After the abdication of the sovereign, on March 2, 1917, as the first act of manifestation of its activities, the Provisional Government sent a decree throughout the country, in which it proclaimed:
- Full and immediate amnesty for all cases - political and religious, including terrorist attacks, military uprisings, agrarian crimes, etc.
- Freedom of speech, press, unions, assembly and strikes, with the extension of political freedoms to servicemen within the limits permitted by military conditions.
- Cancellation of all class, religious and national restrictions.
- Immediate preparation for the convocation on the basis of a general, equal, direct and secret ballot of the Constituent Assembly, which will establish the form of government and the constitution of the country.
- Replacement of the police by the people's militia with elected authorities, subordinate to local government bodies.
- Elections to local government bodies on the basis of universal, equal, direct and secret ballot.
- Non-disarmament and non-withdrawal from Petrograd of military units that took part in the revolutionary movement.
- While maintaining military discipline in the ranks and while performing military service, the elimination of all restrictions for soldiers in the enjoyment of public rights granted to all other citizens.
After the revolution, in addition to members of the State Duma and the Provisional Government, socialist parties of various shades, as well as groups of Social Democrats, Mensheviks and Bolsheviks, who formed the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, spontaneously appeared on the political scene. These parties did not yet have their leaders, who were in exile, where they were looking for support in their activities among the geopolitical opponents of Russia, including the German government and its general staff. The commanders of the active army knew about the events inside the country only from newspaper information, which began to spread in large numbers among the military units, and in the circumstances, all hopes were pinned on the Provisional Government. At first, all these various political groupings, the Provisional Government and the upper strata of the command staff were in full agreement regarding the change of power that had taken place and the overthrow of the autocracy. But later they took completely irreconcilable positions. The leading role in the decaying army, in local garrisons and in the country began to be transferred to an unauthorized organization - the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies.
The revolution brought many completely worthless people to power, and very quickly this became very clear. A. I. Guchkov. His competence in military matters, in comparison with his colleagues, was determined by his stay as a guest performer during the Boer War. He turned out to be a "great connoisseur" of military affairs, and during his two months 150 top commanders were replaced, including 73 divisional commanders, corps commander and army commander. Under him, order No. 1 appeared on the Petrograd garrison, which became a detonator for the destruction of order, first in the capital's garrison, and then in the rear, reserve and training units of the army. But even this hardened destroyer, who staged a merciless purge of the command staff, did not dare to sign the Declaration of the Rights of the Soldier, imposed by the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies. Guchkov was forced to resign, and on May 9, 1917, the new Minister of War Kerensky signed the Declaration, decisively launching into action a powerful instrument for the final disintegration of the army in the field. The officers, who had little understanding of politics, had no political influence on the soldiers' masses. Ideologically, the mass of soldiers was quickly led by emissaries and agents of various socialist parties, sent by the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies to promote peace "without annexations and indemnities." The soldiers did not want to fight anymore and found that if peace should be concluded without annexations and indemnities, then further bloodshed is senseless and unacceptable. Mass fraternization of soldiers in positions began.
Rice. 1 Fraternities of Russian and German soldiers
But that was the official explanation. The secret was that the slogan gained the upper hand: "Down with the war, immediately peace and immediately take the land from the landlords." The officer immediately became an enemy in the minds of the soldiers, for he demanded the continuation of the war and represented in the eyes of the soldiers a type of master in military uniform. At first, most of the officers began to adhere to the Cadet party, and the soldier mass became entirely Socialist-Revolutionary. But soon the soldiers figured out that the SRs with Kerensky wanted to continue the war and were postponing the division of the land until the Constituent Assembly. Such intentions were not at all included in the calculations of the soldier mass and clearly contradicted their aspirations. It was then that the preaching of the Bolsheviks came to the taste and ideas of the soldiers. They were not at all interested in the International, communism and the like. But they quickly assimilated the following principles of future life: immediate peace, by all means, confiscation of all property from the property class of any estate, the destruction of the landowner, the bourgeois and the master in general. Most of the officers could not take such a position and the soldiers began to look at them as enemies. Politically, the officers were poorly prepared, practically unarmed, and at meetings they were easily beaten by any orator who could speak the language and read several brochures of socialist content. There was no question of any counter-propaganda, and no one wanted to listen to the officers. In some units, they drove out all the bosses, chose their own and announced that they were going home, because they did not want to fight anymore. In other units, chiefs were arrested and sent to Petrograd, to the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies. There were also such units, mainly on the Northern Front, where officers were killed.
The interim government changed the entire administration of the country, without giving a new form of organization of power and instructions on how to operate in the new conditions, providing a solution to these issues at the local level. The Soviets of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies immediately took advantage of this provision and announced a decree to the whole country on the organization of local Soviets. The "Declaration of the Rights of the Soldier", promulgated in the army, caused amazement not only among the command staff, but also among the lower ranks, who still retained the consciousness of the need for discipline and order in the army. This revealed the real essence of the Provisional Government, on which hopes were pinned that it would lead the country to the rise and restoration of order, and not to the final chaos in the army and lawlessness in the country. The authority of the Provisional Government was greatly undermined, and the question arose between the command staff from top to bottom: where to look for salvation from the collapse of the army? Democratization from the first days of the revolution led to the rapid collapse of the army in the field. Lack of discipline and responsibility opened up the possibility of fleeing with impunity from the front, and mass desertion began.
Rice. 2 The stream of deserters from the front, 1917
These masses of former soldiers with and without weapons filled cities and villages and, as former front-line soldiers, occupied a dominant position in the local Soviets and became the leaders of the rebellious element rising from the bottom. The established power not only did not restrain arbitrary actions, but also encouraged them, and therefore the peasant masses began to solve their main historical and everyday issue: the seizure of land. Meanwhile, with the breakdown of railway transport, with the collapse of industry and the cessation of the delivery of urban products to the countryside, the connection between the countryside and the city was increasingly reduced. The urban population was isolated from the village, food supplies to the cities were poorly received, for the reason that banknotes lost all value, and there was nothing to buy with them. Factories, under the slogan of making them the property of the workers, quickly turned into dead organisms. To stop the disintegration of the army in the field, the top commanders, Generals Alekseev, Brusilov, Shcherbachev, Gurko and Dragomirov, arrived in Petrograd. On May 4, a joint meeting of the Provisional Government and the Executive Committee of the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies was held, at which statements by the commanding staff were heard. The speeches of the generals presented a vivid picture of the collapse of the army in the field and the powerlessness of the command staff to stop this collapse without the powerful help of the Provisional Government. The final statement said: "We need power: you have pulled the ground out from under our feet, so take the trouble to restore it … If you want to continue the war to a victorious end, then it is necessary to return power to the army …". To this, Skobelev, a member of the Council of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, replied that "a revolution cannot begin and stop by order …". This demagogic statement was the basis for the ongoing collapse of the army and the country. Indeed, all the creators of the revolution classify revolutionary processes in the field of metaphysics. According to them, the revolution moves and is governed by the laws of cycles. The leaders of the revolution explain their powerlessness to stop the raging element by the fact that no one can stop it, and it must go through all the cycles of its development to its logical end, and only destroying everything in its path that was associated with the past order, the element will turn back.
On the Southwestern Front, until May 1917, there was not a single murder of officers, which other fronts could not boast of. But even the popular Brusilov failed to get a promise from the soldiers to advance and attack enemy positions. The slogan "Peace without annexations and indemnities" was already undoubtedly dominant, and that's it. So great was the reluctance to continue the war. Brusilov wrote: “I understood the position of the Bolsheviks, for they preached“down with war and immediate peace at all costs”, but I could not understand the tactics of the Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, who most of all destroyed the army, allegedly in order to avoid counter-revolution, and together with so they wished to continue the war to a victorious end. Therefore, I invited the Minister of War Kerensky to come to the South-Western Front in order to confirm the demand for an offensive on behalf of the Petrograd Soviet at the meetings, since by that time the authority of the State Duma had fallen. In mid-May, Kerensky visited the Southwestern Front, made speeches at rallies. The mass of soldiers greeted him enthusiastically, promised anything and never fulfilled their promise. I understood that the war was over for us, because there were no means to force the troops to fight. " By May, the troops of all fronts were completely out of control and it was no longer possible to take any measures of influence. Yes, and the appointed commissars were obeyed only insofar as they pandered to the soldiers, and when they went against them, the soldiers refused to comply with their orders. So the soldiers of the 7th Siberian Corps, who were on vacation in the rear, flatly refused to return to the front and announced to the Commissioner Boris Savinkov that they wanted to go to Kiev for further rest. No persuasion and threats from Savinkov helped. There were many such cases. True, when Kerensky went around the front, he was well received everywhere and promised a lot, but when it came to the point, they took their promises back. Having taken the enemy's trenches, the troops left them on their own the next day, returning back. They announced that since annexations and indemnities could not be demanded, they were returning to their old positions. It was in such a situation that Brusilov in May 1917 was appointed to the post of Supreme Commander-in-Chief. Seeing the complete collapse of the army, not having the strength and means to change the course of events, he set himself the goal of at least temporarily preserving the army's combat capability and saving the officers from extermination. He had to rush from one unit to another, with difficulty keeping them from unauthorized withdrawal from the front, sometimes with whole divisions and corps. The units hardly agreed to return the command and defend their positions, but flatly refused to take offensive actions. The trouble was that the Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, who in words considered it necessary to maintain the might of the army and did not want to break with the allies, destroyed the army by their own actions.
It should be said that similar destructive processes of revolutionary fermentation took place in other belligerent countries. In France, unrest in the active army, among workers and the public also began in January 1917. More details about this were written in the Military Review in the article "How America Saved Western Europe from the Phantom of the World Revolution." This article serves as an example of the parallelism of events and the similarity of the morale of the armies of the warring countries and shows that military hardships and all kinds of shortcomings in the conditions of a three-year positional war were inherent not only in the Russian army, but also in the armies of other countries, including the German and French. Before the abdication of the sovereign, the Russian army almost did not know major unrest in military units, they began under the influence of demoralization that began from above. The example of France also shows that revolutionary propaganda and demagoguery, in whatever country it is conducted, are built according to the same template and are based on the excitement of base human instincts. In all strata of society and in the ruling elite, there are always people who sympathize with these slogans. But without the participation of the army, there are no revolutions, and France was saved by the fact that in Paris there was no insane accumulation, as in Petrograd, of reserve and training battalions, and it was also possible to avoid a mass flight of units from the front. However, its main salvation was the appearance on its territory of the American armed forces, which raised the morale of the command and social composition of society.
Survived the revolutionary process and the collapse of the army and Germany. After the end of the struggle with the Entente, the army disintegrated, the same propaganda was carried out inside it, with the same slogans and goals. Fortunately for Germany, inside it there were people who began to fight the forces of decay from the head and one morning were found killed and thrown into a ditch by the communist leaders Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. The army and the country were saved from the inevitable collapse and revolutionary process. In Russia, unfortunately, the State Duma and the Provisional Government, which received the right to rule the country, in their activities and in revolutionary slogans did not differ in the least from the extreme party groupings. As a result, they lost their prestige among the popular masses inclined to organization and order, and especially in the army.
In the presence of the Provisional Government and the Council of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, the State Duma and the State Council still continued to operate, but they no longer enjoyed great influence in the country. In this situation, a dual power was created in the capital and anarchy in the country. The unauthorized Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, which was formed on its own, in order to formalize its legality, convened an All-Russian Congress of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies in April, which, under the guise of various political parties from socialists to anarchocommunists, in the amount of 775 people gathered in Petrograd. The overwhelming majority of the Congress was represented by uncultured strata, and by nationality - by foreigners. If the council of socialist revolutionaries still adhered to the slogan: war until the end, although without annexations and indemnities, then the slogans of the Bolsheviks were more straightforward and were expressed simply: "Down with war", "Peace to huts, war to palaces." The slogans of the Bolsheviks were announced by Ulyanov, who had arrived from exile. The activities of the Bolshevik party were based on: 1) the overthrow of the Provisional Government and the complete disintegration of the army 2) the incitement of class struggle in the country and even the intra-class struggle in the countryside.e. the most organized, armed and centralized minority.
The declaration of the Bolshevik leaders was not limited to the promulgation of their theses, and they began to organize a real force, strengthened the formation of the "Red Guard". It was joined by a criminal element, an underground, deserters who filled the country, and a large number of foreign workers, mainly Chinese, of whom many were imported for the construction of the Murmansk railway. And due to the fact that the Red Guard paid well, the Russian proletariat, which was left without work due to the stoppage of factories and industrial production of the country, also reached there. The appearance of the Bolshevik leaders on the surface of the revolutionary turmoil was so absurd for the majority that no one could admit that a country with a thousand-year history, with established moral and economic orders and customs, could find itself at the mercy of this force, which from its foundation had been fighting against the age-old social foundations of mankind. The Bolsheviks brought envy, hatred and enmity to the country.
The leaders of Bolshevism attracted the people to their side not because the people were well acquainted with the political program of Marx - Ulyanov, which up to 99% of the people in the USSR did not know and did not understand even after 70 years. The program of the people was the slogans of Pugachev, Razin and Bolotnikov, expressed simply and clearly: take what is needed, if permitted. This simplified formula was expressed differently by the Bolsheviks and was clothed in an even more understandable form: "plunder the loot." Indeed, by its nature, a significant part of the population of Russia is anarchist and does not value the public domain. But this part of the population rampages only with the permission of the government, and so began to act even before the Bolsheviks. They just went and took what they thought was taken away from him, and above all, they took the land from the large landowners.
The Party of Social Democrats (Bolsheviks) occupied a special position among other political groupings, both in the extreme of its ideas and in the form of their embodiment. According to its ideology, the Bolshevik Party in the revolutionary movement within Russia was the successor to the People's Will Party, which committed the assassination of Emperor Alexander II. This murder was followed by the defeat of this party within the country and the leaders of the People's Will fled abroad, where they began to study the reasons for the failure of their activities in Russia. As their experience showed, after the assassination of the head of state, the situation not only did not change in their favor, but the dynasty strengthened even more. Plekhanov was the chief theoretician among this section of the Narodnaya Volya. When they got acquainted with the theory of the West European Social Democrats, they saw that their mistake in political work was that they saw the main support of their activity in the Russian peasantry or the agricultural class, and not in the masses of the working class. After that, in their reasoning, they came to the conclusion: “The communist revolution of the working class can in no way grow out of that bourgeois-peasant socialism, the conductors of which are almost all of our revolutionary centers, because:
- by the internal nature of its organization, the rural community strives to give way to bourgeois, and not communist, forms of community;
- in the transition to these communist forms of community, the community will have an inactive, but passive role;
- the community is not able to move Russia along the path of communism, but can only resist such a movement;
"Only the working class of our industrial centers can take the initiative of the communist movement."
The program of the Social Democratic Party was based on this platform. The Social Democrats considered agitation among the working class, military activity against the existing regime and terrorist acts as the basis of the tactics of political struggle. The works of Marx, Engels, Liebknecht, Kautsky, Lafargue were taken as the scientific basis for the study of social democratic ideas. And for Russians who did not know foreign languages, the works of Erisman, Yanzhul and Pogozhev. After the defeat of the Duma faction of the Social Democrats, the main activity of the party was transferred abroad, and a congress was convened in London. Political emigrants, spending many years in absolute inaction, living on the money of sponsors, rejecting labor and society, trampling on their homeland and at the same time real life, covered up their parasitism with phrases and lofty ideas. When the revolution broke out in Russia and when the partitions separating them from the Motherland fell, they rushed to Russia from London, Paris, New York, from the cities of Switzerland. They were in a hurry to take their place in those political cauldrons where the fate of Russia was being decided. Even in anticipation of the imminent war of 1914, Ulyanov decided, in order to replenish funds, to enter into an agreement with Germany regarding a joint struggle against Russia. He went to Berlin in June and made an offer to the German Foreign Office to work for him against Russia and the Russian army. For his work, he demanded a lot of money and the ministry rejected his offer. After the February Revolution, the German government realized the benefits and decided to take advantage of this opportunity. On March 27, 1917, Ulyanov was summoned to Berlin, where, together with representatives of the German government, he worked out a plan of action for a rear war against Russia. After that, 70 million marks were released to Ulyanov. From that moment on, Ulyanov followed not so much the instructions of Marx's theory as the directives of the General Staff of the German army. On March 30, Ulyanov and 30 people of his staff, guarded by German officers, were sent through Germany to Stockholm, and a meeting was held here, at which plans for the activities of this group of Bolsheviks in Russia were finally worked out. The main actions consisted in the overthrow of the Provisional Government, the disintegration of the army and the conclusion of a peace treaty with Germany. At the end of the meeting, Ulyanov and his companions left in a special train for Russia and on April 3 arrived in St. Petersburg. By the time Ulyanov and his employees appeared in Russia, everything was already prepared for their activities: the country was not ruled by anyone, the army did not have an authoritative command, and, in addition, the arriving German agents were received with honor from the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies. By the time the German agents arrived at the station, a delegation was awaiting them and a guard of honor with an orchestra was lined up. When Ulyanov showed up, he was seized and carried in his arms to the station, where he made an opening speech praising Russia and that the whole world looks at her with hopes. Ulyanov was assigned to work in the luxurious mansion of the ballerina Kshesinskaya, which turned into a center for Bolshevik propaganda. At this time, a congress of the Socialist Revolutionary Party was held in St. Petersburg, where for the first time Ulyanov made a lengthy speech, calling for the overthrow of the government and a break with the defencists, for an end to the war with Germany. Further, he called on everyone to put on the truly revolutionary clothes of communism, throwing off the rags of the Social Democrats, allies of the bourgeoisie. His speech made a negative impression, the Bolsheviks tried to explain this by the fact that the orator did not understand Russia due to his long absence within its borders. The next day, he delivered a speech at the Council of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, urging the Communists to seize power and land in the country and begin negotiations for peace with Germany. His speech was greeted with shouts: "Get out, go to Germany!" The chairman of the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, who spoke after him, spoke about the harmfulness of Ulyanov's ideas, calling them a blow to the revolution. Among the masses, the arrival of Ulyanov and his companions from Germany also aroused mistrust and suspicion towards them as German agents. But the work of the German agents passed by these popular masses, and they were looking for support in the environment of another category. They continued the formation of combat detachments, which received the name "Red Guard", very well paid. They spared no expense in attracting the masses of soldiers, paying them up to 30 rubles for refusing to leave the barracks against demonstrators. The Ulyanovs issued an appeal to the people and the army, prepared by the German government and its general staff, the content of which was made public in the first days of the arrival of the "leader" in Russia from emigration. Thus, the communists carried out a well-developed propaganda, created for their activities an armed support from the lower classes and a criminal element suitable for any crime. At the same time, the Provisional Government was rapidly losing influence on the people and the soldiers' masses and turned into a helpless talking shop, devoid of authority.
In the Cossack regions, there were also issues that required changes, but these issues did not require a political, social or economic upheaval and breakdown of the basic conditions of the Cossack life. In the Cossack regions, after the February Revolution, the opportunity presented itself to restore the old elective principle of military chieftains, as well as to expand and strengthen the electiveness of the bodies of people's representation. An example of this was the Don Army, deprived of these rights during the reign of Emperor Peter I. The order ataman on the Don, at the time of the sovereign's abdication, was General Count Grabbe. After the Provisional Government announced the right to organize local power by the decision of the local population, Count Grabbe was asked to resign without any excesses, and in his place was elected a Cossack Army Ataman. The right to convene the representatives of the people was announced. The same changes took place in other Cossack regions, where the order of the elective democracy was violated. At the front, among the Cossack units, the sovereign's abdication was accepted calmly. But the order No. 1 that appeared, which introduced changes to the internal life of military units, was accepted with bewilderment. The destruction of the military hierarchy was tantamount to the destruction of the existence of military units. The Cossacks constituted a military class among the rest of the Russian population, on the basis of which their special position and living conditions have developed over the centuries. The declared freedoms and equality put the Cossacks in the need to carefully peer at the events that were taking place, and, not seeing anywhere the consonance of their Cossack ideas, for the most part, the Cossacks took a wait-and-see attitude, without interfering in the events taking place. Everyone remained in the regiments, there was no desertion, everyone followed the order of the military chieftain to remain loyal to the oath of the Provisional Government and to fulfill their duties at the front. Even after the introduction of the norm of Order No. 1 on the election of commanders, the Cossacks, more often than not, voted for their officers. The Committee of Cossack Troops was founded in Petrograd. With the abolition of the title of command personnel, they began to refer to the officers, naming them by rank, adding "master" … which, in essence, had no revolutionary character.
With the beginning of the disintegration of the general units of the army, anxiety on the Don began to manifest itself among the infantry reserve battalions located in the vicinity of Novocherkassk. But in the winter of 1916/1917, units of the corps Cossack cavalry were withdrawn from the front to the Don, from which the 7, 8, 9 Don Cossack divisions were formed, intended for the summer offensive operation of 1917. Therefore, the infantry units around Novocherkassk, which had accepted the revolutionary order, were quickly dispersed by the Cossacks, and Rostov remained the hotbed of unrest, which was one of the junctions of the railway connecting the Caucasian army with Russia.
However, in the Cossack regions, with the beginning of the revolution, a difficult and intractable issue of relations between the Cossacks, urban, nonresident and local peasants arose. On the Don there were three categories of people who did not belong to the Cossack estate: the indigenous Don peasants and peasants who lived temporarily, as nonresidents. In addition to these two categories, formed in the historical process, the Don included the cities of Taganrog, Rostov and Aleksandro-Grushevsky coal region (Donbass), inhabited exclusively by people of non-Cossack origin. With a total population of the Don region of five million people, there were only about half of the Cossacks. Moreover, from different categories of non-Cossack population, a special position was occupied by the indigenous Don peasantry, which amounted to 939,000 people. The formation of the Don peasantry dates back to the time of serfdom and the emergence of large land owners on the Don. Working hands were required to cultivate the land, and the export of peasants from the borders of Russia began. The arbitrary seizure of land on the Don by the bureaucratic world that had arisen on the Don caused complaints from the Cossacks, and Empress Catherine II ordered a land survey of the Don region. The lands, arbitrarily occupied, were taken away from the Don landowners, turned into the common property of the entire Army, but the peasantry, taken out by the Cossack landowners, were left in their places and were awarded with lands. It formed part of the Don population under the name of the Don peasantry. Using the land, these peasants did not belong to the class of the Cossacks and did not use their social rights. In the possession of the Cossack population, not counting land under horse breeding, city and other military lands, there were 9,581,157 dessiatines of land, of which 6,240,942 dessiatines were cultivated, and the rest of the land was public pastures for livestock. In the possession of the Don peasantry there were 1,600,694 tithes, so among them there was no all-Russian cry about the lack of land. In addition to the Don peasantry in the Don region, there were Rostov and Taganrog urban districts and nonresident population. Their position with the land was much worse. However, at first, they did not openly bring disorder into the Don's inner life, with the exception of Rostov and other railway junctions that crossed the territory of the Don region, where deserters of the decaying Russian armies from all vast fronts accumulated.
On May 28, the first military Circle was assembled, which brought together 500 electives from the villages and 200 from the front units. By that time, the former commander of the 8th Army, General A. M. Kaledin, removed from command by the new Supreme Commander-in-Chief, General Brusilov, because of the difficult relationship between them. After repeated refusals, A. M. Kaledin on June 18 was elected as the Army Ataman, M. P. Bogaevsky. The activities of the elected ataman and the government were aimed at resolving the main internal Don issue - the relationship of the Cossacks with the Don peasantry, urban and nonresident, and in the all-Russian plan - bringing the war to a victorious end. It was a mistake on the part of General Kaledin that he continued to believe in the fighting efficiency of the army and left the Cossack regiments in the decaying army. The power of the Provisional Government quickly passed entirely to the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, which in its political orientation was rapidly inclining towards extreme demagoguery. The country was turning into an uncontrollable continent, and deserters and a criminal element began to occupy a dominant position among the population. Under these conditions, the Don region with the ataman became a hotbed of reaction, and General Kaledin turned into a symbol of the counter-revolutionary in the propaganda of all the socialists. Cossack regiments, preserving the appearance of military units, saw collapse everywhere, were surrounded by propagandists, and their chieftain was the center of attacks. But the propaganda, not restrained by any prohibitions or moral responsibility, also affected the Cossacks and gradually infected them. The Don, like all the Cossack regions, gradually turned into two camps: the indigenous population of the regions and the front-line soldiers. A significant part of the front-line soldiers, like a certain part of the population of the regions, fully adopted revolutionary ideas and, gradually moving away from the Cossack way of life, took the side of the new order. But the category of these renegades consisted largely of those front-line soldiers who, following the example of the revolutionary leaders, were looking for opportunities, using the situation, to prove themselves in the events that took place. At the same time, in the process of the collapse of the army and in order to maintain at least a relative order in the management of the units, the higher headquarters of the armies tried to keep the Cossack units at their immediate disposal and showed great attention to them. Cossack regiments were also stationed in the immediate rear, where there was a large accumulation of deserters who threatened areas valuable in terms of food and supplies for the army, and, despite the raging sea of atrocities and unrest, the areas guarded by Cossack regiments were quiet and calm centers. Travelers on the railways, whose stations were filled with crowds of deserters everywhere, did not have to think about restaurants or any kind of food. But at the entrance to the very first station within the Don Cossack, everything changed dramatically. There were no congestions of deserters, no confusion, and it seemed as if the passers-by were entering another world. Everything was available in modest buffets. Internal order by the Cossacks on their land was maintained exclusively by local means, despite the presence of the bulk of the Cossack mass at the front.
Among the whirlpool of people raised by the revolution, all sorts of currents, the extreme right, extreme left, middle, intelligent people, enthusiastic, honest idealists, inveterate scoundrels, adventurers, wolves in sheep's clothing, intriguers and extortionists, it was no wonder to get confused and make mistakes. And the Cossacks did them. And nevertheless, during the revolution and the Civil War in Russia, the population of the Cossack regions, in the overwhelming majority, nevertheless took a different path than the entire population of vast Russia. Why were the Cossack heads not drunk with freedoms and seductive promises? It is impossible to explain this reason by their prosperity, economic situation, because among the Cossacks there were both the rich and the middle, there were also a lot of the poor. After all, the economic situation of families is determined not so much by the general conditions of life as by the qualities of each owner, so one must look for an explanation in another. In general cultural terms, the Cossack population also could not differ from the general level of the Russian people, neither for the worse nor for the better. The base of the general culture was the same as that of the entire Russian people: the same religion, the same schools, the same social needs, the same language and the same racial origin. But the most numerous, having a more ancient origin, the Don Army turned out to be a surprising exception among the general chaos and anarchy. The army turned out to be capable of clearing its lands from spontaneous collapse on its own and without any difficulties, political and social upheavals, to preserve a normal life, which was not disturbed by the Cossack population in their lands, but by an alien element, hostile and alien to the Cossacks. Cossack life and order throughout its history was built on military discipline and the special psychology of the Cossacks. The Cossack population, still under the rule of the Mongols, was part of the armed forces of the Horde, settled on the outskirts or in places requiring constant monitoring and protection of important areas, and their internal life was formed according to the custom of military squads. They were under the direct authority of the khans or ulus khans or noyons loyal to them. In this state of their internal life, they got out of the power of the Mongols and continued to exist, and in an independent position. This order, established over the centuries, was preserved under the rule of Moscow princes, tsars, and then emperors, who supported it and did not fundamentally violate it. The entire Cossack population took part in the decisions of issues of internal life, and all decisions depended on the general agreement of the participants at the gathering general military training. At the heart of the Cossack life was a veche, and the organization of life was built on the basis of the wide participation of the masses of the Cossack people, which, gradually changing, depending on the time, took forms that were more in line with the time, preserving the principle of the participation of the Cossack masses in public life. The 1917 revolution drew wider popular masses of the country into public life, and this process was historically caused by necessity. In the Cossack regions, however, it was not new, but with the hands of newcomers it took forms that perverted real public freedoms. The Cossacks had to defend their life from outside strangers with their distorted ideas about freedom and people's democracy.
In the army, the main resistance to anarchy and decay came from the commanding staff. In the absence of assistance from the Provisional Government, the command saw the recovery of the active army in a successful offensive. As General Denikin believed: "… if not with an explosion of patriotism, then with an intoxicating, captivating feeling of great victory, counting, if not on strategic success, then on faith in revolutionary pathos." After the unsuccessful Mitava operation, the Russian command on January 24 (February 6) approved the campaign plan for 1917. The main blow was delivered by the Southwestern Front in the Lvov direction with simultaneous auxiliary strikes on Sokal and Marmaros-Sziget. The Romanian front was to occupy Dobrudja. The Northern and Western Fronts were to carry out auxiliary strikes at the choice of their commanders. On the Northern Front there were 6 six hundred Don regiments and 6 separate hundreds, in total about 13 thousand Cossacks. On the Western Front, the number of Don Cossacks decreased to 7 thousand. The Southwestern Front had the largest grouping of Cossack units. In its battle formations there were 21 regiments, 20 separate hundreds and 9 batteries. There are about 28 thousand Cossacks in total. 16 Don regiments, 10 separate hundreds and 10 batteries fought on the Romanian front. In total, up to 24 thousand Cossacks. The remaining 7 Don regiments and 26 special hundreds in the middle of 1917 served in the garrisons and the front line.
The army was already dominated by army committees, but the Provisional Government and the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies stood on the idea of "war to a victorious end," and the command was preparing an offensive. On this basis, friction arose between the command and the government. The command demanded the restoration of order and discipline in the army, which was completely undesirable for both the revolutionary rulers and the decaying army. General Alekseev, as the Supreme Commander, after repeated proposals to change the internal order in the army and to convene a congress of army officers, was removed from command on May 22, and General Brusilov was put in his place, having the character of an opportunist (compromiser) and striving to flirt with the army committees.
The activities of the Bolsheviks in Petrograd, meanwhile, went on as usual. At the request of the armed forces and the people, Milyukov was removed from the government on April 20. On April 24, the Congress of the All-Russian Party Conference of the Bolsheviks met in Petrograd, which was attended by 140 delegates. The conference elected the Central Committee and confirmed the program of the Bolshevik Party and their consistent activity. This conference was not important for the center, but for the spread and strengthening of communism in the provinces and among the masses of the country. On June 3, in connection with the anticipated offensive of the army, an All-Russian Congress of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies was convened in Petrograd, in which 105 Bolsheviks took part. Seeing that the slogans of the Bolsheviks at the congress remained in the minority, they decided on June 15 to bring the columns of Bolshevik workers to the streets for a demonstration. The troops took the side of the demonstrators, and it became more and more obvious that the force was going over to the side of the Bolsheviks.
The summer offensive on the Southwestern Front began with artillery preparation on June 16 (29), 1917 and was initially successful. Minister of War Kerensky reported this event as follows: "Today has put an end to slanderous attacks on the organization of the Russian army, built on democratic principles." Further, the offensive continued also successfully: Galich and Kalish were taken. The government was jubilant, the Germans were alarmed, the Bolsheviks were confused, fearing a victorious offensive by the army and the strengthening of the counter-revolution in its ranks. Their central committee began to prepare the impact from the rear. At this time, a ministerial crisis arose in the Provisional Government, and four ministers of the People's Freedom Party resigned from the government. The government was confused, and the Bolsheviks decided to use this to seize power. The basis in the armed forces of the Bolsheviks was the machine-gun regiment. On July 3, a machine-gun regiment and units of two other regiments appeared on the streets with placards: "Down with the capitalist ministers!" Then they appeared at the Tauride Palace, where they remained during the night. A decisive action was being prepared to seize power. On July 4, about 5,000 sailors gathered in front of the Kshesinskaya palace, where Ulyanov and Lunacharsky greeted them as "the beauty and pride of the revolution" and agreed to go to the Tauride Palace and disperse the capitalist ministers. From the side of the sailors, a statement followed that Ulyanov himself led them there. The sailors were hastily sent to the location of the Provisional Government, and revolutionary-minded regiments joined them. Many units were on the side of the government, but only parts of the St. George's Union and the cadet were active protection of it. The Cossacks and two squadrons of the cavalry regiment were summoned. The government, in view of the impending events, fled, Kerensky fled from Petrograd, the rest were in complete oppression. The loyal units were led by General Polovtsev, the commander of the Petrograd district. The sailors surrounded the Tauride Palace and demanded the resignation of all bourgeois ministers. Minister Chernov, who came to them for negotiations, was saved from lynching by Bronstein. Polovtsev ordered a hundred Cossacks with two guns to go to the palace and open fire on the rebels. The rebellious units at the Tauride Palace, having heard the volleys of guns, fled. The detachment approached the palace, then the loyal units of other regiments approached, and the government was saved.
By this time, undeniable information was received in government circles that Ulyanov, Bronstein and Zinoviev were German agents, were in relations with the German government and received large sums of money from it. This information from the counterintelligence and the Ministry of Justice was based on indisputable data, but Ulyanov and his people were under the auspices of Kerensky and other socialist ministers. The criminals were not arrested and continued their activities. By the same time, the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief received reliable information that the work of Lenin's agitators was paid for by the German embassy in Stockholm through a certain Svenson and members of the Union for the Liberation of Ukraine. The military censorship established a continuous exchange of telegrams of a political and monetary nature between the German and Bolshevik leaders. This information was published in all newspapers and produced a sobering effect on the masses. The Bolsheviks became, in the eyes of the soldiers and the masses, German paid agents, and their authority fell sharply. On July 5, the uprising was finally suppressed. By evening, the Bolshevik leaders began to hide. Parts loyal to the government occupied the Kshesinskaya palace and searched. The Peter and Paul Fortress was freed from the Bolshevik detachment. It was necessary to arrest the leaders. A detachment of loyal troops arrived in Petersburg from the front, and Kerensky also appeared. He expressed displeasure to General Polovtsev for the suppressed rebellion and for the publication of documents against the Bolsheviks, the Minister of Justice Pereverzev was removed. But against the German agents there was indignation from the army, and the Preobrazhensky regiment arrested Kamenev. Finally, under pressure from the army, General Polovtsev was ordered to arrest 20 Bolshevik leaders. Ulyanov managed to hide in Finland, and the arrested Bronstein was soon released by Kerensky. The troops began to take away weapons from the workers and Bolshevik detachments, but Kerensky, under the pretext that all citizens had the right to bear arms, banned them. Nevertheless, many leaders were arrested and prosecuted against them, the results of which were reported on July 23 by the prosecutor of the Petrograd Chamber. This material provided ample grounds for establishing the existence of a criminal act and for establishing the circle of persons involved in its commission. This decisive measure on the part of the Prosecutor of the Chamber was paralyzed by Kerensky, General Polovtsev and the Minister of Justice were removed. Ulyanov at this time, in Kronstadt, had a meeting with German agents of the General Staff, where a plan for the Baltic fleet, army and the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks was discussed.
At the front, the successful offensive of the Southwestern Front at the beginning ended in complete disaster and the flight of units from the front. Throwing artillery, carts, supplies, carrying out robberies and murders on the way of flight and shedding to Ternopil, the army practically ceased to exist. On other fronts, units completely abandoned the offensive. Thus, hopes for at least a partial recovery of the country, on the one hand through the arrest of Ulyanov and his employees as German paid spies, and on the other through a successful offensive on the Southwestern Front, collapsed. From that moment on, the importance of Kerensky and the Commander-in-Chief, General Brusilov, fell, and the activity of the Bolsheviks freed from prisons began to rise, and Ulyanov returned to St. Petersburg. In Mogilev, at the Headquarters of the High Command, a meeting of the highest command staff was convened under the chairmanship of Minister of War Kerensky. The result of the meeting was the removal of General Brusilov and the appointment of General Kornilov in his place. There was another reason for the replacement of the Commander-in-Chief. Brusilov received an offer from Savinkov and Kerensky, from which he had no right to refuse and from which General Kornilov did not refuse. Brusilov recalled this in the following way: “I completely deliberately abandoned the idea and role of a dictator, since I thought that it was very unreasonable to build a dam during the flood of the river, for it would inevitably be carried away by the incoming revolutionary waves. Knowing the Russian people, their merits and demerits, I clearly saw that we would inevitably reach Bolshevism. I saw that no party promises the people what the Bolsheviks promise: immediate peace and immediate division of the land. It was obvious to me that the entire mass of soldiers would definitely stand for the Bolsheviks and any attempt at dictatorship would only facilitate their triumph. Kornilov's speech soon proved it."
The catastrophe of the Southwestern Front required two decisions: either the refusal to continue the war, or the adoption of decisive measures in the management of the army. General Kornilov took the path of decisive measures against anarchy in the army and, by order of the Commander-in-Chief, reinstated the death penalty and military courts in the army. But the whole question was who would pass these sentences and carry them out. In that phase of the revolution, any members of the court and executors of sentences would be immediately killed and sentences not carried out. As expected, the order remained on paper. The time of the appointment of General Kornilov to the post of Supreme Commander-in-Chief was the beginning of the aspirations on the part of the command and Kerensky to establish solid power in the person of the dictator, and General Kornilov and the Minister of War Kerensky were nominated for the post of dictator. Moreover, both he and the other were under the influence of their own environment. Kerensky was under the influence of the Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies, which quickly leaned towards Bolshevism, General Kornilov - under the influence of the overwhelming mass of the command staff and his closest associates: the inspirer of his ideas for restoring order in the army and the country Zavoiko and the military commissar at the Headquarters of the socialist-revolutionary Savinkov … The latter was a typical terrorist, without any motives for improving the life of the people, whom he deeply despised, as, incidentally, despised all his inner circle. A prominent representative of terrorism, he was guided in his actions by a sense of his complete superiority over others.
At a time when the Provisional Government received the demands and proposals of General Kornilov, it became clear that all secret information concerning the internal situation of the army was passed on to the enemy and was openly stated in the press of the Communist Party. In addition to the communists, the Minister of the Provisional Government Chernov also held the position of a paid German agent. At the same time, General Kornilov was being persecuted, and he decided to move from words to deeds. He was supported by the Union of Russian Officers, the Union of St. George Knights and the Union of Cossack Troops. According to the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief, the Germans began to prepare an offensive in the direction of Riga. Under the pretext of strengthening the defense of Petrograd, General Kornilov began the transfer of the 3rd Cossack Cavalry Corps as part of the 1st Don Cossack, Ussuriysk Cossack and Native Cavalry Divisions, the command of which was entrusted to General Krymov. On August 19, the German army went on the offensive and on the 21st occupied Riga and Ust-Dvinsk. The troops of the 12th Russian army defended themselves very unsuccessfully against the advancing 8th German army. Only the diversion of forces to the Anglo-French front forced the Germans to abandon the preparation of an offensive on Petrograd. On this, the First World War essentially turned out to be over for Russia, because it was no longer able to conduct large-scale operations, although the army still existed and was formally considered a rather strong enemy capable of providing serious resistance. Even in December 1917, the Russian front still attracted 74 German divisions, accounting for 31% of all German forces. Russia's withdrawal from the war led to the immediate transfer of part of these divisions against the allies.
In Petrograd it became known that the Bolsheviks were preparing for an armed uprising. Kerensky, on the report of the Minister of War Savinkov, agreed to declare Petrograd on martial law. On August 23, Savinkov arrived at General Kornilov's Headquarters. At this time, the cavalry corps of General Krymov was moving towards Petrograd. At a conference with the participation of General Kornilov, Savinkov and some members of the government, it was decided that if, in addition to the Bolsheviks, members of the Council also spoke, then it would be necessary to act against them. Moreover, "actions must be the most decisive and merciless." Moreover, Savinkov assured that the bill with Kornilov's demands "on measures to end the anarchy in the rear" will be passed in the near future. But this conspiracy ended with Kerensky's going over to the side of the Soviets, and with his decisive measures against General Kornilov. Kerensky sent a telegram to the Headquarters announcing: “Headquarters, to General Kornilov. I order you to immediately surrender the post to General Lukomsky, who, until the arrival of the new Supreme Commander-in-Chief, will take over the interim duties of the Commander-in-Chief. You must immediately arrive in Petrograd. " By this time, on the orders of Savinkov, reliable officers had gone to Petrograd, where, with the help of the cadets, they had to organize opposition to the Bolsheviks' actions, before the arrival of the cavalry corps. At the same time, General Kornilov made an appeal to the army and the people. In response to this, on August 28, Kerensky turned to the Bolsheviks with a request to influence the soldiers and stand up for the revolution. A notification was sent to all the railway stations to detain the echelons of the cavalry corps moving to Petrograd and send them to the places of their former stops. Trains with echelons began to go in different directions. General Krymov decided to unload the trains and march in order to Petrograd. On August 30, Colonel of the General Staff, Samarin, came to Krymov from Kerensky and conveyed to Krymov that Kerensky, in the name of saving Russia, asked him to come to Petrograd, guaranteeing his safety with his word of honor. General Krymov obeyed and drove off. Arriving on August 31 in Petrograd, General Krymov appeared to Kerensky. A stormy explanation took place. Towards the end of Krymov's explanation with Kerensky, the naval prosecutor entered and suggested that Krymov come two hours later to the Main Military-Judicial Directorate for interrogation. From the Winter Palace Krymov went to his friend, who occupied an apartment in the house where the office of the Minister of War Savinkov was located, and there he shot himself. According to other sources, General Krymov was actually killed. The commanders of all fronts, except for the South-West, which was commanded by General Denikin, evaded open support of General Kornilov. After Kerensky's announcement of General Kornilov's betrayal, revolutionary tribunals were arbitrarily formed in all parts of the front, in which the Bolsheviks played a decisive role. General Kornilov, his chief of staff Lukomsky and other officers were arrested at Headquarters and sent to the Bykhov prison. On the Southwestern Front, committees met under the chairmanship of the commissar of the Jordanian Front, who assumed military power. On August 29, by order of the Iordansky, Generals Denikin, Markov and other members of the headquarters were arrested. Then, in cars, accompanied by armored cars, they were all sent to the guardhouse, after which they were sent to the Berdichev prison. At the same time, in Petrograd, Trotsky and all those who arrived with Ulyanov, accused of spying for Germany and imprisoned after the first attempt at a Bolshevik uprising, were released from prisons.
Only from the Don chieftain of the Cossack troops, Kaledin, the Provisional Government received a telegram about his annexation to Kornilov. If the government did not come to an agreement with Kornilov, Kaledin threatened to cut off Moscow's communication with the South. The next day, Kerensky sent everyone a telegram declaring General Kaledin a traitor, dismissed him from the post of chieftain and summoned him to Headquarters in Mogilev to testify to the commission of inquiry that was investigating the Kornilov case. On September 5, the Army Circle was convened on the Don, and on the expressed desire of General Kaledin to go to Mogilev to testify to the commission of inquiry, the Circle did not agree and sent an answer to Kerensky that in relation to the ataman General Kaledin the decision of the Circle was guided by the old Cossack law - “from Don no issue.
The Provisional Government, which had turned into the Council of the Republic, no longer had any means to maintain order in the country. Hunger and anarchy set in everywhere. Robberies and robberies took place on the railways and waterways. There remained hope for the Cossack units, but they were scattered between parts of a vast front and among the decaying army masses, served as hotbeds of some order, holding on to the revolutionary movements of complete neutrality. There were three Cossack regiments in Petrograd, but with the impending threat of the seizure of power by the Bolsheviks, they saw no need to defend the unpopular, anti-popular government.
In the region of Gatchina, part of the regiments of the 3rd Cossack corps were concentrated, even during the life of Krymov, other regiments were scattered over vast spaces and in different directions. At General Dukhonin's Headquarters and the Bykhov prison, the only hope remained for the Cossack units. The Council of Cossack Troops supported this hope, and a grouping of Cossack units was created around Bykhov under the pretext of guarding railroad junctions in case of a front collapse and in order to direct the flows of those fleeing from the front towards the south. There was intense correspondence between General Kornilov and Ataman Kaledin. Having achieved the elimination of the "Kornilovism" and disintegrating the Russian army, the Bolsheviks found wide support in the regimental committees of the Petrograd garrison and the ship commands of the Baltic Fleet. They secretly, but very actively, began to prepare for the elimination of the dual power, i.e. to the overthrow of the Provisional Government. On the eve of the uprising, the Bolsheviks were supported by 20,000 soldiers, several tens of thousands of armed Red Guards and up to 80,000 sailors from Tsentrobalt. The uprising was headed by the Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee. On the night of October 25, the Bolsheviks occupied all government offices, except for the Winter Palace, where the Council of the Republic was located. By morning, insurgent soldiers, sailors and Red Guards were in command of Petrograd, who continued to occupy key facilities. At 7 o'clock in the evening, dismounted units of the Cossacks, who were in the Winter Palace, entered into negotiations with the Bolsheviks and, having received the consent of a free exit with weapons, left the palace and went to the barracks. The Cossack units did not want to defend the hateful government of the capitalist ministers and shed blood for it. Leaving the Winter Palace, they carried away the women's death battalion and the cadets of the Northern Front ensign school. Armed Bolsheviks broke into the palace and handed an ultimatum to surrender to the Council of the Republic. Thus, due to the created anarchy, due to the inaction of the Provisional Government, or, rather, with the assistance of the Provisional Government, and with it the liberal public, power in the country passed to the Bolshevik Party, headed by a group of people who, apart from pseudonyms, had no personal biography. … If during the February Revolution in Petrograd more than 1,300 people were killed and wounded, then in October, out of many thousands of participants in the uprising, 6 were killed and about 50 were injured. But a bloodless and quiet coup in the very near future turned into a bloody feud, a civil war. All democratic and monarchist Russia rebelled against the extremist, anti-democratic actions of the Bolsheviks.
Kerensky fled from Petrograd to the active army, trying to call soldiers and Cossacks to fight the Bolshevik coup, but he had no authority. Only the 3rd Cavalry Cossack Corps, which at that moment was commanded by the Cossack General P. N. Krasnov. As the corps moved towards the capital, its ranks melted, and in the vicinity of Petrograd Krasnov had only 10 understaffed hundreds of Don and Ussuri divisions. The Council of People's Commissars sent more than 10 thousand sailors and Red Guards against the Cossacks. Despite such a balance of forces, the Cossacks went on the offensive. The Red Guards fled, but the sailors withstood the blow, and then, with powerful artillery support, went on the offensive. The Cossacks retreated to Gatchina, where they were surrounded. After several days of negotiations, P. N. Krasnov, with the remains of the corps, was released and sent to his native land. There were no other clashes between the new government and opponents. But a difficult and dangerous situation for Soviet power began to develop in the Cossack regions. On the Don, the Cossacks, led by the ataman Kaledin, did not recognize the Council of People's Commissars, and in the Southern Urals, the ataman Dutov raised an uprising the very next day. But at first in the Cossack regions, the protest was sluggish, mainly of the apical, ataman character. In general, the Cossacks, like other estates, received certain benefits from the February Revolution. The military chieftains began to be elected from the Cossack estate, the Cossack self-government expanded, and the military, district and village councils, formed by the elected Cossack Circles of the corresponding level, began to operate everywhere. Nonresident and Cossack women who have reached the age of 21 received the right to vote. And at first the Cossacks, with the exception of some of the most far-sighted chieftains and officers, did not see anything dangerous in the new government and adhered to a policy of neutrality.
The political victory of the Bolsheviks in October 1917 hastened Russia's political withdrawal from the war. They quickly began to establish control over the army, or rather over the multimillion-dollar mass of people who yearned for peace and return home. The new Supreme Commander-in-Chief Ensign N. V. Krylenko on November 13 (26) sent parliamentarians to the Germans with a proposal to start separate negotiations on an armistice, and on December 2 (15), an armistice agreement between Soviet Russia and the Quadruple Alliance was concluded. In December 1917, Cossack units still remained at the fronts. On the Northern Front - 13 regiments, 2 batteries, 10 hundred, on the West - 1 regiment, 4 batteries and 4 hundreds, on the South-West - 13 regiments, 2 batteries and 10 hundred, on the Romanian - 11 regiments, 2 batteries and 15 separate and special hundreds. In total, there were 72 thousand Cossacks on the Austro-German front at the end of 1917. And even in February 1918, 2 Don regiments (46 and 51), 2 batteries and 9 hundred were still serving on the Southwestern Front. After the conclusion of an armistice, Cossack regiments from all over the vast front moved in echelons to their homes. Quiet Don and other Cossack rivers were waiting for their sons.
Fig. 3 Return of the Cossack home
During the October coup, General Kornilov escaped from the Bykhov prison, and, accompanied by the Tekinsky cavalry regiment, went to the Don region. All other prisoners with false identities moved in different ways and after long and hard wanderings began to arrive in Novocherkassk. General Alekseev was the first to arrive in Novocherkassk on November 2 and began to form armed detachments. On November 22, General Denikin arrived, and on December 8, General Kornilov, where his family and associates were waiting for him. A movement of resistance to Soviet power began. But that's a completely different story.
