100 years ago, in January 1919, the Soviet-Polish war of 1919-1921 began. Poland, which gained independence during the collapse of the Russian Empire, laid claim to Western Russian lands - White Russia and Little Russia, Lithuania. The Polish elite planned to restore the Rzeczpospolita within the borders of 1772, to create Greater Poland "from sea to sea." The Poles rejected Moscow's peace proposals and launched an offensive to the east.
Background
During the collapse of the Rurik empire (the Old Russian state), the Western Russian lands fell under the rule of Lithuania and Poland. In the 16th century, Lithuania and Poland entered into a union, the Rzeczpospolita was formed. The huge Slavic empire claimed dominance in Eastern Europe. Its demographic and economic potential was much more powerful than that of the Moscow state. Poland could become the center of unification of most of the Russian lands. However, the Polish elite was unable to do this. The Polish elite could not unite the Poles and the Russians into one development project. Although during this period the Polish-Polish and the Russians were practically still part of the same super-ethnos. Indeed, literally under the first princes of Rurikovich, the western glades (Poles) and Rus-Russians had a single spiritual and material culture, one language and faith.
But the Polish elite became part of the Western development project, the Western matrix. That is, a project to create a global slave-owning civilization. Then the center of management of this project was Catholic Rome. For more than a millennium, right up to the present day, Poland has become an instrument for the war with Russia (Russian civilization and Russian superethnos). The masters of the West over and over again threw the brothers of the Slavs-Poles to Russia-Russia. During the Rus' crisis, the Commonwealth occupied vast territories, including Kiev, Minsk and Smolensk. The Poles laid claim to Pskov and Novgorod, and broke their spears against the walls of Moscow.
However, the Polish elite, submitting to the Western project (through Catholicism), failed and did not want to create a common state for Poles and Russians. In Poland itself, most of the population (peasants) were slaves for the gentry. Working cattle (cattle) for the "chosen" -pans, gentlemen-gentry. Relations were built according to the same scheme in the Western Russian lands. The Russian princely-boyar elite was polished, catholicized. And the Russian masses were turned into slaves, who were oppressed not only socially and economically, but also on national and religious grounds. At the same time, the Polish gentlemen were mired in luxury, feasts and debauchery. The quality of management has plummeted.
It is not surprising that the loose East European empire did not exist for a long time (in historical terms). It was crippled by the uprisings of the Russian population, endless wars with neighbors and civil conflicts, when the pans created confederation-alliances and waged wars among themselves for their candidate for the royal throne and for other reasons. As the Russian kingdom was restored, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which had no internal unity, began to suffer one defeat after another. During the national liberation war of Bohdan Khmelnytsky in the middle of the 17th century. The Russian kingdom was reunited with part of the lands of Western Russia (Left-Bank Ukraine, Zaporozhye army). In 1772-1795. During the three partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Poland's hard internal crisis with the participation of external players), the Polish statehood was destroyed, and the Western Russian lands - Belaya Rus and Little Rus-Russia (without Galician Rus) - returned to Russia. The ethnic Polish lands were divided between Prussia and Austria.
In 1807, after the defeat of Prussia, Napoleon transferred the Bialystok district to Russia. And on the territory of the Polish possessions of Prussia, the Duchy of Warsaw was formed. After the defeat of Napoleon's empire, the Duchy of Warsaw was divided between Prussia, Austria and Russia. Emperor Alexander I granted autonomy to the Poles - the Kingdom of Poland was created. Due to the growth of Polish nationalism and the uprisings of 1830-1831 and 1863-1864. Polish autonomy was cut. In 1867, its status was downgraded, and it received the name of the Privislensky Territory: Warsaw, Kalish, Petrokovsk, Kalets, Radomsk, Suwalk, Lomzhinsk, Lublin and Sedlets (since 1912 - Kholmsk) provinces.
Restoration of the Polish state
With the outbreak of the First World War, the Russian Tsar Nicholas II promised, after the victory, to unite the Polish lands as part of Russia with the Polish regions, which were part of Austria-Hungary and Germany. The restored Polish state was to exist in union with Russia. Polish nationalists at this time split into two parties: the first believed that Poland would be restored with the help of Russia and at the expense of Germany and Austria-Hungary; the second - considered the main enemy of the Russians and the path to independence of Poland lies through the defeat of the Russian Empire, she actively cooperated with the Germans and Austrians. Jozef Pilsudski, one of the leaders of the Polish Socialist Party, began to create Polish legions as part of the Austro-Hungarian army.
In 1915, Austro-German troops occupied the territory of the Kingdom of Poland. In 1916, the German authorities proclaimed the creation of the puppet Kingdom of Poland. Berlin tried to involve the Poles in the fight against Russia and most effectively use the resources of Poland in its own interests. In reality, Poland was not going to be restored as an independent state, but to Germanize and make a province of the Second Reich. After the February Revolution of 1917, the Provisional Government of Russia announced that it would contribute to the restoration of the Polish state on all lands inhabited by the majority of Poles, subject to the conclusion of a military alliance with Russia. The formation of the 1st Polish corps under the command of I. Dovbor-Musnitsky began. After the October Revolution, the Soviet government, by decree of December 10, 1917, recognized the independence of Poland.
In January 1918, the Polish corps of Dovbor-Musnitsky revolted. Red troops under the command of Vatsetis defeated the Poles, they retreated. However, then, with the support of the Germans and Belarusian nationalists, they launched a counteroffensive and occupied Minsk in February. The Polish corps became part of the German occupation forces in Belarus (then it was disbanded). After Germany's surrender in November 1918, the Kingdom's Regency Council appointed Piłsudski (he was then the most popular Polish politician) as interim head of state. The Polish Republic (Second Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) was created.
The new Polish leadership, headed by Pilsudski, set the task of restoring the Rzeczpospolita within the borders of 1772, with the establishment of control over the Western Russian lands (White and Small Russia) and the Baltic states. Warsaw planned to create a powerful state from the Baltic to the Black Sea, to dominate Eastern Europe - from Finland to the Caucasus. They hoped to turn Russia, cut off from the Baltic and Black Seas, from the lands and resources of the south and southwest, into a second-rate power. A war with Soviet Russia in such conditions was inevitable. It is worth noting that at the same time the Poles claimed part of the lands of Czechoslovakia and Germany.
"How the landlord's idea will end." Soviet poster
The beginning of the confrontation
Under the terms of the Brest-Litovsk Peace, Soviet Russia refused to benefit from the Central Powers from the Baltic States, parts of Belarus and Ukraine. West Russian lands were occupied by the Austro-German army. Moscow was unable to continue the war with Germany, but the concession was a temporary measure. The Soviet government did not abandon Belarus and Ukraine. In addition, within the framework of the concept of world revolution, Lenin considered it necessary to make Warsaw Soviet in order to destroy the Versailles system and unite with Germany. Soviet Russia and the victory of the Socialist Revolution in Germany created the basis for the victory of the world revolution.
In November 1918, after the surrender of Germany, the Soviet government issued an order to move the Red Army (7th and Western armies - a total of about 16 thousand bayonets and sabers) to the western lands of Russia behind the retreating German troops in order to establish Soviet power. At the same time, the offensive of the Soviet troops was complicated by the actions of the Germans: the destruction of communications, a delay in evacuation; assistance to whites, local nationalists and Poles in the formation of their own units, their armament and equipment; the delay of the German garrisons in Western Belarus and the Baltic states.
On December 10, 1918, the Red Army occupied Minsk. The Polish government of Pilsudski gave the order to occupy Vilna. On January 1, 1919, the Poles captured Vilna. In December 1918 - January 1919, the Reds occupied most of the territories of Lithuania. On January 5, Soviet troops drove the Poles out of Vilna.
New Soviet republics are being formed. On December 16, 1918, the Lithuanian Soviet Republic was formed. On December 30 - 31, 1918, the Belarusian Provisional Revolutionary Workers 'and Peasants' Government was created in Smolensk. On January 1, 1919, the Provisional Revolutionary Government published a manifesto that proclaimed the formation of the Soviet Socialist Republic of Belarus (SSRB). On January 31, 1919, the SSRB seceded from the RSFSR and was renamed the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic, whose independence was officially recognized by the government of Soviet Russia. On February 27, the merger of the Lithuanian and Belarusian republics took place, the Lithuanian-Belarusian SSR (Litbel) was created with the capital in Vilna. Litbel invited Warsaw to enter into negotiations and settle the issue of a common border. Pilsudski ignored this proposal.
Poland could not immediately go over to a decisive offensive, since the Germans had not yet completed the evacuation, and part of the Polish forces were diverted to the western border (border conflicts with Czechoslovakia and Germany). Only after the intervention of the Entente in February, which transferred Poland into its sphere of influence (as a thousand-year anti-Russian weapon), did German troops let the Poles go to the east. As a result, in February 1919, Polish troops occupied Kovel, Brest-Litovsk, Kobri, and in Little Russia - Kholmshchina, Vldamir-Volynsky. 9 - 14 February 1919, the Germans let the Poles into the line of the river. Neman - r. Zelvyanka - r. Ruzhanka - Pruzhany - Kobrin. Soon, units of the Western Front of the Red Army approached the same place. Thus, the Polish-Soviet front was formed on the territory of Lithuania and White Russia.
At the same time, a confrontation began in the southern strategic direction (Polish-Ukrainian War of 1918-1919). First, Polish and Ukrainian nationalists clashed there in Galicia, in the battle for Lvov. The Galician Army of the West Ukrainian Republic (ZUNR), which was then supported by the Kiev Directory, lost this war. This led to the occupation of Galicia by the Poles. In addition, during the war, Bukovina was captured by the Romanians, and Transcarpathia by the Czechs. In the spring of 1919, the Soviet Ukrainian Front entered into contact with the Polish army in the southern direction, which by that time had restored Soviet power in Little Russia.
Having regrouped its forces, at the end of February 1919, the Polish army crossed the Niemen and went on the offensive. Soviet troops in the western direction numbered 45 thousand people, but by this time the most combat-ready units were sent to other directions. And the situation on the Eastern (offensive by Kolchak's army), Southern and Ukrainian fronts (Denikin's offensive, uprising) did not allow further strengthening of the Western Front. In March 1919, Polish troops captured Slonim, Pinsk, in April - Lida, Novogrudok, Baranovichi, Vilno and Grodno. In May - July 1919, the Polish forces were significantly reinforced by the 70,000-strong army of Józef Haller, which the Entente had previously formed in France for the war with Germany. In July, the Poles captured Molodechno, Slutsk, in August - Minsk and Bobruisk. In the fall, the troops of the Red Army counterattacked, but unsuccessfully. After that there was a pause at the front.
This was largely due to the offensive of Denikin's army and the position of the Entente powers (the Declaration on Poland's eastern border limited the appetites of the Poles). The Polish government was concerned about the successes of Denikin's army in southern Russia. The white government recognized the independence of Poland, but opposed the claims of the Poles to the Russian lands. Therefore, the Poles decided to take a break. Pilsudski underestimated the Red Army, did not want Denikin's victory and expected that the Russians would bleed each other, which would make it possible to implement plans to create a "Greater Poland". He expected that the Reds would defeat Denikin's people, and then it would be possible to defeat the Red Army and dictate a peace beneficial to Poland. In addition, Pilsudski dealt with internal issues, fought the opposition. In the west, the Poles fought against the Germans, in Galicia against Ukrainian nationalists. In August 1919, miners revolted in Silesia. The Polish army crushed the uprising, but the tension remained. Therefore, Pilsudski decided to suspend the movement to the east, to wait for a more favorable situation.
Jozef Pilsudski in Minsk. 1919 year
