalities of this book survived the “execution” of the 1930s and the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945: S. M. Budyonny, K. E. Voroshilov and O. I. Gorodovikov. All of them came from the ranks of the command staff of the famous 1st Cavalry Army, all of them were personally well known to I.V. Stalin. Budyonny and Voroshilov are among the five generals of the Civil War who became the first Marshals of the Soviet Union. In terms of the number of lifetime laurels, not a single hero of the Civil War can compare with them.

All of them are different, these commanders and commanders of the Red Cause, who gave and are ready to give their lives for the Soviet power, for the power of the working people. But she prepared for most of them death and obscurity for many years, which is beyond dispute. But historical truth sooner or later takes its toll, paying a well-deserved tribute to the true merits of the heroes of this book in the field of the Civil War in Russia. That war, which incinerated not only the country, but also the souls of its people.

Alexey Shishov,

military historian and writer

Antonov-Ovseenko Vladimir Alexandrovich
The path from the storming of the Winter Palace to the post of execution prosecutor of the RSFSR

V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko could rightly be called a man of amazing fate even during his lifetime. A professional revolutionary, party publicist, one of the leaders of the storming of the Winter Palace, People's Commissar for Military Affairs, commander of the Soviet troops in the South of Russia and the Ukrainian Front, diplomat and People's Commissar of Justice of the RSFSR, became a victim of Stalin's repressions of the 30s.

Born in 1883 in the ancient city of Chernigov. His father was an officer with the rank of captain A. A. Ovseenko, who received military awards for the war with the Turks. Vladimir had two brothers and two sisters. At the age of 18 he graduated from the Voronezh Cadet Corps.

In September 1901, at the insistence of his parents, Vladimir Ovseenko entered the Nikolaev Military Engineering School in the capital. But the following month, in October, the cadet, an unbalanced and quick-tempered man, was expelled from the school for refusing to take the oath of allegiance to "the Tsar and the Fatherland." So he protested against the parental "coercion" to become, like his father, a military man. Was first arrested for 11 days.

At the end of the year, once in Warsaw, he becomes a member of the student social democratic circle. In the spring of the following year, 1902, having moved to St. Petersburg, he works in the port of Alexander and as a coachman for the Society for the Protection of Animals.

In the same 1902, Vladimir Ovseenko again entered the military school - Vladimirskoe in St. Petersburg, which trained infantry officers. At the end of the year, he joins the ranks of the RSDLP and creates an underground circle in the school, being close to the Socialist Revolutionaries (SRs), then establishes contact with the Bolshevik organization. Engaged in the distribution of prohibited literature. Then he was not even twenty years old.

He graduated from the military school in the first category, having received the highest score in all subjects, that is, 12 points. This meant: “Knows everything that has been covered very thoroughly, answers firmly, develops ideas clearly, arranging answers in a systematic order, resolves all questions, refutes all objections, expresses accurately, coherently and freely.”

Ovseenko graduated from the school with the rank of second lieutenant and was assigned to the 40th Kolyvan Infantry Regiment stationed in Warsaw. Even before arriving in the regiment, while on vacation, the young officer completed a party task, receiving illegal literature in Vilna and appearances from the Social Democracy of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania. He constantly strived for active practical work of an illegal underground worker. For transporting a cargo of illegal literature, he was arrested for 10 days.

In Warsaw, Vladimir Ovseenko and his young wife Anna Mikhailovna, a graduate of the Bestuzhev Courses, became activists in a local underground organization. The second lieutenant participates in an unsuccessful attempt to release the famous Polish Social Democrat S. Kaspshak, who was sentenced to death, succeeds in publishing the underground "Soldier's List". During the revolutionary events of early 1905, he was included in the list of "unreliable" soldiers and officers of the Warsaw garrison.

In March 1905, Lieutenant Vladimir Ovseenko was assigned to the active army in Manchuria. But he did not get into the Japanese War, leaving military service and becoming an underground worker, that is, a professional revolutionary, which became his life's work. For a short time he emigrates to Austria.

In the same year, he participated in an unsuccessful attempt to raise an uprising of soldiers of two infantry regiments in the Warsaw suburb of Pulawy - the 71st Belevsky and 72nd Tula and an artillery brigade. In those events, a second lieutenant who deserted from the army wounded a company sergeant major with a shot from a revolver and managed to escape. Ovseenko has the first underground nickname "Bayonet".

He has to leave Poland for St. Petersburg. The Metropolitan Committee of the RSDLP sends him for underground work in the sea fortress of Kronstadt, having documents for the Austrian citizen Stefan Dolnitsko. There he organizes illegal gatherings of soldiers and sailors. He was arrested, served his sentence in Kronstadt and was released at the end of the same 1905 under an amnesty.

In the same 1905, he participated in an attempt to organize an uprising in the garrison of St. Petersburg (railway battalion and sappers). Antonov-Avseenko on the pages of the "Red Fleet" (1924) spoke about that event as follows:

“... I, as a former officer, must take command. The start is early in the morning.

The night has passed. No one came, as agreed, for me. After I found out - the soldiers refused to speak.

Until October, Antonov-Ovseenko worked in various underground (military) organizations of the united RSDLP, adjoining the Mensheviks. He announced his joining the Bolshevik Party at the end of May 1917. In March 1906, he escaped from the Suschevsky arrest house. In May of the following year, the visiting session of the Odessa Military District Court sentenced him to death as Anton Kabanov. The execution was replaced by 20 years hard labor. A month later, he escaped from the Sevastopol prison. In 1909 he spent 6 months in prison as Anton Hooke, after which he emigrated to France.

There, in Paris, Vladimir Alexandrovich received the party pseudonym Antonov, and subsequently began to be written Antonov-Ovseenko. Under this double surname, he entered the history of the Civil War in Russia, as well as the history of the Stalinist repressions of the 30s.

In May 1917 he returned to Russia. In Helsingfors, he edited the newspaper "Priboy". He was elected to the Constituent Assembly from the Northern Front on the list of the RSDLP (b). Conducted party work in Finland and among the sailors of the Baltic Fleet. In mid-October, he became secretary of the Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee (VRK).

Antonov-Ovseenko entered the history of the October Revolution as one of the leaders of the storming of the Winter Palace and the leader of the arrest of the Provisional Government. On behalf of the Military Revolutionary Committee, he was in charge of the distribution of detachments of Baltic sailors to key points in the city on the Neva and led the "field headquarters" to capture the Winter Palace. Signed an ultimatum addressed to the Commander-in-Chief of the Petrograd Military District, who, in the realities of October, commanded few people.

On the night of October 25-26 (November 7-8, New Style), the Winter Palace was stormed by revolutionary detachments. As a matter of fact, there was no one to defend the Provisional Government, and the Socialist Prime Minister A.F. Kerensky managed to escape from the capital in time. V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko himself recalled the arrest of the Provisional Government as follows:

“... The ministers froze at the table, merging into one quivering pale spot.

- In the name of the Military Revolutionary Committee, I declare you under arrest.

- What is there! Finish them!.. Bay!

- To order! The Military Revolutionary Committee is in charge here!”

The American journalist A. R. Williams witnessed the historic storming of the Winter Palace and the events that followed it in red Petrograd. About Antonov-Ovseenko he wrote:

“I remember Antonov’s pale ascetic face, thick, blond hair under a picturesque wide-browed hat, a calm, concentrated look that makes one forget his purely civilian appearance ...

One sailor told me that even upstairs, after Chudnovsky compiled a list of those arrested, Antonov asked: “Comrades, do we have cars?” Someone answered: "No." And others shouted: “Nothing, they will walk on foot! Enough, train!” Antonov asked for silence, thought for a while and said: “All right, we will take them to the (Peter and Paul) fortress on foot.”

At about 4 o'clock in the morning, Antonov-Ovseenko ordered the arrested "temporary" ministers to be taken to the casemates of the Trubetskoy bastion of Petropavlovka. Saying goodbye to the already appointed commissar of the fortress, the "liquidator" of the Provisional Government said:

- I'm going to Smolny with a report ...

At the Smolny Institute, Vladimir Aleksandrovich delivered a standing ovation to the delegates of the 2nd All-Russian Congress of Soviets. On October 27, Antonov-Ovseenko was elected to the Central Executive Committee of Soviets (CEC) and joined the first composition of the Provisional Workers' and Peasants' Government - the Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom).

The Soviet government, elected by the 2nd All-Russian Congress of Soviets, included the Committee for Military and Naval Affairs (renamed the Council of People's Commissars for Military and Naval Affairs), which consisted of three people's commissars: V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko, ensign N. V Krylenko and Chairman of the Central Balt P. E. Dybenko. In the course of the formation of the Council of People's Commissars, V. I. Lenin distributed duties between them as follows: "Dybenko - the naval ministry, Krylenko - the external front, Antonov - the military ministry and the internal front." The "internal front" was understood as the struggle against the counter-revolution that was raising its head.

The next day, October 28, Antonov-Ovseenko was appointed assistant commander of the Petrograd Military District. This was one of the many cases when he, a former lieutenant, came in handy with the knowledge gained at the Vladimir Military School.

On November 7, he was appointed commander of the defense of Petrograd and the troops of the Petrograd Military District. The revolution had to be defended: the 3rd cavalry corps of General P. N. Krasnov and the socialist minister A. F. Kerensky went to the red Peter. In the capital itself, the junkers of military schools could revolt. The "front" line, which Antonov-Ovseenko took care of, passed along the Pulkovo Heights.

Both the people's commissar for military affairs and the commander of the 3rd cavalry corps turned out to be one of the main characters in the October events of 1917. Krasnov complied with the order of the head of the already former Provisional Government, who had fled from the capital to front-line Pskov, to march on "rebellious" Petrograd. An attempt to take a million-strong city with a rebellious garrison of 300 thousand people by several thousand horsemen looked completely unrealistic. But in Smolny, such a campaign of the class enemy was taken more than seriously.

Moreover, only about nine incomplete hundreds of the 1st Don (9th and 10th Don Cossack regiments) and Ussuri Cossack divisions with 18 horse guns, one armored car and one armored train approached Petrograd. With these forces (they can even be called symbolic - only 700 Cossacks), Major General Krasnov launched an attack on red Petrograd near the village of Pulkovo. That is, he embarked on an outright adventure.

Krasnov's troops were defeated in a long battle on October 30 at the Pulkovo Heights by thousands of detachments of St. Petersburg Red Guards and revolutionary Baltic sailors. They were commanded by the Left SR Lieutenant Colonel M. A. Muravyov. There is no need to talk about the equality of the forces of the parties in terms of the number of people, guns, machine guns and other things.

Before that, about 30 thousand mobilized people sent from the capital to dig trenches, in a matter of days created the defensive line "Zaliv - Neva". However, he turned out to be unclaimed in those events. In addition, the Krasnov Cossacks were not eager to fight for the "temporary" ministers and their head, Kerensky, and did not persist in battle.

This is how the term appeared in Russian (Soviet) history: the counter-revolutionary rebellion of Kerensky-Krasnov in October 1917. Historians argue about its essence today. First of all, there is a discussion about whether these events were a "mutiny", since the order for the 3rd Cavalry Corps was given by the head of the Russian government.

The battle at the Pulkovo Heights ended with negotiations in Krasnoye Selo with a delegation of revolutionary Baltic sailors. They ended with the consent of the Cossacks to go home with horses and weapons. Both sides were satisfied with this outcome of the armed confrontation near the capital. The corps commander was invited to negotiations, arrested and taken to Petrograd, to Smolny. After interrogation, he was released on the word of honor of a Russian officer not to speak out against the Soviet regime anymore. P. N. Krasnov escaped from house arrest, using documents from the Don Cossack Committee.

The head of the Provisional Government, the socialist A.F. Kerensky, warned by Krasnov, also successfully fled from red Petrograd from Gatchina. He had to change into a leather driver's suit and cover half his face with motorcycle goggles. In the White movement in the South of Russia, he was not accepted, and soon ended up overseas, in the USA, where he ended his life. It seems that Antonov-Ovseenko, who "liquidated" the government of the "provisional", was often mentioned by Kerensky.

The People's Commissar himself at Pulkovo Heights, who were defended by the revolutionary detachments of Baltic sailors, Petrograd Red Guards and soldiers of the capital's garrison, gathered by him from the "counter-revolutionary Cossacks", was not there for a good "good" reason. During the speech of the junkers in the capital, he was accidentally arrested by them and spent the night at the telephone exchange of the capital captured by the rebels. The junkers exchanged Antonov-Ovseenko for a promise to save their lives, which was accepted by the Soviet side.

Returning to Smolny, Vladimir Alexandrovich got acquainted with the cases of suppressing the Junker rebellion. Most attentively, he read the report that the cadets of the Vladimir Military School, from which he graduated with the rank of second lieutenant thirteen years ago, held on most stubbornly and for the longest time.

November 23 Antonov-Ovseenko becomes a member of the board of the People's Commissariat for Military Affairs (simultaneously with N. I. Podvoisky and N. V. Krylenko, whom he was well acquainted with in October).

Vladimir Alexandrovich turned out to be those military leaders of the newly established Soviet power, who were given the reins of government to suppress the emerging counter-revolution. On December 8, he was appointed commander of all Red forces in the South of Russia. He was entrusted with the overall leadership of "operations against the Kalinin troops and their accomplices."

There was no Red Army then, and the Red Guard detachments were not a big force. The decree on the reduction of the old Russian army (it had actually collapsed) at the front and in the rear had already been signed by Lenin, Krylenko and Antonov-Ovseenko.

Appointed to lead operations against the troops of the Don military ataman A. M. Kaledin and the Ukrainian Rada, V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko left Petrograd on the same day, December 8, 1917, and on the 10th arrived in Kharkov with a mandate from the Council of People's Commissars, which read:

“This certificate has been given to Comrade Antonov that, with the consent of Commander-in-Chief Krylenko, Commissar Podvoisky and the entire collegium for military affairs, he is authorized to lead operations against the Kaledin troops and their accomplices.

Previous Owls. Nar. Com. V. Ulyanov (Lenin)."

On December 10, at the Mogilev Headquarters of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, which still existed, the so-called Revolutionary Field Headquarters (RPS) was created. He was directly subordinate to V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko, carrying out his orders to concentrate forces gathered against Ataman Kaledin.

Once in Kharkov and having dealt with the situation in the South of Russia, where the first centers of the Civil War had already broken out on the Cossack Don, Antonov-Ovseenko drew up a plan to combat the southern counter-revolution. This plan was communicated to V. I. Lenin for discussion at a meeting of the Council of People's Commissars. What did the people's commissar of the Committee for Military and Naval Affairs of the Council of People's Commissars, who was in charge of the "war ministry and the internal front" offer:

“The plan was this - a defensive line from the side of Poltava (the troops of the Rada were moving there. - A.Sh.), the capture of the junction stations of Lozovaya, Sinelnikovo (connection with Yekaterinoslav), which ensures that hostile trains from the west are not transported and the way to the Donets Basin (from Lozovaya - bypassing the unreliable route through Balakleya). Capture of Kupyansk, movement from Kharkov and Belgorod; an immediate start to arm the workers of the basin, the Donetsk region, etc. After the concentration of some forces in the Donets basin - the displacement of the Cossack gangs, prowling 100 versts south of Nikitovka, and moving several ways to the east against Kaledin, simultaneously with the offensive to the east - a headstrike from Voronezh (the main forces of Kaledin are located along the Voronezh-Rostov railway), from the east - from Tsaritsyn ... and from the south - from the Caucasus ... "

The Antonov-Ovseenko plan was connected with the realities of what was happening. The “Kaledin counter-revolutionary nest” – the capital of the Don Cossack army, the city of Novocherkassk, was taken into the ring and destroyed. Mastering the junction stations on the railway line on the Southern Railway (Kharkov - Simferopol) made it possible to control the military echelons that went from the collapsed Russian front into the depths of Russia, and above all the echelons with Cossack troops - regiments, individual hundreds, artillery batteries.

Antonov-Ovseenko named forces that could be relied upon in the fight against Ataman Kaledin. These were the detachment of the former ensign R.F. Sievers, the “significant detachment” of Black Sea sailors from Sevastopol, the Moscow detachment of the Red Guard (200 people), the revolutionary reserve infantry regiment in Belgorod, the workers of the Donbass, who still had to be organized and armed.

This plan already in January 1918 underwent significant changes. Attacks on Novocherkassk from the side of Tsaritsyn and the Caucasus had to be "set aside", and the Kaledinsky Don had to be attacked only from the side of the Donetsk coal basin. But Antonov-Ovseenko had already gathered more forces for this operation - a large detachment of Yu. V. Sablin from Moscow, Soviet detachments from the front-line Don Cossacks, an infantry regiment from Finland, a detachment of Petrov. The arrival of Latvian riflemen was expected.

Among these troops of the Soviet government was the red "Cossack Ukrainian regiment in Kharkov." It was the 1st Regiment of the Red Cossacks, formed on the basis of the disarmed 2nd Reserve Ukrainian Regiment of the “Petliurist orientation”. The regiment was formed and commanded by a member of the CEC of Ukraine V. M. Primakov, a hero of the Civil War and a victim of Stalinist repressions of the 30s.

Later, V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko in his “Notes on the Civil War” noted: “The main blow could only come from the Donbass, since only from here it could be properly prepared.” No real help could be expected from the Tsaritsyno Defense Headquarters, headed by S.K. Minin. The 39th Infantry Division, which arbitrarily left the Caucasian front, “settled down to feed” in the villages and villages of the Kuban and Stavropol Territory and soon found itself in the fire of Cossack uprisings.

In Kharkov, the People's Commissar without delay set up the headquarters of the Southern Front. The Left Socialist-Revolutionary, Lieutenant Colonel Muravyov, was appointed his chief, with whom Vladimir Aleksandrovich worked together in Petrograd when the "mutiny" of the 3rd cavalry corps of General Krasnov was suppressed.

Antonov-Ovseenko really had a high professional military training. The memoirist M. Z. Levinson writes that when at the end of December a combined detachment of Putilov workers and soldiers of the 176th regiment arrived in Kharkov under his command, the commander with his assistant N. P. Eremeev appeared in Antonov-Ovseenko’s carriage. They saw a man with glasses, long hair, who looked like a musician or a teacher. By the end of the conversation, having received a combat mission, they were convinced that they were dealing with a person who knew military affairs very well.

The People's Commissar, gathering the forces of the Red Guard in Kharkov, demonstrated assertiveness and organizational talent. So it was in the formation of the Southern Revolutionary Armored Division here, which became the first such unit in the Red Army. It was created, as they say, from the world by thread and in a variety of ways. Consisted of six departments of 4-5 armored cars each. In early January, the command of these Red armored forces was entrusted to A.I. Selyavkin.

In Kharkov itself, Ensign Sivers with his detachment, reinforced by artillery, attacked the barracks of the 19th Armored Division, which supported the Central Rada. It was disarmed, and 4 armored cars became the main trophies of the Reds.

10 armored vehicles were delivered by the Baltic sailor Khovrin, who, with his detachment, on the way from Petrograd to the South in the city of Kursk, disarmed the reserve armored division of the British military mission.

An armored detachment of the Kharkov military commandant's office was mobilized to fight against the Kaledin White Cossacks. It consisted of 5 heavy vehicles of the English company "Persorats", armed with cannons.

In addition, V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko himself, who arrived in Kharkov with detachments of the Red Guards, brought with him 12 Austin armored cars from Petrograd.

Antonov-Ovseenko had to lead not only military operations against the Whites on the Don, but also the fight against sabotage in areas where power was in the hands of the Soviets. On January 10, 1918, the commandant of the Alexandrovsk station (now the city of Zaporozhye, Ukraine) Kuznetsov telegraphed the people's commissar to Kharkov:

“All postal and telephone employees, as well as other local governments, went on strike.”

Two hours later, the following order was sent from there to Aleksandrovsk by V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko, which demanded:

“I declare the city under martial law. The senior officials of the post office, telephone and others should be arrested and taken to Kharkov. The rest are invited to report to work within 24 hours, arrest those who did not appear according to the list and send them under escort to Yuzovka, Makeevka for forced labor to clean the mines. Publicize this order widely.

The attack on the White South began with three columns - the former ensign of the Bolshevik R.F. Sievers, the former ensign of the Left SR Yu.V. Sablin (soon one of the leaders of the Left SR rebellion in Moscow) and the former colonel, then the Left SR A. Egorova. At the end of December, the Sievers column took Ilovaiskoye, Sablin reached Lugansk and Rodakov, Yegorov occupied Yekaterinoslav.

17.5 thousand Red Guards, revolutionary sailors and soldiers under the command of R.F. Sievers, Yu.V. Sablin and G.K. Petrov attacked directly against the forces of Ataman Kaledin. At their disposal, they had 48 artillery pieces, 4 armored trains, 4 armored cars and 40 machine guns at the front line.

Simultaneously with the offensive on the White Cossack Don, the Red troops were advancing towards Kyiv, which was in the hands of the Central Rada. Kyiv was liberated largely due to the uprising of the workers of the Arsenal plant. Antonov-Ovseenko's former assistant, G. I. Chudnovsky, was released from prison and appointed by him the first commandant of the Winter Palace. Now, sentenced to death by the Rada, he became the first commandant of Soviet Kyiv, to which the CEC of Ukraine moved from Kharkov.

The red columns advanced with battles. At the end of January, Antonov-Ovseenko reported to Moscow on the successes achieved: "The stations of Likhaya, Zverevo, Sulin, on the way north of Novocherkassk, are occupied by victorious revolutionary troops."

Ataman A. M. Kaledin failed to raise the Don to fight the Soviet regime, and he shot himself. The Don army "swings" to the side of the White Cause later, but not at the beginning of 1918: the Cossacks were tired of the war and had not yet experienced the Red Terror. In February, the Red troops occupy the cities of Rostov and Novocherkassk, the capital of the Don region. The remnants of the White Cossacks went to the Salsky steppes, and the Kornilov Volunteer Army went on their first Kuban ("Ice") campaign.

The blow to the white Don was impressive. The well-known Soviet historian of the Civil War, N. E. Kakurin, attributed to the advantages of the strategic solution to this difficult task “the flexibility of its decisions depending on the situation”, “the desire to concentrate the largest possible number of forces on the directions chosen for delivering the main blows”.

The choice of the best always carries an element of subjectivity and can be challenged. But rarely, even the best commander in history, escaped failure. And the success of a military leader is not always only victories, it is also a career. The title of Marshal in the Red Army was not given just like that.

Mikhail Vasilievich Frunze

Of those whom we will describe here, he is the only one who came to military posts not from the tsarist army, but from the revolutionary struggle, from tsarist hard labor. Frunze's organizational abilities were clearly revealed in the post of military leader. On January 31, 1919, he was appointed commander of the 4th Army, which acted against Kolchak's troops in the western Kazakhstan steppes. In May 1919, Frunze unified the command of the Southern Group of the Eastern Front, and under his leadership, Kolchak's armies advancing on Samara were defeated. This moment marked a radical turning point in the course of the war with Kolchak. Troops led by Frunze cleared the South Urals of the enemy.

In July 1919, Frunze became commander of the Eastern Front, and in August he headed the Turkestan Front. Here he carried out a series of operations, during which he not only restored the connection of Soviet Russia with the Turkestan Soviet Republic, but also completed the conquest of Central Asia, occupying the autonomous Bukhara emirate in September 1920 and proclaiming a Soviet republic in it. In the autumn of the same year, under the leadership of Frunze, Wrangel's armies in the Crimea were finally defeated.

Frunze did not know defeat as a military leader. A civilian, he not only mastered the practice of war, but also became a prominent Soviet military theorist.

Mikhail Nikolaevich Tukhachevsky

Tukhachevsky, as a front commander, suffered a series of major defeats from the Poles in August-September 1920. Nevertheless, he became one of the most successful military leaders of the civil war. A lieutenant from the nobility, in six months he earned five awards for bravery, in 1915, seriously wounded, he was taken prisoner by the Germans, from where he managed to escape on the fifth attempt. In June 1918 he was appointed commander of the 1st Army of the Eastern Front.

Tukhachevsky was repeatedly defeated by the Whites, but he also knew how to win. He developed good relations with Trotsky, who always saw Tukhachevsky as his reliable support in the army. In September 1918, Tukhachevsky carried out a successful operation to capture Simbirsk, Lenin's hometown. Tukhachevsky showed himself best of all, commanding the 5th Army on the Eastern Front in the summer of 1919. Under his leadership, the Reds carried out the Zlatoust and Chelyabinsk operations and overcame the Ural Range.

Tukhachevsky skillfully massaged the forces in the direction of the main attack, seeing this as the key to victory. In February-March 1920, in the rank of commander of the Caucasian Front, he completed the defeat of Denikin's troops in the North Caucasus, and then commanded the Western Front against the Poles, where he first won a decisive victory in Belarus, but then was defeated near Warsaw.

In 1921, he led the suppression of the Kronstadt uprising of sailors and the Tambov uprising of peasants, personally gave orders for the use of chemical weapons, the burning of villages and the execution of hostages. As one who knew him testified, "he was not cruel - he just had no pity."

Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny

He became famous for commanding the famous First Cavalry Army and also did not escape serious setbacks. During the First World War, non-commissioned officer Budyonny became a full Knight of St. George. Consistently commanded a regiment, brigade and division of the red cavalry on the Don Front. In the summer of 1919, Budyonny's division was deployed into a corps, of which he became the commander. In October 1919, when the situation on the Southern Front threatened the Soviet Republic, Budyonny's corps played an important role in defeating the White Cossack troops of Mamontov and Shkuro near Voronezh.

In November 1919, Budyonny's corps was transformed into the 1st Cavalry Army, which became the main strike force of the Red Army in a maneuver war. The army won important victories over the whites, broke into Rostov in January 1920, but was soon defeated by the white cavalry of generals Toporkov and Pavlov. Budyonny suffered another defeat in February in the battle of Yegorlyk. Nevertheless, they did not prevent the defeat of Denikin's troops in the North Caucasus, and even then an aura of legend had formed around Budyonny. It did not fade even after the First Cavalry suffered a cruel defeat near Zamostye from the Poles in August 1920, got into an encirclement and miraculously escaped from it.

Vasily Konstantinovich Blucher

Having begun to serve as a private on mobilization in August 1914 and rose to the rank of junior non-commissioned officer, the namesake of the famous Prussian field marshal was in 1916 discharged after being wounded and, working at a factory, joined the Bolshevik Party. Such a person was a valuable cadre for the Red Army. Back in the winter of 1917/18, he participated in the suppression of the rebellion of the Cossack ataman Dutov in the South Urals. In the summer of 1918, with the intensification of the civil war, Blucher found himself behind enemy lines.

Glory to Blucher brought a thousand-mile raid of his partisan detachment on the white rear in the Urals in August-September 1918. For this campaign, Blucher was the first in the Red Army to receive the Order of the Red Banner. His military talent was revealed at the post of head of the 51st Infantry Division, at the head of which he fought against Kolchak, having traveled from Tyumen to Baikal. Blucher also commanded the same unit during the liquidation of Wrangel's troops in the Crimea. The 51st division took Perekop, crossing part of the forces through the Sivash, and ensured the success of the entire operation.

Nevertheless, Blucher received an unenviable appointment to a distant outskirts - in June 1921 he became Minister of War of the buffer Far Eastern Republic. Having successfully carried out the legendary Volochaev operation in February 1922, he was recalled to Moscow.

Vasily Ivanovich Shorin

The colonel of the tsarist army is little known, probably because, soon after the end of the civil war, he left the ranks of the Red Army due to age. This, however, did not save him in 1938 from execution. After the October Revolution, when the Bolsheviks experimented with the election of military leaders, he became one of those popular officers whom the soldiers elected as their commander. In September 1918, he was appointed commander of the 2nd Army on the Eastern Front after it was completely disorganized by the Izhevsk-Votkinsk uprising in its rear, and in a short time brought it to a combat-ready state.

He unsuccessfully led the actions of the army during Kolchak's winter offensive on Perm, but in the spring of 1919, as commander of the Northern Group of Forces of the Eastern Front, he conducted successful offensive operations near Perm and Yekaterinburg, which ended in the defeat of Kolchak's main forces and the occupation of the Urals. In 1921, he led the suppression of peasant uprisings in Western Siberia.

The crown of his military career was the command of the Turkestan Front in 1922. Under his leadership, in the summer of that year, the main forces of the Basmachi in Eastern Bukhara (Tajikistan) were defeated. During them, the leader of the Basmachi gangs, the former Minister of War of Ottoman Turkey, Enver Pasha, was destroyed.

The events of the civil war in Russia, what happened in the country in 1917-1922, becomes for new and new generations of Russians almost the same ancient history as, for example, the oprichnina. If some 20 years ago the Civil War was presented in heroic and romantic tones, then in recent years the struggle between the "reds" and "whites" is presented as a senseless bloody meat grinder in which everyone lost, but the whites look more "fluffy". Under the slogan of the final reconciliation of the "Reds" and "Whites", the reburial of Generals A. I. Denikin, V. O. Kappel and others from foreign cemeteries to domestic graveyards was initiated. Some of today's youth believe that the whites defeated the reds more than eight decades ago. So, some American schoolchildren sometimes imagine that in World War II the United States defeated Germany and the USSR.

M. V. Frunze

In this situation, it is useful to ask the question posed in the title. Why did the Red Army units under the leadership of the half-educated student Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze, lieutenant Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky, sergeant major Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny and others defeat the white armies of Admiral Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak, generals Anton Ivanovich Denikin, Nikolai Nikolayevich Yudenich, Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel, Vladimir Oskarovich Kappel and others ?

Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze was 32 by 1917 (born 1885). He studied at the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute, but could not complete his studies. In 1904 he joined the RSDLP, became a Bolshevik, and already in 1905 (at the age of 20!) led the Ivanovo-Voznesenskaya strike, during which the first Soviets were formed. In 1909-1910. Mikhail Frunze was twice sentenced to death, in 1910-1915. he was in hard labor, from where he fled.

In 1917, Frunze took part in the revolutionary events in Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Moscow. With the outbreak of the Civil War, he was, as they said then, sent to military work. Frunze showed himself as a major military leader. He commanded the army, then the Southern Group of Forces of the Eastern Front and, at the head of the entire Eastern Front, inflicted a decisive defeat on the armies of A. V. Kolchak. Under the command of Frunze, the troops of the Southern Front broke into the Crimea in the fall of 1920 and defeated the remnants of the Whites under the command of P. N. Wrangel. About 80 thousand soldiers, officers of the "Russian Army" and refugees were evacuated to Turkey. These events marked the official end of the Civil War. He commanded Frunze and the Turkestan Front.

V. K. Blucher

The opponents of the half-educated student were professional military men with serious combat experience.

Alexander Vasilievich Kolchak ten years older than Mikhail Frunze. He was born in 1874 in the family of a naval officer, graduated from the Naval Corps in St. Petersburg (1894), participated in the Russian-Japanese and World War I. In 1916-1917. Kolchak commanded the Black Sea Fleet and received the rank of admiral (1918).

Kolchak was a direct protege of Great Britain and the United States, where he was after the February Revolution of 1917. He was considered a strong, integral and decisive person. In November 1918 he returned to Russia. He overthrew the Social Revolutionary government in Omsk, took the title of "Supreme Ruler of the Russian State" and the title of Supreme Commander. It was Kolchak who captured almost the entire gold reserve of the Russian Empire, which he paid for the help of his patrons. With their support, he organized a powerful offensive in March 1919, setting the goal of reaching Moscow and destroying the Bolshevik government. Ufa, Sarapul, Izhevsk, Votkinsk were occupied.

M. H. Tukhachevsky

However, the Bolsheviks were able to withstand the blow. The Red troops under the command of Frunze went on the offensive, in April-June 1919 they carried out the Buguruslan, Belebey and Ufa operations. By August 1919, the Reds took control of the Urals, the cities of Perm and Yekaterinburg; by the beginning of 1920 - Omsk, Novonikolaevsk and Krasnoyarsk. Soviet power was established throughout Siberia up to the Far East. In January 1920, Kolchak was arrested by the Czechs near Irkutsk. Guided by their own interests, they handed over Kolchak to the Socialist-Revolutionaries, who considered it good to extradite the Supreme Ruler and Supreme Commander-in-Chief to the Bolsheviks. The latter conducted a short investigation and shot Kolchak and Pepelyaev.

Another opponent of Mikhail Frunze - Pyotr Nikolaevich Wrangel - died a natural death in exile. He, a nobleman and a Baltic baron, was also older than Frunze, born in 1878. Pyotr Nikolaevich graduated from the Mining Institute and the General Staff Academy, was a participant in the Russian-Japanese and World War I, rose to the rank of lieutenant general and received the title of baron. After the October Revolution, P. N. Wrangel left for the Crimea.

S. M. Budyonny

In August 1918, he joined Denikin's Volunteer Army, commanded a cavalry corps, and from January 1919, the Caucasian Volunteer Army. For criticizing A. I. Denikin and trying to remove him from the post of commander in chief, Wrangel was removed from his post, went abroad, which spoke of confusion in the leadership of the White movement. In May 1920, P. N. Wrangel not only returned to Russia, but also replaced A. I. Denikin as commander of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia. The harsh repressive regime he established in the Crimea in April-November 1920 was called "Wrangelism." He was able to mobilize up to 80 thousand people into his army. The government of the South of Russia was created. Wrangel's troops, taking advantage of the offensive of the White Poles, set out from the Crimea, but they again had to hide behind the fortifications of Perekop, which they counted on very much.

The operation to liberate Crimea took Frunze less than a month. Wrangel in November 1920 was evacuated to Constantinople. He created in Paris the "Russian All-Military Union" (1924), which numbered up to 100 thousand people. Already after the death of Wrangel, the ROVS was paralyzed by the actions of the OGPU-NKVD agents.

Perhaps the most colorful and popular figure of the Civil War - Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny(1883-1973). He was born in the Don region, but his father was not a Cossack with his own land, but a tenant peasant. Semyon grazed the calves and pigs of his settlement Bolshaya Orlovka, worked as a farm laborer. In 1903, called up for military service, during the Russian-Japanese war in the Far East, he participated in the fight against the hunghuz. The strong young guy preferred the fate of the farm laborer to serve in the army, he rode horses, preparing them for service.

During the First World War, in the cavalry units, he went from non-commissioned officer to sergeant major (January 1917). In the summer of 1917, S. M. Budyonny became chairman of the regimental soldiers' committee, and on his initiative, at the end of August 1917, part of the troops of General L. G. Kornilov was detained and disarmed.

In the Platovskaya stanitsa of the Salsk district, the demobilized cavalryman at the beginning of 1918 organized a stanitsa council of peasants and Kalmyks. But the Soviets were dispersed, and Budyonny began to form red detachments. At the beginning of 1919, he was already in command of a cavalry division. During the Civil War, tanks, cars, planes were used, but the cavalry remained the main striking force. An important innovation of the Reds was the creation of large cavalry units, called cavalry armies. The creator of the first such army, Mironov, died because of Trotsky's intrigues. In March 1919, S. M. Budyonny joined the RCP (b), in June he became a corps commander, and in November 1919, the formation he led was called the 1st Cavalry Army.

A. V. Kolchak

The Red cavalrymen of Budyonny broke the enemy lines on the Southern Front in 1919, on the Polish Front in 1920, in the Crimea. For Budyonny, the Civil War was the peak of his personal career. He was awarded two Orders of the Red Banner from the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, the Order of the Red Banner from the Azerbaijan Central Executive Committee. The former sergeant-major received a golden weapon - a saber and a Mauser, both with orders of the Red Banner.

Later he held command positions in the Red Army, was deputy and first deputy people's commissar of defense. In 1941-1942. commanded the troops of a number of fronts and directions, then the cavalry of the Red Army. He became one of the first Marshals of the Soviet Union. By his 90th birthday, S. M. Budyonny was three times Hero of the Soviet Union.

Lived a long life and Anton Ivanovich Denikin(1872-1947), with whose troops Budyonny's horsemen fought. The son of an officer who graduated from the Academy of the General Staff, Anton Ivanovich rose to the rank of lieutenant general.

After the Bolsheviks came to power, he became one of the organizers and then commander of the Volunteer Army (1918). From January 1919 to April 1920 he was Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia. In June 1919, he led the White campaign against Moscow from the south, when Donbass, the Don region, and part of Ukraine were captured. In September 1919, units of the Volunteer and Don armies captured Kursk, Voronezh, Orel and reached Tula. But on October 7, 1919, the troops of the Southern Front of the Red Army launched a counteroffensive, which lasted until January 1920. The Whites retreated to the Crimea. Already in April 1920, A. I. Denikin transferred command to P. N. Wrangel and emigrated. In exile, he wrote a huge work, Essays on Russian Troubles.

Guards lieutenant of the Russian army was a participant in the First World War Mikhail Nikolaevich Tukhachevsky. He comes from the nobility, was born in 1893, and in 1914 he graduated from a military school.

During the First World War he was awarded several orders, he was captured, from which he escaped several times, including together with the future French President Charles de Gaulle.

From the beginning of 1918, Tukhachevsky was in the Red Army, worked in the Military Department of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. As you know, the Bolsheviks initially decided that the Red Army would be formed solely on the basis of the principle of voluntariness. It was assumed that the volunteers of the revolution will receive two recommendations from persons who are trustworthy. By April 1918, about 40 thousand people signed up for the Red Army, a quarter of which were officers of the old Russian army. One of them was M. N. Tukhachevsky. In May 1918, he was the military commissar of defense of the Moscow region, and in June 1918, at the age of 25, he led the 1st Army on the Eastern Front, proved to be an outstanding commander in battles against the White Guard and White Czechoslovak troops. In 1919, M. H. Tukhachevsky commanded the armies on the Southern and Eastern fronts. For the battles during the defeat of Kolchak's troops, he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner and the Honorary Revolutionary Weapon. In February-April 1920 he commanded the Caucasian Front, and from April 1920 to March 1921 - the Western Front.

Tukhachevsky led the troops that suppressed the Kronstadt rebellion in March 1921 and the "Antonovshchina" in 1921-1922.

On September 4, 1918, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee appointed Ioakim Ioakimovich Vatsetis(1873-1938), not spoiled by the attention of authors and readers. Meanwhile, during the year I. I. Vatsetis was in this post, 62 corps were created, consolidated into 16 armies, which made up 5 fronts. To a much greater extent than Trotsky or Stalin, the creator of the Red Army is I. I. Vatsetis.

Joachim's childhood and youth were difficult. His grandfather was ruined by the Courland baron, and his father was a laborer all his life. Joachim himself also had to work as a laborer. An alternative to this lot was military service. The Riga training non-commissioned officer battalion, the Vilna military school and the Academy of the General Staff, the former farm laborer passed in 1891-1909.

In 1909-1915. I. I. Vatsetis grew from a captain to a colonel.

Vatsetis had nothing to do with the old system, just like thousands of Latvian riflemen, whose corps he headed in December 1917. During the Civil War, the red Latvian riflemen, mostly children of the poor and farm laborers, formed a reliable support for Soviet power, guarded the most important objects, including the Kremlin.

At the age of almost 50, I. I. Vatsetis fulfilled his youthful dream - he became a student of the Faculty of Social Sciences in the Law Department of the 1st Moscow State University. Later, like many other prominent Soviet military leaders, he became a victim of Stalinist suspicion.

Why did the red lieutenants win the Civil War against the generals of the old formation? Apparently, because at that moment history, the support of most of the people, other circumstances were on their side. And leadership talent is a thing that will come with time. In addition, about 75 thousand people from among the old officers served with the "Reds". We can say that 100,000 old officers made up the combat core of the White movement. But this was not enough.

Stories about leaders-adventurers who are ready to give up everything for the sake of fighting for an idea have been interesting to people for many years. They have been told to each other for centuries. Stories about Geyer, Bolívar, Washington or Garibaldi circulated around the world. The Russian Civil War added hundreds of names to the pantheon of heroes. VATNIKSTAN tells about the seven most extravagant commanders of the Civil War.

Grigory Kotovsky

The biography of Kotovsky is shrouded in a veil of secrets. Often he greatly embellished his history, reduced himself to 5-6 years of age, spoke about his early political consciousness, noble origin. Today it is known that Kotovsky was the son of a Pole, a mechanic from Moldova. The boy was alone in a big city, got involved with crime. He deserted from the army in 1904, during the revolution of 1905 he gathered a detachment and burned estates, robbed apartments and shops, attacked police convoys, and freed those arrested. He was quickly caught and imprisoned, but Kotovsky constantly escaped, raised riots in prisons. He was released by the amnesty of the Provisional Government.

He ended up on the Romanian front, then in Odessa, fought with the Romanians in Moldova, fought with the troops of the UNR, carried out underground terrorist work in Odessa occupied by the interventionists. Soon he was noticed, and Kotovsky received his first post in the Red Army. From 1919 to 1921, he went from the commander of a cavalry detachment of 60 people to the commander of the 2nd Cavalry Corps.

During the years of the revolutionary storm, he managed to fight the Romanians, the UNR, the Austrians, the French, the Denikinists, the Makhnovists, pacified the rebellious villages and broke up the gangs. Kotovsky was known for his selfishness, during times of expropriation, he often began robbery with the words “Kotovsky is robbing you”, he loved theatrical gestures - he could throw a threatening note under the pillow of the sleeping police chief. A man of remarkable physical strength with two revolvers in his hands - this is how Chisinau and Odessa remembered him.

At the end of the Civil War, after being wounded, Kotovsky was not active in the service, more and more often he rested at his dacha, where he was overtaken by a bullet from the killer - Meyer Seider, who in 1925 killed him either because of jealousy, or because of the fact that Kotovsky slowed down his promotion. In 1930, three veterans who served under Kotovsky took revenge on Zayder.

Kotovsky managed a lot in his short life. After all, can you find another red commander to play himself in a feature film? True, the footage with Kotovsky was never included in the film Pilsudski Bought Petliura, since he had to be filmed with another actor.

Roman Ungern

Baron Robert Nicholas Maximilian von Ungern-Sternberg - this is the full name of one of the most odious military leaders of the Civil War. Ungern is a descendant of an ancient noble family, from an early age he studied military affairs, was famous for his harsh, rebellious disposition and cruelty to himself and others.

Ungern was a man of action, he always wanted to be at the center of events, he asked to go to the front during the Russo-Japanese War, in 1913 he tried to go to the aid of the Mongols in their war of independence. Roman Fedorovich became famous on the fronts of the First World War, only in its first year he was wounded 5 times. Always not cured, he returned to the front, managed to fight in Galicia, formed detachments of Assyrians in Persia, was brave everywhere, received many awards.

Ungern did not recognize the October Revolution, from its first days he showed himself to be an opponent of the power of the Soviets. The baron and his friend, Ataman Semyonov, created a Special Manchurian detachment, in which Mongols and Buryats were recruited, the detachment operated in Transbaikalia, but soon Ungern left for Manchuria. The Asiatic Division was soon formed. The baron had connections with Chinese officials, ruler generals (for example, with Zhang Zuolin), and even married a representative of the Qing dynasty. Ungern's dream was the restoration of the monarchy and the destruction of communism, including international.

The baron hatched truly Napoleonic plans, he wanted to start the revival of the monarchy from Mongolia, and for this it had to be freed from Chinese troops. The forces of the division managed, despite the almost fivefold superiority of the Chinese in manpower, to take the capital - Ugra. The Mongols fully supported Ungern, saw him as a liberator, the baron even received a blessing from the spiritual leader of the Mongols Bogdo Gegen VIII.

Gradually, Ungern's forces managed to liberate all of Mongolia from the Chinese. The Mongols granted Ungern and his officers many titles, but this was not enough for the baron, he longed for a campaign in Russia. In Mongolia, Ungern was a semi-mythical figure, the Chinese and Mongols believed that a bullet did not take him. The baron is remarkable in that he was a Eurasian in practice, he believed that the salvation of Russia was in its inclusion in a large middle empire that stretched from the Caspian Sea to the Pacific Ocean.

In 1921, the campaign against the revolution began, but almost immediately Roman Fedorovich failed, the Reds not only defeated the Asian division, but also took Ugra on its “shoulders” with the help of the Mongolian communists.

Ungern retreated, but did not abandon the idea of ​​\u200b\u200ba campaign against Russia. He decided to spend the winter in Tibet, but the soldiers were tired, a conspiracy formed, and several brigades left the division. A few days later, Baron Ungern caught up with his soldiers, they tied him up and left him in the steppe. Red partisans found him tied up, and Ungern was eventually tried in an open show trial and shot for participating in the struggle against Soviet power and the massacre of civilians. At the time of the execution, he was only 35 years old.

Marusya Nikiforova

The vast majority of commanders during the Civil War are men, but there are also characters of the “weaker” sex who have distinguished themselves in history, who will give odds to any representative of the “strong” half of humanity. It is precisely such a character that the anarchist Maria Nikiforova appears before us.

The girl was born in the family of a retired officer, but at the age of 16 she left her father's house, worked a lot in various low-paid positions, and gradually began to be interested in politics. In Ukraine at that time there was an extensive anarchist underground, the girl Marusya joined it.

Together with her comrades, she participated in raids, robberies, terrorist attacks, for which she ended up in life hard labor in 1907, Siberia did not hold back the fiery revolutionary, Maria fled, there were years of emigration ahead in Japan, the USA, Spain and France. In France, an interesting twist in Mary's biography took place: out of hatred for German imperialism, a staunch anarchist graduates from officer school and goes to the bourgeois war, ends up in Macedonia.

The revolution in Russia could not but interest Maria, in 1917 she returned to her homeland. Nikiforova became one of the organizers of the Black Guard in Ukraine. Initially, she and her comrades adhered to the position of allied relations with the Bolsheviks, the armed detachment organized by her helped to establish Soviet power in Ukraine.

In 1918, Nikiforova began a conflict with the Bolsheviks, her detachment was accused of looting and discrediting the Soviet government, Maria went to her old friend Nestor Makhno. In Gulyai-Pole, Marusya was engaged in propaganda, writing speeches for Makhno and other prominent commanders of the movement.

Makhno instructed a responsible and experienced comrade-in-arms to organize sabotage groups for operations in the Crimea in the rear of Wrangel. These plans were not destined to come true, in August 1919, in the "white" Sevastopol, Marusya was uncovered and hanged by a court verdict. Maria Nikiforova died at the age of 34, leaving behind a vivid image of an anarchist revolutionary with a difficult fate.

Epifan Kovtyukh

Unlike previous heroes, the biography of Epifan Iovich itself is not replete with interesting details, but there was one event in it that even formed the basis of a popular Soviet book.

Kovtyukh, like many young men, spent his youth on the fronts of the First World War, fought well, studied, was awarded four crosses, and ended the war as a staff captain. He was fascinated by the revolution, he sided with the Bolsheviks, held various combatant command positions, but the main event in his life occurred in 1918.

In August 1918, the Bolsheviks formed a 30,000-strong Taman army, but soon it was cut off from the main forces, the army forces had to get from the Taman Peninsula to Armavir through the territories occupied by the enemy. Kovtyukh became the commander of one of the three columns of the army, his column moved in the forefront. The path was seriously complicated by the fact that a string of refugees with their belongings followed the troops. The Taman army simultaneously made its way through the Georgian troops, repulsed the raids of the Cossacks and fought off the Denikinists who were pursuing it.

The campaign in the most difficult conditions lasted a month, during which time the troops and refugees traveled about 600 kilometers. On the way, in addition to the Georgian troops, Cossacks and White Guards, the army was threatened by hunger, thirst and the threat of a mass epidemic of typhus and dysentery. The army felt a severe shortage of ammunition, often the troops had to go into bayonet attacks. Discipline in the army rested only on the personality of the column commanders and the commissar.

The Taman army united with the main forces and continued its combat path, Kovtyukh, from the commander of the column, became the commander of the army, and ended the war in Astrakhan. After the war, the biography of Kovtyukh again repeated the biographies of many hundreds of red commanders: endless study, retraining. In 1938, Epifan Iovich, who led the Taman army out of complete encirclement and saved tens of thousands of lives, was shot on charges of participating in a conspiracy. Komkor was 48 years old. The feat of the fighters and commanders of the Taman army was forever immortalized by Alexander Serafimovich in the story "Iron Stream", the hero of the work Kozhukh became the embodiment of Kovtyukh.

Yakov Slashchev

Slashchev was born into a family of hereditary military men, he began his military career as a teacher of the page corps, with the outbreak of the First World War he went to the front. At the front, Slashchev showed good training and remarkable boldness, was twice shell-shocked, received five wounds of varying severity. Slashchev ended the war with the rank of colonel. He was promised a brilliant career, but the revolution changed his life.

He met the February Revolution in Moscow as commander of a guards regiment. As soon as power passed to the Bolsheviks, Slashchev realized that the only way out for him was to resist the new government. Slashchev leaves for the South, where the Volunteer Army is already being formed. Together with the Volunteer Army, Slashchev goes through the first years of the war, he fights in the Caucasus. Kuban, receives the rank of colonel general, commands an entire corps. But the most famous page of Slashchev's biography is the defense of the Crimea.

During the battles for the Crimea, Slashchev became famous as a talented officer who can find a way out of the most difficult situation. He commanded the defense of Perekop, on the orders of Wrangel landed on the coast of the Sea of ​​Azov. General Slashchev is a truly fearless person, he personally leads soldiers into battle, gets wounded, shell-shocked. But Crimea was not to be kept.

Together with the remnants of the white army, Slashchev fled to Constantinople, where he became redundant among the veterans of the white movement. He is considered a dissolute alcoholic and drug addict: indeed, Slashchev in the Crimea was addicted to morphine and cocaine, so he experienced terrible pain from injuries, over time it outgrew addiction. Poverty and strife within the emigration put pressure on Slashchev, he is on the verge of suicide.

At this time, the Soviet government announces an amnesty to its former enemies. General Slashchev contacted the Ambassador of the RSFSR and returned to Russia. The Soviet government took advantage of this event for its own benefit, the general became the mouthpiece of propaganda for returning to his homeland. Slashchev is always under secret supervision, but they do not interfere with his life. He teaches at the "Shot" courses, writes his memoirs.

The most famous tale about Slashchev is connected with teaching: once Budyonny, already an eminent military leader, was present at the courses, and the former white general quipped about operations under his command. Budyonny got furious and fired, missed. To this Slashchev replied: "That's how you shoot, that's how you fought."

It seemed that the past let him go, a new life began, but the past thought differently. On a January evening in 1929, Slashchev was killed in his room by Lazar Kolenberg, the killer motivated his crime with revenge for the Jewish pogroms in Nikolaev, which were perpetrated by Slashchev's troops. The general was 43 years old.

Zhen Fuchen

The young Chinese revolutionary-internationalist embodied the very dream of a world revolution, became an example of international heroism in the struggle for freedom. A young guy from the city of Tieling in the Qing Empire - how did he end up in the ranks of the Red Army?

Zhen was born into the family of a simple Chinese craftsman. The life of ordinary people in the Qing Empire was not easy, from childhood Fuchen was forced to work, at the age of 15 he entered the service in one of the structures of the Chinese Eastern Railway. Here, working side by side with the Russians, Zhen gradually learns the Russian language and makes acquaintance with workers from Russia.

Childhood and youth are over, it is time to choose the future path, Zhen decided to become a military man. He entered a military school, was promoted, even rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel. At the same time, Fuchen became interested in socialist ideas. In 1911, Fuchen became an active participant in the revolution in China, he fought for the republic for two years, but after the establishment of Yuan Shikai's dictatorship, he left for Russia at the head of a group of workers.

Fuchen worked in Alapaevsk when the revolution began in Russia. He immediately took the side of the Bolsheviks, began to agitate the Chinese workers to take up arms and help the young republic. Fuchen managed to form a Chinese battalion, of which he himself became the commander, the regiment, as part of the Red Army units, fought with Kolchak and the invaders in the Urals.

Fuchen acted successfully - the experience of service and the civil war in China affected. The number of Chinese who wanted to fight for Soviet power grew, in 1918 the battalion was transformed into the combined 255th Chinese International Regiment. In November 1918, the regiment was surrounded in the area of ​​the Vyya station in the Perm province. Of the 400 fighters of the regiment, only 62 escaped from the ring. The commander of the regiment Zhen Fuchen died in battle.

Fuchen is an example of an internationalist warrior. In the pantheon of heroes of the Civil War, he takes a place next to other Chinese - Pau Tisan, Ku Machen and many hundreds of other inhabitants of the Celestial Empire, who were ready to fight in snowy Russia for their beliefs. It is noteworthy that Fuchen's merits were so highly appreciated that Lenin personally met with his widow and children.

Alexey Dolinin

The civil war in Russia is not just a confrontation between reds and whites. There was a powerful third force, which was represented by the multi-million Russian peasantry. The large-scale popular uprising led by Antonov is widely known, but it was not the only major peasant uprising. In 1919, all of Russia was on fire: here and there, the young Soviet government was faced with an armed rebuff. One of the largest such uprisings was the Chapan War, which broke out on the territory of the Simbirsk and Samara provinces. Aleksey Dolinin became the leader of the peasants.

All his life, Dolinin was a simple peasant; he spent all four years in the war. When he returned to his native village, he took the post of Soviet judge and chairman of the assembly of soldiers. The peasants were dissatisfied with grain requisitions and constant robberies. They believed that the new government would starve them to death, drove out the food detachments, created their own volost council, elected new representatives there, and organized the headquarters of the uprising. Red Army soldiers who found themselves on the territory of the uprising were disarmed, commanders and commissars were shot, many soldiers went over to the side of the rebels.

The rebels were guided by the slogans "For people's power", "For Soviet power without communists." The number of rebels varied from 100 to 150 thousand active participants. The peasants were poorly armed, sometimes they went into battle with axes, scythes and pitchforks. However, they even managed to take Togliatti (then called Stavropol), which became the capital of the uprising, Dolinin was appointed commandant of the city. In this post, he actively engaged in propaganda. Two of his appeals are known - to the people and to the Red Army. Dolinin called on the peasants to order and to stop the reprisals against communists and their families.

The Bolsheviks were ready to give a tough answer. The troops of the Red Army and CHON (special purpose units) approached the city. At the head of the troops was Mikhail Frunze, the Bolsheviks recaptured the city in one night. Dolinin managed to get out of the city.

His further fate resembles a novel about an adventurer. Under other people's documents, he served in the Red Army, fought with Denikin, was captured, escaped from captivity, fought in the Soviet-Polish. Everything would have turned out well, but, probably, afraid of exposure, Dolinin himself wrote a penitential letter to the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, spoke about the uprising and other people's documents.

Unexpectedly, he was pardoned. The former commandant of the uprising continued to serve in the Red Army. In the formidable 30s, Dolinin was nevertheless arrested, but was immediately released by a court verdict. Aleksey Dolinin is the only one of the heroes of this article who died a natural death in his native village in 1951, when the battles of the Civil War had long since become history.

The Reds played a decisive role in the civil war and became the driving mechanism for the creation of the USSR.

With their powerful propaganda, they managed to win the commitment of thousands of people and unite them with the idea of ​​​​creating an ideal country of workers.

Creation of the Red Army

The Red Army was created by a special decree on January 15, 1918. These were voluntary formations from the worker-peasant part of the population.

However, the principle of voluntariness brought with it disunity and decentralization in the command of the army, from which discipline and combat effectiveness suffered. This forced Lenin to declare universal military service for men aged 18-40.

The Bolsheviks created a network of schools for the training of recruits, who studied not only the art of war, but also underwent political education. Commander training courses were created, for which the most outstanding Red Army soldiers were recruited.

The main victories of the red army

The Reds in the civil war mobilized all possible economic and human resources to win. After the annulment of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, the Soviets began to expel German troops from the occupied regions. Then the most turbulent period of the civil war began.

The Reds managed to defend the Southern Front, despite the considerable efforts it took to fight the Don Army. Then the Bolsheviks launched a counteroffensive and won back significant territories. On the Eastern Front, a very unfavorable situation developed for the Reds. Here the offensive was launched by very large-scale and strong troops of Kolchak.

Alarmed by such events, Lenin resorted to emergency measures, and the White Guards were defeated. Simultaneous anti-Soviet speeches and the entry into the struggle of the Volunteer Army of Denikin became a critical moment for the Bolshevik government. However, the immediate mobilization of all possible resources helped the Reds win.

War with Poland and the end of the civil war

In April 1920 Poland decided to enter Kyiv with the intention of liberating Ukraine from illegal Soviet rule and restoring its independence. However, the people took this as an attempt to occupy their territory. The Soviet commanders took advantage of this mood of the Ukrainians. The troops of the Western and Southwestern fronts were sent to fight against Poland.

Soon Kyiv was liberated from the Polish offensive. This revived hopes for an early world revolution in Europe. But, having entered the territory of the attackers, the Reds received a powerful rebuff and their intentions quickly cooled. In the light of such events, the Bolsheviks signed a peace treaty with Poland.

reds in civil war photo

After that, the Reds concentrated all their attention on the remnants of the Whites under the command of Wrangel. These fights were incredibly furious and cruel. However, the Reds still forced the Whites to surrender.

Notable Red Leaders

• Frunze Mikhail Vasilievich. Under his command, the Reds carried out successful operations against the White Guard troops of Kolchak, defeated the Wrangel army in the territory of Northern Tavria and Crimea;
• Tukhachevsky Mikhail Nikolaevich. He was the commander of the troops of the Eastern and Caucasian Fronts, with his army he cleared the Urals and Siberia from the White Guards;
• Voroshilov Kliment Efremovich. He was one of the first marshals of the Soviet Union. Participated in the organization of the Revolutionary Military Council of the 1st Cavalry Army. With his troops, he liquidated the Kronstadt rebellion;
• Chapaev Vasily Ivanovich. He commanded a division that liberated Uralsk. When the whites suddenly attacked the reds, they fought courageously. And, having spent all the cartridges, the wounded Chapaev started running across the Ural River, but was killed;
• Budyonny Semyon Mikhailovich The creator of the Cavalry Army, which defeated the Whites in the Voronezh-Kastornensky operation. The ideological inspirer of the military-political movement of the Red Cossacks in Russia.

• When the workers' and peasants' army showed its vulnerability, former tsarist commanders who were their enemies began to be recruited into the ranks of the Reds.
• After the assassination attempt on Lenin, the Reds dealt particularly cruelly with 500 hostages. On the line between the rear and the front, there were barrage detachments that fought desertion by shooting.