Notice: This is the official website of the All Empires History Community (Reg. 10 Feb 2002)

  FAQ FAQ  Forum Search   Register Register  Login Login

Polish-Soviet War

 Post Reply Post Reply
Author
Nick1986 View Drop Down
Emperor
Emperor
Avatar
Mighty Slayer of Trolls

Joined: 22-Mar-2011
Location: England
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 7940
  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: Polish-Soviet War
    Posted: 15-Dec-2012 at 19:45
File:Bij Bolszewika.jpg
Seeking to prevent German and Russian expansionism, Josef Pilsudski ordered the Polish military to occupy land in the east that once belonged to Russia. The successful defeat of the invading Red Army in 1919 enabled the Poles to launch their own offensive, allied with Simon Petilura's Ukrainians. By 1920, the war turned in the Russians' favor as Brusilov recruited former Tsarist officers into the Red Army. Warsaw itself was threatened, but the Poles fought back and forced the Russians to make peace
Me Grimlock not nice Dino! Me bash brains!
Back to Top
Nick1986 View Drop Down
Emperor
Emperor
Avatar
Mighty Slayer of Trolls

Joined: 22-Mar-2011
Location: England
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 7940
  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22-Dec-2012 at 13:12
The Poles used Ford Model T armored cars, like this one. These had two-man crews and a machine gun turret:
http://derela.republika.pl/ftb.htm
Me Grimlock not nice Dino! Me bash brains!
Back to Top
Nick1986 View Drop Down
Emperor
Emperor
Avatar
Mighty Slayer of Trolls

Joined: 22-Mar-2011
Location: England
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 7940
  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23-Dec-2012 at 13:29

The Ivans' most common armored car was the WWI Austin-Putilov. This was built on a truck chassis, had a large crew and caterpillar tracks to cross snow. The two small wheels at the front were designed to cross trenches
Me Grimlock not nice Dino! Me bash brains!
Back to Top
Mountain Man View Drop Down
General
General
Avatar

Joined: 16-Aug-2012
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 873
  Quote Mountain Man Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23-Dec-2012 at 21:44
The Poles seem to have spent most of their history fighting to be a free nation, with unfortunate results.  Thier bravery, however, is without question.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Back to Top
lirelou View Drop Down
Colonel
Colonel


Joined: 26-Mar-2009
Location: Tampa, FL
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 528
  Quote lirelou Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Dec-2012 at 15:08
Actually the First Soviet-Polish War, if we count that back-stabbing invasion after Hitler and Stalin cut a deal.
Phong trần mài một lưỡi gươm, Những loài giá áo túi cơm sá gì
Back to Top
Nick1986 View Drop Down
Emperor
Emperor
Avatar
Mighty Slayer of Trolls

Joined: 22-Mar-2011
Location: England
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 7940
  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Dec-2012 at 19:36
Originally posted by Mountain Man

The Poles seem to have spent most of their history fighting to be a free nation, with unfortunate results.  Thier bravery, however, is without question.

Were it not for the breakup of the Austrian empire and the takeover of Russia by the Bolsheviks, Poland might still be living in bondage. The European politicians only supported the Poles because they wanted a buffer zone to protect from Russian invasion
Me Grimlock not nice Dino! Me bash brains!
Back to Top
Nick1986 View Drop Down
Emperor
Emperor
Avatar
Mighty Slayer of Trolls

Joined: 22-Mar-2011
Location: England
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 7940
  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Dec-2012 at 14:08
Me Grimlock not nice Dino! Me bash brains!
Back to Top
Domen View Drop Down
Pretorian
Pretorian
Avatar

Joined: 13-Apr-2008
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 170
  Quote Domen Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12-May-2013 at 14:32
A very good article on the Polish-Soviet War from this website:

The Russian Revolution

Excerpt:

VIII. The Polish-Soviet War, 1919-1920.

The nature of this war and the significance of its outcome were not understood in the West at the time, and are still little known today. The war was more national than ideological. Its roots went back to the old Polish-Russian struggle over the borderlands, i.e. Lithuania, Belorussia, and the Ukraine, which now took on a new significance. The war led to the Red Army's only conclusive defeat, which meant that not only Poland and the Baltic states, but perhaps also Hungary and Czechoslovakia, were saved from Soviet domination at this time.

1. The Background of the War: Key Factors.

(a) The old Polish-Russian rivalry over the borderlands, the Partitions of Poland, and Polish revolts against Russian rule in the 19th century, have been outlined earlier (see ch. I, appendix I). This history made the Poles see Russia both as an oppressor and, in 1919-20, as the key threat to their independence. The Bolsheviks, for their part, proclaimed the principle of self-determination - but in fact followed a policy of uniting the former Russian western provinces with Soviet Russia. To this end, they established communist governments and tried to take over the territories in question. The Poles saw this as resurgent Russian imperialism.

(b) The Polish Head of State and Commander-in-Chief, Jozef Pilsudski (1867-1935), did not trust any kind of Russia, "White" or "Red." He had hated his Russian school in Vilnius, Lithuania - then known by its Russian name: Vilna (Polish: Wilno), which was then a predominantly Polish and Jewish city. His Russian teachers had belittled Polish history and achievements. Both here and in Russian Poland, as also in all their western territories, the Russian authorities implemented a repressive policy of Russification.

As a very young man, Pilsudski had spent five years in Siberian exile (1887-92). His brother had been implicated in a plot to assassinate Tsar Alexander III, so he was arrested and deported. In Siberia, he became a socialist but concluded that most Russian socialists were also imperialists, i.e. that they planned to establish a democratic, socialist Russia which would include the non-Russian peoples of the empire. (See ch. I. , Socialist Parties in the Russian Empire).This is how he interpreted the Russian socialist principle of national self-determination and, as we know, he was right. In 1892, he joined the Polish Socialist Party (PPS), which was founded that year in Paris, and then worked actively as a writer and printer of underground papers -- also as a smuggler of same --, for an independent, socialist Poland. He was arested by the Russians in 1900, but feigned mental illness and escaped from a hospital in St. Petersburg. In the period 1908-14, he trained young Polish students as future officers in " Riflemen's Associations," a type of ROTC organization in Austrian Poland (Galicia), tolerated by the Austrian government in return for military intelligence on the Russian army. According to one account, Pilsudski foresaw not only the coming of World War I, but also its outcome. According to the memoirs of S.R. leader Victor Chernov, Pilsudski told him in early 1914, that in the coming world war the Central Powers would first defeat Russia, and then be defeated themselves by France, Great Britain and probably the United States. ( V.Chernorv, Pered Burei, Before the Storm, NewYork, 1953, pp. 295-306),

When the world war broke out in 1914, Pilsudski saw it as an opportunity to create a Polish army, so he formed Polish Legions, which fought initially on the side of Germany and Austria-Hungary against Russia. However, after the Russian Revolution of March 1917, he refused to work any longer with the Germans, who, in any case, would not define the frontiers and status of a future Poland. Therefore, he and some of his men refused to take the oath of allegiance to a future Polish King and to brotherhood in arms with the Germans. In July 1917 he was arrested and imprisoned in Germany for over a year. When the Germans released him in early November 1918, he returned home as a national hero. He then became Head of the Polish State (pending the election of a President), and Commander-in-Chief of the Polish army.

Pilsudski's distrust of the Bolsheviks was confirmed by the policy of the Polish Communist Party (Polish acronym KPRP, then KPP), which emerged in December 1918 out of the former left-wing of the PPS (Socialist Party) and the SDKPiL (see ch. 1, "Socialist Parties in the Russian Empire"). The Polish Communist Party followed the Bolshevik lead, calling for the overthrow of "bourgeois-landlord Poland" and for friendship with the Soviet peoples. It was declared illegal for advocating the forcible overthrow of the Polish government. At the same time, Pilsudski saw Soviet expansion into the borderlands as a resurgence of Russian imperialism, and thus a threat to Polish independence.

(c) Despite Western agreement that the German army stay in the former Russian territories so as to stem a Bolshevik advance westward, the demoralized Germans began to flow back home after the armistice of November 11, 1918. At the same time, the Red Army moved into the Baltic states and Belorussia. A communist-led Lithuanian-Belorussian (Litbel) Republic was set up in January 1919, with its capital in Vilna (see note 4 b).

(d) Pilsudski believed that the borderlands should be federated with Poland. Polish troops moved into Belorussia [now Belarus] and clashed with Red Army units at Bereza Kartuska in February 1919. In April, they marched into Vilnius, and overthrew the government of the Litbel Republic. The predominantly Polish population of the city welcomed the Polish troops with great enthusiasm and Pilsudski declared he wished the people to decide the fate of their land. However, the Lithuanians - who formed about 2% of the city's population - claimed Vilna as their capital because it had been the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania before its union with Poland in 1386.

(e) After these events, there was calm on the Polish-Soviet front until late April 1920. The French and British governments tried to persuade Pilsudski to help Denikin against the Bolsheviks. They proposed that the Poles take and hold the borderlands "in trust" for the Russian general. Pilsudski refused, for he knew Denikin wanted to restore the former Russian empire. He also believed it was in Poland's interest for the "Whites" and "Reds" exhaust themselves in the civil war.

At this time, Poland had many other problems to contend with. She had been devastated by war, for the German-Austrian and Russian fronts had passed back and forth across the country; there was was also hunger and disease. The Poles were fighting the Ukrainians of former East Galicia (now western Ukraine), who had seized the preponderantly Polish city of L'viv (Polish: Lwow; Russian: Lvov, German: Lemberg) in November 1918 and proclaimed a Ukrainian Republic. As in the case of Vilnius, so in L'viv, the Ukranians claimed the city because it had been the capital of the medieval Ukrainian state of Halich, before it was annexed to Poland in the mid 1300s. . In late 1918, the Polish population fought hard to regain the city and it was finally taken by Polish troops, which then fought a war with the west Ukrainian army... The Western powers reluctantly sanctioned a Polish advance east of the Zbrucz River in spring 1919, on the grounds that this would weaken the Bolsheviks. Thus, the Poles took over all of East Galicia. The French government supported Polish claims to this land (where they had an interest in the oil fields), but British Prime Minister David Lloyd George strongly opposed them and favored its annexation by Russia, "White" or "Red." We should note that this territory had never belonged to Russia, but was claimed and invaded by the Russians in World War I; it was also claimed by the first Provisional Govenment in spring 1917.

In spring 1920, Poland's situation was complicated by the fact that it was awaiting a plebiscite in the economically important region of Upper Silesia (coal and steel), which had a predominantly Polish-speaking population east of the Oder River, but which the Germans insisted they must keep. The area was the scene of bitter fighting between Germans and Poles, while a small Allied military force tried to keep order. Finally, after a plebiscite held in March 1921, whose results were contested, the League of Nations divided the region between Germany and Poland, giving the industrial core to the Poles on the basis of Polish preponderance in the communal (village) - but not the urban - vote.. This award was passionately resented by the Germans who had secured a majority in the plebiscite - but a majority provided by German "outvoters," that is, voters born but not resident in the plebiscite district. They had simply come in to vote, then returned home to Germany. A large part of the Polish vote came from workers who had immigrated to the region from Austrian Galicia, but were resident there before 1914, so they had the right to vote. Finally, the workers whose families had lived for centuries in Upper Silesia, had their own dialect -- a mix of Polish and German -- and were in favor of an autonomous Upper Silesia.

(f) Meanwhile, the situation in Russia had been clarified. By December 1919, Denikin and Yudenich had been defeatedby the Bolsheviks, who were clearly winning the civil war. But they still had to fight retreating White armies in southern Russia, now led by his successor, General Wrangel. Therefore, in order to safeguard his rear in the west, Lenin decided to offer peace to Poland, which he wrongly saw as a puppet of the Entence powers, the supporters of the "Whites" in Russia.

However, exploratory Polish-Soviet talks broke down and Pilsudski did not take up Soviet peace offers in December 1919 and January 1920. When he did agree to negotiations, he specified they be held in the Belorussian town of Borisov (about 50 miles northeast of Minsk, on the railway line to Smolensk). He did so both because he wanted to end Soviet troop movements there, as well as deprive the Bolsheviks of the opportunity of making propaganda for themselves, as they could have done in cities easily accessible to Western reporters such as Riga or London.. When the Soviets refused, Pilsudski broke off the talks. He suspected rightly that the Soviets only wanted a breather to finish off the "Whites" in southern Russia, after which they would try to take Poland.

We should also note that in December 1919, the French and British had proposed that Polish administration go up to a line approximating the eastern border of Congress Poland (1815-1830), i.e. to the northern Bug River (pronounced: Boog).. They did not want the Poles to go further east into the predominantly Belorussian and Ukrainian- populated territories, which were claimed as part of Russia by both "Whites" and "Reds." The line proposed by the Conference of Ambassadors in Paris on December 8, 1919, had two variations in the south-east: one left Lviv and the adjoining oil fields on the Polish side, and while the other line left them on the Russian side. This line was to surface again in July 1920. Pilsudski countered this proposal with his own: to hold plebiscites in the former Polish lands east of the Bug River under the supervision of the League of Nations. He said this would allow the inhabitants to choose either independence or federation with Poland. London and Paris, however, ignored this proposal.

Contrary to the view prevalent in the West and in Russia , Pilsudski did not want to annex the eastern territories held by Poland before the first partition of 1772.In fact , since the late 1890s he had advocated a Polish-Belorussian-Ukrainian-Lithuanian federation, designed to weaken Russia and thus provide security for Poland. His political rival, the leader of the National Democratic Party, Roman Dmowski [1863-1939], opposed federation. However, not even he demanded the eastern lands held by Poland in 1772, but those belonging to her in 1793-95, i.e. between the Second and Third Partitions. Finally, all Poles, except the communists, demanded the then predominantly Polish cities of L'viv and Vilnius for Poland.

2. The Polish-Soviet War of 1919-1920.

The following factors brought about the oubreak of the war:

(a) As noted earlier, the first battle had taken place at Bereza Kartuska, Belorussia, in February 1919 and in April of that year Pilsudski had driven the Bolsheviks out of Vilnius. However, he did not support the Whites against the Bolsheviks in the Russian Civil War, as the western powers had wished. By late 1919, it was clear the Bolsheviks were winning that war and they proposed peace negotiations to Poland. The Polish rejection of the Bolshevik offers (December 1919 and January 1920) to open peace negotiations, and then the breakdown of talks over Borisov -- where Pilsudski wanted them to take place -- strengthened the Soviet government's fear that the Poles were planning to attack Soviet Russia, abetted in this by France and Britain. (In fact, these two powers wanted to prevent the Poles from moving east of the Bug line). Therefore Bolsheviks decided to mount an offensive against Poland in early spring 1920, and began massing troops in the former provinces of western Russia.

(b) Polish and French military intelligence noted the growing Red Army troop concentrations; therefore Pilsudski assumed they would attack Poland. Indeed, Soviet documents show that the details of the Red Army's deployment against Poland were fixed on March 10 1920, at a meeting in Smolensk between General W. M. Gitis, the Commander of the Western Front, and Sergei S. Kamenev, the Commander-in-Chief of the Red Army. The Soviet military plan was to launch an offensive in April in the direction of Vilnius and Lida in Lithuania. At the same time, Polish troops were to be engaged in the region of the Polesie Marshes in Belorussia to prevent them from interfering with the Soviet offensive, or from mounting a diversion in the south. Another Soviet offensive toward the southwest was to be launched after the transfer of the 1st Cavalry Army from the Caucasus. Thus, the Red Army was to attack Poland in late April from two directions. However, it was preempted by a Polish drive into Ukraine. (8)

(c) Pilsudski's reaction to intelligence about the Bolshevik military build-up was a decision to attack the Red Army before it was ready to attack him. *In keeping with his long range plans, he also signed an alliance treaty and a military convention with the head of the East Ukrainian government, General Semyon V. Petlyura (1877-1926). These agreements were signed in late April 1920. The alliance treaty envisaged the creation of an independent Ukraine, which would be allied with Poland. In return for Polish help to establish it, Petlyura agreed to give up claims to the predominantly Ukrainian-speaking territories of East Galicia and Volhynia, which were to form part of Poland. Each government was committed to respect the rights of the minorities in its country. (There was a sizable Polish minority in central Ukraine, mostly landowners and part of the middle class in the cities, mainly Kiev). Petlyura's troops were to march with the Poles, but the latter were to evacuate the Ukraine after the establishment of an independent Ukrainian government. The Ukrainian politicians of East Galicia repudiated this treaty because they insisted on it being part of independent Ukraine.

* Polish military intelligence had broken Soviet military codes sometime in 1919, and the Soviet were not aware of this.

(d) Pilsudski and Petlyura set off at the head of the Polish and Ukrainian troops on April 24, 1920. Pilsudski's goal was not to annex the Ukraine, but to smash the Red Army before it could attack Poland. When the Polish and Ukrainian troops entered Kiev on May 7th, Petlyura proclaimed an independent Ukraine and announced that Polish troops would withdraw as soon as a Ukrainian government was established. Pilsudski made a proclamation to the same effect.

Contrary to official Soviet history, France and Britain had no part in the Polish offensive. In fact, they reacted with shock and dismay. Prime Minister David Lloyd George was furious because Pilsudski's attack threatened his plans for extensive British trade with Bolshevik Russia. Indeed, British-Soviet trade negotiations were then proceeding in London. The French favored an independent Ukraine, but were principally interested in the Poles fighting the Bolsheviks in order to relieve General Wrangel, whom France recognized as the Supreme Ruler of Russia in August 1920. and who was then fighting in the Crimea. They also warned the Poles against taking "Russian" land. Thus, Pilsudski's advance was not part of a Western "crusade" against Bolshevik Russia, but a Polish initiative that was roundly condemned in Britain and only partly supported by France.

(e) After the Polish and Ukranian troops entered Kiev on May 7, 1920, a Ukrainian government was set up there under Petlyura, but the Red Army counter-attacked in June, driving back the Polish and Petlyura troops. By early July, the Poles and their Ukrainian Allies were in full retreat and Warsaw was threatened. On July 2nd, the Commander of the northern Red Army group, General Mikhail N. Tukhachevsky (1893-1937), issued an Order of the Day in which he told his troops: "Over the dead body of White Poland shines the road to worldwide conflagration." (9)

(f) On July 6-11th, an Allied conference was in session a Spa, Belgium, discussing German war reparations. The Polish government sent a delegation there to ask for help. Faced with the likelihood of a Soviet victory, the French and British prime ministers heaped abuse on the Poles and could not agree on what to do. The French wanted to help Pilsudski, but said they could not send troops. British Prime Minister Lloyd George wanted to get a Polish-Soviet armistice so the Red Army would not roll into Germany and he could conclude a trade treaty with the Soviets.

Therefore, British proposed an armistice line, known as the Curzon Line, after George Nathaniel Curzon (Marquess of Kedleston, 1859-1925), who was then Foreign Secretary. This line was, in fact, based on the demarcation line between Polish and Russian administrations proposed by the Allies in Paris on December 8 1919. In July 1920, the British proposed the armistice line to be between the existing Polish and Red armies, and the Polish delegation agreed. This would have left Lviv on the Polish side. The British proposal for Moscow, drawn up at Spa, however, was a line generally following the ethnic boundary between preponderantly Polish territories in the west, and the preponderantly Belorussian and Ukrainian lands in the east. Originally, the line left East Galicia on the Polish side, but this was changed to Soviet advantage in the Foreign Office, London. Thus, East Galicia, together with the then preponderantly Polish city of L'viv and the adjoining oil fields, were put on the Soviet side of the line. (This was one of the variants of the line proposed in Paris on December 8, 1919). Furthermore, seeking a Soviet-Polish peace, the Allies sent an "Ambassadors' Mission" to advise the Polish government. The French also sent General Maxime Weygand to take over the command of the Polish armies. Finally, the Allies promised to help Poland, but only if the Soviets crossed the armistice line into ethnic Poland.

(g) However, the Bolsheviks rejected the Curzon Line, saying they were willing to offer the Poles much more land if they accepted other Soviet terms. The real reason for this rejection was quite different. Russian documents published for the first time in 1992 show that the Bolshevik leaders rejected the Curzon Line and carried on the war against Poland because they believed they had already won the war against the Entente Powers. Therefore, as Lenin put it, they wanted to "taste with bayonets whether the Socialist revolution of the proletariat had not ripened in Poland." Furthermore, they believed that the whole Versailles settlement would collapse with the fall of Poland, and hoped that revolutions would break out in Germany and Italy. (10)

A Polish Provisional Revolutionary Committee (Polrevkom), made up of Polish communists from Moscow, was set up in Smolensk on July 24th. It moved on to Minsk, then Vilnius and finally Bialystok on July 30th. Here, it issued a manifesto nationalizing factories, forests, and lands, but declaring peasant holdings to be inviolable. The Polrevkom was, in effect, an embryo communist government for Poland. It did not gain any popularity and was seen by all Poles, except communists, as an agent of the Bolshevik government in Moscow.

(h) When Polish-Soviet talks began in Minsk, in early August, the Soviet delegation demanded that Poland abolish its army in favor of a "workers' militia;" abolish all arms production; and agree to Red Army passage through Polish lands any time the Soviet government demanded it. Acceptance of these terms would have made Poland a state subject to Moscow. Nevertheless, Lloyd George advised the Polish government to accept these terms; he was, after all, negotiating a trade treaty with the Soviets and did not want the Red Army to drive on to Germany. However, the Poles refused and the French supported them, because they hoped Poland would fight on, thus helping the hard-pressed General Wrangel.

On August 11th, Lenin telegraphed Joseph Stalin, who was then the Political Commissar attached to Semyon M. Budyenny's 1st Cavalry Army, transferred here from the Crimea and now marching on L'viv. He told Stalin that the British government had knuckled under fearing a general strike, and that Lloyd George was advising the Poles to accept Soviet armistice terms. Lenin called this a great diplomatic victory for the Soviets. Indeed, Lloyd George opposed the Poles, and even encouraged the Labour Party and the London dockworkers who opposed sending aid to Poland. (The dockworkers refused to load war supplies on ships departing for Poland). On the same day, August 11, 1920, Lenin telegraphed the chairman of the Soviet delegation conducting the talks with the Poles in Minsk, telling him to take the great Soviet diplomatic victory successfully into account. He was to include Warsaw in the peace terms (perhaps to be annexed to Soviet Russia ?) and to "guarantee the rest." (10a) Thus, Lenin seemed to envisage a Soviet Poland.

(i) However Pilsudski upset Lenin's plans by bold military action. He moved some troops from the Warsaw perimeter south to Deblin, in order to build up a major striking force. He then launched an attack on August 13th toward the northeast, expecting to clash with Tukhachevsky's main force -- which had, in fact, outflanked Warsaw and was heading for Danzig (Polish: Gdansk), while detaching some troops to attack Warsaw. Tukhachevsky wanted to cut off French arms supplies sent by sea to Danzig and take Warsaw in a flanking movement from the north-west. Indeed, the Danzig dockworkers refused to unload the supplies, while the British High Commissioner of the League of Nations in the Free City of Danzig, Sir Reginald Tower, followed Lloyd George's orders to forbid the unloading of the ships -- as Lloyd George had promised the Soviet delegates in London.

Tukhachevsky's men actually found a copy of Pilsudski's plan on the body of a dead Polish officer, but Tukhachevsky decided this was a "blind;" at least that is what he wrote later in a lecture on the war. The Polish troops defeated Tukhachevsky's rearguard and separated it from the main body of his army. By August 25th, Pilsudski had won the Battle of Warsaw (sometimes called the Battle of the Vistula). The Poles took about a 100,000 prisoners. Tukhachevsky retreated to Lithuania, where he was beaten again at the Battle of the Neman River in September. While Pilsudski pursued Tukhachevsky part of the Polish army moved south, cutting the communications between the Soviet armies in the center and the south. There, Budyonny and Stalin disregarded orders to abandon their march on L'viv until August 12th. The lst Cavalry Army then retreated, narrowly escaping encirclement and defeat by the Poles.

The Polish victory came as a great surprise to everyone. In the West, people generally believed that General Weygand had saved the day. Although he denied it at the time, this legend had a very long innings and occasionally still appears in Western history books. In reality, Weygand had advised Pilsudski to abandon Warsaw, but hold the Vistula line. Pilsudski refused because he had another plan. Weygand offered his services in carrying it out and this offer was accepted.

A number of French officers served with the Polish army as advisers and instructors. Among them was Charles De Gaulle (1890-1970), then a captain. (In World War II, he was to be the leader of the "Free French," and later President of France). The French also sold the Poles arms and ammunition, though at least part of these supplies (sent through the Free City of Danzig) were rusty arms collected on French battlefields.

The Red Army slightly outnumbered the Poles (each side had about 200,000 men), but it was exhausted by the long drive west. Both sides made great use of cavalry because they lacked tanks. (Although the Poles had a few French tanks, they kept on breaking down). There were a few airplanes on each side. On the Polish side, there were flyers from the American Lafayette Squadron, who had fought in France and volunteered to help Poland. They formed the backbone of the Polish "Kosciuszko Squadron" (named after Thaddeus Kosciuszko, 1746-1817, who had served under George Washington in the War of Independence and led the Polish revolt against Russia in 1794).

But planes and tanks played a marginal role. In fact, the Polish-Soviet War in 1920 was the last cavalry war in Europe. Aside from lack of modern equipment, both Pilsudski and Tukhachevsky had a low opinion of tanks; they believed that while tanks broke down, horses always got through. (This opinion was also shared by Western military men until 1940.) Nevertheless, the Polish-Soviet War of 1920 had a significant impact on some military thinkers. The German General Heinz Guderian (1888-1954) studied it as a war of swift movement, i.e., a "Blitzkrieg," or "lightning war." He concluded that future wars would not be static like World War I, but would be fought and won quickly. However, they would be fought not by cavalry, but by a combination of tanks, planes and troops, with armored and tank divisions playing a key role. The German General Staff developed plans for this type of war after Hitler came to power in 1933 and applied them during World War II, 1939-45. In the USSR, Tukhachevsky also developed a new doctrine of mobile warfare, but he was executed in Stalin's purges in 1937. (See ch. 3).

Ultimately, the Polish victory over the Red Army was due both to Pilsudski's daring leadership and to the wholehearted support of the Polish people. Masses of young men volunteered for the army, including peasants, who wanted an independent Poland in which they could farm their own land. The Polish victory secured Polish independence from Soviet Russia, at least for a while. It also cancelled German hopes for the renewal of a German-Russian alliance and thus a new partition of Poland. Finally, it saved the Baltic states from Soviet domination, and perhaps Hungary and Czechoslovakia as well.

4. The Peace of Riga, March 18, 1921.

Peace talks began in Riga (Latvia), and led to a preliminary peace on October 12, 1920. Lenin was very anxious for peace because of peasant revolts in Russia against "war communism."

The final peace treaty was signed on March 18, 1921, and is known as the "Peace of Riga." It established the Polish-Soviet frontie as it existed until September 17, 1939, when the Red Army seized eastern Poland as part of Stalin's bargain with Hitler.

The Peace of Riga was a compromise. For the time being, Lenin gave up the aim of establishing a Polish Soviet Republic, as well as the idea of exporting the revolution to Central and Western Europe. He now concentrated on rebuilding Russia. To this end adopted the New Economic Policy (NEP), which was a mix of capitalism and socialism (see ch. 3). However, the Bolsheviks never gave up the goal of including the Baltic States, Belorussia, Volhynia and East Galicia (western Ukraine) in the Soviet Union, nor the long-term goal of establishing Soviet control over Poland. (The USSR would attain these goals and more in 1945).

Pilsudski gave up the idea of an independent Ukraine allied with Poland, and of a Polish-Belorussian-Lithuanian federation. He did gain western Belorussia, Volhynia and East Galicia (western Ukraine) for Poland. Furthermore, Polish forces occupied Vilnius in late October 1920. When Pilsudski failed to obtain Lithuanian agreement to set up a Central Lithuanian state withVilnius as part of a Polish-Lithuanian federation, a plebiscite was held which led to the city's incorporation in Poland. This was never accepted by Lithuania whose constitution named Vilnius as the capital of the Lithuanian Republic. (However, in March 1938, normal Polish-Lithuanian relations were established).

It is important to note that the inclusion in Poland of territories east of the Curzon Line was not only opposed by the Soviets, but also was never approved by Britain and by some politicians in France. There was thus a widespread opinion in the West that the Poles had antagonized the Russians by taking territories to which Russia had more right than Poland. In fact, the people who should have been asked to express their opinion, i.e. the Belorussians and the Ukrainians, did not have a voice in the matter. Therefore, their lands were divided between Poland and the Soviet Union. While most of those peoples left in Poland, especially the Ukrainians of East Galicia, resented Polish rule, they saw their brothers in the USSR suffer grievously under Stalin's forced collectivization in the 1930s (see ch. 3). After this, those remaining in Poland came to see their lot as much better than that of their kinsmen in the USSR.

Finally, while the Poles formed a minority in eastern Poland, it was a sizable one, amounting to about one-third of the whole population of some 12,500,000. Furthermore, in certain areas the Poles had a majority, e.g. in the cities of Lwow (L'viv) and Wilno (Vilnius) and the surrounding regions. Also, most Poles believed that the possession of the eastern territories was vital for Poland's security from the designs of the Soviet Union. The Soviets, for their part, always saw them as vital to their security. These facts should be borne in mind because the question of the Polish-Soviet frontier was to play an important role in the diplomacy of World War II (11). [See ch. 5].


Edited by Domen - 12-May-2013 at 14:33
Back to Top
longbaby View Drop Down
Knight
Knight


Joined: 21-Oct-2012
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 50
  Quote longbaby Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25-Jun-2013 at 02:03
Excuse me, I am very ignorant of Europe history so I would feel embarrased to start a topic. Recently I read a statement;

Europe was split by the attempts of those who sought to unite it by force.

Well this line confuses me. In my memory, only Naepoleon and Hitler tried to unite Europe but their efforts didn't produce a more split Europe. By this I mean no more nations came up as a result of their actions. But I guess I am wrong.

Anyone could help me?
Back to Top
 Post Reply Post Reply

Forum Jump Forum Permissions View Drop Down

Bulletin Board Software by Web Wiz Forums® version 9.56a [Free Express Edition]
Copyright ©2001-2009 Web Wiz

This page was generated in 0.094 seconds.