In December 1918, at a meeting of the party activists in the city of Kursk, L.D. Trotsky, the chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the republic and the people's commissar for naval affairs, analyzing the results of the year of the civil war, instructed: “Each of you should be clear that the old ruling classes inherited their art, their management skills from their grandfathers and great-grandfathers. What can we oppose to this? How can we compensate for our inexperience? Remember, comrades, only by terror. A consistent and merciless terror! Compliance, softness, history will never forgive us. If until now we have destroyed hundreds and thousands, now the time has come to create an organization, the apparatus of which, if necessary, can destroy tens of thousands. We have no time, no opportunity to seek out our real, active enemies. We are forced to take the path of destruction. "

In confirmation and development of these words, on January 29, 1919, Ya. M. Sverdlov, on behalf of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), sent a circular letter known as "a directive on decossackization to all responsible comrades working in the Cossack regions." The directive read:

“The recent events on various fronts and Cossack regions, our advances deep into the Cossack settlements and the disintegration among the Cossack troops force us to give instructions to party workers about the nature of their work in the indicated regions. It is necessary, taking into account the experience of the Civil War with the Cossacks, to recognize as the only right one the most merciless struggle against all the tops of the Cossacks, through their universal extermination.

1. Carry out a mass terror against the rich Cossacks, exterminating them without exception; to carry out a merciless terror against all Cossacks who took any direct or indirect part in the struggle against Soviet power. It is necessary to take all those measures towards the middle Cossacks that provide a guarantee against any attempts on their part to new actions against Soviet power.

2. Confiscate bread and force all surplus to be poured into the indicated points, this applies both to bread and to all agricultural products.

3. Take all measures to assist the resettling immigrant poor, organizing resettlement where possible.

4. Equalize the newcomers from other cities with the Cossacks in land and in all other respects.

5. to carry out complete disarmament, to shoot everyone who has a weapon after the deadline for delivery.

6. To issue weapons only to reliable elements from other cities.

7. Leave the armed detachments in the Cossack villages from now on until complete order is established.

8. All commissars appointed to certain Cossack settlements are encouraged to show maximum firmness and unswervingly carry out these instructions.

The Central Committee resolves to pass through the appropriate Soviet institutions the obligation of the People's Commissariat of Land to develop in a hurry the actual measures for the mass resettlement of the poor to the Cossack lands. Central Committee of the RCP (b) ".

There is an opinion that the authorship of the directive on storytelling belongs only to one person - Ya. M. Sverdlov, and neither the Central Committee of the RCP (b) nor the Council of People's Commissars took any part in the adoption of this document. However, analyzing the entire course of the seizure of power by the Bolshevik party in the period 1917-1918, it becomes obvious that violence and lawlessness were elevated to the rank of state policy. The desire for an unlimited dictatorship has provoked a cynical justification for the inevitability of terror.

Under these conditions, the terror unleashed against the Cossacks in the occupied villages acquired such proportions that, on March 16, 1919, the Plenum of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) was forced to recognize the January directive as erroneous. But the flywheel of the extermination machine was started, and it was already impossible to stop it.

The outbreak of state genocide on the part of the Bolsheviks and distrust of yesterday's neighbors - the mountaineers, fear of them, pushed part of the Cossacks back onto the path of struggle against Soviet power, but now as part of General Denikin's Volunteer Army.

The outright genocide of the Cossacks that began led the Don to disaster, but in the North Caucasus it ended in complete defeat for the Bolsheviks. The 150,000th XI Army, which Fedko led after the death of Sorokin, was cumbersome to deploy for a decisive blow. From the flank it was covered by the XII Army, occupying the area from Vladikavkaz to Grozny. The Caspian-Caucasian Front was created from these two armies. In the rear, the Reds were restless. Stavropol peasants more and more inclined towards the whites after the invasion of food detachments. The mountaineers turned away from the Bolsheviks, even those who supported them during the period of general anarchy. So, inside the Chechens, Kabardins and Ossetians there was a civil war: some wanted to go with the Reds, others with the Whites, and still others - to build an Islamic state. The Kalmyks frankly hated the Bolsheviks after the atrocities perpetrated on them. The Terek Cossacks hid after the bloody suppression of the Bicherakhov uprising.

On January 4, 1919, the Volunteer Army inflicted a crushing blow on the XI Red Army in the area of ​​the village of Nevinnomysskaya and, breaking through the front, began to pursue the enemy in two directions - to the Holy Cross and Mineralnye Vody. The gigantic XI-I army began to fall apart. Ordzhonikidze insisted on retreating to Vladikavkaz. Most of the commanders were against it, believing that the army pressed against the mountains would fall into a trap. Already on January 19, Pyatigorsk was taken by the whites, on January 20, the Georgievsk group of the Reds was defeated.

To repulse the white troops and to lead all military operations in the region, by the decision of the Caucasian Regional Committee of the RCP (b), at the end of December 1918, the Defense Council of the North Caucasus was created, headed by G.K. Ordzhonikidze. At the direction of the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR, weapons and ammunition were sent to the North Caucasus to help the XI Army.

But, despite all the measures taken, the Red Army units were unable to withstand the onslaught of the Volunteer Army. The extraordinary commissar of the South of Russia GK Ordzhonikidze, in a telegram addressed to V. I. Lenin on January 24, 1919, reported the state of affairs as follows: “There is no XI army. She was completely decomposed. The enemy occupies cities and villages with almost no resistance. At night, the question was to leave the entire Tersk region and go to Astrakhan. "

On January 25, 1919, during the general offensive of the Volunteer Army in the North Caucasus, the Kabardian Horse Brigade of two regiments under the command of Captain Zaurbek Dautokov-Serebryakov took Nalchik and Baksan in battle. And on January 26, A.G. Shkuro's detachments occupied the Kotlyarevskaya and Prokhladnaya railway stations. At the same time, the White Guard Circassian division and two Cossack Plastun battalions, turning to the right from the village of Novoosetinskaya, reached the Terek near the Kabardian village of Abaevo and joined forces with Shkuro along the railway line towards Vladikavkaz at the Kotlyarevskaya station. By the beginning of February, the white units of generals Shkuro, Pokrovsky and Ulagai blocked the administrative center of the Tersk region - the city of Vladikavkaz on three sides. On February 10, 1919, Vladikavkaz was taken. Denikin's command forced the XI-th Red Army to retreat across the hungry steppes to Astrakhan. The remnants of the XII-th Red Army crumbled. The extraordinary commissar of the South of Russia G.K. Ordzhonikidze fled to Ingushetia with a small detachment, some units under the command of N. Gikalo went to Dagestan, and the bulk, representing already disorderly crowds of refugees, poured into Georgia through the winter passes, freezing in the mountains, dying from avalanches and snowfalls, exterminated by yesterday's allies - the highlanders. The Georgian government, fearing typhus, refused to let them in. The Reds tried to storm through from the Darial Gorge but were met with machine-gun fire. Many died. The remnants surrendered to the Georgians and were interned as prisoners of war.

By the time the Volunteer Army occupied the North Caucasus, only a detachment of the independent Terek units that survived the defeat of the uprising survived Terek Cossacks in Petrovsk, led by the commander of the troops of the Terek Territory, Major General I. N. Kosnikov. It consisted of the Grebensky and Gorsko-Mozdok cavalry regiments, a hundred of Kopay Cossacks, the 1st Mozdok and 2nd Grebensky Plastun battalions, a hundred foot Kopai Cossacks, the 1st and 2nd artillery divisions. By February 14, 1919, the detachment consisted of 2,088 people.

One of the first units of Tertsy who joined the Volunteer Army was the Terek officer regiment, formed on November 1, 1918 from the officer's detachment of Colonel B.N.Litvinov, who arrived in the army after the defeat of the Terek uprising (disbanded in March 1919), as well as detachments of colonels V. K. Agoeva, Z. Dautokova-Serebryakova and G. A. Kibirova.

On November 8, 1918, the 1st Terek Cossack Regiment (later poured into the 1st Terek Cossack Division) was formed as part of the Volunteer Army. The broad formation of Terek units began with the establishment of the Volunteer Army in the North Caucasus. The Terek formations in the Civil War were based on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Terek Cossack divisions and the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Terek Plastun brigades, as well as the Terek Cossack cavalry artillery divisions and separate batteries, which were both part of the Troops Terek-Dagestan Territory, and the Volunteer and Caucasian Volunteer armies. Beginning in February 1919, the Terek formations were already conducting independent military operations against the Red Army. This was especially significant for the white forces in the south, in connection with the transfer of the Caucasian Volunteer Army to the Northern Front.

The Terek Plastun separate brigade was formed as part of the Volunteer Army on December 9, 1918 from the newly formed 1st and 2nd Terek Plastun battalions and the Terek Cossack artillery battalion, which included the 1st Terek Cossack and 2nd Terek Plastun batteries.

With the end of the North Caucasian operation of the Volunteer Army, the Armed Forces in the South of Russia established control over most of the territory of the North Caucasus. On January 10, 1919, A.I.Denikin appointed General V.P. Lyakhov, the commander of the III Army Corps, as the chief and commander of the troops of the created Terek-Dagestan Territory. The newly appointed commander, in order to recreate the Terek Cossack army, was ordered to assemble the Cossack Circle to select the Army Ataman. The Tersk Large Army Circle began its work on February 22, 1919. More than twenty issues were put on the agenda, but in terms of its importance in the first row was the question of adopting a new Constitution of the region, which was then adopted on February 27. The day after the adoption of the Constitution, the election of a military chieftain took place. He was Major General G.A. Vdovenko, a Cossack of the State stanitsa. The Big Circle showed support for the Volunteer Army, elected the Small Circle (Commission of Legislative Provisions). At the same time, the Military Circle decided to temporarily deploy the military authorities and the residence of the military chieftain in the city of Pyatigorsk.

The territories liberated from Soviet power returned to the mainstream of peaceful life. The former Tersk region itself was transformed into the Tersko-Dagestan region with the center in Pyatigorsk. The Cossacks of the Sunzha villages, evicted in 1918, were returned back.

The British tried to restrict the advance of the White Guards, keeping the oil fields of Grozny and Dagestan for small "sovereign" formations, such as the Central Caspian government and the Gorsko-Dagestan government. The detachments of the British, even having landed in Petrovsk, began to move to Grozny. Leaving the British ahead, the White Guard units entered Grozny on February 8 and moved on, occupying the Caspian coast to Derbent.

Confusion reigned in the mountains, which were approached by the White Guard troops. Each nation had its own government, or even several. Thus, the Chechens formed two national governments, which fought bloody wars among themselves for several weeks. The dead were counted in the hundreds. Almost every valley had its own money, often home-made, and rifle cartridges were the generally recognized "convertible" currency. Georgia, Azerbaijan, and even Great Britain tried to act as guarantors of the "mountain autonomies". But the commander-in-chief of the Volunteer Army, A. I. Denikin (whom Soviet propaganda so loved to portray as a puppet of the Entente) resolutely demanded the abolition of all these "autonomies". Having appointed governors from white officers of these nationalities in the national regions. So, for example, on January 19, 1919, the commander-in-chief of the Terek-Dagestan region, Lieutenant General V.P. Lyakhov, issued an order according to which a colonel, later a major general, Tembot Zhankhotovich Bekovich-Cherkassky was appointed the ruler of Kabarda. His assistants: Captain Zaurbek Dautokov-Serebryakov was appointed for the military, Colonel Sultanbek Kasayevich Klishbiev was appointed for civil administration.

Relying on the support of the local nobility, General Denikin convened mountain congresses in March 1919 in Kabarda, Ossetia, Ingushetia, Chechnya and Dagestan. These congresses elected Rulers and Councils under them, which had extensive judicial and administrative powers. Sharia law was preserved in criminal and family matters.

At the beginning of 1919, in the Terek-Dagestan Territory, a system of self-government was formed by the region of two centers: the Cossack and the volunteer (both were in Pyatigorsk). As A.I.Denikin later noted, the unresolved issue of a number of issues dating back to pre-revolutionary times, lack of agreement in relations, the influence of the Kuban self-styledists on the Tertsi could not but generate friction between these two authorities. Only thanks to the awareness of the mortal danger in the event of a rupture, the absence of independent tendencies in the mass of the Terek Cossacks, personal relationships between representatives of both branches of government, the state mechanism in the North Caucasus worked throughout 1919 without significant interruptions. Until the end of the white power, the region continued to be in double subordination: the representative of the volunteer government (General Lyakhov was replaced by general from the cavalry I.G. a meeting in May 1919; the military chieftain ruled on the basis of the Terek constitution.

Political disagreements and misunderstandings between representatives of the two authorities, as a rule, ended in the adoption of a compromise solution. During 1919, friction between the two centers of power was created mainly by a small but influential part of the radical independent Terek intelligentsia in the government and the Krug. The most vivid illustration is the position of the Terek faction of the Supreme Cossack circle, which gathered in Yekaterinodar on January 5 (18), 1920 as the supreme power of the Don, Kuban and Terek. The Terek faction retained a loyal attitude towards the government of the South of Russia, proceeding from the position of unacceptability of separatism for the army and the fatefulness of the mountain question. The resolution to break off relations with Denikin was adopted by the Supreme Circle of the Don, Kuban and Terek with an insignificant number of votes from the Terek faction, most of which went home.

On the territory liberated from the Bolsheviks, the work of transport was improved, paralyzed enterprises were opened, and trade revived. In May 1919, the South-Eastern Russian Church Council was held in Stavropol. The Council was attended by bishops, clergy and laity elected from the Stavropol, Don, Kuban, Vladikavkaz and Sukhum-Black Sea dioceses, as well as members of the All-Russian Local Council who found themselves in the south of the country. At the Council, issues of the spiritual and social structure of this vast territory were discussed, and the Supreme Provisional Church Administration was formed. Its chairman was Archbishop Mitrofan (Simashkevich) of Donskoy, members - Archbishop Dimitriy (Abashidze) of Tauride, Bishop Arseny (Smolensk) of Taganrog, Protopresbyter G.I.Schavelsky, Professor A.P. Rozhdestvensky, Count V. Musin-Pushkin and Professor P. Verkhovsky.

Thus, with the arrival of the White troops in the Terek region, the Cossack military government was restored, headed by the ataman, Major General G.A. Vdovenko. The Southeastern Union of Cossack Troops, Highlanders of the Caucasus and Free Peoples of the Steppes continued its work, the basis of which was the idea of ​​the federal principle of the Don, Kuban, Terek, the North Caucasus region, as well as the Astrakhan, Ural and Orenburg troops. The political goal of the Union was to join it as an independent state association to the future Russian Federation.

A. I. Denikin, in turn, advocated "preserving the unity of the Russian state, subject to the granting of autonomy to individual peoples and distinctive entities (Cossacks), as well as broad decentralization of the entire state administration ... The basis for the decentralization of management was the division of the occupied territory into regions."

Recognizing the fundamental right of autonomy for the Cossack troops, Denikin made a reservation regarding the Terek army, which "in view of the extreme lopsidedness and the need to reconcile the interests of the Cossacks and mountaineers" should have entered the North Caucasian region on the basis of autonomy rights. It was planned to include representatives of the Cossacks and mountain peoples in the new structures of regional power. The mountain peoples were provided with broad self-government within ethnic boundaries, with an elected administration, non-interference from the state in matters of religion and public education, but without funding these programs from the state budget.

Unlike the Don and the Kuban, on the Terek the "connection with the all-Russian statehood" has not weakened. On June 21, 1919, Gerasim Andreevich Vdovenko, elected by the military ataman, opened the next Big Circle of the Terek Cossack army at the Park Theater of the city of Essentuki. The circle was also attended by the Commander-in-Chief of the Volunteer Army A. I. Denikin. The program of the Terek government said that "only a decisive victory over Bolshevism and the revival of Russia will create the possibility of restoring the power of the native army, bled and weakened by the civil struggle."

In view of the ongoing war, the Tertsy were interested in increasing their numbers by attracting their neighbors-allies to the anti-Bolshevik struggle. Thus, the Karanogay people were included in the Terek army, and at the Big Circle the Cossacks expressed their agreement in principle to join the Ossetians and Kabardians "on equal terms" with the Army. The situation with the nonresident population was more complicated. Encouraging the entry of certain representatives of the indigenous peasants into the Cossack estate, the Tertsy were very prejudiced towards the demand of nonresident peasants to resolve the land issue, to introduce them into the work of the Circle, as well as into central and local government bodies.

In the Tersk region, liberated from the Bolsheviks, a complete mobilization took place. In addition to the Cossack regiments, units formed from the highlanders were also sent to the front. Wishing to reaffirm their loyalty to Denikin, even yesterday's enemies of the Tertsi, the Chechens and Ingush, responded to the call of the Commander-in-Chief of the Volunteer Army and replenished the White Guard ranks with their volunteers.

Already in May 1919, in addition to the Kuban combat units, the Circassian Cavalry Division and the Karachaev Cavalry Brigade operated on the Tsaritsin front. The 2nd Terek Cossack division, the 1st Terek Plastun brigade, the Kabardian cavalry division, the Ingush equestrian brigade, the Dagestan equestrian brigade and the Ossetian cavalry regiment were also transferred here. In Ukraine, the 1st Terek Cossack Division and the Chechen Cavalry Division were involved against Makhno.

The situation in the North Caucasus remained extremely difficult. In June, Ingushetia started an uprising, but a week later it was suppressed. Kabarda and Ossetia were disturbed by their forays by the Balkars and "Kermenists" (representatives of the Ossetian revolutionary democratic organization). In the mountainous part of Dagestan, Ali-Khadzhi rebelled, and in August this "baton" was taken up by the Chechen sheikh Uzun-Khadzhi, who settled in Vedeno. All nationalist and religious demonstrations in the North Caucasus were not only supported, but also provoked by anti-Russian circles in Turkey and Georgia. The constant military threat forced Denikin to keep up to 15 thousand fighters in this region under the command of General I. G. Erdeli, including two Terek divisions, the 3rd and 4th, and one more Plastun brigade belonged to the North Caucasian group.

Meanwhile, the situation at the front was even more deplorable. So, by December 1919, the Volunteer Army of General Denikin, under the pressure of three times superior enemy forces, lost 50% of its personnel. As of December 1, there were 42,733 people wounded alone in military medical institutions in the south of Russia. A large-scale retreat of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia began. On November 19, parts of the red army broke into Kursk, on December 10, Kharkov was left, on December 28 - Tsaritsyn, and already on January 9, 1920, Soviet troops entered Rostov-on-Don.

On January 8, 1920, the Terek Cossacks suffered irreparable losses - units of the First Cavalry Army of Budyonny almost completely destroyed the Terek Plastun brigade. At the same time, the commander of the cavalry corps, General K. K. Mamontov, in spite of the order to attack the enemy, withdrew his corps through Aksai to the left bank of the Don.

In January 1920, the Armed Forces of the South of Russia numbered 81 506 people, of which: Volunteer units - 30 802, Don troops - 37 762, Kuban troops - 8 317, Terek troops - 3 115, Astrakhan troops - 468, Mountain units - 1042. These forces were clearly not enough to contain the offensive of the Reds, but the separatist games of the Cossack leaders continued at this critical moment for all anti-Bolshevik forces.

In Yekaterinodar, on January 18, 1920, the Cossack Supreme Circle gathered, which began to create an independent union state and declared itself the supreme power in the affairs of the Don, Kuban and Terek. Some of the Don delegates and almost all of the Tertsi called for the continuation of the struggle in unity with the main command. Most of the Kuban, some of the Don and a few Tertsi demanded a complete break with Denikin. Some of the Kuban and Don people were inclined to end the struggle.

According to A. I. Denikin, "only the Tertsy - the ataman, the government and the Krug faction - almost fully represented the united front." Reproaches were made against the Kuban that the Kuban units had abandoned the front, proposals were made to separate the eastern divisions ("linemen") from this army and annex them to the Terek. The Terek ataman G. A. Vdovenko spoke with the following words: “The current is the same for the Tertsi. We have written in golden letters "United and indivisible Russia".

At the end of January 1920, a compromise clause was drawn up, accepted by all parties:

1. South Russian power is established on the basis of an agreement between the main command of the Armed Forces in the South of Russia and the Supreme Circle of the Don, Kuban and Terek, until the convocation of the All-Russian Constituent Assembly.

2. Lieutenant-General AI Denikin is recognized as the first head of the South Russian government ...

3. The law on the succession of power of the head of state is drawn up by the Legislative Chamber on a general basis.

4. Legislative power in the South of Russia is exercised by the Legislative Chamber.

5. The functions of the executive power, except for the head of the South Russian power, are determined by the Council of Ministers ...

6. The Chairman of the Council of Ministers is appointed by the person who heads the South Russian authorities.

7. The person who heads the South Russian government has the right to dissolve the Legislative Chamber and the right of a relative "veto" ...

By agreement with the three factions of the Supreme Circle, a cabinet of ministers was formed, but "the emergence of a new government did not bring any change in the course of events."

The military and political crisis of the White Guard South was growing. The government reform did not save the day any more - the front collapsed. On February 29, 1920, Stavropol was taken by units of the Red Army, on March 17 Yekaterinodar and the village of Nevinnomysskaya fell, on March 22 - Vladikavkaz, on March 23 - Kizlyar, on March 24 - Grozny, on March 27 - Novorossiysk, on March 30 - Port-Petrovsk and on April 7 - Tuapse ... Almost throughout the entire territory of the North Caucasus, Soviet power was restored, which was confirmed by the decree of March 25, 1920.

Part of the army of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia (about 30 thousand people) was evacuated from Novorossiysk to the Crimea. The Terek Cossacks, who left Vladikavkaz (in total, together with the refugees, about 12 thousand people), went along the Georgian Military Highway to Georgia, where they were interned in camps near Poti, in a swampy malaria area. The demoralized Cossack units, trapped on the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus, for the most part surrendered to the Red units.

On April 4, 1920, A. I. Denikin gave the order to appoint as his successor to the post of Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia, Lieutenant General Baron P. N. Wrangel.

After the evacuation of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia to Crimea from the remnants of the Terek and Astrakhan Cossack units in April 1920, the Separate Terek-Astrakhan Cossack Brigade was formed, which, from April 28, as the Terek-Astrakhan Brigade, was part of the 3rd Cavalry Division of the Consolidated Corps. On July 7, after reorganization, the brigade again became separate. In the summer of 1920, she was part of the Special Forces Group that participated in the Kuban landing. From September 4, the brigade operated separately as part of the Russian army and included the 1st Tersk, 1st and 2nd Astrakhan regiments and the Terek-Astrakhan Cossack horse-artillery division and the Separate Terek reserve Cossack hundred.

The attitude of the Cossacks to Baron Wrangel was ambivalent. On the one hand, he contributed to the dispersal of the Kuban Regional Rada in 1919, on the other hand, his toughness and adherence to order appealed to the Cossacks. The Cossacks' attitude towards him was not spoiled by the fact that Wrangel put the Don general Sidorin on trial for telegraphing to the military chieftain Bogaevsky about his decision to "withdraw the Don army from the Crimea and the subordination in which it is now located."

The situation with the Kuban Cossacks was more complicated. The military chieftain Bukretov was opposed to the evacuation of the Cossack units trapped on the Black Sea coast to the Crimea. Wrangel was not immediately able to send the ataman to the Caucasus to organize the evacuation, and the remnants of those who did not surrender to the Reds (about 17 thousand people), only on May 4 were able to board the ships. Bukretov handed over the ataman power to the chairman of the Kuban government, Ivanis, and together with the "self-styled" deputies of the Rada, taking with him a part of the military treasury, fled to Georgia. The Kuban Rada, gathered in Feodosia, recognized Bukretov and Ivanis as traitors, and elected the military chieftain of the military general Ulagai, but he refused power.

The small Terek group, led by ataman Vdovenko, was traditionally hostile to separatist movements and, therefore, had nothing in common with the ambitious Cossack leaders.

The lack of unity in the political Cossack camp and Wrangel's uncompromising attitude to the "self-styled" allowed the commander-in-chief of the Russian army to conclude the treaty with the military atamans, which he considered necessary for the state structure of Russia. Gathering together Bogaevsky, Ivanis, Vdovenko and Lyakhov, Wrangel gave them 24 hours to think about it, and thus, “On July 22, an agreement was solemnly signed ... with the atamans and governments of the Don, Kuban, Terek and Astrakhan ... in the development of the agreement from 2 (15 ) April this year ...

1. The state formations of the Don, Kuban, Terek and Astrakhan are provided with complete independence in their internal structure and management.

2. The Council of Heads of Directorates under the Government and the Commander-in-Chief shall include, with a decisive vote on all issues, the chairmen of the governments of the state entities of the Don, Kuban, Terek and Astrakhan or their substitute members of their governments.

3. The Commander-in-Chief is assigned full authority over all the armed forces of state entities ... both in operational terms and on fundamental issues of the organization of the army.

4. All necessary for the supply ... food and other means are provided ... according to a special allocation.

5. Management of railway tracks and main telegraph lines shall be vested in the authority of the Commander-in-Chief.

6. Agreement and negotiations with foreign governments, both in the field of political and commercial policy, shall be carried out by the Ruler and the Commander-in-Chief. If these negotiations concern the interests of one of the state entities ..., the Ruler and the Commander-in-Chief preliminarily enters into an agreement with the subject ataman.

7. A common customs line and a single indirect taxation are established ...

8. A single monetary system is established on the territory of the contracting parties ...

9. Upon the liberation of the territory of state formations ... this agreement has to be submitted for approval by the large military circles and regional councils, but it accepts force immediately upon its signing.

10. This agreement is established until the complete end of the Civil War. "

The unsuccessful landing of the Kuban assault force, led by General Ulagay, in the Kuban in August 1920, and the choking September offensive on the Kakhovsky bridgehead forced Baron Wrangel to lock himself up within the Crimean peninsula and begin preparations for defense and evacuation.

By the beginning of the offensive on November 7, 1920, the Red Army numbered 133 thousand bayonets and checkers, the Russian army had 37 thousand bayonets and checkers. The superior forces of the Soviet troops broke the defenses, and on November 12, Baron Wrangel issued an order to abandon the Crimea. The evacuation organized by the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Army was completed on November 16, 1920 and made it possible to save about 150 thousand military and civilians, including about 30 thousand Cossacks.

The territory of Russia was abandoned by the remnants of the last provisional state government and the last legitimate governments of the Cossack troops of the Russian Empire, including Tersky.

After the evacuation of the Russian army from the Crimea in Chataldzha, the Terek-Astrakhan regiment was formed as part of the Don corps. After the transformation of the army into the Russian General Military Union (ROVS), the regiment until the 1930s was a cropped unit. So by the fall of 1925, there were 427 people in the regiment, including 211 officers.

· Cossacks in the Civil War. Part II. The year is 1918.

· In the fire of fratricidal Troubles.·

The civil war in Siberia had its own characteristics. Siberia in territorial space was several times larger than the territory of European Russia. The peculiarity of the Siberian population was that it did not know serfdom, there were no large landowners' lands that impeded the ownership of the peasants, and there was no land issue. In Siberia, the administrative and economic exploitation of the population was much weaker already because the centers of administrative influence spread only along the line of the Siberian railway track. Therefore, such an influence almost did not extend to the internal life of the provinces lying at a distance from the railway line, and the people only needed order and the possibility of a calm existence.

Siberian village

Under such patriarchal conditions, revolutionary propaganda could succeed in Siberia only by force, which could not but provoke resistance. And it inevitably arose. In June, the Cossacks, volunteers and detachments of the Czechoslovakians cleared the entire Siberian railway line from Chelyabinsk to Irkutsk from the Bolsheviks.

After that, an irreconcilable struggle began between the parties, as a result of which the advantage was established in the power structure that had formed in Omsk, relying on the armed forces of about 40,000, among which half were from the Ural, Siberian and Orenburg Cossacks. Anti-Bolshevik insurgent units in Siberia fought under the white-green flag, because "according to the decree of the extraordinary Siberian regional congress, the colors of the flag of autonomous Siberia were set, white and green, as a symbol of Siberian snow and forests."

Siberia flag

Of course, all these centrifugal chimeras arose primarily from the impotence of the central government, which was repeated in the early 90s. In addition to the national-geographical rift, the Bolsheviks managed to organize an internal split: the formerly united Cossacks were divided into "Reds" and "Whites." Some of the Cossacks, primarily young people and front-line soldiers, were deceived by the promises and promises of the Bolsheviks, and left to fight for the Soviets.

Red Cossacks

In the South Urals, the Red Guards, under the leadership of the worker-Bolshevik V.K. Blucher, and the Red Orenburg Cossacks of the brothers Nikolai and Ivan Kashirins fought surrounded and retreated from Vekhneuralsk to Beloretsk, and from there, repelling the attacks of the White Cossacks, began a great march along the Ural Mountains near Kungur, to join the 3rd Red Army. Having passed with battles on the rear of the whites for more than 1000 kilometers, the red fighters and Cossacks in the Askino area united with the red units.

Of these, the 30th Infantry Division was formed, the commander of which was appointed Blucher, the former Cossack captains Kashirins were appointed deputy and brigade commander. All three receive the newly established Order of the Red Banner, and Blucher received it at number 1.

During this period, about 12 thousand Orenburg Cossacks fought on the side of Ataman Dutov, up to 4 thousand Cossacks fought for the power of the Soviets. The Bolsheviks created Cossack regiments often on the basis of the old regiments of the tsarist army. So, on the Don, for the most part, the Cossacks of the 1st, 15th and 32nd Don regiments went to the Red Army. In battles, the Red Cossacks appear as the best fighting units of the Bolsheviks. In June, the Don red partisans were reduced to the 1st Socialist Cavalry Regiment (about 1000 sabers), headed by Dumenko and his deputy, Budyonny. In August, this regiment, replenished with cavalry from the Martyno-Oryol detachment, deployed to the 1st Don Soviet Cavalry Brigade, headed by the same commanders. Dumenko and Budyonny were the initiators of the creation of large equestrian formations in the Red Army.

Boris Mokeevich Dumenko

Since the summer of 1918, they persistently convinced the Soviet leadership of the need to create cavalry divisions and corps. Their views were shared by K.E. Voroshilov, I.V. Stalin, A.I. Egorov and other leaders of the 10th Army. By order of the commander of the 10th Army K.E. Voroshilov No. 62 dated November 28, 1918, Dumenko's cavalry brigade was reorganized into the Consolidated Cavalry Division.

The commander of the 32nd Cossack regiment, military sergeant major Mironov, also unconditionally sided with the new government. The Cossacks elected him the military commissar of the Ust-Medveditsky district revolutionary committee. In the spring of 1918, to fight the Whites, Mironov organized several Cossack partisan detachments, which were then combined into the 23rd Division of the Red Army. Mironov was appointed chief of the division. In September 1918 - February 1919, he successfully and dashingly smashed the white cavalry near Tambov and Voronezh, for which he was awarded the highest award Soviet republic- Order of the Red Banner under No. 3.

Philip Kuzmich Mironov

However, most of the Cossacks fought for the Whites. The Bolshevik leadership saw that it was the Cossacks who made up the bulk of the manpower of the White armies. This was especially typical for the south of Russia, where two-thirds of all Russian Cossacks were concentrated in the Don and Kuban. The civil war in the Cossack regions was fought with the most brutal methods, the destruction of prisoners and hostages was often practiced.

shooting of captured Cossacks

Due to the small number of Red Cossacks, the impression was that all Cossacks were at war with the rest of the non-Cossack population. By the end of 1918, it became obvious that in almost every army, about 80% of the combat-ready Cossacks are fighting the Bolsheviks and about 20% are fighting on the side of the Reds. On the fields of the outbreak of civil war, the White Cossacks Shkuro cut themselves with the Red Cossacks of Budyonny, the Red Cossacks of Mironov fought with the White Cossacks of Mamantov, the White Cossacks of Dutov fought with the Red Cossacks of Kashirin, and so on ... The bloody whirlwind swept over the Cossack lands. The grief-stricken Cossacks said: "Divided into white and red and let's chop each other for the joy of the Jewish commissars." This was only to the advantage of the Bolsheviks and the forces behind them. Such is the great Cossack tragedy. And there were reasons for her. When in September 1918 in Orenburg the 3rd Emergency Circle of the Orenburg Cossack army took place, where the first results of the struggle against the Soviets were summed up, the ataman of the 1st district K.A. Kargin with ingenious simplicity and very accurately described the main sources and causes of Bolshevism among the Cossacks. "The Bolsheviks in Russia and in the army were the result of the fact that we have a lot of poor people. And neither disciplinary regulations, nor executions can eliminate the discord while we are naked. Eliminate this empty space, give it the opportunity to live like a human being - and all these Bolshevism and other "isms" will disappear. However, it was too late to philosophize, and at the Circle, drastic punitive measures were planned against the supporters of the Bolsheviks, Cossacks, nonresidents and their families. I must say that they differed little from the punitive actions of the Reds. The abyss among the Cossacks deepened. In addition to the Ural, Orenburg and Siberian Cossacks, Kolchak's army included the Trans-Baikal and Ussuri Cossack troops, which were under the auspices and support of the Japanese. Initial education armed forces for the fight against the Bolsheviks it was based on the principle of voluntariness, but in August the mobilization of young people aged 19-20 was announced, as a result, Kolchak's army began to number up to 200,000 people.

By August 1918, forces were deployed on the Western Front of Siberia alone, numbering up to 120,000 people. Parts of the troops were distributed into three armies: Siberian under the command of Gaida, who broke with the Czechs and promoted to generals by Admiral Kolchak, Western under the command of the glorious Cossack general Khanzhin and South under the command of General Dutov, the ataman of the Orenburg army. The Ural Cossacks, who threw back the Reds, fought from Astrakhan to Novonikolaevsk, occupying a front of 500-600 miles. Against these troops, the Reds had from 80 to 100,000 men on the Eastern Front. However, having strengthened the troops by violent mobilization, the Reds went on the offensive and on September 9 they occupied Kazan, on the 12th Simbirsk and on October 10 they occupied Samara. By the Christmas holidays, Ufa was taken by the Reds, the Siberian armies began to withdraw to the east and occupy the passages of the Ural Mountains, where the armies were supposed to replenish themselves, put themselves in order and prepare for the spring offensive.

M.V. Frunze and V.I. Chapaev when crossing the river. White

At the end of 1918, Dutov's southern army, formed mainly from the Cossacks of the Orenburg Cossack army, also suffered heavy losses, and in January 1919 left Orenburg.

In the south, in the summer of 1918, 25 ages were mobilized into the Don army and there were 27,000 infantry, 30,000 cavalry, 175 guns, 610 machine guns, 20 aircraft, 4 armored trains in service, not counting the young standing army. The reorganization of the army was completed by August. The infantry regiments had 2-3 battalions, 1000 bayonets and 8 machine guns in each battalion, the cavalry regiments were six hundred in number with 8 machine guns. The regiments were divided into brigades and divisions, divisions into corps, which were placed on 3 fronts: the northern one against Voronezh, the eastern one against Tsaritsyn, and the southeastern one near the village of Velikoknyazheskaya. The Don's special beauty and pride was a standing army of 19-20 years old Cossacks. It consisted of: 1st Don Cossack Division - 5 thousand checkers, 1st Plastun brigade - 8 thousand bayonets, 1st rifle brigade - 8 thousand bayonets, 1st engineer battalion - 1 thousand bayonets, technical troops - armored trains , airplanes, armored detachments, etc. In total, up to 30 thousand excellent fighters.

A river flotilla of 8 ships was created. After bloody battles on July 27, the Don units left the army in the north and occupied the city of Boguchar, Voronezh province. The Don army was free from the Red Guard, but the Cossacks categorically refused to go further. With great difficulty, the ataman managed to carry out the order of the Circle on the crossing of the borders of the Don army, which was expressed in the order. But it was a dead letter. The Cossacks said: "We will go if the Russians also go." But the Russian Volunteer Army was firmly stuck in the Kuban and could not go north. Denikin refused the chieftain. He declared that he must remain in the Kuban until he liberated the entire North Caucasus from the Bolsheviks.

Cossack regions of the south of Russia

Under these conditions, the ataman looked closely at Ukraine. As long as there was order in Ukraine, as long as there was friendship and an alliance with the hetman, he was calm. The western border did not require a single soldier from the chieftain. There was a correct exchange of goods with Ukraine. But there was no firm conviction that the hetman would resist. The hetman did not have an army, the Germans prevented him from creating it. There was a good division of the Sich riflemen, several officer battalions, a very smart hussar regiment. But these were ceremonial troops. There were a bunch of generals and officers who were appointed commanders of corps, divisions and regiments. They dressed the original Ukrainian zhupans, let go of the sedentary forelocks, hung crooked sabers, occupied the barracks, issued statutes with covers in Ukrainian and content in Russian, but there were no soldiers in the army. The entire order was provided by the German garrisons. Their formidable "Halt" silenced all political mongrels.

kaiser's army

However, the hetman understood that it was impossible to rely on German troops forever and sought a defensive alliance with the Don, Kuban, Crimea and the peoples of the Caucasus against the Bolsheviks. The Germans supported him in this. On October 20, the hetman and the ataman held negotiations at the Skorokhodovo station and sent a letter to the command of the Volunteer Army, setting out their proposals.

Pavel Petrovich Skoropadsky Pyotr Nikolaevich Krasnov

But the outstretched hand was rejected. So, the goals of Ukraine, Don and the Volunteer Army had significant differences. The leaders of Ukraine and the Don considered the main goal to be the struggle against the Bolsheviks, and the determination of the structure of Russia was postponed until victory. Denikin adhered to a completely different point of view. He believed that he was on his way only with those who deny any autonomy and unconditionally share the idea of ​​a single and indivisible Russia.

Anton Ivanovich Denikin

Under the conditions of the Russian Troubles, this was his huge epistemological, ideological, organizational and political mistake, which determined the sad fate of the white movement.

Ataman faced the fact of harsh reality. The Cossacks refused to go beyond the limits of the Donskoy army. And they were right. Voronezh, Saratov and other peasants not only did not fight the Bolsheviks, but also went against the Cossacks. The Cossacks, not without difficulty, were able to cope with their Don workers, peasants and nonresident people, but they could not defeat the whole of central Russia and understood this perfectly. The ataman had the only way to force the Cossacks to go to Moscow. It was necessary to give them a break from the hardships of combat and then force them to join the Russian people's army advancing on Moscow. He asked volunteers twice and was refused twice. Then he began to create a new Russian southern army with funds from Ukraine and the Don. But Denikin obstructed this business in every possible way, calling it a German undertaking. However, the ataman needed this army due to the extreme weariness of the Don army and the decisive refusal of the Cossacks to march to Russia. In Ukraine, there were personnel for this army. After the aggravation of relations between the Volunteer Army with the Germans and Skoropadsky, the Germans began to hinder the movement of volunteers to the Kuban and in Ukraine, a lot of people who were ready to fight the Bolsheviks, but did not have such an opportunity, accumulated. From the very beginning, the Kiev union "Our homeland" became the main supplier of personnel for the southern army. The monarchical orientation of this organization sharply narrowed the social base of manning the army, since monarchist ideas were very unpopular among the people. Thanks to the propaganda of the socialists, the word king was still a bogey to many people. With the name of the tsar, the peasants inextricably linked the idea of ​​a harsh collection of taxes, of the sale of the last cow for debts to the state, of the dominance of landlords and capitalists, of gold-digging officers and of an officer's stick. In addition, they were afraid of the return of the landlords and punishment for the ruin of their estates. Simple Cossacks did not want restoration, because they associated with the concept of monarchy universal, long-term, compulsory military service, the obligation to equip at their own expense and maintain combat horses that are not needed in the economy. Cossack officers associated tsarism with the idea of ​​a ruinous "privilege". The Cossacks liked their new independent system, they were amused that they themselves were discussing issues of power, land and mineral resources.

Tsar and monarchy were contrasted with the concept of freedom. It is difficult to say what the intelligentsia wanted and what it feared, because it itself never knows. She is like that Baba Yaga who is “always against”. In addition, General Ivanov, also a monarchist, a very distinguished man, but already sick and elderly, undertook to command the southern army. As a result, little came of this venture.

And the Soviet government, suffering defeat everywhere, from July 1918 began to organize the Red Army correctly. With the help of the officers involved in it, the scattered Soviet detachments were brought together into military formations. In regiments, brigades, divisions and corps, military experts were assigned to command posts. The Bolsheviks managed to create a split not only among the Cossacks, but also among the officers. It was divided into approximately three equal parts: for whites, for red, and for no one. Here's another great tragedy.


The tragedy of the mother. One son is for the whites and the other for the red

The Don army had to fight against a militarily organized enemy. By August, more than 70,000 fighters, 230 guns with 450 machine guns were concentrated against the Don army. The numerical superiority of the enemy in forces created a difficult situation for Don. This situation was exacerbated by political turmoil. On August 15, after the liberation of the entire Don territory from the Bolsheviks, the Great Troops Circle was convened in Novocherkassk from the entire population of the Don. It was no longer the old "gray" Don's Salvation Circle. The intelligentsia and semi-intelligentsia, people's teachers, lawyers, clerks, clerks, solicitors entered it, managed to master the minds of the Cossacks, and the Circle broke up into districts, villages, parties. At the Circle, from the very first meetings, opposition to Ataman Krasnov, which had its roots in the Volunteer Army, opened up.

The ataman was accused of his friendly relations with the Germans, the desire for solid independent power and independence. Indeed, the chieftain opposed Bolshevism with Cossack chauvinism, internationalism with Cossack nationalism, and Russian imperialism with Don independence. Very few people then understood the significance of the Don separatism as a transitional phenomenon. Denikin did not understand this either. Everything on the Don irritated him: the anthem, the flag, the coat of arms, the chieftain, the Circle, discipline, satiety, order, Don patriotism. He considered all this to be a manifestation of separatism and by all means fought against the Don and the Kuban. As a result, he chopped off the branch on which he was sitting. As soon as the civil war ceased to be national and popular, it became class and could not have success for the whites because of the large number of the poorest class. First, the peasants, and then the Cossacks fell away from the Volunteer Army and the White Movement, and it perished. They talk about the treason of the Cossacks to Denikin, but this is not so, but quite the opposite. If Denikin had not betrayed the Cossacks, would not have cruelly insulted their young national feelings, they would not have left him. In addition, the decision taken by the ataman and the Army Circle to continue the war outside the Don intensified anti-war propaganda on the part of the Reds, and ideas began to spread among the Cossack units that the ataman and the government were pushing the Cossacks to conquests alien to them outside the Don, which the Bolsheviks did not encroach on. ... The Cossacks wanted to believe that the Bolsheviks really would not touch the Don territory and that one could agree with them. The Cossacks reasoned: "We liberated our lands from the Reds, let the Russian soldiers and peasants lead the further struggle against them, and we can only help them."

In addition, for summer field work on the Don, workers were required, and therefore it was necessary to free the older ages and dismiss them to their homes, which greatly affected the strength and combat capability of the army. The bearded Cossacks with their authority tightly rallied and disciplined hundreds. But despite the intrigues of the opposition, popular wisdom and national egoism prevailed on the Circle over the sly attacks of political parties. The ataman's policy was approved, and he himself was re-elected on September 12. The ataman firmly understood that Russia itself should be saved. He did not trust either the Germans, much less the Allies. He knew that foreigners did not go to Russia for Russia, but to snatch as much as possible from it. He also understood that Germany and France, for opposite reasons, needed a strong and powerful Russia, and England a weak, fragmented, federal one. He believed in Germany and France, he did not believe in England at all.

By the end of the summer, the fighting on the border of the Don region concentrated around Tsaritsyn, which was also not part of the Don region. The defense there was headed by the future Soviet leader I.V. Stalin, whose organizational abilities are still doubted only by the most ignorant and stubborn.

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (Dzhugashvili)

Putting the Cossacks to sleep with propaganda that it was useless to fight them outside the borders of the Don, the Bolsheviks concentrated large forces on this front. However, the first offensive of the Reds was repulsed, and they retreated to Kamyshin and to the lower Volga. While the Volunteer Army during the summer fought to clear the Kuban region of the army of paramedic Sorokin, the Don Army provided its activities on all fronts against the Reds from Tsaritsyn to Taganrog. During the summer of 1918, the Don army suffered heavy losses, up to 40% of the Cossacks and up to 70% of the officers. The quantitative superiority of the Reds and the vast front-line space did not allow the Cossack regiments to leave the front and go to the rear for rest. The Cossacks were in constant combat tension. Not only people were tired, but the horse train was also exhausted. The harsh conditions and lack of adequate hygiene began to cause infectious diseases, typhus appeared in the troops. In addition, the Red units under the command of the Rednecks, defeated in battles north of Stavropol, went towards Tsaritsyn. The appearance from the Caucasus of Sorokin's army, which was not finished by volunteers, posed a threat from the flank and rear of the Don army, which was waging a stubborn struggle against the garrison of 50,000 people that occupied Tsaritsyn. With the onset of cold weather and general fatigue, the Don units began to move away from Tsaritsyn.

But what about the Kuban? The lack of weapons and soldiers of the Volunteer Army was made up for by enthusiasm and daring. On an open field, under a hurricane of fire, officer companies, striking the imagination of the enemy, moved in slender chains and drove ten times the number of Red troops.

Officer company attack

Successful battles, accompanied by the capture of a large number of prisoners, lifted the spirits in the Kuban villages, and the Cossacks began to massively take up arms. The composition of the Volunteer Army, which suffered heavy losses, was replenished with a large number of Kuban Cossacks, volunteers who arrived from all over Russia and people from the partial mobilization of the population. The need for a unified command of all forces that fought against the Bolsheviks was recognized by the entire command staff. In addition, it was necessary for the leaders of the White movement to take into account the all-Russian situation in the revolutionary process. Unfortunately, none of the leaders of the Good Army, who claimed the role of leaders on a national scale, possessed flexibility and dialectical philosophy. The dialectic of the Bolsheviks, who, in order to retain power, gave the Germans more than a third of the territory and population of European Russia, of course, could not serve as an example, but Denikin's claims to the role of the immaculate and unyielding guardian of "one and indivisible Russia" under the Time of Troubles could only be ridiculous. In the conditions of the multifactorial and merciless struggle of “all against all”, he did not possess the necessary flexibility and dialectics. The refusal of the ataman Krasnov to subordinate the administration of the Don region to Denikin was understood by him not only as the personal vanity of the ataman, but also as the independence of the Cossacks hidden in this.

All parts of the Russian Empire, striving to establish order with their own forces, were considered by Denikin to be enemies of the white movement. The local authorities of the Kuban also did not recognize Denikin, and punitive detachments began to be sent against them, from the first days of the struggle. Military efforts were scattered, significant forces diverted from the main goal. The main parts of the population, objectively supporting the whites, not only did not join the struggle, but became its opponents.

Cossacks go to the Red Army

The front demanded a large number of male population, but it was necessary to reckon with the demands of internal work, and often Cossacks who were at the front were released from the units for certain periods. The Kuban government freed some ages from mobilization, and General Denikin saw in this "dangerous preconditions and a manifestation of sovereignty." The army was fed by the Kuban population. The Kuban government paid all the expenses for the supply of the Volunteer Army, which could not complain about the supply of food. At the same time, according to the laws of wartime, the Volunteer Army appropriated the right to all property seized from the Bolsheviks, cargo going to the Red units, the right of requisition, and more. Other means of replenishing the Dobrarmia treasury were indemnities imposed on villages that showed hostile actions towards it. For the accounting and distribution of this property, General Denikin organized a commission of public figures from the military-industrial committee. The activities of this commission proceeded in such a way that a significant part of the cargo was spoiled, some were plundered, there was abuse among the members of the commission that the commission was made up of persons, mostly unprepared, useless, even harmful and ignorant. The immutable law of any army is that everything beautiful, brave, heroic, noble goes to the front, and everything cowardly, evading battle, everything thirsting not for feat and glory, but for profit and outward splendor, all speculators gather in the rear. People who have not seen a hundred-ruble ticket before, turn over millions of rubles, they feel dizzy from this money, they sell "booty" here, here are their heroes. The front is ragged, barefoot, naked and hungry, but here people are sitting in cleverly sewn Circassians, in colored caps, service jackets and breeches. Here they drink wine, jingle with gold and politicize.

Here are infirmaries with doctors, nurses and sisters of mercy. Here is love and jealousy. So it was in all armies, so it was in the white armies. Self-seekers marched into the white movement along with ideological people. These self-seekers firmly settled in the rear and flooded Yekaterinodar, Rostov and Novocherkassk. Their behavior cut the sight and hearing of the army and the population. In addition, for General Denikin it was not clear why the Kuban government, while liberating the region, put in place the rulers the same persons who were under the Bolsheviks, renaming them from commissars to atamans. He did not understand that the business qualities of each Cossack were determined in the conditions of Cossack democracy by the Cossacks themselves. However, not being able to restore order in the regions liberated from the power of the Bolsheviks himself, General Denikin remained implacable to the local Cossack order and to local national organizations that lived in pre-revolutionary times with their own customs. They were credited to them as hostile "self-styled", and punitive measures were taken against them. All these reasons could not help to attract the population to the side of the white army. At the same time, General Denikin, both during the Civil War and in emigration, pondered a lot, but uselessly, about the completely inexplicable (from his point of view) epidemic spread of Bolshevism. Moreover, the Kuban army, territorially and in origin, was divided into the army of the Black Sea Cossacks, resettled by the order of Empress Catherine II after the destruction of the Dnieper army, and the linemen, whose population was made up of settlers from the Don region and from the Volga Cossack communities.

These two parts, which made up one army, were different in character. In both parts, their historical past was kept. The Chernomorites were the heirs of the army of the Dnieper Cossacks and Zaporozhye, whose ancestors, due to their many times demonstrated political instability, were destroyed like an army. Moreover, the Russian authorities only completed the destruction of the Dnieper Army, and Poland began it, under the rule of the kings of which the Dnieper Cossacks were for a long time. This unstable orientation of the Little Russians has brought many tragedies in the past, it is enough to recall the inglorious fate and death of their last talented hetman Mazepa. This violent past and other features of the Little Russian character imposed a strong specificity on the behavior of the Kuban people in the civil war. The Kuban Rada split into 2 streams: Ukrainian and independent. The leaders of Rada Bych and Ryabovol proposed merging with Ukraine, the self-styledists stood for the organization of a federation in which the Kuban would be completely independent. Both dreamed and strove to free themselves from Denikin's tutelage. He, in turn, considered them all traitors. The moderate part of the Rada, the front-line soldiers and the ataman Filimonov held on to the volunteers. They wanted to free themselves from the Bolsheviks with the help of volunteers. But the ataman Filimonov had little authority among the Cossacks, they had other heroes: Pokrovsky, Shkuro, Ulagai, Pavlyuchenko.

Viktor Leonidovich Pokrovsky Andrey G. Shkuro

The Kuban people liked them very much, but their behavior was difficult to predict. The behavior of numerous Caucasian peoples was even more unpredictable, which determined the greater specificity of the civil war in the Caucasus. Frankly, for all their zigzags and twists, the reds used all this specificity much better than Denikin.

Many hopes of whites were associated with the name of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich Romanov. Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich lived all this time in the Crimea, not openly entering political events. He was greatly oppressed by the thought that by sending his telegram to the sovereign with a request to abdicate, he had contributed to the death of the monarchy and the destruction of Russia. The Grand Duke wanted to make amends for this and take part in combat work. However, in response to General Alekseev's lengthy letter, the Grand Duke replied with only one phrase: “Be calm” ... and General Alekseev died on September 25. The high command and the civilian part of the administration of the liberated territories were completely united in the hands of General Denikin.

Heavy continuous fighting depleted both sides of the fighting in the Kuban. The Reds also fought among the high command. The commander of the 11th Army, the former paramedic Sorokin, was eliminated, and the command was transferred to the Revolutionary Military Council. Not finding support in the army, Sorokin fled from Pyatigorsk in the direction of Stavropol. On October 17, he was caught, imprisoned, where he was killed without any trial. After the assassination of Sorokin, as a result of internal squabbles among the red leaders and from impotent rage at the stubborn resistance of the Cossacks, also wanting to intimidate the population, Mineralnye Vody a demonstrative execution of 106 hostages was carried out. Among those executed were General Radko-Dmitriev, a Bulgarian in the Russian service, and General Ruzsky, who so persistently urged the last Russian Emperor to abdicate the throne. After the verdict on General Ruzsky, the question was asked: "Do you now recognize the great Russian revolution?" He replied: "I see only one great robbery." To this it is worth adding that the beginning of the robbery was laid by him at the headquarters of the Northern Front, where violence was carried out against the will of the emperor, who was forced to abdicate the throne.

abdication of Nicholas II

As for the bulk of the former officers who were in the North Caucasus, they turned out to be absolutely inert to the events taking place, showing no desire to serve either white or red, which decided their fate. Almost all of them were destroyed “just in case” by the Reds.

In the Caucasus, the class struggle was deeply involved in the national question. Among the numerous peoples inhabiting it, Georgia was of the greatest political importance, and in the economic sense - the Caucasian oil. Politically and territorially, Georgia found itself primarily under pressure from Turkey. Soviet power, but to the Brest Peace, ceded Kars, Ardahan and Batum to Turkey, which Georgia could not recognize. Turkey recognized the independence of Georgia, but on the other hand, it presented even more difficult territorial demands than those of the Brest Peace. Georgia refused to carry them out, the Turks went on the offensive and occupied Kars, heading for Tiflis. Not recognizing Soviet power, Georgia sought to ensure the country's independence by armed force and began to form an army. But Georgia was ruled by politicians,

who took an active part after the revolution in the composition of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies. These same people now ingloriously tried to build the Georgian army on the same principles that at one time led the Russian army to decay. In the spring of 1918, the struggle for Caucasian oil began. The German command removed a cavalry brigade and several battalions from the Bulgarian front and transferred them to Batum and Poti, which was leased by Germany for 60 years. However, the Turks were the first to appear in Baku and there the fanaticism of Turkish Mohammedanism, the ideas and propaganda of the Reds, the power and money of the British and Germans clashed. In Transcaucasia, since ancient times, there was an irreconcilable enmity between Armenians and Azerbaijanis (then they were called Turko-Tatars). After the establishment of the Soviets' rule, the age-old enmity was intensified by religion and politics. Two camps were created: the Soviet-Armenian proletariat and the Turkish-Tatars. Back in March 1918, one of the Soviet-Armenian regiments, returning from Persia, seized power in Baku and slaughtered entire quarters of the Turkish-Tatars, killing up to 10,000 people. For several months the power in the city remained in the hands of the Red Armenians. In early September, a Turkish corps under the command of Mursal Pasha arrived in Baku, dispersed the Baku commune and occupied the city.

shooting of 26 Baku communards

With the arrival of the Turks, the massacre of the Armenian population began. The Muslims were triumphant.

Germany, after the Brest Peace, fortified on the shores of the Azov and Black Seas, in the ports of which part of their fleet was introduced. In the coastal cities of the Black Sea, German sailors, who sympathetically followed the unequal struggle between the Dobrarmia and the Bolsheviks, offered their help to the army headquarters, which Denikin contemptuously rejected. Georgia, separated from Russia by a mountain range, had a connection with the northern part of the Caucasus through a narrow strip of coast that made up the Black Sea province. Having annexed the Sukhumi District to its territory, Georgia put forward an armed detachment under the command of General Mazniev in Tuapse by September. This was a fatal decision, when the yeast of the national interests of the newly emerging states with all their acuteness and insolubility was poured into the Civil War. Against the Volunteer Army in the direction of Tuapse, the Georgians sent a detachment of 3,000 men with 18 guns. On the coast, the Georgians began to build fortifications by the front to the north, a small German landing force landed in Sochi and Adler. General Denikin began to reproach the representatives of Georgia for the difficult and humiliating situation of the Russian population on the territory of Georgia, the plundering of the Russian state property, the invasion and occupation by the Georgians, together with the Germans, of the Black Sea province. To which Georgia replied: "The Volunteer Army is a private organization ... In the current situation, the Sochi District should become part of Georgia ...". In this dispute between the leaders of the Dobrarmia and Georgia, the Kuban government turned out to be entirely on the side of Georgia. The Kubans had friendly relations with Georgia. It soon became clear that the Sochi district was occupied by Georgia with the consent of the Kuban, and that there were no misunderstandings between the Kuban and Georgia.
Such turbulent events developing in the Transcaucasus left no room there for the problems of the Russian Empire and its last stronghold, the Volunteer Army. Therefore, General Denikin finally turned his gaze to the East, where the government of Admiral Kolchak was formed. An embassy was sent to him, and then admiral Kolchak was recognized by Denikin as the Supreme ruler of national Russia.

Meanwhile, the defense of the Don continued on the front from Tsaritsyn to Taganrog. Throughout the summer and autumn, the Don army, without any outside help, fought heavy and constant battles in the main directions from Voronezh and Tsaritsyn. Instead of the Red Guard gangs, the Workers and Peasants Red Army (RKKA), which had just been created by the efforts of military experts, had already fought against the people's Don army. By the end of 1918, the Red Army already had 299 regular regiments, including on the eastern front against Kolchak there were 97 regiments, on the north against the Finns and Germans 38 regiments, on the west against the Polish-Lithuanian troops 65 regiments, on the south 99 regiments, of which there were 44 regiments on the Don front, 5 regiments on the Astrakhan front, 28 regiments on the Kursk-Bryansk front, 22 regiments against Denikin and Kuban. The army was commanded by the Revolutionary Military Council, headed by Bronstein (Trotsky), and the Defense Council headed by Ulyanov (Lenin) stood at the head of all the country's military efforts.

founders of the Red Army (Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army)

In October, the headquarters of the Southern Front in Kozlov received the task to demolish the Don Cossacks from the face of the earth and occupy, by all means, Rostov and Novocherkassk. The front was commanded by General Sytin. The front consisted of Sorokin's 11th army, headquarters in Nevinnomyssk, which operated against the volunteers and Kubanians, Antonov's 12th army, headquarters in Astrakhan, Voroshilov's 10th army, headquarters in Tsaritsyn, General Yegorov's 9th army, headquarters in Balashov, General Chernavin's 8th Army, headquarters in Voronezh. Sorokin, Antonov and Voroshilov were the remnants of the previous electoral system, and the fate of Sorokin had already been decided, Voroshilov was looking for a replacement, and all the other commanders were former headquarters officers and generals of the imperial army. Thus, the situation on the Don front took shape in a very formidable manner. The chieftain and the commanders of the armies, Generals Denisov and Ivanov, were aware that the times when one Cossack was enough for ten Red Guards had passed and they understood that the period of "handicraft" operations had passed. The Don army was preparing to repulse. The offensive was stopped, the troops withdrew from the Voronezh province and entrenched in a fortified strip along the border of the Don army. Relying on the left flank on the Ukraine, which was occupied by the Germans, and on the right on the hard-to-reach Trans-Volga region, the ataman hoped to hold the defense until spring, during which time, strengthening and strengthening his army. But man proposes and God disposes.

In November, extremely unfavorable events of a general political nature took place for Don. The Allies won a victory over the Central Powers, Kaiser Wilhelm abdicated the throne, a revolution and the disintegration of the army began in Germany. German troops began to leave Russia. The German soldiers did not obey their commanders, they were already ruled by their Soviets of Soldiers' Deputies. More recently, the formidable "Halt" stern German soldiers stopped crowds of workers and soldiers in Ukraine, but now they meekly allowed themselves to be disarmed by the Ukrainian peasants. And then Ostap suffered. Ukraine boiled over, seethed with uprisings, each volost had its own "fathers" and the civil war rolled dashingly across the country. Hetmanism, Gaidamatchina, Petliurism, Makhnovshchina…. All this was heavily implicated in Ukrainian nationalism and separatism. Many works have been written about this period and dozens of films have been shot, including incredibly popular ones. If you remember "Wedding in Malinovka" or "Red Devils", then you can vividly imagine ... the future of Ukraine.

And then Petlyura, joining with Vynnychenko, raised a revolt of the Sich riflemen.

Sich Riflemen

There was no one to suppress the rebellion. The hetman did not have his own army. The German Council of Deputies concluded an armistice with Petliura, who drove the echelons and the German soldiers loaded into them, abandoning their positions and weapons, and went home. In these conditions, the French command on the Black Sea promised the hetman 3-4 divisions. But at Versailles, the Thames and the Potomac, they looked at it very differently. Big politicians saw in united Russia a threat to Persia, India, the Middle and Far East. They wanted to see Russia destroyed, shattered and burned over a slow fire. In Soviet Russia, the events were followed with fear and trepidation. Objectively, the victory of the Allies was the defeat of Bolshevism. Both the commissars and the Red Army men understood this. As the Don people said that they could not fight the whole of Russia, so the Red Army men understood that they could not fight against the whole world. But they didn't have to fight. Versailles did not want to save Russia, did not want to share with her the fruits of victory, so they postponed help. There was another reason as well. Although the British and French said that Bolshevism was a disease of the defeated armies, they were the winners and their armies were not touched by this terrible disease. But that was not the case. Their soldiers no longer wanted to fight with anyone, their armies were already being eaten away by the same terrible gangrene of war weariness as the others. And when the allies did not come to Ukraine, the Bolsheviks had a hope of victory. Hastily formed squads of officers and cadets remained to defend Ukraine and the hetman. The hetman's troops were defeated, the Ukrainian Council of Ministers surrendered Kiev to the Petliurists, having bargained for themselves and the officers' squads the right to evacuate to the Don and Kuban. The hetman escaped.
Petliura's return to power was colorfully described in the novel Days of the Turbins by Mikhail Bulgakov: chaos, murders, violence against Russian officers and just over Russians in Kiev. And then a stubborn struggle against Russia, not only against the red, but also against the white. The Petliurites staged a terrible terror, massacre and genocide of the Russians in the occupied territories. The Soviet command, having learned about this, moved Antonov's army to the Ukraine, which easily defeated the Petliura bands and occupied Kharkov, and then Kiev. Petliura fled to Kamenets-Podolsk. In Ukraine, after the departure of the Germans, huge reserves of military equipment remained, which the Reds got. This gave them the opportunity to form the Ninth Army from the Ukrainian side and direct it against the Don from the west. With the withdrawal of the German units from the borders of the Don and the Ukraine, the position of the Don was complicated in two respects: the army was deprived of replenishment of weapons and military supplies, and a new, western front, 600 miles long, was added. For the command of the Red Army, great opportunities opened up for using the prevailing conditions, and they decided to first defeat the Don army, and then destroy the Kuban and Volunteer armies. All the attention of the chieftain of the Donskoy army was now turned to the western borders. But there was a belief that the allies would come and help out. The intelligentsia was lovingly, enthusiastically disposed towards the allies and looked forward to them. Thanks to the wide spread of Anglo-French education and literature, the British and French, despite the remoteness of these countries, were closer to the Russian educated heart than the Germans. And even more so the Russians, for this social stratum is traditionally and firmly convinced that in our Fatherland there can be no prophets by definition. The common people, including the Cossacks, had different priorities in this regard. The Germans enjoyed the sympathy and liked the simple Cossacks as a serious and hardworking people, the common people looked at the French as a frivolous creature with some contempt, and at the Englishman with great distrust. The Russian people were firmly convinced that during the period of Russian successes "the Englishwoman always shits." It soon became clear that the faith of the Cossacks in the allies turned out to be an illusion and a chimera.

Denikin had an ambivalent attitude to the Don. While the affairs of Germany were good, and supplies to the Dobroarmiya came from the Ukraine through the Don, Denikin's attitude towards the ataman Krasnov was cold, but restrained. But as soon as it became known about the victory of the allies, everything changed. General Denikin began to take revenge on the ataman for independence and show that now everything is in his hands. On November 13, in Yekaterinodar, Denikin convened a meeting of representatives of the Dobroarmiya, Don and Kuban, at which he demanded that 3 main issues be resolved. About a single power (the dictatorship of General Denikin), a single command and a single representation to the allies. The meeting did not come to an agreement, and relations worsened even more, and with the arrival of the allies, a cruel intrigue began against the ataman and the Donskoy army. Denikin's agents among the allies ataman Krasnov has long been presented as a figure of "German orientation". All attempts of the chieftain to change this characteristic were unsuccessful. In addition, when foreigners met, Krasnov always ordered to play the old Russian anthem. At the same time, he said: “I have two options. Either play in such cases "God Save the Tsar", not attaching importance to the words, or a funeral march. I deeply believe in Russia, that's why I can't play the funeral march. I play the Russian anthem. " For this, the Ataman was also considered a monarchist abroad. As a consequence, Don received no help from the allies. But the chieftain was not up to parrying intrigues. The military situation changed dramatically, the Donskoy army was threatened with death. Attaching special importance to the territory of the Don, the Soviet government by November against the Don army concentrated four armies of 125,000 soldiers with 468 guns and 1,337 machine guns. The rear of the Red armies were reliably covered by railway lines, which ensured the transfer of troops and maneuvering, and the Red units were numerically increased. The winter was early and cold. With the onset of cold weather, diseases developed, and typhus began. The 60,000-strong Don army began to melt and freeze numerically, and there was nowhere to take reinforcements.

The resources of manpower on the Don were completely exhausted, the Cossacks were mobilized from 18 to 52 years old, and they were even older as volunteers. It was clear that with the defeat of the Don Army, the Volunteer Army would also cease to exist. But the Don Cossacks held the front, which allowed General Denikin, taking advantage of the difficult situation on the Don, to conduct a behind-the-scenes struggle against Ataman Krasnov through the members of the Army Circle. At the same time, the Bolsheviks resorted to their tried and tested means - the most tempting promises, behind which there was nothing but unheard-of perfidy. But these promises sounded very attractive and humane. The Bolsheviks promised the Cossacks peace and complete inviolability of the borders of the Don troops, if the latter lay down their arms and go home.

They pointed out that the allies would not help them; on the contrary, they were helping the Bolsheviks. The fight against the two or three times superior enemy forces depressed the morale of the Cossacks, and the Reds' promise to establish peaceful relations in some units began to find supporters. Individual units began to leave the front, exposing it, and, finally, the regiments of the Upper Don District decided to enter into negotiations with the Reds and stopped resistance. The truce was concluded on the basis of self-determination and friendship of peoples. Many Cossacks went home. Through the breaks of the front, the Reds penetrated deep into the rear of the defending units and, without any pressure, the Cossacks of the Khopyorsky District rolled back. The Don army, leaving the northern districts, withdrew to the line of the Seversky Donets, surrendering village by village to the Red Mironov Cossacks. The ataman did not have a single free Cossack, everything was sent to the defense of the western front. The threat arose over Novocherkassk. The situation could only be saved by volunteers or allies.

By the time the front of the Don Army collapsed, the regions of the Kuban and the North Caucasus had already been liberated from the Reds. By November 1918, the armed forces in the Kuban consisted of 35 thousand Kuban residents and 7 thousand volunteers. These forces were free, but General Denikin was in no hurry to provide assistance to the exhausted Don Cossacks. The situation and the allies demanded a unified command. But not only the Cossacks, but also the Cossack officers and generals did not want to obey the tsarist generals. This collision had to be resolved somehow. Under pressure from the allies, General Denikin invited the ataman and the Don government to convene for a meeting in order to clarify the relationship between the Don and the command of the Good Army.

On December 26, 1918, Don commanders Denisov, Polyakov, Smagin, Ponomarev, on the one hand, and generals Denikin, Dragomirov, Romanovsky and Shcherbachev, on the other, gathered for a meeting in Torgovaya. The meeting was opened with a speech by General Denikin. Beginning with a broader perspective on the fight against the Bolsheviks, he urged those present to forget personal grievances and insults. The issue of a single command for the entire command staff was a vital necessity, and it was clear to everyone that all the armed forces, incomparably smaller in comparison with the enemy's units, should be united under one general leadership and aimed at one goal: the destruction of the center of Bolshevism and the occupation of Moscow. The negotiations were very difficult and constantly came to a standstill. There were too many discrepancies between the command of the Volunteer Army and the Cossacks, in the field of politics, tactics and strategy. But still, with great difficulty and great concessions, Denikin managed to subjugate the Don army.

In these difficult days, the ataman accepted the Allied military mission led by General Poole. They examined the troops in positions and in reserve, factories, workshops, stud farms. The more Poole saw, the more he realized that help was needed immediately. But in London there was a completely different opinion. After his report, Poole was removed from the leadership of the mission in the Caucasus and replaced by General Briggs, who did nothing without a command from London. And there were no commands to help the Cossacks. England needed a Russia weakened, exhausted and plunged into permanent turmoil. Instead of helping, the French mission presented the ataman and the Don government with an ultimatum, in which it demanded the complete submission of the ataman and the Don government to the French command on the Black Sea and full compensation for all losses of French citizens (read coal owners) in the Donbass. Under these conditions, the persecution against the ataman and the Donskoy army continued in Yekaterinodar. General Denikin maintained contacts and conducted constant negotiations with the chairman of the Circle Kharlamov and other figures from the opposition to the ataman. However, realizing the seriousness of the situation of the Don army, Denikin sent a division of May-Mayevsky to the Mariupol area and 2 more Kuban divisions were echeloned and awaited an order to move. But there was no order, Denikin was waiting for the Circle's decision regarding the chieftain Krasnov.

The Great Military Circle met on February 1. This was no longer the same circle that had been on August 15 in the days of victories. The faces were the same, but the expression was not the same. Then all the front-line soldiers were wearing shoulder straps, orders and medals. Now all the Cossacks and junior officers were without shoulder straps. The circle, represented by its gray part, became democratized and played like the Bolsheviks. On February 2, the Krug expressed no confidence in the commander and chief of staff of the Don Army, Generals Denisov and Polyakov. In response, ataman Krasnov insulted for his comrades-in-arms and resigned from himself the position of ataman. The circle did not accept her at first. But on the sidelines, the opinion dominated that without the resignation of the ataman, there would be no help from the allies and Denikin. After that, the Circle accepted the resignation. In his place, General Bogaevsky was elected ataman. On February 3, General Denikin visited the Circle, where he was greeted with thunderous applause. Now the Volunteer, Don, Kuban, Terek armies and the Black Sea Fleet were united under his command under the name of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia (ARSUR).

The truce of the Severodon Cossacks with the Bolsheviks continued, but not for long. A few days after the armistice, the Reds appeared in the villages and began to carry out savage reprisals among the Cossacks. They began to take away grain, steal cattle, kill the recalcitrant and make violence. In response, on February 26, an uprising began, which engulfed the villages of Kazan, Migulinskaya, Veshenskaya and Elanskaya.

The defeat of Germany, the elimination of the ataman Krasnov, the creation of the Armed Forces of Yugoslavia and the uprising of the Cossacks began a new stage in the struggle against the Bolsheviks in southern Russia. But that's a completely different story.

The civil war is usually represented as a confrontation between the "reds" and "whites". Moreover, supporters of both of them love to accuse each other of unleashing a conflict. Find out who first took up arms and resorted to the policy of terror. Nevertheless, the war would start even if the white movement could not arise and were suppressed, say, at the beginning of 1918. Or the red ones suddenly disappeared somewhere. Indeed, in addition to the above guys, there were other parties to the conflict. For example, national movements and regional governments, the so-called "green", foreign invaders. However, there was another force, thanks to which the White Guards were able to form massive armies. And her name is Cossacks.
Source of illustration: http://lemur59.ru Dissatisfied with the new government, the Cossacks made up a considerable part of the majority of the White Guard armies. The Don, Kuban and Terek Cossacks in 1919 constituted the bulk of the white cavalry of the All-Soviet Union on the Southern Front and a considerable (up to fifty percent) part of the foot formations. In 1918, it was the Cossacks who became a massive, mobilized element in the parts of the Don and Volunteer armies. The Ural Cossack army on the Eastern Front was subordinate to Admiral Kolchak, it was the Urals that destroyed the headquarters of the division of the famous Vasily Chapaev. Such a large-scale participation of the Cossacks in the Civil War was due to several reasons:
1. The desire of the Cossacks for independence, their relatively rich existence in the "good old" tsarist Russia.
2. The Cossacks had not just weapons, but also their own military organizations, which sometimes numbered tens (!) Of thousands of fighters.
3. The Cossack regions themselves, quite remote from the center, isolated.
There were, of course, and "red" Cossacks. For example, the Chervonnoye Cossacks, where there were many descendants of the Zaporozhye Cossacks. Many poor people, "nonresident" fighters of the decayed white and insurgent units also went to the service of the Bolsheviks. But, nevertheless, according to the Central Executive Committee (the legislative body of the young Soviet government) in 1919, only a fifth of the Cossacks served in the Red Army. The rest, up to three-quarters, supported the whites or were in rebel groups.
Source of illustration: https://www.syl.ru The bottom line, however, is that the Cossacks, in no small part, cared primarily about their native regions. The Bolsheviks have unequivocally turned into oppressors for them, into a force that seeks to deprive the Cossacks of their old rights and privileges. But the goals of the White Guards (a large-scale war, a campaign against Moscow, a united and indivisible Russia) were of little interest to the Cossacks, excluding some of the officers. But their, Cossack, separatism had serious support among the masses. Therefore, even if there were no whites, the Cossacks would still oppose the Bolsheviks, striving for independence. Actually, the Veshensk uprising went on like that, moreover, the popular slogan at that time was an interesting phrase: "Soviets without communists!" Earlier, the Don Cossacks also fought separately from the White Volunteer Army, led by the ataman Peter Krasnov. At that time (1918), the Cossacks were guided by Germany, receiving equipment from it. In any case, the Cossack regions could not peacefully become part of the new Soviet state, if only because of the large number of owners who did not share the idea of ​​land redistribution. Yes, and the Cossack women did not want to part with their weapons ...

The reasons why the Cossacks of all Cossack regions for the most part rejected the destructive ideas of Bolshevism and entered into an open struggle against them, and in completely unequal conditions, are not completely clear to this day and constitute a mystery for many historians. After all, the Cossacks in everyday life were the same farmers, like 75% of the Russian population, they bore the same state burdens, if not more, and were under the same administrative control of the state. With the beginning of the revolution that followed the abdication of the sovereign, the Cossacks within the regions and in the front-line units went through various psychological stages. During the February rebellious movement in Petrograd, the Cossacks took a neutral position and remained onlookers of the unfolding events. The Cossacks saw that in the presence of significant armed forces in Petrograd, the government not only did not use them, but also strictly prohibited their use against the rebels. During the previous revolt in 1905-1906, the Cossack troops were the main armed force that restored order in the country, as a result, in the public opinion, they earned the contemptuous title of "nagayechnik" and "tsarist satraps and oprichniks". Therefore, in the rebellion that arose in the capital of Russia, the Cossacks were inert and left the government to decide the issue of restoring order by the forces of other troops. After the abdication of the sovereign and the entry of the Provisional Government into control of the country, the Cossacks considered the continuity of power to be legitimate and were ready to support the new government. But gradually this attitude changed, and, observing the complete inactivity of the authorities and even the encouragement of unbridled revolutionary excesses, the Cossacks began to gradually move away from the destructive power, and the instructions of the Council of Cossack Troops, which operated in Petrograd under the chairmanship of the ataman of the Orenburg army, Dutov, became authoritative for them.

Inside the Cossack regions, the Cossacks also did not get drunk with revolutionary freedoms and, having made some local changes, continued to live in the old way, without producing any economic and, moreover, social upheavals. At the front in the military units, the order on the army, which completely changed the basis of the military order, the Cossacks accepted with bewilderment and continued to maintain order and discipline in the units under the new conditions, most often electing their former commanders and chiefs. There were no refusals to execute orders and no settling of personal scores with the command staff took place either. But the tension grew gradually. The population of the Cossack regions and the Cossack units at the front were subjected to active revolutionary propaganda, which inadvertently had to be reflected in their psychology and forced to listen carefully to the calls and demands of the revolutionary leaders. In the area of ​​the Donskoy army, one of the important revolutionary acts was the displacement of the order ataman Count Grabbe, his replacement by the elected ataman of Cossack origin, General Kaledin, and the restoration of the convocation of public representatives on the Army Circle, according to the custom that existed from antiquity, until the reign of Emperor Peter I. After which their life continued to walk without any particular shocks. The question of relations with the non-Cossack population arose sharply, which psychologically followed the same revolutionary paths as the population of the rest of Russia. At the front, a powerful propaganda was conducted among the Cossack military units, accusing the ataman Kaledin of counter-revolutionism and having a certain success among the Cossacks. The seizure of power by the Bolsheviks in Petrograd was accompanied by a decree addressed to the Cossacks, in which only geographical names were changed, and it was promised that the Cossacks would be freed from the oppression of generals and the severity of military service, and equality and democratic freedoms would be established in everything. The Cossacks had nothing against this.

Rice. 1 Donskoy army area

The Bolsheviks came to power under anti-war slogans and soon began to fulfill their promises. In November 1917, the Council of People's Commissars invited all the belligerent countries to start peace negotiations, but the Entente countries refused. Then Ulyanov sent a delegation to Brest-Litovsk, occupied by the Germans, for separate peace negotiations with the delegates of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria. Germany's ultimatum demands shocked the delegates and caused hesitation even among the Bolsheviks, who were not particularly patriotic, but Ulyanov accepted these conditions. The "obscene Peace of Brest" was concluded, according to which Russia lost about 1 million km² of territory, pledged to demobilize the army and navy, transfer ships and infrastructure of the Black Sea Fleet to Germany, pay an indemnity in the amount of 6 billion marks, recognize the independence of Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland. The hands of the Germans were untied for the continuation of the war in the west. At the beginning of March, the German army on the entire front began to move forward to occupy the territories that were given by the Bolsheviks under a peace treaty. Moreover, Germany, in addition to the treaty, announced to Ulyanov that Ukraine should be considered a province of Germany, to which Ulyanov also agreed. There is a fact in this case that is not widely known. The diplomatic defeat of Russia in Brest-Litovsk was caused not only by the venality, inconsistency and adventurousness of the Petrograd negotiators. The joker played a key role here. A new partner suddenly appeared in the group of negotiating parties - the Ukrainian Central Rada, which, despite the precariousness of its position, behind the back of the delegation from Petrograd on February 9 (January 27) 1918 signed a separate peace treaty with Germany in Brest-Litovsk. The next day, the Soviet delegation with the slogan "we end the war, but do not sign peace" interrupted the negotiations. In response, on February 18, German troops launched an offensive along the entire front line. At the same time, the German-Austrian side tightened the peace conditions. In view of the complete inability of the Sovietized old army and the rudiments of the Red Army to withstand even the limited offensive of the German troops and the need for a respite to strengthen the Bolshevik regime, Russia also signed the Brest Peace Treaty on March 3. After that, the "independent" Ukraine was occupied by the Germans and, as unnecessary, they threw Petliura "off the throne", placing the puppet hetman Skoropadsky on him. Thus, shortly before sinking into oblivion, the Second Reich, under the leadership of Kaiser Wilhelm II, captured Ukraine and Crimea.

After the conclusion of the Brest Peace Treaty by the Bolsheviks, part of the territory of the Russian Empire turned into zones of occupation of the Central countries. Austro-German troops occupied Finland, the Baltic states, Belarus, Ukraine and eliminated the Soviets there. The allies vigilantly watched what was happening in Russia and also tried to secure their interests, linking them with the former Russia. In addition, in Russia there were up to two million prisoners who, with the consent of the Bolsheviks, could be sent to their countries, and for the Entente powers, it was important to prevent the return of prisoners of war to Germany and Austria-Hungary. To connect Russia with the allies, ports served in the north of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk, in the Far East of Vladivostok. In these ports were concentrated large warehouses of property and military equipment, delivered by orders of the Russian government by foreigners. The accumulated cargo was over a million tons worth up to 2.5 billion rubles. Cargo was shamelessly plundered, including by local revolutionary committees. To ensure the safety of cargo, these ports were gradually occupied by the Allies. Since the orders imported from England, France and Italy were sent through the northern ports, they were occupied by parts of the British at 12,000 and the Allies at 11,000. Import from the USA and Japan went through Vladivostok. On July 6, 1918, the Entente declared Vladivostok an international zone, and the city was occupied by parts of Japan of 57,000 and parts of other allies of 13,000. But they did not overthrow the Bolshevik regime. Only on July 29, the power of the Bolsheviks in Vladivostok was overthrown by the White Czechs under the leadership of the Russian general M.K.Diterichs.

In domestic policy, the Bolsheviks issued decrees that destroyed all social structures: banks, national industry, private property, land ownership, and under the guise of nationalization, a simple robbery was often carried out without any state leadership. Inevitable devastation began in the country, for which the Bolsheviks blamed the bourgeoisie and "rotten intellectuals", and these classes were subjected to the most severe terror, bordering on destruction. Until now, it is completely impossible to understand how this all destructive force came to power in Russia, given that power was seized in a country with a thousand-year history and culture. After all, with the same measures the international destructive forces hoped to produce an internal explosion in the agitated France, transferring for this purpose to French banks up to 10 million francs. But France, by the beginning of the twentieth century, had already exhausted its limit on revolutions and was tired of them. Unfortunately for the businessmen of the revolution, there were forces in the country that were able to unravel the insidious and far-reaching plans of the leaders of the proletariat and to resist them. This was written in more detail in the Military Review in the article "How America Saved Western Europe from the Phantom of the World Revolution."

One of the main reasons that allowed the Bolsheviks to carry out a coup d'etat, and then quite quickly seize power in many regions and cities of the Russian Empire, was the support of numerous reserve and training battalions stationed throughout Russia that did not want to go to the front. It was Lenin's promise of an immediate end to the war with Germany that predetermined the transition of the Russian army, which had disintegrated during the Kerensky era, to the side of the Bolsheviks, which ensured their victory. In most regions of the country, the establishment of Bolshevik power proceeded quickly and peacefully: out of 84 provincial and other large cities, only in fifteen Soviet power was established as a result of an armed struggle. Having adopted the “Decree on Peace” on the second day of their stay in power, the Bolsheviks ensured the “triumphal march of Soviet power” across Russia from October 1917 to February 1918.

Relations between the Cossacks and the rulers of the Bolsheviks were determined by decrees of the Union of Cossack Troops and the Soviet government. On November 22, 1917, the Union of Cossack Forces submitted a decree in which it informed the Soviet government that:
- The Cossacks do not seek anything for themselves and do not demand anything for themselves outside the boundaries of their regions. But, being guided by the democratic principles of self-determination of nationalities, it will not tolerate in its territories other power, except for the people, formed by the free agreement of local nationalities without any external and outside influence.
- Sending punitive detachments against the Cossack regions, in particular against the Don, will bring civil war to the outskirts, where vigorous work is underway to establish public order. This will disrupt transport, obstruct the delivery of goods, coal, oil and steel to Russian cities and worsen the food supply, disrupting the granary of Russia.
- The Cossacks oppose any introduction of foreign troops into the Cossack regions without the consent of the military and regional Cossack governments.
In response to the peace declaration of the Union of Cossack Forces, the Bolsheviks issued a decree to open hostilities against the south, which read:
- Relying on the Black Sea Fleet, carry out the armament and organization of the Red Guard to occupy the Donetsk coal region.
- From the north, from the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief, move the combined detachments south to the starting points: Gomel, Bryansk, Kharkov, Voronezh.
- To move the most active units from the Zhmerinka region to the east for the occupation of Donbass.

This decree created the embryo of the fratricidal civil war of the Soviet government against the Cossack regions. For their existence, the Bolsheviks desperately needed Caucasian oil, Donetsk coal and bread from the southern outskirts. The massive famine that began pushed Soviet Russia towards the rich south. At the disposal of the Don and Kuban governments, there were no well-organized and sufficient forces to protect the regions. The units returning from the front did not want to fight, they tried to disperse to the villages, and the young front-line Cossacks entered into an open struggle with the old people. In many villages, this struggle acquired a fierce character, the reprisals on both sides were brutal. But there were many Cossacks who came from the front, they were well armed and loudmouths, had combat experience, and in most of the villages victory remained with the front-line youth, heavily infected with Bolshevism. It soon became clear that in the Cossack regions, strong units can only be created on the basis of volunteerism. To maintain order in the Don and Kuban, their governments used detachments consisting of volunteers: students, cadets, cadets and youth. Many Cossack officers volunteered to form such volunteer (among the Cossacks they are called partisan) units, but in the headquarters this business was poorly organized. Permission to form such units was given to almost everyone who asked. Many adventurers appeared, even robbers, who simply robbed the population for the purpose of profit. However, the main threat to the Cossack regions was the regiments returning from the front, since many of those who returned were infected with Bolshevism. The formation of volunteer Red Cossack units also began immediately after the Bolsheviks came to power. At the end of November 1917, at a meeting of representatives of the Cossack units of the Petrograd Military District, it was decided to create revolutionary detachments from the Cossacks of the 5th Cossack Division, 1st, 4th and 14th Don regiments and send them to the Don, Kuban and Terek to defeat the counter-revolution and establish the Soviet authorities. In January 1918, a congress of the front-line Cossacks gathered in the village of Kamenskaya with the participation of delegates from 46 Cossack regiments. The congress recognized Soviet power and created the Donvoenrevkom, which declared war on the ataman of the Don army, General A.M. Kaledin, who opposed the Bolsheviks. Among the command staff of the Don Cossacks, supporters of Bolshevik ideas turned out to be two headquarters officers, military foremen Golubov and Mironov, and Golubov's closest employee was Podtyolkov, a lieutenant. In January 1918, the 32nd Don Cossack regiment returned to the Don from the Romanian front. Having elected a military sergeant major F.K. Mironov, the regiment supported the establishment of Soviet power, and decided not to go home until the counter-revolution led by Ataman Kaledin was defeated. But the most tragic role on the Don was played by Golubov, who in February occupied Novocherkassk with two regiments of the Cossacks he had promoted, dispersed the sitting Army Circle, arrested General Nazarov, who took over as chieftain of the Army after General Kaledin's death, and shot him. After a short time, this "hero" of the revolution was shot by the Cossacks right at the rally, and Podtyolkov, who had large sums of money with him, was seized by the Cossacks and hanged by their verdict. Mironov's fate was also tragic. He managed to captivate a significant number of Cossacks, with whom he fought on the side of the Reds, but not satisfied with their orders, he decided with the Cossacks to go over to the side of the fighting Don. Mironov was arrested by the Reds, sent to Moscow, where he was shot. But it will be later. In the meantime, there was a great confusion on the Don. If the Cossack population was still hesitant, and only in a part of the villages the prudent voice of the elderly took over, then the non-Cossack population entirely sided with the Bolsheviks. The nonresident population in the Cossack regions always envied the Cossacks, who owned a large amount of land. Taking the side of the Bolsheviks, the nonresident hoped to take part in the division of the officer, landlord Cossack lands.

Other armed forces in the south were the units of the newly formed Volunteer Army, located in Rostov. On November 2, 1917, General Alekseev arrived on the Don, got in touch with the ataman Kaledin and asked him for permission to form volunteer detachments on the Don. General Alekseev's goal was to use the southeastern base of the armed forces to gather the remaining staunch officers, junkers, old soldiers and organize from them the army necessary to establish order in Russia. Despite the complete lack of funds, Alekseev eagerly got down to business. On Barochnaya Street, the premises of one of the infirmaries were turned into an officers' dormitory, which became the cradle of volunteerism. Soon the first donation was received, 400 rubles. This is all that the Russian society allocated to its defenders in November. But people just went to the Don, having no idea what awaited them, groping, in the darkness, across the continuous Bolshevik sea. We went to the place where the centuries-old traditions of the Cossack freemen and the names of the leaders, whom popular rumor associated with the Don, served as a bright beacon. They came exhausted, hungry, ragged, but not discouraged. On December 6 (19), disguised as a peasant, with a forged passport, General Kornilov arrived on the Don by rail. He wanted to go further to the Volga, and from there to Siberia. He considered it more correct that General Alekseev remained in the south of Russia, and he would be given the opportunity to work in Siberia. He argued that in this case they would not interfere with each other and he would be able to organize a big business in Siberia. He was eager to open up. But the representatives of the National Center who came to Novocherkassk from Moscow insisted that Kornilov stay in southern Russia and work together with Kaledin and Alekseev. An agreement was concluded between them, according to which General Alekseev assumed control of all financial and political issues, General Kornilov assumed the organization and command of the Volunteer Army, General Kaledin continued the formation of the Don Army and the administration of the affairs of the Don army. Kornilov had little faith in the success of the work in the south of Russia, where he would have to create a white cause in the territories of the Cossack troops and depend on the military chieftains. He said: “I know Siberia, I believe in Siberia, there you can put things on a broad scale. Here Alekseev alone can easily cope with the matter. " Kornilov, with all his heart and soul, was eager to go to Siberia, wanted to be released and took no particular interest in the work of forming the Volunteer Army. Kornilov's fears that he would have friction and misunderstandings with Alekseev were justified from the first days of their joint work. The forced abandonment of Kornilov in the south of Russia was a big political mistake of the National Center. But they believed that if Kornilov left, then many volunteers would leave for him and the business started in Novocherkassk could fall apart. The formation of the Dobroarmiya progressed slowly, on average 75-80 volunteers were enrolled per day. There were few soldiers, mainly officers, cadets, students, cadets and high school students were enrolled. The weapons in the Don warehouses were not enough; they had to be taken from the soldiers traveling home in the military echelons passing through Rostov and Novocherkassk, or bought through buyers in the same echelons. Lack of funds made the work extremely difficult. The formation of the Don units progressed even worse. Generals Alekseev and Kornilov understood that the Cossacks did not want to go to establish order in Russia, but they were sure that the Cossacks would defend their lands. However, the situation in the Cossack regions of the southeast turned out to be much more complicated. The regiments returning from the front were completely neutral in the events taking place, they even showed a penchant for Bolshevism, declaring that the Bolsheviks did nothing wrong to them.

In addition, within the Cossack regions, a hard struggle was waged against the nonresident population, and in the Kuban and Terek also against the highlanders. At the disposal of the military chieftains was the opportunity to use well-trained teams of young Cossacks who were preparing to be sent to the front, and to organize the call of the next age of youth. General Kaledin could have been supported in this by the old men and veterans, who said: "We have served ours, now we must call on others." The formation of Cossack youth from the draft age could give up to 2-3 divisions, which in those days was enough to maintain order on the Don, but this was not done. At the end of December, representatives of the British and French military missions arrived in Novocherkassk. They inquired about what had been done, what was planned to be done, after which they announced that they could help, but so far only with money, in the amount of 100 million rubles, in tranches of 10 million a month. The first paycheck was expected in January, but was never received, and then the situation changed completely. The initial funds for the formation of the Dobroarmy consisted of donations, but they were scanty, mainly due to the unimaginable greed and avarice of the Russian bourgeoisie and other possessing classes for the given circumstances. It should be said that the tight-fisted and stingyness of the Russian bourgeoisie is simply legendary. Back in 1909, during a discussion in the State Duma on the issue of the kulaks, P.A. Stolypin uttered prophetic words. He said: “... there is no more greedy and shameless kulak and bourgeois than in Russia. It is no coincidence that in the Russian language the phrase “fist-the world-eater and the bourgeois-world-eater” is used. If they don’t change the type of their social behavior, big shocks await us ... ”. He looked into the water. They did not change social behavior. Almost all the organizers of the white movement point to the little usefulness of their appeals for material assistance to the property classes. Nevertheless, by mid-January, a small (about 5 thousand people), but very combat and morally strong Volunteer Army had turned out. The Council of People's Commissars demanded the extradition or dispersal of the volunteers. Kaledin and Krug answered: "There is no issue from the Don!" The Bolsheviks, in order to liquidate the counter-revolutionaries, began to draw units loyal to them from the Western and Caucasian fronts to the Don area. They began to threaten the Don from the Donbass, Voronezh, Torgovaya and Tikhoretskaya. In addition, the Bolsheviks tightened control of the railways and the influx of volunteers dropped sharply. At the end of January, the Bolsheviks occupied Bataysk and Taganrog, on January 29, horse units moved from Donbass to Novocherkassk. Don was defenseless against the Reds. Ataman Kaledin was confused, did not want bloodshed and decided to transfer his powers to the City Duma and democratic organizations, and then committed suicide with a shot in the heart. It was a sad but logical outcome of his activities. The first Don Circle gave first to the elected chieftain, but did not give him power.

At the head of the region was put the Military Government of 14 foremen, elected from each district. Their meetings were in the nature of a provincial duma and did not leave any trace in the history of the Don. On November 20, the government turned to the population with a very liberal declaration, convening a congress of the Cossack and peasant population on December 29 to organize the life of the Don region. In early January, a coalition government was created on an equal footing, 7 seats were given to the Cossacks, 7 to nonresidents. The involvement of intellectual demagogues and revolutionary democracy in the government finally led to the paralysis of power. Ataman Kaledin was ruined by his trust in the Don peasants and nonresident, his famous "parity". He failed to glue the heterogeneous pieces of the population of the Don region. Under him, the Don split into two camps, Cossacks and Don peasants, together with nonresident workers and artisans. The latter, with few exceptions, were with the Bolsheviks. The Don peasantry, which constituted 48% of the region's population, carried away by the broad promises of the Bolsheviks, was not satisfied with the measures of the Don government: the introduction of zemstvos in peasant districts, the attraction of peasants to participate in the stanitsa self-government, their wide acceptance into the Cossack estate and the allotment of three million dessiatines of landlord land. Under the influence of the newcomer socialist element, the Don peasantry demanded a general division of the entire Cossack land. The numerically smallest working environment (10-11%) was concentrated in the most important centers, was the most hectic and did not hide its sympathy for the Soviet regime. The revolutionary-democratic intelligentsia did not outlive its former psychology and, with surprising blinding, continued its destructive policy, which led to the death of democracy on an all-Russian scale. The bloc of Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries reigned in all peasant and nonresident congresses, all kinds of dumas, councils, trade unions and inter-party meetings. There was not a single meeting where resolutions of no confidence in the ataman, the government and the Circle, protests against their taking measures against anarchy, criminality and banditry were not passed.

They preached neutrality and reconciliation with the force that openly declared: "He who is not with us is against us." In the cities, workers' settlements and peasant settlements, the uprising against the Cossacks did not subside. Attempts to place subdivisions of workers and peasants in the Cossack regiments ended in disaster. They betrayed the Cossacks, went to the Bolsheviks and took the Cossack officers with them to torment and death. The war took on the character of a class struggle. The Cossacks defended their Cossack rights from the Don workers and peasants. The death of Ataman Kaledin and the occupation of Novocherkassk by the Bolsheviks ends in the south of the period The great war and the transition to civil war.

Rice. 2 Ataman Kaledin

On February 12, the Bolshevik detachments occupied Novocherkassk and the military sergeant major Golubov, in "gratitude" for the fact that General Nazarov once saved him from prison, and shot the new chieftain. Having lost all hope of keeping Rostov, on the night of February 9 (22), the Dobroarmy of 2500 fighters left the city for Aksai, and then moved to the Kuban. After the establishment of the power of the Bolsheviks in Novocherkassk, terror began. Cossack units were prudently scattered throughout the city in small groups, domination in the city was in the hands of nonresident and Bolsheviks. On suspicion of links with the Dobroarmiya, officers were ruthlessly executed. The robberies and robberies of the Bolsheviks made the Cossacks wary, even the Cossacks of the Golubov regiments took a wait-and-see attitude. In the villages where power was seized by nonresident and Don peasants, the executive committees began to divide the Cossack lands. These atrocities soon caused a Cossack uprising in the villages adjacent to Novocherkassk. The leader of the Reds on the Don, Podtyolkov, and the head of the punitive detachment, Antonov, fled to Rostov, then were caught and executed. The occupation of Novocherkassk by the White Cossacks in April coincided with the occupation of Rostov by the Germans, and the return of the Volunteer Army to the Don region. But out of 252 villages of the Donskoy army, only 10 were liberated from the Bolsheviks. The Germans firmly occupied Rostov and Taganrog and the entire western part of the Donetsk region. The outposts of the Bavarian cavalry stood 12 versts from Novocherkassk. In these conditions, Don faced four main tasks:
- immediately convene a new Circle, in which only the delegates of the liberated villages could take part
- establish relations with the German authorities, find out their intentions and negotiate with them
- to recreate the Don army
- to establish a relationship with the Volunteer Army.

On April 28, a general meeting of the Don government and delegates from the villages and military units that took part in the expulsion of Soviet troops from the Don region took place. The composition of this Circle could not have a claim to resolve issues for the entire Army, which is why it limited itself in its work to issues of organizing the struggle for the liberation of the Don. The meeting decided to declare itself the Don Salvation Circle. There were 130 people in it. Even in the democratic Don it was the most popular meeting. The circle was called gray because there were no intelligentsia on it. The cowardly intelligentsia was sitting at this time in cellars and basements, shaking for their lives or cheating in front of the commissars, signing up for service in the Soviets or trying to get a job in innocent institutions for education, food and finance. She had no time for elections in this troubled time, when both voters and deputies risked their heads. The circle was chosen without a party struggle, it was not up to that. The circle was chosen and was elected to it exclusively by the Cossacks, who passionately wanted to save their native Don and were ready to give their lives for this. And these were not empty words, because after the elections, having sent their delegates, the electors themselves dismantled the weapons and went to save the Don. This Circle did not have a political physiognomy and had one goal - to save the Don from the Bolsheviks, by all means and at any cost. He was truly popular, meek, wise and businesslike. And this gray, from the greatcoat and coat cloth, that is, truly democratic, the Circle was saved by the people's minds Don. Already by the time of the convening of the full military circle on August 15, 1918, the Don land was cleared of the Bolsheviks.

The second urgent task for the Don was the settlement of relations with the Germans who occupied Ukraine and the western part of the lands of the Don army. Ukraine also claimed the Don lands occupied by the Germans: Donbass, Taganrog and Rostov. The attitude towards the Germans and towards Ukraine was the most pressing issue, and on April 29, the Circle decided to send a plenipotentiary embassy to the Germans in Kiev in order to find out the reasons for their appearance on the territory of the Don. The negotiations took place in calm conditions. The Germans stated that they were not going to occupy the region and promised to clear the occupied villages, which they soon did. On the same day, the Circle decided to organize a real army, not from partisans, volunteers or vigilantes, but obeying the laws and discipline. That, around and about which the ataman Kaledin with his government and the Circle, consisting of chatterbox-intellectuals, had been hovering about for almost a year, the gray Don’s Salvation Circle decided at two meetings. Even the Don Army was only in the project, and the command of the Volunteer Army had already wished to crush it under themselves. But the Circle answered clearly and specifically: "The supreme command of all military forces operating on the territory of the Don army, without exception, should belong to the military chieftain ..." This answer did not satisfy Denikin, he wanted in the person of the Don Cossacks to have large replenishments of people and materiel, and not to have a "allied" army nearby. The circle worked intensively, meetings were held in the morning and in the evening. He was in a hurry to restore order and was not afraid of reproaches in an effort to return to the old regime. On May 1, the Circle decided: "Unlike the Bolshevik gangs, which do not wear any external insignia, all units participating in the defense of the Don must immediately take on their military uniform and put on shoulder straps and other insignia." On May 3, as a result of a closed vote by 107 votes (13 against, 10 abstained), Major General P.N. Krasnov. General Krasnov did not accept this election until the Circle adopted the laws that he considered necessary to introduce in the Don army, in order to be able to fulfill the tasks assigned to him by the Circle. Krasnov said at the Circle: “Creativity has never been the lot of the collective. Raphael's Madonna was created by Raphael, not a committee of artists ... You are the owners of the Don land, I am your manager. It's all about trust. If you trust me, you accept the laws I have proposed, if you don’t accept them, then you don’t trust me, you’re afraid that I will use the power you have given to the detriment of the army. Then we have nothing to talk about. I cannot rule the army without your complete trust. " To the question of one of the members of the Circle, if he could propose to change or alter anything in the laws proposed by the ataman, Krasnov replied: “You can. Articles 48,49,50. You can offer any flag except red, any coat of arms except the Jewish five-pointed star, any anthem except the International ... ". The very next day, the Circle considered all the laws proposed by the chieftain and adopted them. The circle has restored the old pre-Petrine title “The Great Don Host”. The laws were almost a complete copy of the basic laws of the Russian Empire, with the difference that the rights and prerogatives of the emperor passed to ... the chieftain. And then there was no time for sentimentality.

Before the eyes of the Don’s Salvation Circle stood the bloody ghosts of the shot ataman Kaledin and the shot ataman Nazarov. The Don lay in the rubble, it was not only destroyed, but contaminated by the Bolsheviks, and German horses drank the water of the Quiet Don, a river sacred to the Cossacks. This was the result of the work of the former Krugs, with whose decisions Kaledin and Nazarov fought, but could not win, because they did not have power. But these laws created many enemies for the chieftain. As soon as the Bolsheviks were driven out, the intelligentsia, hiding in the cellars and basements, got out and started a liberal howl. Denikin, who saw in them a striving for independence, did not satisfy these laws either. On May 5, the Circle parted, and the chieftain was left alone to rule the army. On the same evening, his adjutant, Esaul Kulgavov, went to Kiev with his own handwritten letters to Hetman Skoropadsky and Emperor Wilhelm. The result of the letter was that on May 8 a German delegation came to the chieftain, with a statement that the Germans were not pursuing any conquest goals in relation to the Don and would leave Rostov and Taganrog as soon as they saw that it had been restored in the Don region. full order... On May 9 Krasnov met with the Kuban Ataman Filimonov and the Georgian delegation, and on May 15 in the village of Manychskaya with Alekseev and Denikin. The meeting revealed deep differences between the Don chieftain and the command of the Dobrarmia both in tactics and in the strategy of fighting the Bolsheviks. The goal of the insurgent Cossacks was the liberation of the Don army from the Bolsheviks. They had no further intentions to wage war outside their territory.

Rice. 3 Ataman Krasnov P.N.

By the time of the occupation of Novocherkassk and the election of the ataman of the Don Salvation Circle, all the armed forces consisted of six foot and two cavalry regiments of different numbers. The junior officers were from the villages and were good, but there was a shortage of centenary and regimental commanders. Having experienced many insults and humiliations during the revolution, many senior leaders at first had distrust of the Cossack movement. The Cossacks were dressed in their paramilitary dress, they lacked boots. Up to 30% were wearing boots and bast shoes. Most wore shoulder straps; on their caps and hats, everyone wore white stripes to distinguish them from the red guard. The discipline was fraternal, the officers ate with the Cossacks from the same pot, because they were most often relatives. The headquarters were small, for economic purposes in the regiments there were several public figures from the villages, who solved all logistical issues. The battle was fleeting. Trenches and fortifications were not built. The trench tool was not enough, and natural laziness prevented the Cossacks from digging in. The tactics were simple. At dawn, the offensive began in liquid chains. At this time, a bypass column was moving along an intricate route to the flank and rear of the enemy. If the enemy was ten times stronger, it was considered normal for the offensive. As soon as a detour column appeared, the Reds began to retreat, and then the Cossack cavalry rushed at them with a wild, chilling boom, overthrew and took them prisoner. Sometimes the battle began with a feigned retreat of twenty miles (this is an old Cossack vent). The Reds rushed to chase, and at this time the detour columns closed behind them and the enemy found themselves in a fire sack. With this tactic, Colonel Guselshchikov with regiments of 2-3 thousand people smashed and took prisoners whole divisions of the Red Guard of 10-15 thousand people with carts and artillery. The Cossack custom demanded that the officers go ahead, so their losses were very great. For example, the chief of the division, General Mamantov, was wounded three times and everyone was in chains. In the attack, the Cossacks were merciless, they were also merciless towards the captured Red Guards. They were especially harsh towards the captured Cossacks, who were considered traitors to the Don. Here the father used to sentence his son to death and did not want to say goodbye to him. It also happened vice versa. At this time, echelons of red troops, fleeing to the east, continued to move through the territory of the Don. But in June, the railway line was cleared of the Reds, and in July, after the expulsion of the Bolsheviks from the Khopyorsky District, the entire Don territory was liberated from the Reds by the Cossacks themselves.

In other Cossack regions, the situation was no easier than on the Don. The situation was especially difficult among the Caucasian tribes, where the Russian population was scattered. The North Caucasus was raging. The fall of the central government has caused a shock here more serious than anywhere else. Reconciled by the tsarist power, but not outliving age-old strife and not forgetting old grievances, the multi-tribal population became agitated. The Russian element that united it, about 40% of the population consisted of two equal groups, the Terek Cossacks and nonresident. But these groups were divided by social conditions, settled their land accounts and could not oppose the Bolshevik danger of unity and strength. While the ataman Karaulov was alive, several Terek regiments and some specter of power survived. On December 13, at the Prokhladnaya station, a crowd of Bolshevik soldiers, by order of the Vladikavkaz Sovdep, uncoupled the ataman's carriage, drove it to a distant dead end and opened fire on the carriage. Karaulov was killed. In fact, on the Terek, power passed to the local councils and gangs of soldiers of the Caucasian Front, who flowed in a continuous stream from Transcaucasia and, unable to penetrate further, to their native places, due to the complete blockage of the Caucasian highways, settled like locusts along the Terek-Dagestan Territory. They terrorized the population, planted new councils or hired themselves to serve existing ones, bringing fear, blood and destruction everywhere. This stream served as the most powerful conductor of Bolshevism, which engulfed the nonresident Russian population (because of the thirst for land), offended the Cossack intelligentsia (because of the thirst for power) and embarrassed the strongly Terek Cossacks (because of the fear of "going against the people"). As for the highlanders, they were extremely conservative in their way of life, in which social and land inequality was very weakly reflected. True to their customs and traditions, they were governed by their own national councils and were alien to the ideas of Bolshevism. But the highlanders quickly and willingly accepted the applied aspects of the central anarchy and intensified violence and robbery. By disarming the passing troop echelons, they had a lot of weapons and ammunition. On the basis of the Caucasian native corps, they formed national military formations.

Rice. 4 Cossack regions of Russia

After the death of Ataman Karaulov, an unbearable struggle with the Bolshevik detachments that filled the region and the aggravation of controversial issues with neighbors - Kabardians, Chechens, Ossetians, Ingush - the Terek Host was turned into a republic that was part of the RSFSR. Quantitatively, the Terek Cossacks in the Terek region accounted for 20% of the population, nonresident - 20%, Ossetians - 17%, Chechens - 16%, Kabardians - 12% and Ingush - 4%. The most active among other peoples were the smallest - the Ingush, who put forward a strong and well-armed detachment. They robbed everyone and kept Vladikavkaz in constant fear, which they captured and plundered in January. When Soviet power was established on March 9, 1918 in Dagestan, as well as on the Terek, the Council of People's Commissars set its first goal to break the Terek Cossacks, destroying its special advantages. Armed expeditions of the mountaineers were sent to the villages, robberies, violence and murders were carried out, land was taken away and transferred to the Ingush and Chechens. In this difficult situation, the Terek Cossacks lost heart. While the mountain peoples created their armed forces by improvisation, the natural Cossack army, which had 12 well-organized regiments, disintegrated, dispersed and disarmed at the request of the Bolsheviks. However, the atrocities of the Reds led to the beginning of the Terek Cossack uprising under the leadership of Bicherakhov on June 18, 1918. The Cossacks defeat the red troops and block their remnants in Grozny and Kizlyar. On July 20, in Mozdok, the Cossacks were summoned to a congress, at which they decided on an armed uprising against Soviet power. The Tertsy established contact with the command of the Volunteer Army, the Terek Cossacks created a combat detachment of up to 12,000 people with 40 guns and resolutely took the path of fighting the Bolsheviks.

The Orenburg Army under the command of Ataman Dutov, the first to declare independence from the power of the Soviets, was the first to be invaded by detachments of workers and red soldiers, who began robbery and repression. Veteran of the struggle against the Soviets, Orenburg Cossack General I.G. Akulinin recalled: “The stupid and harsh policy of the Bolsheviks, their undisguised hatred of the Cossacks, desecration of the Cossack shrines and, especially, bloody reprisals, requisitions, indemnities and robbery in the villages - all this opened our eyes to the essence of Soviet power and made us take up arms ... The Bolsheviks could do nothing to lure the Cossacks. The Cossacks had the land, and the freedom - in the form of the broadest self-government - they returned to themselves in the first days of the February revolution. " In the mood of the rank and file and the front-line Cossacks, a turning point was gradually coming; they began to speak out more and more actively against the violence and arbitrariness of the new government. If in January 1918 the ataman Dutov, under the pressure of Soviet troops, left Orenburg, and he had barely three hundred active fighters left, then on the night of April 4, more than 1000 Cossacks were raided on sleeping Orenburg, and on July 3 in Orenburg, power again passed into the hands of the chieftain.

Fig. 5 Ataman Dutov

In the area of ​​the Ural Cossacks, the resistance was more successful, despite the small number of troops. Uralsk was not occupied by the Bolsheviks. The Ural Cossacks, from the beginning of the birth of Bolshevism, did not accept its ideology, and back in March they easily dispersed the local Bolshevik revolutionary committees. The main reasons were that there were no nonresident among the Urals, there was a lot of land, and the Cossacks were Old Believers who more strictly preserved their religious and moral principles. In general, the Cossack regions of Asian Russia occupied a special position. All of them were not numerous in composition, most of them were historically formed under special conditions by state measures, for the purpose of state necessity, and their historical existence was determined by insignificant periods. Despite the fact that these troops did not have well-established Cossack traditions, foundations and skills for the forms of statehood, they all turned out to be hostile to the advancing Bolshevism. In mid-April 1918, from Manchuria in Transbaikalia, the troops of Ataman Semyonov launched an offensive with about 1000 bayonets and sabers against 5.5 thousand from the Reds. At the same time, an uprising of the Trans-Baikal Cossacks began. By May, Semyonov's troops approached Chita, but could not immediately take it. The battles between Semyonov's Cossacks and the red detachments, which consisted mainly of former political prisoners and Hungarian prisoners, went on in Transbaikalia with varying success. However, at the end of July, the Cossacks defeated the Red troops and took Chita on August 28. Soon the Amur Cossacks drove the Bolsheviks out of their capital, Blagoveshchensk, and the Ussuri Cossacks took Khabarovsk. Thus, under the command of their atamans: Zabaikalsky - Semyonov, Ussuriysky - Kalmykov, Semirechensky - Annenkov, Uralsky - Tolstov, Siberian - Ivanov, Orenburg - Dutov, Astrakhan - Prince Tundutov, they entered into a decisive battle. In the struggle against the Bolsheviks, the Cossack regions fought exclusively for their lands and law and order, and their actions, according to historians, were in the nature of a partisan war.

Rice. 6 White Cossacks

A huge role along the entire length of the Siberian railway track was played by the troops of the Czechoslovak legions, formed by the Russian government from Czech and Slovaks prisoners of war, numbering up to 45,000 people. By the beginning of the revolution, the Czech corps was in the rear of the Southwestern Front in the Ukraine. In the eyes of the Austro-Germans, the legionaries, as former prisoners of war, were traitors. When the Germans attacked Ukraine in March 1918, the Czechs offered them strong resistance, but most Czechs did not see their place in Soviet Russia and wanted to return to the European front. According to the agreement with the Bolsheviks, the echelons of Czechs were sent towards Siberia to board ships in Vladivostok and send them to Europe. In addition to the Czechoslovakians, there were many Hungarian prisoners in Russia, who mainly sympathized with the Reds. With the Hungarians, the Czechoslovakians had a centuries-old and fierce enmity and enmity (how can one not recall the immortal works of J. Hasek in this regard). Due to fear of attacks on the way of the Hungarian red units, the Czechs resolutely refused to obey the order of the Bolsheviks to surrender all weapons, which is why it was decided to disperse the Czech legions. They were divided into four groups with a distance between the groups of echelons of 1000 kilometers, so that the echelons with the Czechs stretched across the whole of Siberia from the Volga to Transbaikalia. The Czech legions played a colossal role in the Russian civil war, since after their mutiny the struggle against the Soviets intensified sharply.

Rice. 7 Czech legion en route along the Transsib

Despite the agreements, there were considerable misunderstandings in the relationship between Czechs, Hungarians and local revolutionary committees. As a result, on May 25, 1918, 4.5 thousand Czechs rebelled in Mariinsk, on May 26, the Hungarians provoked an uprising of 8.8 thousand Czechs in Chelyabinsk. Then, with the support of the Czechoslovak troops, the power of the Bolsheviks was overthrown on May 26 in Novonikolaevsk, on May 29 in Penza, on May 30 in Syzran, on May 31 in Tomsk and Kurgan, on June 7 in Omsk, on June 8 in Samara and on June 18 in Krasnoyarsk. In the liberated areas, the formation of Russian combat units began. On July 5, Russian and Czechoslovak troops occupy Ufa, and on July 25 they take Yekaterinburg. At the end of 1918, the Czechoslovak legionaries themselves began a gradual retreat to the Far East. But, participating in battles in Kolchak's army, they will finally finish the withdrawal and leave Vladivostok for France only at the beginning of 1920. In such conditions, the Russian white movement began in the Volga region and Siberia, not counting the independent actions of the Ural and Orenburg Cossack troops, who began the struggle against the Bolsheviks immediately after they came to power. On June 8, in Samara, liberated from the Reds, a Constituent Assembly Committee (Komuch) was created. He declared himself a temporary revolutionary power, which, having spread over the entire territory of Russia, was to transfer the government of the country to the legally elected Constituent Assembly. The rising population of the Volga region began a successful struggle against the Bolsheviks, but in the liberated areas, the administration was in the hands of the fleeing fragments of the Provisional Government. These heirs and participants in destructive activities, having formed a government, carried out the same pernicious work. At the same time, Komuch created his own armed forces - the People's Army. On June 9, in Samara, a detachment of 350 people began to command Lieutenant Colonel Kappel. The replenished detachment in mid-June takes Syzran, Stavropol Volzhsky (now Togliatti), and also inflicts a heavy defeat on the Reds near Melekes. On July 21, Kappel takes Simbirsk, defeating the superior forces of the Soviet commander Gai defending the city. As a result, by the beginning of August 1918, the territory of the Constituent Assembly stretches from west to east for 750 miles from Syzran to Zlatoust, from north to south for 500 miles from Simbirsk to Volsk. On August 7, Kappel's troops, having previously defeated the red river flotilla that had come out to meet at the mouth of the Kama, took Kazan. There they seize a part of the gold reserve of the Russian Empire (650 million gold rubles in coins, 100 million rubles in credit marks, bars of gold, platinum and other valuables), as well as huge warehouses with weapons, ammunition, medicines, and ammunition. This gave the Samara government a solid financial and material base. With the capture of Kazan, the General Staff Academy located in the city, headed by General A.I. Andogsky, was transferred to the anti-Bolshevik camp in full force.

Rice. 8 Hero of Komucha Lieutenant Colonel Kappel A.V.

In Yekaterinburg, a government of industrialists was formed, in Omsk - the Siberian government, in Chita, the government of Ataman Semyonov, who headed the Trans-Baikal army. Allies dominated Vladivostok. Then General Horvath arrived from Harbin, and as many as three authorities were formed: from the henchmen of the Allies, General Horvath and from the board of the railway. Such fragmentation of the anti-Bolshevik front in the east demanded unification, and a meeting was convened in Ufa to select a single authoritative state power. The situation in units of the anti-Bolshevik forces was unfavorable. The Czechs did not want to fight in Russia and demanded that they be sent to the European fronts against the Germans. There was no trust in the Siberian government and the members of the Komuch in the troops and the people. In addition, the representative of England, General Knox, said that until a solid government was created, the supply of supplies from the British would be stopped. Under these conditions, Admiral Kolchak entered the government and in the fall he made a coup and was proclaimed the head of the government and the supreme commander with the transfer of all power to him.

In the south of Russia, events developed as follows. After the Reds took Novocherkassk in early 1918, the Volunteer Army retreated to the Kuban. During the campaign to Yekaterinodar, the army, having endured all the difficulties of the winter campaign, later called the "ice campaign", fought continuously. After the death of General Kornilov, who was killed near Yekaterinodar on March 31 (April 13), the army again made its way with a large number of prisoners to the territory of the Don, where by that time the Cossacks who had rebelled against the Bolsheviks had begun to clean up their territory. Only by May the army found itself in conditions that allowed it to rest and replenish itself for the further struggle against the Bolsheviks. Although the attitude of the command of the Volunteer Army to the German army was irreconcilable, it, having no means of weapons, tearfully begged Ataman Krasnov to send the Volunteer Army weapons, shells and cartridges that he received from the German army. Ataman Krasnov, in his colorful expression, receiving military equipment from the hostile Germans, washed them in the clear waters of the Don and handed over part of the Volunteer Army. The Kuban was still occupied by the Bolsheviks. In the Kuban, the gap with the center, which occurred on the Don due to the collapse of the Provisional Government, occurred earlier and sharper. Back on October 5, with a decisive protest of the Provisional Government, the regional Cossack Council adopted a resolution on the separation of the region into an independent Kuban Republic. At the same time, the right to choose a self-government body was granted only to the Cossack, mountain population and old-time peasants, that is, almost half of the region's population was deprived of voting rights. The army chieftain, Colonel Filimonov, was appointed the head of the socialist government. The discord between the Cossack and nonresident population took on more and more acute forms. Not only the nonresident population, but also the front-line Cossacks stood up against the Rada and the government. Bolshevism came to this mass. The Kuban units returning from the front did not go to war against the government, did not want to fight the Bolsheviks and did not carry out the orders of their elected authorities. An attempt to create a government on the basis of "parity" on the model of Don ended in the same paralysis of power. Everywhere, in every village, stanitsa, the Red Guards from nonresidents gathered, part of the Cossack front-line soldiers adjoined them, poorly subordinate to the center, but following exactly its policy. These undisciplined, but well-armed and violent gangs began to plant Soviet power, land redistribution, seizure of grain surpluses and socialization, and simply to rob wealthy Cossacks and beheading the Cossacks - the persecution of officers, non-Bolshevik intelligentsia, priests, authoritative old people. And above all, to disarmament. It is surprising how complete non-resistance the Cossack villages, regiments and batteries gave up their rifles, machine guns, and guns. When the villages of the Yeisk department revolted at the end of April, it was a completely unarmed militia. The Cossacks had no more than 10 rifles per hundred, the rest armed themselves with whatever they could. Some of them attached daggers or scythes to long sticks, others took pitchforks, others took stocks, and others just shovels and axes. Punitive detachments with ... Cossack weapons came out against the defenseless villages. By the beginning of April, all nonresident villages and 85 out of 87 villages were Bolsheviks. But the Bolshevism of the villages was purely external. Often, only the names changed: the ataman became a commissar, the stanitsa gathering became a council, the stanitsa government became a waste of time.

Where the executive committees were captured by nonresidents, their decisions were sabotaged, re-electing them every week. There was a stubborn, but passive, without inspiration and enthusiasm, the struggle of the age-old way of Cossack democracy and life with the new government. There was a desire to preserve the Cossack democracy, but there was no daring. All this, in addition, was heavily implicated in the pro-Ukrainian separatism of a part of the Cossacks who had Dnieper roots. The pro-Ukrainian leader Luka Bych, who stood at the head of the Rada, said: "To help the Volunteer Army means to prepare for the re-absorption of the Kuban by Russia." Under these conditions, Ataman Shkuro gathered the first partisan detachment, located in the region of Stavropol, where the Council met, intensified the struggle and presented an ultimatum to the Council. The uprising of the Kuban Cossacks was rapidly gaining strength. In June, the 8,000th Volunteer Army began its second campaign against the Kuban, which had completely rebelled against the Bolsheviks. This time white was lucky. General Denikin successively defeated Kalnin's 30,000th army at Belaya Glina and Tikhoretskaya, then Sorokin's 30,000th army in a fierce battle near Yekaterinodar. On July 21, whites occupy Stavropol, and on August 17, Yekaterinodar. Blocked on the Taman Peninsula, a 30,000-strong Red group under the command of Kovtyukh, the so-called "Taman Army", fought along the Black Sea coast for the Kuban River, where the remnants of the defeated armies of Kalnin and Sorokin fled. By the end of August, the territory of the Kuban army is completely cleared of the Bolsheviks, and the number of the White army reaches 40 thousand bayonets and sabers. However, having entered the territory of the Kuban, Denikin issued a decree addressed to the Kuban chieftain and the government, demanding:
- full tension on the part of the Kuban for its early liberation from the Bolsheviks
- all the primary units of the military forces of the Kuban should henceforth be part of the Volunteer Army to carry out national tasks
- in the future, no separatism should be shown on the part of the liberated Kuban Cossacks.

Such a gross interference by the command of the Volunteer Army in the internal affairs of the Kuban Cossacks had a negative effect. General Denikin led an army that did not have a definite territory, people under his control and, even worse, no political ideology. The commander of the Don Army, General Denisov, in his hearts even called the volunteers "wandering musicians." General Denikin's ideas were guided by armed struggle. Lacking sufficient funds for this, General Denikin for the struggle demanded the subordination of the Cossack regions of the Don and Kuban to him. Don was in better conditions and was not at all bound by Denikin's instructions. The German army was perceived on the Don as a real force that helped to get rid of Bolshevik domination and terror. The Don government entered into contact with the German command and established fruitful cooperation. Relations with the Germans resulted in a purely businesslike form. The exchange rate of the German mark was established at 75 kopecks of the Don currency, a price was made for a Russian rifle with 30 cartridges per one pood of wheat or rye, and other supply agreements were concluded. In the first month and a half, the Don Army received from the German army through Kiev: 11,651 rifles, 88 machine guns, 46 opudes, 109,000 artillery shells, 11.5 million rifle cartridges, of which 35,000 artillery shells and about 3 million rifle cartridges. At the same time, the entire shame of peaceful relations with an implacable enemy fell solely on Ataman Krasnov. As for the High Command, such, according to the laws of the Don Army, could only belong to the Military Ataman, and before his election - to the marching Ataman. This discrepancy led to the fact that Don demanded the return of all donors from the Pre-Volunteer Army. The relationship between the Don and the Dobrarmia became not allied, but the relationship of fellow travelers.

In addition to tactics, there were also large differences in the white movement in the strategy, politics and goals of the war. The goal of the Cossack masses was to free their land from the invasion of the Bolsheviks, to establish order in their area and to provide an opportunity for the Russian people to arrange their fate at their own will. Meanwhile, the forms of civil war and the organization of the armed forces returned the art of war to the era of the 19th century. The successes of the troops then depended solely on the qualities of the commander who directly controlled the troops. Good generals of the 19th century did not scatter the main forces, but were directed towards one main goal: the capture of the political center of the enemy. With the seizure of the center, the paralysis of the government of the country occurs and the conduct of the war is complicated. The Council of People's Commissars, who was sitting in Moscow, was in extremely difficult conditions, reminiscent of the position of Muscovite Russia in the XIV-XV centuries, limited by the borders of the Oka and Volga rivers. Moscow was cut off from all types of supplies, and the goals of the Soviet rulers were limited to obtaining basic means of food and a piece of daily bread. In the pathetic appeals of the leaders there were no longer the high incentive motives emanating from the ideas of Marx, they sounded cynical, figurative and simple, as they once sounded in the speeches of the people's leader Pugachev: “Go, take everything and destroy everyone who gets in your way” ... The People's Commissariat for Military Affairs Bronstein (Trotsky) in his speech on June 9, 1918, pointed out the goals simple and clear: “Comrades! Among all the questions that excite our hearts, there is one simple question - the question of our daily bread. One concern, one anxiety now dominates over all thoughts, over all our ideals: how to survive tomorrow. Everyone involuntarily thinks about himself, about his family ... My task is not at all to carry on only one agitation among you. We need to seriously talk about the food situation in the country. According to our statistics, in 17 the surplus of grain in those places that are producing and exporting grain was 882,000,000 pounds. On the other hand, there are regions in the country where there is not enough bread of their own. If we calculate it, it turns out that they lack 322 OOO OOO poods. Consequently, in one part of the country there are 882,000,000 pounds of surplus, and in the other 322,000,000,000 poods are not enough ...

In the North Caucasus alone, there is now a grain surplus of no less than 140,000,000 poods: in order to satisfy our hunger, we need 15,000,000 poods a month for the whole country. Just think: 140 million poods of surplus, which is only in the North Caucasus, may be enough, therefore, for ten months for the entire country. ... Let each of you now promise to provide immediate practical assistance in order for us to organize a campaign for bread. " In fact, it was a direct call for robbery. Due to the complete lack of publicity, the paralysis of public life and the complete fragmentation of the country, the Bolsheviks nominated people for leadership positions for whom, under normal conditions, there was only one place - a prison. In such conditions, the task of the white command in the fight against the Bolsheviks should have had the shortest goal of capturing Moscow, without being distracted by any other secondary tasks. And to fulfill this main task it was necessary to involve the broadest strata of the people, primarily the peasants. In reality, the opposite was true. The volunteer army, instead of marching on Moscow, was firmly bogged down in the North Caucasus, the white Ural-Siberian troops could not get over the Volga in any way. All the revolutionary changes beneficial to the peasants and the people, economic and political, were not recognized as white. The first step of their civilian representatives in the liberated territory was a decree canceling all orders issued by the Provisional Government and the Council of People's Commissars, including those concerning property relations. General Denikin, having absolutely no plan for establishing a new order that could satisfy the population, consciously or unconsciously, wanted to return Russia to its original pre-revolutionary position, and the peasants were obliged to pay for the seized lands to their former owners. After that, could the whites count on the support of their activities by the peasants? Of course not. The Cossacks, however, refused to go beyond the limits of the Donskoy army. And they were right. Voronezh, Saratov and other peasants not only did not fight the Bolsheviks, but also went against the Cossacks. The Cossacks, not without difficulty, were able to cope with their Don peasants and nonresident people, but they could not defeat the entire peasant central Russia and they understood this perfectly.

As Russian and non-Russian history shows us, when cardinal changes and decisions are required, we need not just people, but extraordinary personalities, who, to our great regret, did not appear during the Russian timelessness. The country needed a government capable of not only issuing decrees, but also having intelligence and authority, so that these decrees were carried out by the people, preferably voluntarily. Such power does not depend on state forms, but is based, as a rule, solely on the abilities and authority of the leader. Bonaparte, having established power, did not seek any forms, but managed to force him to obey his will. He forced to serve France as representatives of the royal nobility, and immigrants from the Sans-culottes. There were no such consolidating personalities in the white and red movement, and this led to an incredible split and bitterness in the ensuing civil war. But that's a completely different story.

Materials used:
A.A. Gordeev - History of the Cossacks
Mamonov V.F. and others - History of the Cossacks of the Urals. Orenburg-Chelyabinsk 1992
Shibanov N.S. - Orenburg Cossacks of the XX century
Ryzhkova N.V. - Don Cossacks in the wars of the early twentieth century-2008
Brusilov A.A. My memories. Military Publishing. Moscow, 1983
P.N. Krasnov The great Don army. "Patriot" M. 1990
Lukomsky A.S. The origin of the Volunteer Army, Moscow, 1926
Denikin A.I. How the fight against the Bolsheviks began in southern Russia, Moscow, 1926

The policy of the Donburo RCP (b) in relation to the Cossacks during the Civil War

The situation in Soviet Russia during the civil war largely depended on the situation on the outskirts, including on the Don, where the largest detachment of the "most organized and therefore most significant" force of the non-proletarian masses of Russia - the Cossacks - was concentrated.

The origins of the Cossack policy of the Bolsheviks date back to 1917, when Lenin warned about the possibility of the formation of a “Russian Vendée” on the Don. Although the Cossacks during the October 1917 revolution generally adhered to the position of neutrality, some of its groups even then took part in the struggle against Soviet power. V.I. Lenin considered the Cossacks a privileged peasantry, capable of acting as a reactionary mass if their privileges were infringed. But this does not mean that the Cossacks were viewed by Lenin as a single mass. Lenin noted that it was fragmented by differences in the size of land ownership, in payments, in the conditions of medieval use of land for service.

The appeal of the Rostov Soviet of Workers' Deputies said: Again I remember 1905, when the black reaction rode out on the Cossacks. Again the Cossacks are being sent against the people, again they want to make the word “Cossack” the most hated for the worker and peasant ... Again the shameful glory of the people's executioners is won by the Don Cossacks, again for the revolutionary Cossacks it becomes embarrassing to wear the Cossack title ... , take the power of the Kaledins and Bogaevskys and join your brothers, soldiers, peasants and workers.

The civil war, as a sharp exacerbation of class contradictions in specific historical conditions, could hardly have been prevented then. General Kaledin, the ataman of the Don Army, rose up to fight the revolution at noon on October 25, i.e. even before the opening of the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies and its adoption of historic decrees that rocked the whole of Russia. Following him, the ousted Prime Minister of the Provisional Government Kerensky, the Cossack General Krasnov, the atamans of the Cossack troops of the Kuban, Orenburg, Terek Central Rada of Ukraine revolted against the Soviet power. General Alekseev in Novocherkassk launched the formation of a volunteer army. This is how a powerful hotbed of counter-revolution arose in the south of the country. The Soviet government threw in an armed force headed by Antonov-Ovseenko to defeat him.

All eyewitnesses and contemporaries viewed these battles as a civil war. In particular, this is how they were then qualified by the head of the Soviet government created by the revolution, V.I. Lenin. Already on October 29, 1917, he explained that "the political situation has now been reduced to a military one," and at the beginning of November he pointed out: "An insignificant handful began a civil war." On November 28, he signed a document with the expressive title "Decree on the arrest of the leaders of the civil war against the revolution." The Soviets were entrusted with the duty of special supervision over the Cadet Party in view of its ties with ardent counter-revolutionaries. The resolution of December 3 stated: under the leadership of the Cadets, a fierce civil war began "against the very foundations of the workers 'and peasants' revolution."

• On February 2, 1918, "Free Don" reported that the peasants in Novonikolevskaya decided to destroy the Cossack estate and take away the land from the Cossacks. The peasants await the Bolsheviks as their deliverers, who will bring the peasants both freedom and, more importantly, land. On this basis, relations between them and the Cossacks are aggravated every day, and, apparently, heroic measures will be required to prevent a civil massacre on the Quiet Don.
• 1918 marked a turning point in the development of a whole series of social, economic and political processes that were woven into a rather tangled knot in Russia. The disintegration of the empire continued, and this process reached its lowest point. In the country as a whole, the state of the economy was disastrous, and although the harvest in 1918 was above average, famine raged in many cities.

From the end of February to the end of March 1918, a kind of split between the politically active prosperous Cossacks and the Don service elite took place on the Don. Active supporters of the anti-Bolshevik struggle created the "Detachment of Free Don Cossacks" and the Foot Partisan Cossack Regiment in order to retain the necessary officers and partisan personnel by the time the Don Cossacks awakened. There was no idea to unite and oppose all anti-Bolshevik forces in the detachment to the Soviets. The detachments acted separately for purely opportunistic reasons.

In February 1918, the Military Revolutionary Committee, actually headed by S.I.Syrtsov, pursued a line on an agreement with the laboring Cossacks. As a result of this policy - the creation of the Don Soviet Republic. The Cossack Committee under the All-Russian Central Executive Committee sent to the Don more than 100 agitators from the unit “Protection of the Rights of Labor Cossacks”. Their task is to organize Soviets of Cossack Deputies in the Don region. By April, about 120 of them were created in cities, villages and farms. However, the acceptance of Soviet power was far from unconditional.

The first recorded armed clash with the Soviet government was on March 21, 1918 - the Cossacks of the village of Lugansk recaptured 34 arrested officers. On March 31, a mutiny broke out in the Suvorovskaya stanitsa of the 2nd Don District, on April 2 - in the Yegorlykskaya stanitsa. With the onset of spring, contradictions in the countryside intensified. The bulk of the Cossacks, as usual, hesitated at first. When the peasants tried to divide the land without waiting for the legislative solution of the land issue, the Cossacks even appealed to the regional Soviet power. In the north of the region, the Cossacks reacted painfully even to the seizure of the landowners' lands by the peasants. The further development of events put the majority of the Cossacks in direct opposition to Soviet power.

"In some places, the violent seizure of land begins ...", "Nonresident peasantry began to cultivate ... military spare land and surplus land in yurts of rich southern villages", Peasants who rented land from the Cossacks "stopped paying rent." The authorities, instead of smoothing out the contradictions, set out to fight the "kulak elements of the Cossacks."

Due to the fact that nonresident peasants stopped paying rent and began to use the land free of charge, part of the Cossack poor, who leased the land, recoiled to the side of the anti-Bolshevik forces. Refusal of nonresident rent payments deprived her of a significant part of her income.

The growing struggle exacerbated the contradictions within the Cossacks, and in April 1918 the Cossack-Bolshevik V.S. Kovalev, characterizing the relationship between the Cossack poor and the elite, stated: “When the Soviet troops went to fight Kaledin, this abyss was not noticeable, but now she showed up. "

Thus, by May 1918, in one of the regions of the South of Russia - on the Don - a massive anti-Bolshevik movement was emerging. The reasons for the mass uprising and mass resistance were different. All those changes in the social, political and agrarian structure that took place in Central Russia were not acceptable for the Don Cossacks, which preferred armed struggle. Cossacks rise up to fight initially defensive, from a military point of view, this doomed them to defeat. The insurgents' logic was as follows: “The Bolsheviks are destroying the Cossacks, the intelligentsia, like the Communists, strive to abolish us, but the Russian people do not even think about us. Let's go recklessly - or we will die, or we will live: everyone has decided to destroy us, we will try to fight back. "

In June 1918, the split and class struggle in the Russian countryside reached their peak. On the Don, the outbreak of class struggle led to the transition of the Cossacks, incl. and the poor, in the southern districts on the side of the whites, in the northern districts, more homogeneous in class and class terms, the Cossacks were inclined to neutrality, but obeyed mobilization. This turn of events slowed down the political demarcation within the estates. "

"The peasantry on the Don, more unanimous than anywhere else in Russia, was entirely on the side of the Soviets." Grassroots Cossack villages (Bessergenevskaya, Melekhovskaya, Semikarakorskaya, Nagaevskaya, etc.) passed sentences on the eviction of nonresident. There were also exceptions: in May August 1918, 417 nonresidents who participated in the struggle against the Bolsheviks were admitted to the Cossacks, 1400 sentences expelled the Cossacks from the estate for actions directly opposite, and 300 sentences were passed on eviction from the region. And yet the war took on a class coloration.

With all their fighting qualities, the Cossack insurgents, as in the times of the peasant wars, having liberated their village, did not want to go further, and “it was not possible to raise them to vigorous pursuit of the enemy. The rebels wanted to fight the Bolsheviks, but had nothing against the Soviets. " As contemporaries believed, “when rebelling, the Cossacks thought least of all about the structure of their state. Rebelling, they did not forget for a minute that it was possible to make peace, as soon as the Soviet government agreed not to violate their stanitsa life. "

Quite in the spirit of the times were the words of the chairman of the Moscow Soviet P. Smidovich, said in September 1918 from the rostrum of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee: “This war is not being waged in order to bring about an agreement or to subjugate, it is a war of destruction. There can be no other civil war. " Terror as a state policy became a logical natural step in such a struggle.

In the fall of 1918, the forces of the Cossacks were split: 18% of the combat-ready Cossacks ended up in the ranks of the Red Army, 82% in the Donskoy. Among those who left for the Bolsheviks, the presence of the poor was clearly visible. The forces of the Don army were torn apart. In the October battles, 40% of the Cossacks and 80% of the officers dropped out of its ranks.

Having made sure in practice in the spring and summer of 1918 that they were incompatible with them, the Soviets, led by the RCP (b), from the fall of 1918 took a course towards their complete defeat: ... The civil war on the Don managed to quite sharply demarcate and separate the revolutionary elements from the counter-revolutionary ones in a year. And strong Soviet power must rely only on economically true revolutionary elements, and the dark counter-revolutionary elements must be suppressed by the Soviet power with its strength, with its power, enlightened with its agitation and proletarianized with its economic policy. "

The Donburo took a course towards ignoring the specifics of the peculiarities of the Cossacks. In particular, the liquidation of the "Cossack-police" division of the region into districts was begun, part of the territory was transferred to neighboring provinces. Syrtsov wrote that by these steps the beginning of the abolition of the old form, under the cover of which the Russian Vendée lived, was laid. Revolutionary committees, tribunals and military commissariats were created in the formed regions, which were supposed to ensure the effectiveness of the new policy.

In early January 1919, the Red Army launched a general offensive against the Cossack Don, who was then experiencing a stage of agony, and at the end of the same month the notorious circular letter from the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the Bolsheviks flew to the ground. A merciless bloody ax fell on the heads of the Cossacks ... ”.

The January (1919) anti-Cossack actions served as an expression of the general policy of Bolshevism towards the Cossacks. Yes, and its very foundations received an ideological and theoretical development long before 1919. The foundation was made by the works of Lenin, his associates and the resolutions of the Bolshevik congresses and conferences. The by no means impeccable idea of ​​the Cossacks as opponents of bourgeois transformations that existed in them received absolutization in them and ultimately merged into indisputable dogmas about the Cossacks as the backbone of the Vendée forces of Russia. Guided by the latter, the Bolsheviks, having seized power and following the formal logic of things, led - and could not help but lead - a line to eradicate the Cossacks. And after they faced a furious Soviet destiny and attacks by the Cossacks on them, this line acquired anger and wild hatred.

Don fought and the government took unpopular measures. On October 5, 1918, an order was issued: “The entire amount of bread, food and fodder, the harvest of the current 1918, past years and the future harvest of 1919, minus the stock necessary for food and household needs of the owner, is received (from the time the bread was taken to accounting) at the disposal of the Great Don Host and can be alienated only through the food authorities. "

The Cossacks were asked to hand over the harvest themselves at a price of 10 rubles per pood until May 15, 1919. The villages were unhappy with this decree. The last straw was the Soviet offensive against Krasnov on the Southern Front, which began on January 4, 1919, and the beginning of the collapse of the Don Army.

In August 1918, E.A. Trifonov, People's Commissar for Military Affairs of the Don Soviet Republic, pointed to mass transitions from camp to camp. With the onset of counter-revolutionary forces, the Don government was losing its authority and territory. The Cossack department of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee tried to organize the Cossacks, which sided with Soviet power. On September 3, 1918, the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR issued a decree on the creation of the “Marching Circle of the Don Army” of the revolutionary Cossack government. “To convene the Marching Circle of the Soviet Don Army - a military government clothed with full power on the Don ... The Marching Circle ... includes representatives of the Don Soviet regiments, as well as farms and villages that have freed themselves from the officer and landlord power.

But during that period, Soviet power on the Don did not last long. After the liquidation in the fall of 1918, the Council of People's Commissars of the Don Republic of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) appointed several members of the Donburo of the RCP (b) to lead illegal party work in the territory occupied by the enemy. The death of the Don Republic as a result of the intervention German troops and the uprising of the Lower Don Cossacks in the spring of 1918, as well as the execution of the Podtelkovo expedition, significantly influenced the attitude of the leaders of the Don Bolsheviks to the Cossacks. As a result - the Circular of the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) of January 24, 1919, containing clauses on mass terror against the counter-revolutionary Cossacks.

And when the November revolution broke out in Germany, the Cossacks became a real threat. "To pull the thorn out of the heart" - that was the unanimous decision. In early January 1919, units of the Southern Front of the Red Army launched a counteroffensive to end the rebellious Cossack Don. Its organizers neglected the fact that by that time the Cossacks, especially the front-line soldiers, had already begun to lean towards Soviet power. Although the political agencies urged soldiers and commanders to tolerate and prevent violence, for many of them the principle of "blood for blood" and "tit for tat" became the defining principle. The villages and farmsteads, which were quiet, turned into a boiling cauldron.

In such an extremely aggravated and cruel situation, on January 24, 1919, the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) adopted a Circular Letter that spurred violence and served as a target for decossackization:

“To carry out a mass terror against the rich Cossacks, exterminating them without exception; to carry out a merciless mass terror against all Cossacks who took any direct or indirect part in the struggle against Soviet power. It is necessary to apply to the middle Cossacks all those measures that provide a guarantee against any attempts on their part to new actions against Soviet power.

• 1. To confiscate bread and force all surplus to be poured into the indicated points, this applies both to bread and to all agricultural products.
• 2. Take all measures to assist the resettling immigrant poor, organizing resettlement where possible.
• 3. Equalize newcomers, nonresidents with Cossacks in land and in all other respects.
• 4. Carry out complete disarmament, shoot everyone who has a weapon after the deadline for delivery.
• 5. To issue weapons only to reliable elements from other cities.
• 6. Leave the armed detachments in the Cossack villages from now on until complete order is established.
• 7. All commissars appointed to these or those Cossack settlements are invited to show maximum firmness and unswervingly carry out these instructions. "

Since January 1919, the practice of decossackization in the Bolshevik style began: it all boiled down to military-political methods. And this policy was not at all limited to some one-time act. She is the course, the line. Their theoretical beginning goes back to the end of the 19th century, and their implementation refers to the entire period of the undivided rule of the RCP (b) - VKP (b) - CPSU.

On March 16, 1919, the Central Committee of the RCP (b) suspended the circular letter, which met the requirements of the policy of an alliance with the middle peasantry, which was to be adopted by the party congress. But at the same time, Lenin and other top leaders agreed with the regulation on organizing the eviction of the Cossacks and the resettlement of people from the starving regions.

The Donburo met with bewilderment the decision to suspend the January decision and on April 8 adopted a resolution stating that “the very existence of the Cossacks with their way of life, privileges and survivals, and most importantly, the ability to wage an armed struggle, poses a threat to Soviet power. Donburo proposed to liquidate the Cossacks as a special economic and ethnographic group by dispersing them and settling them outside the Don. "

1919 -1920 - the peak of the relationship between the Soviet government and the Cossacks. The Cossacks suffered huge losses. Some died on the battlefield, others - from the bullets of a Czech, and others - tens of thousands - thrown out of the country, lost their homeland. Bolshevik-style decoraction changed its forms and methods, but it never stopped. It demanded the complete destruction of the counter-revolutionary leaders of the Cossacks; the eviction from the Don of its unstable part, which included all the middle peasants - the bulk of the villages and farms; resettlement of poor peasants from the North-West industrial center to the Don. The indiscriminate approach to the implementation of these inhuman orders resulted in a rampant crime, which meant a genuine genocide.

A cruel and unjustified political line, which gave rise to grave consequences, including the echo that has reached our days, causing just anger, however, a biased interpretation. Circular writing, often mistakenly called a directive, has become overgrown with stories and fables. But accuracy is essential to presenting history with truth. The implementation of the cruel circular on the ground resulted in repression, which fell not only on the real culprits, but also on defenseless old people and women. Many Cossacks became victims of lawlessness, although there is no exact information about their number. ...

The Cossacks, whose amplitude of fluctuations in the direction of Soviet power had been quite large before, now turned in their mass by 180 o. Widespread repression served as an anti-Soviet catalyst. On the night of March 12, 1919, in the farmsteads of the Kazanskaya stanitsa, the Cossacks killed the small Red Guard garrisons and local communists. A few days later, the flames engulfed all the districts of the Upper Don, which went down in history as Veshensky. It blew up the rear of the Southern Front of the Red Army. The offensive of its units on Novocherkassk and Rostov was drowned out. An attempt to suppress the uprising was not crowned with success, since in practice it was reduced only to an exclusively military effort.

The policy of the Center in relation to the Cossacks in 1919 was not distinguished by consistency. On March 16, the plenum of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) specially discussed the issue of them. G.Ya. Sokolnikov condemned the Circular Letter and criticized the activities of the Donburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) (9, p. 14). However, the outlined course was not developed and implemented. The problems of resettlement of new settlers to the Don occupied a central place, which added fuel to the fire and created a field of heightened political tension. FK Mironov sent his protests to Moscow. The RVS of the Southern Front, although reluctantly, somewhat softened its position in relation to the Cossacks. VI Lenin hastened to put an end to the uprising. (9, p. 14). However, the military command was in no hurry with this. Trotsky created an expeditionary corps, which went on the offensive only on May 28. But by June 5, the White Guard troops broke through to Veshenskaya and united with the rebels. Soon Denikin announced a campaign against Moscow. He assigned the decisive role to the Cossacks. Civil war, widening and fierce. It dragged on for several more months. Decossackization turned out to be such a high price.

On August 13, 1919, a joint meeting of the Politburo and the Organizational Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) discussed the appeal to the Cossacks presented by Lenin. The government stated that it "is not going to deceive anyone by force ... it does not go against the Cossack way of life, leaving the working Cossacks their villages and farms, their lands, the right to wear whatever uniform they want (for example, stripes)." But the patience of the Cossacks ran out. And on August 24, Mironov's corps unauthorizedly set out from Saransk to the front. On August 28, Grazhdunupr, the organ of decossackization, was abolished and a temporary Don Executive Committee headed by Medvedev was created. In Balashov, under the leadership of Trotsky, the conference brought to the "foreground" and outlined "broad political work in the Cossacks." After that, Trotsky developed the "Theses on the work on the Don."

At the moment when Denikin broke through to Tula, Trotsky left the question in the Central Committee of the party about changing the policy towards the Don Cossacks and about Mironov: “We give the Don, the Kuban full 'autonomy', our troops are clearing the Don. The Cossacks completely break with Denikin. Adequate guarantees must be created. Mironov and his comrades could act as a mediator, who should have gone deep into the Don. " On October 23, the Politburo decided: "Free Mironov from all punishment," and agree on his appointment with Trotsky. On October 26, it was decided to issue Mironov's appeal to the Don Cossacks. Trotsky proposed to appoint him to the command post, but the Politburo, disagreeing with him, sent Mironov to work so far only in the Don Executive Committee.

The truth about decossacking without falsifying it and without playing a political game around it is one of the most difficult pages in the history of the Cossacks, although it had many of them. And not only in the Soviet era, but also in ancient times.

The triumphal procession of Soviet power in many regions of the country took place in an atmosphere of civil war. This is so obvious that there is no doubt about it. Another thing is that there was a fundamental difference between the civil war at the end of 1917 and the middle of 1918. It consisted in both its forms and scales. In turn, this directly depended on the intensity and strength of the imperialist intervention in Soviet Russia.

The foregoing provides a full basis for the following conclusion: the civil war in Russia in general and in its individual regions with a special composition of the population, where the forces of the all-Russian counter-revolution were relocated, began from the first days of the revolution. Moreover, this revolution itself unfolded in the context of the peasant war, which flared up in September 1917 against the landlords. The overthrown classes resorted to violence against the rebellious people. And the latter had no choice but to respond with force to force. As a result, the revolution was accompanied by the most acute armed clashes.

At the same time, the severity of the civil war had a decisive influence on the choice of ways and forms of socio-economic transformations and the first steps of Soviet power. And for this reason, she, too, often took unjustifiably cruel measures, ultimately hitting her with a boomerang, because this repelled the masses from her, especially the Cossacks. Already in the spring of 1918, when the dispossessed peasantry began an equalizing redistribution of land, the Cossacks turned their backs on the revolution. In May, they destroyed F. Pod-Telkov's expedition to the Don.

“Cossack uprising on the Don in March-June 1919. was one of the most serious threats to the Soviet government and had a great influence on the course of the civil war. " The study of materials from the archives of Rostov-on-Don and Moscow made it possible to reveal contradictions in the policies of the Bolshevik Party at all levels.

The plenum of the RCP (b) of March 16, 1919 canceled Sverdlov's January directive, just on the day of his "untimely" death, but the Donburo did not reckon with this and on April 8, 1919 promulgated another directive: "The urgent task is complete, quick and the decisive destruction of the Cossacks as a special economic group, the destruction of its economic foundations, the physical destruction of the Cossack bureaucracy and officers, in general, all the tops of the Cossacks, the dispersal and neutralization of the rank-and-file Cossacks and their formal liquidation. "

The head of the Donburo Syrtsov telegraphs the pre-revolutionary committee of the village of Veshenskaya: "For every killed Red Army soldier and member of the revolutionary committee, shoot a hundred Cossacks."

After the fall of the Don Soviet Republic in September 1918, the Don Bureau was created to direct the underground communist work in Rostov, Taganrog and other places in the rear of the whites. When the Red Army advanced to the South, the Donburo became the main factor in the administration of the Don region. The members of the bureau were appointed by Moscow and operated from Kursk, Millerovo - the rear areas, which remained under Soviet control. Local officials carried out large-scale confiscations of private property. The Revolutionary Military Council of the Southern Front insisted on executions and shootings and called for the creation of tribunals in each regiment. The repressions carried out by the army tribunals and the Donburo forced the territory to rise against the communists, and this led to the loss of the entire upper Don region.

The first signs of a departure from the brutal military confrontation and extreme methods of resolving the contradictions between the Cossacks and the Soviet regime appeared towards the end of 1919 and took hold in 1920, when the civil war in southern Russia brought victory to the Bolsheviks. The White movement, in which the Cossacks played a significant role, was defeated. On the Don, Bolshevism came into its own.

Evaluating the activities of the Donbureau of the RCP (b) from the fall of 1918 to the fall of 1919, it should be admitted that despite the well-known positive contribution of the Donburo to the defeat of the counter-revolution and the establishment of Soviet power on the Don, a number of major mistakes and failures were made in its Cossack policy. “Subsequently, all members of the Donburo revised their views and actions. SI Syrtsov admitted the work experience of the Grazhdunupra department was unsatisfactory and tried to limit the administrative activities of political departments on the Don in the spring of 1920. At the first regional party conference, he opposed SF Vasilchenko, who called for crushing the Cossacks with "fire and sword." Five years later, according to Syrtsov's report at the April (1925) plenum of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), a resolution was adopted "On work among the Cossacks", which outlined the course for the widespread involvement of the Cossacks in Soviet construction and the removal of all restrictions in their life.

Don Bolshevik Cossacks Civil War